rec.autos.simulators

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 JMO,

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After reading all the good responses by most. Some where trying to demean my driving ability which can not be determined by what I write.

What's the point is a good place to continue.

Many people stated these two points:

1. It's hard to simulate real driving because the limitations of the hardware in terms of senses given the racer compared to the real thing. (Understand)

2. That companies are doing their best, and getting better. (Understand)

Before I go on let me state I can run around N2 in sim mode fairly well. But I also have a lot of time invested in it. I still find from time to time that I can just go through spurts where I just drive completely insane, which would never happen for real. No matter how well I drive the replays over a race look scary....

On both points above however I feel N2 Arcade mode (driving model), Toca, and MTM 2 have captured the feel of driving very well. We do lose some senses from the real thing but the game needs to then be forgiving instead of penalizing us for not being able to get these lost senses, heat, wind, g's, these aren't necessarily important though to making an accurate handling model.  I think a real good handling model has been accomplished in the three games listed above. So I feel both points have already been done and can be handled. Toca I feel does a superb job at giving us extra input that we don't get it many many racing games. The wheel hopping feel and sound of it is wonderful, the griping and sliding sounds are very accurate, whipping into a near 180 degree turn if pushing to hard makes a wonderful feel, sound and then resulting in a very realistic abrupt stop,  the bumps on the course, the leaning off the car in turns again make it feel like what I experience in a real car cornering heavily. These things do give us added sense to make us be able to react much more accordingly to how we would for real. So with code you can make some great visuals to simulate what it would be like Toca and MTM 2 have many great examples of this.

I want to talk about N2 Arcade mode to clear some things up. First it's to easy to state "This says a lot about you" and leave it at that. What I'm talking about here is the feel for the car as you drive it around, yeah the lap times are to fast compared to the real track and yes you can't hold the throttle wide open on some tracks compared to the real thing. This is simply because they programmed it for the "So called sim mode" and added better handling, speed ect. to arcade mode afterwards without adjusting the tracks to represent real life times ect. So I'm not discussing lap times in arcade mode as being realistic, to clear this up.

I'm talking about the feel of the car to the pavement. The car feels much heavier and I'm sorry but it' much more like a real car feeling, passenger or racing. I've had normal passenger cars, a Nissan ZX twin turbo and a 67' Chevelle drag car. The closest thing I had to a race car was the Nissan and it by far outperformed any other car in terms of handling. I do expect a real race car to even be able to out handle the Nissan by a wide margin. So yes I get disappointed when many sims make the race cars handle poorly.

Now I didn't just try these things out and 5 minutes later came up with this. This is after years of driving these things. Using N2 Arcade mode as an example again I can state that by racing network races under this mode simply makes a much more realistic looking race. I don't care how good you are or think you are you do things that you would never do in the "sim " mode. In the arcade mode you never find yourself in those cockamamie situations, why? Because you can feel the car much better and would have to do something intentional to really put the car in peril. As in the sim mode you don't have to do much of anything to get the car all messed up.

Now watching replays of network races you would find arcade mode races look much much more like the real thing. In fact you would hardly ever (if ever) see a real race look like the "Sim" mode race replay. The Sim replay would be known as the AA500 and all drivers would be banned from every driving in that state again I would bet!

But with N2 if you try to run network arcade races I can tell you this much without heavily modifying the blaps and rels and each AI drivers skills ratings you won't get a good race at all Papyrus has this all screwed up, most likely because they didn't spend 15 minutes with this part, after 40 hours or so adjusting I finally got it racing a great race. Leave out AI though and your set to go. In single player mode if I recall could at least make a halfway decent race as the cpu racers adjust to your speed. But the whole game needs readjusted to make arcade mode great racing against the AI. So so some may be turned off by that. Not really the point as much as the way the car feels ion the pavement in arcade mode.

I can only state what I see and don't try to piss anybody off. I  put people behind the wheel to see their reactions and they like the feel of the Arcade mode as compared to the sim mode. They don't like the steep curve and when they are good they still don't like the overall feel. I've setup many many people with N2 with my adjusted settings because they want it badly. A few forget how to get into an arcade race properly and find themselves racing sim unkowningly. I later race with them and I find they've been racing sim, they complain about the handling they;ve been experiencing, I put it back over to the adjusted arcade mode and they fall in love again. They then go on to race the game much more often. I'm sorry but I see this all the time and if I didn't I would even post here.

They need an arcade mode racing on NRO's so the rest of us can race a safer, funner and tighter race. Arcade mode races are much much safer (wreck free) and the whole pack is so tight it's like the real thing you can race lap after lap side by side other humans. This is a very risky practice in sim mode racing. Hum on tv they don't seem scared at all racing next to on another. You can have the whole group finish within mere seconds of one another, I thinks it's a beautiful thing. I can't get these results when I put a network race in sim mode. Thus it losses a lot of thrill for all involved. I often wonder if arcade mode was the real mode for N2 how things would be perceived. I feel the hard-liners would accept and defend that as the real thing since this is what they were given and stated as being real. One thing I do know is that there would be more people racing the game both on and off line. Hard-liners are more willing to adjust because they are so devoted, where as commoners expect things to be as they believe they are (sometimes right or wrong) and won't settle for anything less. honestly I feel most of what I talk about here falls right into these last statements.

You look at N2 sales it's done wonderful but that doesn't nesscessarily  mean a lot of people are downright satisfied. Many people have computers and love Nascar racing, they see it buy it and try it and never become very good at it and shelve it for the most part or struggle with it. I'm confident this is very common. I also know people that have raced at my place went out bought the game and then complained about their system not performing like mine (handling). I go over it again with them, give them the patch and they thank me give me a twenty for taking the time going to their place ect and everyone is happy, they don't get this out of the box.

Now Toca & F1RS. How's come I can race Toca without ever racing the track once without running off it? In F1RS even after I know the track very well it's hard to do this? Somebody here has a better handling system so it's not that it can't be done. Before Toca I almost reserved my multiplayer racing experience to only oval tracks where you can get a great tight race with other competitors. But Toca has blown me away on how people that never have driven it before can after a few laps race competitively, even better than N2 arcade. Why? Because the car acts like what they have come to know by driving their respective cars. By now driving is second nature to us but many sims make us feel like were driving spaceships. Toca gives a wonderful feel for the track and car.

I also feel that MTM 2 has a very natural driving feel as to the way the suspension and big tires would feel racing a pickup. I had one of those by the way, not quite so big though. So many people can jump right in there and race a good race beaus many have gone baha'n before. I could just imagine MTM2 tracks with F1RS's handling model. It would be pure work and frustration to make just 1 lap. Could we call this that off road Sierra title that did so well SODA?

Now many companies are deep into getting more complex with the physics. Is this gonna really make a better handling car? Or is it gonna make it even more difficult to race. From what I hear it's the later. Well I'm not so sure that's a good thing first it takes more processing power which means good for Intel which means bad for us. But most importantly there are legions of would be racers that just don't have fun with these so called simulators because they simply can't relate well to what they have come to know. I believe after reading a poster's response that these sims make great test beds for practicing for the real thing. It's always better to practice harder than the real thing. Boy after racing F1RS for a while I bet it would be a welcome change to be able to jump into the real thing and run it for a while. (Of course there would be some adjusting). But lets say you were a F1 Racer already I bet they feel much more at home and comfortable inside the real Mccoy. But the point I think isn't about using a sim as practice for the real thing for the majority of us. So we don't need it harder than the real thing. Make it as real as you can but make it inviting for people to ...

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After reading your rather lengthy ;) post I find that I agree with many of your points but I think the bigger problem with sim's is due to the very poor setup's included with most of them, N2 being one of the worst offenders.  I can understand why this is done but I think they (papy in this case) need to realize the majority of us (myself included) don't want to spend hours & hours coming up with a decent setup which will allow us to be competitive and relatively sane on the track. Now I might be mistaken but, seems to me most real racing teams hire people to take care of setting up the car, If I wanted to be a crew chief I'd buy Nascar Crew Chiefing 2 :)

Once you have a good setup IMO it is not really much of a problem to race in "sim" mode, but getting the setup is another story.  I know many will say you can just download setups, but having downloaded most of the available setups I find many if not most of them tweaked simply for the fastest lap possible with no consideration for stability and/or # of laps the setups will last.  Many are a reasonable starting point but again were still back to hours of tweaking and testing to getting a race usable setup that will allow you race much as you see on TV ie: side by side.  The one's who live and breath sim racing may not find this to be drawback, but I suspect the vast majority simply want to race and the game should provide for this without resorting to an arcade mode.

Another consequence of this is that it makes it hard for good racers to find people to race with on NROS.  Even though I consider myself to be decent racer I'm not sure Id want to race on TEN simply because either I'd be in race's where I'd be getting continually wrecked (those who haven't found decent setups), be non-competitive or wreck somebody else and have to listen to them whine about
it.  Setup's are the key, you don't really need the arcade mode if (big if) you have the key. ;)

Well getting rather lengthy here myself so I'll leave it at that for now.

Smokin_D,  *Its hard to race like a Ferrari, driving a Yugo*

    After reading all the good responses by most. Some where trying to demean my driving ability which can not be determined by what I write.

    What's the point is a good place to continue.

    Many people stated these two points:

    QBM

    Smokin D stated:

    Another consequence of this is that it makes it hard for good racers to find people to race with on NROS.  Even though I consider myself to be decent racer I'm not sure Id want to race on TEN simply because either I'd be in race's where I'd be getting continually wrecked (those who haven't found decent setups), be non-competitive or wreck somebody else and have to listen to them whine about
    it.  Setup's are the key, you don't really need the arcade mode if (big if) you have the key. ;)

    R:

    The points you make about Ten are right on the point. In sim mode racing Nascar on a network makes way to many variables available that can lead to a bad race or experience. Their is nothing a racer want less then a wreck filled mess or a feeling they simply can't compete. In arcade mode (wish they never used that word I really do) the races I've been involved with (100's to 1000's) are so much more satisfying for everyone in the group. At least for beginner to good sim racers, expert sim racers will sit on their perch and be to proud to come race with us. Being lonely missing out on all the fun they would be. :(

    The paradox of Papy's Arcade Mode is that it has better handling than Common SIM mode games and True Arcade Racing. So if it were Arcade mode than by what we have come to know about arcade racers it should handle worse than Sim Mode, many times much worse. But it doesn't in fact it goes the opposite direction, so I volunteer dropping the bad name Papy gave it and come up with something else, maybe Magna Traction like those AFX cars we ran on the slots.

    To whomever please never get me confused with a guy that likes Arcade racers. I hate them so badly you would be shocked at how pissed I get when I try them out from time to time. I leave the place cussing. Latest victim Indy 500 at Sea World last year. That thing was so bad I can't even think straight even now trying to describe it. Ahhhh. My wife will tell you how bent out of shape I was after that, damn near ruined the day.

    Funny thing after I wrote my last post on this I seen at OP3DFX there is a game called Super Toca Racing coming out. In that they talk about exactly what I was babbling about today that 98% of people that try sim racers don't want to go back to them. They want a realistic as possible game with good handling that is fun for everyone. Very coincidental.

    QBM  

It seems that the Arcade/Sim button would be the answer to this dilemma of which you speak. But the companies can't use it. The problem with it is that Sim racers don't want to see the word "Arcade" on the box and Arcade lovers don't want to see "Sim". The sims I've driven use amateur classification and "helps" to soften the blow for beginners. This is a good neutral marketing solution that also helps get one racing.

I guess the real answer is forums like this one. Join in, ask a few questions, check out your options, go to the software store.

If you are referring to GPL as a game with "more complex physics", I, for one, see it as just the beginning of the whole shebang and am thankful that someone cares enough to produce this type of game. I certainly hope that everyone gets what they are looking for, but not at the expense of losing hard racing simulations.

--

mark
"A lot of people think racing is about going fast. But it's not. It's about going just slow enough to stay on the track."

F1RS - http://www.nmia.com/~chaser/car/results.htm
Remove us here and there to mail me.

    After reading all the good responses by most. Some where trying to demean my driving ability which can not be determined by what I write.

    What's the point is a good place to continue.

    Many people stated these two points:

    1. It's hard to simulate real driving because the limitations of the hardware in terms of senses given the racer compared to the real thing. (Understand)

    2. That companies are doing their best, and getting better. (Understand)

--

(please change antispam to worldnet.att when replying)

Sim Racing News - http://www.simnews.com
The Sim Project - http://www.simproject.com

* No animals were harmed in the making of this e-mail *

Yep. It seems there needs to be a third category nowadays I guess thats' the one I really like.

Games that fall into are then: Off the top of my head...

N2 Arcade Mode
MTM 2
Toca
Motoracer
Seems GT on PSX would...

What they have in common is good (more understood) handling model that may exaggerate reality a bit, but not always.  They are more lenient on damage even though it is still there. They are always easier to learn, often times very playable from the first lap. They are more competitive (in general) in a multiplayer environment for the reasons stated above plus you can usually mess up once and recover to stay competitive. These games usually have light setup adjustments even though this really doesn't matter it's the handling of the vehicle that counts, so none or a gob of adjustments could work. They ultimately allow good bumper to bumper racing that is simply fun without being corny. That is why I like them, they aren't braindead like arcade racers and their not so difficult (to a point I believe as being unrealistic many times) as sim racers. So I think they do fit in nicely in their own place.

I guess we need to come up with a name for that catertgory  of racer since there is a vast difference between this and the two old standards Sim and Arcade and their becoming more prevalent. I also feel once understood people will be able to use this word so we can get a quicker explanation of new racing products. No more paragraphs stating it's like and arcade but different but not quite a sim, that goes on for a while trying to find it's niche. What it end up being is what this category is. It really does need a name.

QBM

    It seems that the Arcade/Sim button would be the answer to this dilemma of which you speak. But the companies can't use it. The problem with it is that Sim racers don't want to see the word "Arcade" on the box and Arcade lovers don't want to see "Sim". The sims I've driven use amateur classification and "helps" to soften the blow for beginners. This is a good neutral marketing solution that also helps get one racing.

Perhaps this thread should be renamed "All arcade racers suck! (because
they are not good enough for sims)"

8-)

Correct, TOCA (good though it *is*) is just a racing *GAME*, not a
racing sim.

If this is what you want, buy Screamer Rally or Motorhead, they are both
excellent *arcade* racing games, where you do not have to worry about
driving into other cars, damage or set-ups,  etc, etc, which it appears
to me is what you are asking for? N2, F1GP2, F1RS, ICR2 are all
SIMULATORS, not Arcade racing games......GET IT?

Simple, because TOCA is arcade, and F1RS is a sim, and you obviously do
not like sims (cos they are a bit harder to handle?), but you obviously
like arcade racers, (cos they are a bit easier to handle?)

I really don't see why you are even having this discussion?
All you keep talking about is arcade this, and arcade that, why don't
you just stick to arcade and forget sims?

8-)

BTW, I'm *not* knocking arcade racing gmaes, I love them almost as much
as I love sims, and I've got loads myself (TOCA, Screamer 2, Motorhead,
Motoracer, etc) just seems a bit of a pointless thread to me?

8-)

*Peter*    8-)
(NB: remove asterix to e-mail)

If you are going to go for lap records you should be punished (crash, spin off)
when you push to hard. I was more thinking that todays sims it seems to easy to
make a little mistake that causes a crash/spin. Plenty of times I've just turned
the wheel a fraction more/less than I meant/should - end of race.

Don't get me wrong, I'm very much in favour of the push towards realism
its just that I'd like to see some improvements in feedback and a help system
that doesn't make it so easy to drive but can still help us mere mortals enjoy
the realistic handling.

David

--

UK.

ABOUT DIFFICULTY OF SIMS:

R:

I agree that this is the point many sim racers take. But I can state from
trying both ways that many things you say above aren't neccessarily true in
multiplayer racing. I'm gonna use Nascar 2 Arcade again as my ex.. Even
though it is much easier to drive for all the there still are better drivers
and average drivers. Instead of .5's a lap faster it may be reduced to .1 or
thereabouts. Sim racers dropping down to arcade will by the most part be
better than those never racing sim and only race arcade. But eveybody can
from time to time win in the arcade mode. An average sim racers almost never
has a shot at winning against real good sim racers. I know from experience
overall better quality multiplayer are possible in N2 Arcade mode due simply
to better handling.

See NRO only has sim mode available, I would like to see arcade mode added
in. I'm an average to good sim racer and I've practiced my arse off and I've
hit the wall it seems. I can't keep putting in unreasonable hours to get
much better, my bad I know. On top of this arcade mode races are closer and
with less wrecks yours or others, two ingrediants I like in all racing
games. So I would like to race on Ten in this mode so I can be competitive
and fun. There are more people I believe would appreciate this mode if they
know, "IF THEY KNOW" another big ingrediant.

Also others may try it out and be pleasantly surprised they like it as well.
I'm certain the big dogs would never like it no matter what.

It's not surprising that some of the response here is that they like it
harder even if it's harder than real life. This is a bit odd, but I can
understand.

I'm not here to to tell people what mode they should race in. I just feel
many sim games handling models are harder than their real life counterparts,
and it's not impossible to do becuase of harware limitations.

R:

A few of you guys are now bringing up 60's cars. I was mainly talking about
F1m, Nascar and Toca cars of taoday that handle much better. I'm certain the
60's F1 cars were harder to drive but would also state that a feeling would
be obtained after a few laps, sorta like pitching stock cars on a dirt track
that we would be able to adjust to. How many hours do real race drivers
spend a week actually driving their race cars around the track? I know from
friends in local stock cars they only race when it's race time. So how can
they do it. NO PRACTICE and just race and race well. It's points like this
that strenghten my position I feel. Everyone should be able to drive the
track to an acceptable level but again the creame will still rise to  the
top, we haven't reduced this to tic-tac-toe.

R:

They sell into the high numbers becasue there are a lot of fans. I know a
lot of people that don't drive them much at all due to their difficulty
level. Yet they still own it. NRO is a good example of how many play it I
would say multiply it's members by five and that would probably give you a
good number on how many are still actually driving the game regualrly. (BIG
IF) But I expect people that have mastered the game will end up on NRO why
not spend the extra cash since you've spent so much time on the game
already. Even though I haven't tried it Grand Trasimo sounds familiar with
TOCA in terms of control. Now this game has sold millions or on it's way I
bet more average folk drive this game than N2 or any sim since they can get
behind the wheel and drive it based on lessons they've learned from driving.
I want better handling so we can get more people invovled on the pc end and
have larger leagues.

But going from a real racing car to

R:

My point exactly even the pro's struggle. You keep comming back to things we
can't feel. Then they should put things in the game to give us more feedback
or write routines that assume we would be doing proper things if the
feedback were there to correct us (not typical lame aids). Toca somehow
gives the driver a good feeling of how the car is handling without feeling
g's ect. When the car's weight shifts the car visably looks as as it
shifted, this is I'll I need and seems very natural to me.

But I still think if we did have all the same input as the real thing the
sims would still be very difficult, simply  becuase it is programmed harder
than the real thing.

I'm not bringing GPL in this and feel it could be very representative for
the time. Here's one: since everybody feels GPL is very accurate due to it's
physics then does that mean N2, F1RS ect are not very realisitic since they
have a lesser physics enginge. And on top of that GPL is simulating an older
model racer with less handling compared to todays racers. So that really
throws off N2, F1RS ect. even more since they are vehicles with better
handling and the best physics engines we have right now are only able to
represent cars over 30 years old. So with this being true for example than
it concedes those sims are not realistic at all.

I'm assuming eveyone believes todays cars handle much better the old F1's.
So what's easier to drive around the track GPL or F1RS? If it's GPL than I
rest my point that games like F1RS are way to hard compared ot the real
thing. Then I'll go on to state that YOU CAN program variables into a game
natural or not that would make it easier for a player to race a vehicle
around the track without feeling phony. Today's F1 cars should be easier to
drive in general as compared to 60's F1 cars.

Meant I've written a lot and that  time and it was time to go. :)

I'm into civil arguments about this.

Understood your point clearly.

QBM

I'm sorry but I dissagree I believe the handling mode of N2 is closer to the
way a stock car handles. All the rest of the compnents are still there,
damage, yellows, setups ect. The only dif between sim and arcade N2 is the
handling of the car.

Well I beat you to it and named it sim racers suck! Better luck next time.
:)

Why becasue you say so? Tturn damage model to high and then you wouldn't
want to bump other as much. I feel the game is very representative of da
real thing.

R:

Sir what I want is more involment by more people so we can get more money
invovled. The sims I believe are artifically tougher because of handling on
ly handling. The biggest ingrediant to please would be racers.

I want NRO to add Arcade mode. I'm certain it wouldn't go over huge right
now becuase they do nothing to promote it meaning people that own N2 that
would like to drive arcade mode have no clue as to how and what is NRO. If
they had this model to start with people would have then known than shown up
ready to race.

These are the things I want so you won't have to tell me. I already know.

I don't mind setting up a car or damage yellows ect. I want my setup to be
able to obtain better handling than what they are currently offering. Good
stock setups are important though to have a good base of racers that don't
want to mess with this time consuming part of it.

First True ARCADE RACERS=TYPICAL RACERS FOUND AT AN ARCADE. These are the
poorest handling models ever devised. Dollar easters are all they are
representing racing on ice.

I don't want this in fact I'd like to put concrete shoes on the develpers
and throw them overboard.

See I'm not your typical braindead argument to just summarize me up as a
idiot that is to lazy to try. I've put in big hours on these things like
you. I just don't bowl over easy and accept what they are delivering as
gosspil. I don't hate the sims I just think they are much harder than need
be. Please try reading all my posts they all hit different areas.

Please read my points in all the posts if you can't see where I'm comming
from then you need comprehension lessons. You might not agree and that's
fine but it's not about just race arcade games and shut up. Why are you
feeling offended by this?

I felt most of your points were pointless. But I still love you!

QBM

R:

My point exactly. Grand Prix courses will always be inherantly diffiuclt
becuase no matter if the car had super stickim your always gonna push the
corners to it's limits, creating difficulty. But yep even taking them at
half speed can be tricky. I don't buy that being realisitc, at least not
yet.

Thanks Dave.

QBM