rec.autos.simulators

Somewhere it was written that Grand Prix Legends by Papyrus will allow
the player to look left and right while driving.  Apparently this will
be implemented so, that when a button or key is pushed, the wiev will
begin so shift to the desired direction, and upon release it
(immediately?) centers.  If this is going to be vital game function, one
obviously has to be able to control it without taking hands off from the
steering wheel.
  My question:  If I by a TSW, will I be able to control viewing with
the paddle shifters and gears with the gear column, or are the switches
internally wired to present only two joystick buttons?  I expect, that
the sofware will be flexible enough.  How about ECCI?  Does it have
enough buttons?
  Of course, it may turn out, that while racing one doesn't have time to
mess with this kind of things.  By the way, I think the ideal way to
control head panning might be with wheel mounted analog controllers,
like those in Thrustmaster GP1.

(sorry... WAY too little sleep last night...)

Trips

It seems like analog panning of the view removes the sense of
what the car is doing for me.  I relate to the handling
of the car by seeing how the scenery changes in relation to
the***pit.  If the***pit is moving too much (more than
just chassis roll or suspension movement) it seems to remove
my internal sense of how the car is reacting to the road.

Of course I turned off the head panning feature in CARTPR
almost immediately so I never got used to it.  It still
seems to me that fixed views will allow more precise driving.

The answer is: options, options, options!  Give everyone
what they want and allow full flexibility and adjustability
in the view systems. Provide options for manual analog view
changes, manual fixed view changes, and automatic head panning.

The ulitmate will be affordable quality HMD head tracking,
but that still seem to be a long way off.

--
Pat Dotson
IMPACT Motorsports

so I never got used to it.  

I've used both on and off quite a bit.  I turn it off now for ovals, and turn
it on for road courses.  This is mainly because for ovals you are going to exit
the turns and go up near the walls and you darn well want to see where that
right wheel is, and the view just doesn't back out fast enough or far enough to
allow you to place your right wheel at the wall with any precision.  Fixed at
least allows you to get used to where the wheel should be.  But for road
courses, I definitely prefer being able to see into and through the turns at
the correct points, and smoothly.  The button idea is not one I like much
because its one more manual control I have to mess with while I'm trying to
drive the car.  I recently got a book called Think to Win (you can look it up
on www.amazon.com).  Its really neat because it shows camera views of where you
should be looking at just about every point on a sample road course (Willow
Springs).  You can clearly see the benefit of head panning when done right, and
I've discovered this benefit for road courses.  I just wish they'd get the head
back out to track-out faster so I can deal with any curbing on the exit.

Randy
Randy Magruder
Staff Writer
Digital Sportspage
http://www.digitalsports.com/

Jari,

All ECCI controls have four buttons mounted on the wheel. You could assign
two for gear shifting and still have two remaining for other functions. I
can't give you any information on GPL's features, but if it can be assigned
button control, it will work with our system. All ECCI systems are as
compatible typical four button joystick conventions.

Regards!
Andy Cers
ECCI