Well I just finished with 2 hours of playing!  It works great with my Happ 3" Trackball.  I never played 2k4 on the PC, but I can say that this one is great with a dedicated cabinet.  I only needed my mouse, and mouse buttons to play.  You need the ALT key to open the menu in game play, but you should have it as button 2 on your cab anyway.  You will need a keyboard to type your name in when creating your profile, but that is about it.  Great game, and great addition to my cab!