The Legend of Dreamcast Trigger Lag

[undamned]

So, where did this notion of official DC controllers having trigger lag come from? I remember reading somewhere, when this topic came up, that stuff like Zangief's Lariat wasn't reliable because of this? Out of curiosity/disbelief I soldered X, Y, and the Right Trigger hall effect sensor pin indicated on the SlagCoin guide together and Zangief's Lariat (MvsC2) worked 100% of the time.

Unless there is gross lag (which I am unable to detect, just playing a game) the only real way to prove lag would be for someone to write a homebrew program for the DC that would sample the button inputs and display response time differences between button presses in milliseconds. With all punch buttons tied together as I described above, said program could tell us how much extra time it takes for the system to register analog trigger activation over a digital button press. It can be assumed that the controller's ADC is going to take a bit more time to process the analog sample, but my wager is that it's a delay far too small for a human to detect.
-ud

[Sandlegs]

i think it is just that the activation of the triggers happens further down in the press. leading to the assumption of lag.

[antron]

i think it is just that the activation of the triggers happens further down in the press. leading to the assumption of lag.

but he is talking about soldering a digital arcade pushbutton to its sensor

and here is where this may have started:
http://forums.shoryuken.com/showthread.php?t=126088

[undamned]

and here is where this may have started:
http://forums.shoryuken.com/showthread.php?t=126088

Thankyou! At least now I have a specific game to try out which has said supposed lag. $5 says my hacked pad still works fine for Zangief's lariat with the buttons soldered together. I'm thinking the reason it's flaky on CvsS2 is the programmers of MvsC2 gave a larger window of time for all 3 punches to be pressed than the programmers for CvsS2. I'm not denying the possibility of lag, just saying it's the game program that determines how tight input sequences need to be for specific moves.
-ud

[Ed Oscuro]

Unless there is gross lag (which I am unable to detect, just playing a game) the only real way to prove lag would be for someone to write a homebrew program for the DC that would sample the button inputs and display response time differences between button presses in milliseconds.

What would this actually achieve? The "lag" is probably the extra travel for pushing an analog stick in a full circle (with the added complication over a digital stick of needing to pass a certain dead zone in a game like this) compared to squicking your thumb across a d-pad. "Mechanical" lag was mentioned in some thread here a while ago (in a discussion about LCD lag measurement methods IIRC).

The people on Shoryuken are pushing the PS to DC converters because it's something they feel comfortable enough with that the lag introduced is a secondary consideration.

Since we're all here, does anybody have any particular feeling about lag on various console -> console converters? I have a pair of PS -> Neo Geo pinout converters for my Fire-Bug supergun and it makes me feel icky Not at all sure it adds any significant lag though, and it gives the benefit of autofire (probably 30Hz).

[undamned]

Since we're all here, does anybody have any particular feeling about lag on various console -> console converters?

I have zero experience outside of SS->DC for VO (Total Control 3 or somesuch thing), which I honestly haven't spent enough time with to say officially whether there is noticeable lag or not. There is a pretty extensive thread on converters here.
-ud

[undamned]

Finally somebody pointed me to conclusive testing. The training mode in CvS2 has a key display option (like in SFIV) which shows you what buttons the console is seeing pushed and in what sequence. According to Toodles over at SRK, CvS2 registers inputs by video frame, so as much as we don't get accuracy in the millisecond range (as I wanted in my hypothetical homebrew test program), we at least can tell more accurately than your average human could perceive (10's of milliseconds):

http://www.shoryuken.com/showthread.php?t=144153

Looks like Sega never originally intended the L & R triggers for anything other than analog. Software developers ended up using them for digital actions because they were available and better than being stuck with only 4 face buttons.

That being said, Madcatz was the largest producer of DC pads with 6 pure digital face buttons (C and Z buttons being direct digital mirrors of L & R action). Be leery of some of the other 3rd party controllers which have a 6 button configuration, but the two extra buttons are merely programmable macro buttons.
-ud

[antron]

so it's just one frame of lag?

people then blame that for poor playing when using a Sega pad, in a non-hacked situation? the extra travel distance of the trigger would be more than that.

[Ex-Cyber]

Be leery of some of the other 3rd party controllers which have a 6 button configuration, but the two extra buttons are merely programmable macro buttons.

Not only that, but at least on the one I had (the Interact "Quantum FighterPad", which was quite common and can still be bought new in a few places if you feel like wasting $10) it wasn't even possible to use the triggers in the macros. So if you were thinking that you'd just program a one-button macro to use them as triggers, tough luck.

[undamned]

people then blame that for poor playing when using a Sega pad, in a non-hacked situation?

Do they? The context of this quandary has been that of hacked controls.
-ud