rec.autos.simulators

First of all this was a post I did on T.g.s.n. after somebody posted info
about that new H-style shifter by ACT Labs.  I think it's also appropriate
here, because there's some important issues here to talk about.  The URL is
:

http://www.racesimcentral.net/
in.htm

------
Yeah yeah... looks cute.. probably works well.  But it won't work until
every wheel manufacturer and software developer create a standard for gear
shifting.  In every I mean "every".  From the big boys of Papyrus to the
little company that publishes it's first racing title on the market, sim or
arcade type.

For those who don't know, it's a H-type sequential shifter.  Nice thing, but
the software needs to be programmed for it.  Or else it's just a up/down
shifter (sequential).  And I laugh when the article mentions "I can't tell
the names but there is some software companies working on this".  Nice way
to sell that option when at the moment NO racing titles offer that
possibility.

Especially since many will say "Hey I don't care or want to waste time for a
H-shifter".  I mean Im sorry but the mass market of racing simulators, even
the most serious one, is made of people using joysticks, not wheels.  People
using a wheel are a fairly low # of users.  So they will just don't really
care about that idea. Or maybe they will.. who knows.

Look at some of the racing sim at the moment :

N2 :  1-2-3-4   (reverse is done with a second button).  You can't go from 2
to per example 4gear without passing in 3rd.

GPL : R-N-1-2-3-4-5(-6)  :  You can't go from let's say 5th gear into
reverse, as with mostly all Papyrus titles.

GP2 : R-N-T-N-1-N-2-N-3-N-4-N-5-N-6-N    Neutral is when you press the
button and stay with it.  Im talking here about the up shifting
possibilities, because when you disable the turn-around on itself it takes
off the T on certain situation. How can you monopolize when you got all
those different gearing situations ? It's not like tomorrow every company
will go and say "ok we will go with that idea".

And what if somebody goes from 1 to 5.. will it go like this :  1-N-N-5 ?
(since you pass 2 times in Neutral position per example).

So let's see..

Papyrus : probably won't approve this for N3 (probably too deep in
development).  SportsCar GT no.  All the current racing sims on the market
from Papy, Microprose, Microsoft : No.   Codemaster maybe. Ubisoft probably
but it would be unrealistic to Formula 1 racing.  TAR maybe.

Im not saying it's not a good idea (the idea is great), but I just can't see
it doing good. Especially if they don't want to make it possible for other
types of wheel and they patent that shifter.  Im just worried that it's
maybe 2years too late.

--
-- Fran?ois Mnard <ymenard/Nas-Frank>
-- NROS Nascar sanctioned Guide http://www.racesimcentral.net/
-- SimRacing Online http://www.racesimcentral.net/
-- Official mentally retarded guy of r.a.s.
-- May the Downforce be with you...

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realise
how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

The URL is : http://www.rs2league.com/press/press.htm

My name is "Jason"... not... "some guy" and I thought you'd appreciate the
sneak peak.

As I posted in the TSGN... I cannot release a lot of the technical data that
will answer a LOT of your questions/issues to a tee.

So my advice to you is to stay tuned, and wait for the indepth release
coming very soon... IT WILL ANSWER THEM...

Cheers,

--
Jason Murray (Shumi)
Eisen Racing
RS2League Coordinator: http://www.rs2league.com

Sorry for calling you "some guy"   ;-)

I appreciated it, I wasn't targeting you but mostly ACT Labs.  Like I said
on T.g.s.n. (eh sorry if I cross-post my comments), it's vaporware.  It's a
great idea, but vaporware.  I mean r.a.s people do the same for software
press-release or previews (like per example the "LeMans" racing game), so
there's nothing wrong with doing this for a hardware.  We have talked on
r.a.s about that type of shifter for years, with in-depth discussion with
even major people from wheel manufacturers, so there's nothing wrong with
what I said.

I know your just the medium here, nothing wrong with that :)

It looks very convincing, and as you can read Im just wondering myself about
how they did it both hardware and software side, and both from the
manufacturer and PC software developer side.

Thanks ! :)      If you can it would be a neat idea to build yourself the
correct shifter styles (like a simple H-pattern to not go further into the
HH  (<-- think this is the 8-way shifter)).

--
-- Fran?ois Mnard <ymenard/Nas-Frank>
-- NROS Nascar sanctioned Guide http://www.nros.com/
-- SimRacing Online http://www.simracing.com/
-- Official mentally retarded guy of r.a.s.
-- May the Downforce be with you...

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realise
how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

I think this has some GREAT possibilities.  Imagine driving a
Penske-prepared 1969 Z-28 Camaro in the upcoming Trans Am Racing title
with an actual H-pattern shifter . . . nirvana!

This sounds EXACTLY like the kind of nay-saying that people were
proclaiming about the future of Force Feedback controls . . . until
companies like Microsoft, Logitech, Saitek, and ACT Labs brought out
their extraordinary interpretations of Force Feedback hardware (and
companies like MGI and EA began producing games with some truly
excellent games that support FF effects).  Never say never -- if
everybody has to get on the bandwagon, you'll usually be surprised to
find that it's a HUGE bandwagon that they have to climb on to, and
everybody seems to want to climb on board once the first lemming
jumps. <G>

Yeah, this I agree with -- which is why there are NO sims out there
that support split-axis brake and throttle controls.  I mean, how many
people out there actually have PEDALS to begin with, let alone pedals
that can support split-axis operation?  I mean, every game company
surely knows that everybody plays these driving games on a keyboard,
right?  And when was the last time you tried to find a driving wheel
and pedal combo at someplace like Best Buy or CompUSA?  There's just
NO market for these kinds of things, right?  <G>

GT Interactive is gearing up to produce the next Indy 500/Indy Racing
League simulation right now.  The IRL is moving towards sequential
gearboxes, but nobody says that GT Interactive is going to focus
*solely* on a modern perspective on the Indy 500 -- and a whole bunch
of Indy cars in the past prior to the CART era used standard H-pattern
shifters (can you say "Indy 500 Racing Legends?"  Remember, you heard
it from me first . . . <G>).  Then there's the aforementioned Trans Am
Racing, also from GT Interactive -- definitely a natural for an
H-pattern shifter.  Do you really think that ACT Labs would cart out
hardware that has absolutely NO games to support it?  Something's in
the works, you can be sure -- and be prepared to be surprised.  Sure a
Force Feedback patch for GPL would be nice, but Papy doesn't view FF
as the way to go.  They haven't said anything about OTHER advanced
hardware, like ACT Labs' H-pattern shifter . . .

They didn't say they WEREN'T going to produce a stand-alone product,
either, though, so they may make a version that will function separate
from the RS wheel itself.  You may not be able to sell an ACT Labs RS
wheel to someone who owns an ECCI or TSW rig, but you can bet those
folks *might* consider purchasing a stand-alone shifter (I know I
would!).

-- John Bodin
    "Be kind -- don't snip the messages (we like 'em long)!"

Yes I really do like this idea.. In fact it is an advantage to be able to
shift multiple gears compared to going down 1 by 1.  Especially if you
understeer, instead of going down gears (and maybe even hitting the neutral
depending on how it's modeled), it can be the 0.01 advantage that gets you a
pole or the win :)

Ah yes I see.  That's exactly why I mentionned that hopefully there will be
a standard for this.  It would be great to see on both side (hardware
manufacturers and *** developpers) go and standardise (sp?) it.  But like
I said it would be very difficult at first, considering that  users with
wheels are a fairly low % of racing game sales and that there's always some
new-commer that wouldn't want to, or maybe they would, who knows :)

There's major steps ahead in controller issues.  Force Feedback pedals,
H-type shifter, an actual steel Force-Feedback wheel, etc... plus you have
the whole advancement in plastic-type materials to create more long-lasting
wheel parts.  I see what ACT Labs do as a step, but  I mean the world is not
perfect :)

And for your remarks, be sure that most of the sims don't even support
split-axis.  Microsoft "just" did that but still they only modeled that it
can be possible, since the car doesn't act correctly if you press both
pedals in MMMadness.

Hmm I forgot GT Interactive, so you have a point.  Indy 500Racing legends is
a neat idea, still, and I could see the utility of that shifter if thus
software is in developement.  Wow the more I think the better the idea.  I
never thought they could use their Indy and IRL license to do that.. hmm
interesting <drools>.

If they do it the correct way (assuming it will be a standard), I would
guess they will make it only available for their wheels, and after half a
year to a year they will sell their patent to other companies or at least
offer it afterall, at a higher price than the one for ACTLabs wheels 8)

I have a custom-built wheel here made from mostly CH Products (the excellent
EXL wheel and CH pedals modified), and I would seriously want such a thing.
I don't like my shifter on the side, and I mean... it looks cool visually
also no ? :)>

(and I got a spare racing-quality shifter somewhere in the garage hehe).

-- Time for bed now...
-- Fran?ois Mnard <ymenard/Nas-Frank>
-- NROS Nascar sanctioned Guide http://www.racesimcentral.net/
-- SimRacing Online http://www.racesimcentral.net/
-- Official mentally retarded guy of r.a.s.
-- May the Downforce be with you...

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realise
how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

Keep in mind that the idea of an historic Indy 500 sim is pure
speculation on my part -- but given the success of GPL, I think GT
Interactive should definitely be considering something along these
lines.  Nobody at GT Interactive is asking me, of course, but I hope
to rectify that in the near future! <G>

claimed:

i take it as just some creative way to SPAM... after all, it's only
usable for actlabs customers anyway. ;-]

tomasd

Francois, the double HH allows for the single H with the insert. This is a
very flexible design, please think about what you said.

Tore Hanson

Not necessarily Tom. I use the PDPI L4 gamecard. I wrote PDPI to find out if
and how it can work with my NascarPro controller.

Tore Hanson

Exactly. The main problem is that it's really just an add-on for the
Actlab wheels - something only a very small minority owns, and I
certainly won't buy such a wheel just to be able to use that
H-shifter. I see no software company patch their software either,
Papyrus for example do not even think about FF, why about such an
*** device? And the rest either have already marketing contracts
with other developers or build wheels themselves (Microsoft). It's
nice yes, but at the moment (and foreseeable future) of little use for
most simracers.

--Tel

You don't need any "standard"!  All you need is the ability to map
each gear in a sim to a different key stroke.  You can already
select which key or button you want for upshifting and downshifting.

For those unfamiliar with ACT Labs, they make all sorts of programmable
joystick controllers.  I would imagine that the H-shifter will be able
to support older sims through this programmability, and won't
necessarily
have to be supported directly by software.

For example, in GPL, if you downshift from 5th to 2nd, the shifter
can output the downshift command 3 times.  This isn't perfect - it
will be better if the software could recognize the non-sequential
shift and go directly from 5th to 2nd, but it's not a useless feature
either.

BTW, how long ago was the idea floated to allow each individual gear
in a sim to be mapped to a different keystroke?  Sim developers
should get off their lazy ***** and implement that simple feature! :)
It amazes me that there are companies out there willing to commit
to building hardware that will improve driving sims immensely, yet
they have trouble getting the needed software support.  That mere
users willingly accept that, and criticize the hardware makers for
their effort, leaves me speechless.

--
Pat Dotson
IMPACT Motorsports
http://www.impactmotorsports.com/pd.html

He never thinks about what he says.
That's why he comes off looking like an idiot all of the time.

Bollocks.  Hide under your nospam address.

I was talking about going too far in the HH.  It can happen sometimes you
know..

Now think before you post, next time.

--
-- Fran?ois Mnard <ymenard/Nas-Frank>
-- NROS Nascar sanctioned Guide http://www.nros.com/
-- SimRacing Online http://www.simracing.com/
-- Official mentally retarded guy of r.a.s.
-- May the Downforce be with you...

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realise
how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

Ah indeed..  I know this was one of the most predilected idea when we were
talking about the H-style shifter.  So it's a confirmation that ACT modeled
it that way ?

I totally agree...

--
-- Fran?ois Mnard <ymenard/Nas-Frank>
-- NROS Nascar sanctioned Guide http://www.nros.com/
-- SimRacing Online http://www.simracing.com/
-- Official mentally retarded guy of r.a.s.
-- May the Downforce be with you...

"People think it must be fun to be a super genius, but they don't realise
how hard it is to put up with all the idiots in the world."

Well, according to the preview, the shifter has metal inserts to prevent you
from going to far, and as for the complaint of not enough support: well not
only is there support coming from more than 11 developers, but don't forget
that a simple patch would probably do the trick for most games. I don't
think you'd have to write the whole game with the H shifter in mind. But,
let's just wait and let the criticisims wait until the product is actually
out.

-Josh de Bever