rec.autos.simulators

Perhaps European vehicles lack these artificial limits since in Europe
they don't have the ridiculous driving laws of the U.S. (speaking as
an American who lived in Germany for 2 years and loved the driving
laws there)

Seeyas on the track.

--John (Joao) Silva

Certainly drag is a very important term. Going back to the original reply's
car, a Mazda 626 2.0 Si (did I get that right)?  Do you know how much the
frontal area * Cd might be lowered compared to the US variant?  I can't
imagine enough to make it anywhere near a  150/150 car.  Can you name "real
world" (includes Europe :-)) cars that make 150 mph with only 150 hp?

I don't mean this as a beat-a-dead-horse issue, just wondering how much of a
factor that might be.  As an aside, yes, I've driven in Europe.  Quite enjoyed
the cars there being into smaller cars myself.

Interesting.  I'd like to know more of these inside stories.  Remember, this
whole things started with someone claiming GT handily had the best physics out
there, (GPL included if I recall), to which I replied that I thought not.

Ah, but you are.

Was this addressed to me, or just a general observation?  My last two cars
have been Hondas.  Before that a Dodge-badged Mitsubishi, and a German
Ford.  Honda is over-rated in hp in the game.  Yet, I buy, race and enjoy the
Hondas.  If anything, I want them to add European cars to the game.  So, if
you meant to apply the above to me, you must have done some creative
observing.

My observation?  Everyone is more willing to ascribe behaviors to "them" that
don't apply to "us".  

Porsches, Ferrari's, etc are just as desired here, if not more, than in
Europe.  We don't have as wide a variety of cars, so yes, maybe we tend to
dismiss what we don't know (Citroen, Peugot disappeared from the US market
years ago, as did Fiat).  And certainly there are the "Ford guys" and "Chevy
guys" who swear by their brands.  But I'd say there is as strong a bias
here (sad to say) that says "american = junk".

I was in the UK about a month ago.  Picked up a couple of car mags to burn
some coins (Car, Autocar).  Not very surprised to see the Elise and TVR's held
in such high esteem.  Got quite a kick out of the panning they gave the
Corvette.

What do I want next?  An Elise!

regards,
Dave

Cheers!
John

Well, the Diablo is bigger than a Ford Transit van but I know what you
mean! It's just different I suppose. I like driving in the U.S.
because it's sometimes good to drive something as big as a barge on a
road that's like the front straight at Indy! Coming from Scotland
where the "main road" to go to the highlands is a massively congested
two lane affair that looks like a road through residential housing in
the U.S. it's a nice change!

Somewhere in the house I have an interview with the designer where
people asked about some of the foibles and inconsistencies of GT and
he explained where they came from. Certainly from his description of
the physics of GT I know it's not as "good" (meaning "complete") as
GPL but then the "physics" of a sim is only a means to an end - how to
get it to "feel" real when driving - and GT accomplishes that very
well. It's also pretty clear from the interview that he played fast
and loose with the parameters sometimes depending upon his preferences
or what gameplay required, which is something a sim shouldn't really
do (or only to a lesser extent).

I know it looks like it but honestly I wasn't :-)  It's just something
I've observed many times. I think that coming from a small country
like Scotland we get used to not being the best at something, whereas
people from the U.S. tend to think the opposite.

Not even slightly related to you - sorry if I implied it. We both
drive Hondas, so that's something in common! My last cars have been
Honda, Volvo, Peugot & BMW.

So the world is less self-analytical than outwardly critical. No
surprise there.

There's no doubt Europeans are as biased in their own way. There is a
belief here that American cars are big, powerful and handle like a
tractor. European cars are biased toward poise and roadholding, which
is why cars like the Elise are given such respect.

You wouldn't go far wrong - it is a really nice car as long as you
don't want to drag-race too many Corvettes!

Cheers!
John

I still believe that the physics in gt set the standard , certain play
mechanics excluded. Gpl feels a little
plasticy, and artificial. I mean in certain situations you can feel certain
gyroscopic forces pulling vectors around.
gt does that too but only on spastic set-ups.

David Masten schrieb in Nachricht

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