I am not sure of the difference between MAME and Fightcade versions, could a mod or someone else please explain to me why fightcade runs are separate from the MAME category. As far as I understand, fightcade is using a version of a mame emulator and GGPO for netplay.

EDIT: "MAME stands for Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator" of which fightcade uses its own branch and emulates multiple arcade machines. Just curious as to how this is different?

FightCade uses multiple emulators to simulate different arcade machines/consoles.

For Neo Geo, FightCade uses FinalBurn Neo, not MAME. FinalBurn Neo is based on FinalBurn Alpha, which was "coded for speed and not accuracy", as one of it's devs put it in this post: https://neo-source.com/index.php?topic=3260.0

Anyway, this doesn't really matter. The problem is that FightCade now has a mod that allows for overclocking. FightCade runs and Kawaks runs might be, in the future, merged into a new category called "Overclock". For now, the FightCade mod is not official, but just the fact that it exists excludes it from the Arcade category, which aims for high fidelity. (And if you ask me, I think MAME should also be banned from that category.)

Thank you for replying GenevensiS! It makes a lot more sense when you explain it this way!