At the time of writing this post, the below rule is set for running this category:
"Rules:
- Default settings (2 rounds, 99 sec, 4 stars)
- The timer starts when the character is selected and stops when the final blow is delivered to Bison or akuma
- Continues are permitted."
This needs to be reviewed and changed, as there any many issues that will make it near impossible to submit a fair run.
Super Turbo is also a very difficult category to get right because there are drastically different speed differences between every port. In addition to this, a certain US ROM version has the AI bug where it remains at the highest difficulty regardless of the game setting. The Japanese ROM fixes the AI difficulty issue, but this is not available on the original 30th Anniversary Collection release, nor whether it can be confirmed whether it was fixed in a patch due to Digital Eclipse not documenting their patch notes. The 30th Anniversary International Version (released in Japan), has access to both US and JP ROM versions.
To add further complications, the Japanese version have a faster post-match transition as you cannot speed up the win dialog as it being printed on the screen. The dialog characters are displayed at a set speed which cannot be skipped until it is complete (indicated by being able to speed up the scrolling purple background by holding any attack button which speeds up the transition). Because the japanese version has fewer characters to output, the speed advantage is huge. Easy examples to spot are Fei Long and T.Hawk as they have long post-match win quotes.
The US and JP version also has a confusing turbo setting. The US version has Turbo settings 0-3, and the Japanese version has 1-4. This does not imply that the Japanese version has a faster maximum turbo setting, but it is just branded differently (i.e. US Turbo 0 = JP Turbo 1, US Turbo 3 = JP Turbo 4 etc.)
Also, due to the unstable speed nature of Super Turbo on original CPS2, it effectively means that every port runs at a different speed (emulators, OS platform and console ports).
The 30th Anniversary collection needs it's own category as it has already been proven run faster than CPS2 hardware, it must be made clear that people with the International version (JP release) must run on the US ROM to ensure no post-match transition advantage.
The Turbo setting needs clarification, whether the runner has a free choice, and if not, to state the correct number (US Turbo reference).
Also due to the AI glitch and the uncertainty whether Digital Eclipse addressed the AI glitch in the original 30th Anniversary Collection, it may be worth ditching the difficulty sub category altogether and require all runners to play at the hardest difficulty.
Thank you for this information. I will do my best to take these items into consideration when revamping the board and the rules.
Okay, I just finished completing a basic makeover of the Super Turbo board, and it already looks MUCH better. I'm looking for feedback from you all regarding what categories should be included, taking into consideration everything Rakurai posted above.
For the Arcade category, it looks like everyone exclusively runs the JPN version, which is good because apparently that is the correct, fixed version. Should we agree to only accept JPN version runs for Arcade? Should we accept both Normal and Hardest difficulties? These are the kind of questions I'd like to address.
For the 30th Anniversary collection, I'm very much inclined to agree with Rakurai that we should only accept hardest runs due to the reasons he stated. Thoughts?
I look forward to your feedback.
While it's true there are speed differences to every port, I believe separating by platform is the simplest and most efficient solution to that which would contain any discrepancies from port to port within the selected platform without causing problems.
[big]30th AC difficulty...[/big] I'm in full agreement of keeping 30th AC as Hardest difficulty only. There are ways we could go about allowing other difficulties but the only way to do so would be some sort of rule to show the most up to date version release on the XBox/PS4 screen before entering the game but that would invalidate current runs since they don't do that and even then we aren’t still 100% sure it's actually fixed in the game's release itself. I don't know if this flaw in difficulty representation exists with other SF2 iterations or just Turbo but that could be a concern for those other boards too if so.
[big]INT and JP iterations...[/big] I think that whatever ruling is decided upon for it should be specifically in regards to the 30th AC as the only reason it causes a disturbance in the leaderboards is because of the scarcity of purchase which other platforms do not suffer from as they can easily pick and choose the ROM version they would like to run on via emulation – since only the JP disc for 30th AC has the choice of which ROM option to play on, I suggest banning JP version on 30th AC submissions only.
[big]Rule Settings for Turbo Speed[/big] I've managed to arrange different jump tests – all using a MiSTeR FPGA which is our most accurate representation of real hardware - into the compilation video below of different Turbo speeds to help us come to a decision on which we believe to be an agreeable standard. I've also included footage of Hyper Fighting as well to show as a reference which seems to fall between the “Normal” and “Fast” examples. Finally, I've omitted the “Slow” speed comparison in my test as it's not necessary to consider for a decision on the rules to be made.
JP 1 / US 0 / 30th AC 1 Slow = A slowed down version from ROM default, not worth banning since going too slow isn't a problem, only if it's too fast.
JP 2 / US 1 / 30th AC 2 Normal = The default listing in the Service Menu from ROM boot.
JP 3 / US 2 / 30th AC 3 Fast - The established standard in the pro tournament scene and the most comparable example to Hyper Fighting.
JP 4 / US 3 / 30th AC 4 Extra Fast - A special unnaturally fast mode that is both beyond tournament standard and not accessible with Free Select.
When playing on real arcade hardware, Free Select allows the first three options to be selected whereas “Extra Fast” has to be manually selected in the service menu only and as such should be considered unnatural in my opinion. Taking this all into account, It is my belief that anything selectable via Free Select should be allowed in standard rules whereas “Extra Fast” specifically deserves it's own category in the same way you provided for SF2HF on SNES.
All that seems reasonable enough to me. I will work on implementing these changes in a way that is clear and concise throughout the week in addition to giving the other 4 boards their complete makeovers. Anyone else have any input? Now's the time to let me know!
The rules are still misleading and not specific enough. For the sake of alleviating confusion, the US version is "SSF2T" and the JP version is "SSF2X".
Game Rules:
- State that the final boss can either be M.Bison/Dictator or Akuma/Gouki
- There are no game settings that allow you to change the rounds or timer speeds, remove these. "Stars" are not a term used here, and you should specify the difficulty by number (8 being the hardest setting). This also applies to the Arcade category.
30th Anniversary Collection official releases:
There needs to be distinction between the 2 official releases of 30th Anniversary Collection, both which can be used in that category. The only difference is that the "30th Anniversary Collection International" released in Japan, contains both SSF2X and SSF2T roms, with SSF2X being the default selection. You can select SSF2T by changing the language settings. The original 30th Anniversary Collection only has SSF2T.
The official Nintendo Switch version from what I understand has access to both SSF2T and SSF2X regardless of the region the game was purchased in.
Category Implementation:
The extra speed was added in the same way like Street Fighter II Turbo, which sits alongside the character records. This is just replicating the poor implementation again which was previously complained about (without the community's consent). The character records should be moved to the IL category.
Arcade Runs ROM version / Emulator choice:
The arcade category for the hardest difficulty, for the sake of consistency should be set on 1 ROM version only, as nobody can prove consistently prove whether the JP or US versions both have the same AI algorithms (even though SSF2X fixed it) whether they have the same difficulty progression.
There are significant pros and cons in both versions.
- The post-match unskippable printed quote, where the SSF2X version has less characters to print allowing for a faster transition between fights. In SSF2T this is noticable with Fei Long or T.Hawk who have long win quotes. It's also apparent that if you play Akuma/Gouki in SSF2T, he has no post-match win quote compared to SSF2X, allowing him to transition to the next fight much quicker.
- There is an unskippable cutscene of about 5 seconds if Akuma/Gouki is the final boss in SSF2X. This does not appear in SSF2T.
By allowing either SSF2T or SSF2X in the hardest difficulty, it runs the risk of people accidentally submitting an SSF2T run in the normal difficulty category. In this case, keep the Arcade emulator runs to using the SSF2X 940223 on both difficulties to avoid runs getting rejected. This game is brutally hard to speedrun, and it will only annoy people to find their run being rejected because the ROM version was not made clear.
Due to the unstable nature of CPS2 hardware effectively running this game in an overclocked state (by design), almost every emulator will run it at different speeds. There needs to be an agreement which emulators can and cannot be used. FBNeo which is packaged with Fightcade has been recognized to run Capcom games slightly faster on the non SF2 leaderboards, and therefore is not allowed. The WolfMAME emulator seems to be the accepted choice, although I'm not sure which version particular is used as I don't normally do this category.
Revamping and clarifying the rules is on my list of things to do. I will take this information into consideration as I do so.
Changes implemented. For more information, refer to the final report in the "Concerns" thread in Hyper Fighting.
I read over your final post but some parts of it have left me a bit confused? I can't post there since the thread is locked now so I'll do it here.
No one was trying to suggest we should have even more categories, we were actually asking the reverse for simplicity sake - that's essentially what a merging of the individual character categories on the mainboards would provide. With a seperate IL board in place everyone would still be able to submit for character-WRs no problem.
Looks like there was just a simple misunderstanding. We'll get it sorted.
It has been sorted. After incorporating that massive laundry list of changes to the SF2 boards (referenced at the end of the long Hyper Fighting thread) and evaluating the requests voiced there and the requests for additional categories made years ago, I've decided that the current board layout we now have strikes a good balance regarding clarity and comprehensiveness. I realize you may not be getting literally everything you want necessarily, but sometimes finding a good compromise is one of those tough decisions I have to make as mod.
