Speed equivalences

Tonight, Umbrellastyle and I tried to put to rest something that has been bothering us for a long time. We attempt to answer the following questions

1) What is the difference between Free Select and Arcade fixed speed?

2) What is the difference between USA and Japanese arcade boards of super turbo?

3) What speed on CCC2 corresponds to the arcade versions of Super Turbo, both American and Japanese?

In order to answer these questions, we needed some equipment. We have
* A PS2 with CCC2. The monitor used was NOT HD, to avoid any HD lag
* A japanese arcade board of Super Turbo, on an actual arcade machine (not super gun)
* A usa arcade board of Super Turbo, on an actual arcade machine (not super gun)

We decided on the following methodology. Using a stopwatch, we would time the round timer three times. During our testing, we found that the speed of the stage affects the speed of the timer, so we timed the most common stages (Ken, Guile, and Fei Long).

Now before I get to the data and our conclusions, let me explain the various settings on the various machines.

The US Arcade version of super turbo has five settings for game speed. They are:
Turbo 0, Turbo 1, Turbo 2, Turbo 3, and Free Select.

The Japan Arcade version of super turbo has also five settings for game s peed. They are:
Turbo 1, Turbo 2, Turbo 3, Turbo 4, and Free Select.

Finally, CCC2 also has five settings. They are:
0, 1, 2, 3, and Free Select

Now part of the confusion here is that when it comes to the turbo settings, the american numbers start at 0, while the Japanese numbers start at 1. However, the Free Select options are 1, 2, and 3, regardless of game. Because this confusion, I am going to use the following terminology for the remainder of this document:

USA FACTORY SLOW
USA FACTORY NORMAL
USA FACTORY FAST
USA FACTORY FASTEST
USA FREE SELECT 1
USA FREE SELECT 2
USA FREE SELECT 3

JPN FACTORY SLOW
JPN FACTORY NORMAL
JPN FACTORY FAST
JPN FACTORY FASTEST
JPN FREE SELECT 1
JPN FREE SELECT 2
JPN FREE SELECT 3

CCC2 FACTORY SLOW
CCC2 FACTORY NORMAL
CCC2 FACTORY FAST
CCC2 FACTORY FASTEST
CCC2 FREE SELECT 1
CCC2 FREE SELECT 2
CCC2 FREE SELECT 3


With me so far? :)

Now, the assumption that everyone has been making so far is that CCC2 is perfect emulation of the USA arcade. A fairly reasonable assumption. But I haven't found any actual data backing this assumption up. Part of our goal was to determine whether or not it was true, and to settle the question once and for all!

On fei long's stage, we got the following data (each of these numbers is the average of three runs)


USA FACTORY FAST: 52.09
USA FACTORY FASTEST: 50.45
USA FREE SELECT 2: 51.91
USA FREE SELECT 3: 50.76


JPN FACTORY FAST: 51.7
JPN FACTORY FASTEST: 50.59333333
JPN FREE SELECT 2: 53.98
JPN FREE SELECT 3: 51.74


CCC2FREE SELECT 1: 52.77
CCC2FREE SELECT 2: 56.47666667
CCC2FREE SELECT 3: 49.62

A couple of strange things jump out here. Let's go over them one at a time

CCC2 FREE SELECT 3 IS WAY TOO FAST
First of all let's take a look at the CCC2 Free select speed 3. It clocks in at 49.62 seconds, where USA free select 3 clocks in over a second slower, at 50.76.
Now some of you may be asking "so what? It's only a second?". Fair enough. But note that the difference between USA Free Select 2 and Free Select 3 is a second. So CCC2 Free select 3 is faster than ANY arcade machine. It's faster than ANY speed the Japanese arcade or USA arcade machines can even produce! If anything, it would be equivalent to "free select 4" if such a thing was possible!

CCC2 SPEEDS ARE VERY INCONSISTENT
The other wierd thing we noticed was that on Fei long's stage of CCC2, Free select 2 is actually SLOWER than Free select 1! This sounds unbelievable, but here's the results of three separate runs:

Fei Long's stage:

CCC2FREE SELECT 3: 49.73, 49.63, 49.5

CCC2FREE SELECT 2: 56.47, 56.54, 56.42 <- SLOWER THAN FREE SELECT 1!! WTF??

CCC2FREE SELECT 1: 52.67, 52.79, 52.85

Okay, so maybe Fei Long's state is wierd. Let's take a look at Ken's stage.

Ken's stage:

CCC2FREE SELECT 3: 50.04, 50.12, 49.93

CCC2FREE SELECT 2: 49.91,49.85,49.94 <-- FASTER THAN FREE SELECT 3!!

CCC2FREE SELECT 1: 53.51, 53.48, 53.26

So CCC2 Free Select is just messed up. Sometimes Free Select 2 is FASTER than Free Select 3, sometimes SLOWER than Free Select 1! We did not see this behavior on either of the arcade versions.

USA FREE SELECT SPEEDS EQUIVALENT TO FACTORY SPEEDS
USA Free Select options are almost identical to the Factory set options. The equivalences are:
USA FACTORY FASTEST = USA FREE SELECT 3
USA FACTORY FAST = USA FREE SELECT 2

JPN FREE SELECT SPEEDS NOT THE SAME AS FACTORY SPEEDS
JPN Free select options are almost identical to the Factory set options, BUT ONE SPEED OFF. The equivalences are:
JPN FACTORY FASTEST -- NO EQUIVALENT IN JPN FREE SELECT!!
JPN FACTORY FAST = JPN FREE SELECT 3
JPN FACTORY NORMAL = JPN FREE SELECT 2


JPN FREE SELECT SPEEDS NOT THE SAME AS USA FREE SELECT SPEEDS
USA FREE SELECT 3 = USA FACTORY FASTEST = JPN FACTORY FASTEST -- NO EQUIVALENT IN JPN FREE SELECT
USA FREE SELECT 2 = USA FACTORY FAST = JPN FACTORY FAST = JPN FREE SELECT 3
USA FREE SELECT 1 = USA FACTORY NORMAL = JPN FACTORY NORMAL = JPN FREE SELECT 2
USA FACTORY SLOW = JPN FACTORY SLOW = JPN FREE SELECT 1

I hope this clarifies much long standing confusion. Now what conclusions can we draw?

First of all, CCC2 is really not a very good version. Unfortunately, it's too late to change the logistics, so we should make do with what we have. Free select 3 is DEFINITELY too fast. It's wrong enough that there's a significant difference. So what speed should we use?

Well, aside from the craziness regarding Fei and Ken's stages, it turns out that CCC2 Free select 2 is equivalent to USA FREE SELECT 3, and CCC2 Free Select 1 is equivalent to USA FREE SELECT 2.

Our final, and most important conclusions are:
IF YOU WANT USA TOURNAMENT STANDARD, YOU SHOULD BE USING CCC2 FREE SELECT 2

IF YOU WANT JAPANESE TOURNAMENT STANDARD, YOU SHOULD BE USING CCC2 FREE SELECT 1

IN NO CASE SHOULD YOU BE USING CCC2 FREE SELECT 3!!

If you are interested in viewing our data, you can see it here.