rec.autos.simulators

Not when it was launched!!! We didn't have PIIs in summer '96

Tony

Well I am driving GPL with a P1 233mhz with no L2 cache.  Greame can be
thanked for the help getting the computer to where it will run good FPS.  I
have evev won races online with this PC at IP addresses.  So you can drive
GPL without have a P2 with over 400mhz.  Also I am running 128.24 personal
best at Monza and 105.45 at Watkins, so I am a bit slower hten the really
fast guys but the dog will hunt.

I am running a little 50 dollar T2 I bought last year and have resprung a
milloin times already.  So you can drive GPL with a low cost set of pedals
well you know what htey say about opinions every has one and they all ____
IMHO, mine does too

Dave

    I gotta admit, I was geeked when GPL first hit the shelves. I was
watching this group everyday waiting for it to come out. When it did I even
crossed the border to Detroit because Canada always gets it a little later
than the States. But today, 3 months after I got it, I deleted it from my
system. Why? Frustration factor. GPL is not a game one can just "jump into"
and race. Like many have said it takes time and patience. I really don't
have the time, working 40 hours a week. I do like to spend some time AWAY
from the computer. Plus the cars are just TOO damn hard to control. And
guys, come on now. This game may have awesome physics and be super realistic
but it is a game played on a computer sitting on a desk.

    The art of racing is mostly from "feel". You can feel a car starting to
slip under you. You can't do that in a game. It's like "BOOM" the car starts
to spin, you try to correct it, the wheel turns a tad too much, and you're
on the grass, in the wall, unable to race anymore. FUN!! Sorry, I'll wait
for Nascar3 where the cars give a bit more and bide my time with NR1999
meanwhile!

We ought to compile a list of whats wrong with it just to address balance.

1) Opponents hit on framerate is unacceptable. Running on a 200mmx with a
Voodoo2 should be good enough (5 FPS with a full field is just bad
programming). The Voodoo2 should take all the graphic duties and the AI
should have no effect on the graphics. Name one other game that does this.
If a 12 meg Voodoo2 can't move the fairly simple graphics around then Papy
have done a terrible job as far as 3d acceleration goes.

2) Crashing and getting stuck in a wall is just stupid. Advanced 3D engine?
I don't think so. I remember getting locked together with other cars in
Indycar 2 so maybe Papy just can't get collision detection sorted.

3) Accelerated time in menus going in to the race. Pop to the loo while
accelerated time is on and you return to a race in action.

4) No clutch control on auto gearbox. Why?

5) Why when you crash badly do you get the TV snow effect? Ruins any
immersion I feel.

6) No Force Feedback. I notice the manual sarcastically dismisses current
feedback technology but even with this you can tell when the front end has
begun to slide in MGPRS2 which would be a big addition to GPL.

7) It is said GPL models air over the engine. Shame they never model a car
with grass on its tyres. Go on the grass and it has no effect once your back
on the track. Also I'm sure you wouldn't get the amount of grip on the grass
as you get. You can go wide on to the grass at 130mph (not that you can tell
your speed in the***pit - what use are those guages?) and still find
enough grip to get back on. Surely not right.

8) Its difficult to tell what gear your in as the stick graphic is terrible.
I don't have time while hurtling in to a corner to look at this as I
downshift (a real driver would know as he would feel the position) so often
downshift too much and lock the rear. I'm sure practice will get rid of this
but Papy should have used another method to provide feedback (even if it's
unrealistic -after all its unrealistic to not know what gear your in without
looking - real Indycars didn't have the gear as a digit right in the field
of view but it made Indycar 2 easier).

9) The accuracy of the physics simulation is great but why ignore the fact
your on a computer without the feedback of a real car. Surely you need to
get creative with using other sources to give you feedback about what the
car is doing. I remember GP2 sound allowing me to know exactly what the car
was doing. I could tell the revs, speed and grip level just from the noise
(I'm not blaming GPL as no other race game has had the accurate audio
feedback that GP2 had).

There are loads of other things but I'll give someone else a chance.

All that said it's still the most advanced race game but it's not perfect by
any stetch of the imagination.

Dean

I'm yet to find any racing sim with perfect collision detection.

Simple--turn off accelerated time before relieving yourself.

Why even have an auto gearbox? The real cars didn't.

Just consider it the fog of unconciousness.

Programmer's perogitive--I tend to agree with them, as the few FF titles I
have tried are utter crap, and FF adds nothing. Maybe someday it'll be
viable, but I don't think it's a must have.

Noone who hasn't driven one of these cars can say for sure, but remember
that they used treaded tires. And the gauges are accurate. I don't believe
they had speedos in them, and most racing cars don't have today.

I've never had this problem--the shifter is pretty easy to see, IMHO.

That's purely your opinion. As everything I've written is mine. These are
not problems for most people, and the sim remains true to the programmer's
intent. Nothing is perfect, but this comes closer than anyhting else out
there.

Scott Moore
Team Tachyon
http://www.racesimcentral.net/
Sports *** Network
http://www.racesimcentral.net/***.com
Vintage Internet Racing Club
http://www.racesimcentral.net/
ICQ 13433409
Responsible Online Racers
http://www.racesimcentral.net/~marknjess/nonflame.html

-I hope this clears things up
-Nana

A 200MMX is significantly less than half the speed of currently available
processors.  Don't be suprised to get significantly less than half of what
is available.  I have a fast computer and I don't want a lesser game because
you don't feel like staying current with technology.

Yeah..this is pretty annoying.

Duh.  Shut it off before you go to the 'loo'.  Or, realize that real race
drivers can't go to the bathroom that close to the start of a race and
consider it part of the realism to be prevented from doing so.

I have to admit this baffles me.  Not so much that the cars had no auto
gearboxes, but how are you going to know when to use the clutch if the
computer is deciding on its own when it is going to shift?  Are you going to
guess?  What happens if you push in the clutch to upshift while the computer
thinks it should be accelerating a bit more?  Is it OK that you blow the
motor to bits?

That is pretty goofy.

Being a Force Feedback user, I agree.  When implemented well, as in Viper
racing, Force Feedback is very useful and enjoyable.  That said, in GPL I am
so involved in the driving that I don't notice the lack of FF.  The forced
centering of my MSFF wheel feels much nicer than springs, though. Springs
only return the energy you put into them, electric motors push back.

Some ability to display the speed would be nice.  The appearance on the
screen of the illusion of speed is pretty good, but not precise enough to
accurately gauge the speed.  Yeah, the real cars had no speedos, but you
could read the tach a little more clearly, too.

terrible.

Yes!!!  Put a gear indicator right next to the speed indicator, sort of like
"S" in NASCAR 2/99

While we are at it, how about a wheel/pedal/shifter that uses a gated
shifter.  I know thats not GPLs problem, but it would be nice.

I didn't like GP2, but then again I am having no trouble with the sounds in
GPL.  SBLive! with surround is terrific.  My dogs hide under the furniture
when I drive the Ferarri.

I wanna put in my own whine about the crashing.  I was pulling into the pits
at the end of a race a couple days ago and bumped the tire of another car at
about 5 mph.  The car flew about 6 feet in the air and flipped over.
Yea..that's realistic...

~daxe
"religion is remedial spirituality"

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Agreed, but 5-10 FPS is hardly half is it. I can run Half-Life, Unreal and
anything else at a playable level. GPL is not playable with a full field.
With 8 cars I get 15-30 FPS in 1024 so the AI is the culprit. I don't accept
that they couldn't have a less consuming system for working out where the
other cars are. Have you ever had a problem with your opponents taking all
your resources when you can'teven see them in any other race game.

Maybe but it's still real quick and once its ended it goes through the race
build up in a millisecond whether you pop to the loo or not.

The excellent illusion is a real plus but that can't give you the speed
within a few MPH which I feel is needed to balance the car going in to a
bend. Consistent lap times becoms dificult. I know they didn't have speedos
but then the real life feel would compensate a lot.

Dean

No, but I don't try to run stuff that is too advanced for my computer.  As
for the AI, when would you like them to be aware of your presence?  I like
the fact that the AI isn't as 'stupid' as in games past.  I could usually
figure out ways to dupe the AI before in other sims.  Now they act more like
real drivers.  Should they start reacting to you when they are in view?
When they are 100 yards away?  When?  The problem is that you can't have the
AI switching on and off during the sim.  At the risk of sounding redundant,
my computer has no trouble with it.  Any new computer is not going to have a
problem with it.  The computers coming out 6 months and a year from now
aren't going to have a problem with it.  If Papyrus should have dumbed down
the game to run on your 200MMX, why shouldn't they have made it run on a
P133 or 486dx100?  Where do you get the completely arbitrary notion that
your outdated computer is less outdated than other outdated computers?

I'm sorry, I can't find any sympathy here, either.  There is a clock ticking
in front of you and you are complaining that you have trouble sensing the
time. Why don't you pee before the practice session starts? I can see you in
a real race, raising your hand and asking the race officials to hold up the
start of the race because you have to go to the bathroom.  It's a RACE, it's
not supposed to be leisurely!

I agree.

It sure would.  You eventually develop the speed sense in any game, though.
I find looking at the road surface to help me in GPL.  There is alot of
stuff on the road (skid marks, brake zones, the groove) and it goes by at a
more rapid pace than anything else you are looking at, so in effect it is
the most accurate way to judge the speed.  Being a musician, I might also be
able to gain a really good sense of the speed in any given gear based on the
pitch of the engine sound.

Maybe I'm just full of ***and I should shut up.

~daxe

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Or uses more of it than any other game.  Things have to move forward at some
point and you've found that point.

Why would the speed of your processor have an effect on how the VooDoo
performs in ANY game if it was doing all the work?

I don't either, but when they are ON screen, your computer is going to have
to start working harder.  I'd rather the load remain consistent.

That's relative to how much money you have to spend.  I don't have a fast
computer to run GPL, I have it because I do a lot of 3d modelling and
rendering and animation, so the speed was already there.

Now YOU listen carefully.  Papyrus is going to sell a lot more copies of GPL
in the FUTURE than it is going to sell in the PAST. In the FUTURE, most
computers will not have a problem with the game, so they aren't doing
anything wrong and aren't being lazy, they are designing a game that will
run just fine on the computers available during its life span on the shelf.

I wouldn't buy a whole new computer for a game, but rest assured that I am
never more than 6 months off the hardware pace because I can afford it and I
enjoy it.

I don't want my processor load switching in and out when the other drivers
show up.  I would rather it be consistent.  The erratic performance of the
sim if the additional AI was suddenly cut in or out would be very irritating
to me.  We are back to the same point.  It works fine on my computer, but
not on yours.  I don't want the game to be one iota less comprehensive just
so you can run it.

Because it's more advanced and better.

I don't use it, then again, I wasn't the one complaining about it.  :o)  And
it's hard to tell the lighthearted stuff from the real stuff when the real
stuff is stupid enough to be a joke, like someone complaining that their
ancient P200MMX can't run a cutting edge sim as well as a cutting edge
computer.  ;-)

I agree here, too.  I noticed the odd letterbox concept.  People have ragged
Papyrus sims for awhile for using creative ways to reduce the amount of
screen that needs to be drawn.  How about N2/99?  You actually have a pretty
small percentage of the screen showing you what's outside the vehicle.

Very true.  It also depends on how often you visit the loo.

~daxe

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Listen carefully! A 12 meg Voodoo2 should chuck as many poly's and textures
around as GPL needs it to at a frightening rate regardless of processor. In
GPL it doesn't because Papy have chosen to do it a different way. I don't
have a problem with a 200mmx being old hat but I resent it when I don't see
an effective use of the fastest 3D hardware available for games. Bottom line
is that GPL is the only game I can't get 20-30 FPS in (including Falcon 4 in
800x600). I've been meaning to upgrade for a while but everything I've
bought this year (Unreal, Need for Speed 3-was a present, honest, F22 ADF,
Falcon 4, MGPRS2, Half Life, Colin McRae, TOCA, European air War) run
smoothly in 800x600 so I've held off. Then GPL comes along and positively
wastes processor power.

I just think that Papy have been lazy. Why would the processor slow down the
frame rate so drastically anyway when the Voodoo2 is moving everything
around. I don't care if the opponents physics are simplified or AI routines
follow a more predictable path when they are off screen. My hardware can run
the sim fine with 8 opponents. Are you telling me it's worth 350 to add 12
drivers to the field that I won't see for 95% of a race. Mmm. I don't think
so.

I will be going for a PII 450 in the next 2 weeks but people like you making
excuses for software houses that have already used up all the power a 450
can muster are doing the industry no use. I can see you getting a PII 900
with a Voodoo3 just to have a full field for GPL 2 because they decide to
model how the opponents moustaches blow in the wind on the other side of the
track.

Not when they are on the other side of a 9 minute track. I think that's fair
to say don't you? Be realistic for god's sake. How often are you within
sight of more than 5 cars? Not for long after the start, yet you are content
for your processor cycles to be working out all that they are doing on the
other side of the track.

The problem is that you can't have the

Fine but I'll say it again the Voodoo2 should be in control of the framerate
not the processor. NO other game suffers from this. Why GPL?

Are you an idiot? This was a lighthearted comment at best to show some
imperfections in what's obviously an excellent but imperfect game. Get a
grip. Every other game would stop accelerated time after the practice. Why
would you want to leave it on anyway? A feature with no use.

Oh finally.

The sound in GPL almost allows me to get it mostly right, I just think as I
try to get faster and the feedback need to be more accurate it will become a
major problem. BTW why is the speedo available in the outside view only.
There's an awful lot of black screen in the game that could be used for
other bits. (widescreen was a stupid choice as well when you can run smooth
in 1024x768 - why not use that resolution to fill the screen)

Were all full of crap. It's just a question of how much on any given day.

As far as I can see, GPL is the best *overall* racing sim so far, just
IMHO, it is not perfect, it has flaws, but it is *still* the best so
far. The perfect program has not been written yet, and probably never
will be. So lets give credit where credit it due?

I am a huge GPL fan. It is very hard to get to grips with (and I'm
an *experienced* sim racer, note that I said experienced, and not
fast or very good!) But thats half the thrill for me, mastering
(even if its only slightly mastering!) the handling of these cars.

I knew it would be hard before I got it, and I am quite prepared to
give up hours every week to continue the steep learning curve it takes
to master these cars. Thats my choice, no-one is making me do it?

It also seems to me that most of the people ranting about GPL also
think GPL is hard, often they think it is *too* hard?

I feel obliged to comment to some people who have, IMHO, posted unfair
comments with regards to GPL, when it appears plain to me that they
simply do not like GPL, or find it too hard to drive.

If you don't like it, don't drive it, simple? No-one is forcing you
to buy it/drive it.

If its too hard, don't drive it, simple? plenty of people *can* drive
the cars ok, and get decent times (I hasten to add I am not one of
them, I'm still learning and not very good?)

If the above comments constitute religious rantings from a religious
follower, then so be it......

As I've said, GPL is not perfect, but neither is *any* other sim? GPL
comes a lot closer to perfection to most (if not all?) though. And its
remarkably bug free, compared to most other sims.

I have a K6 200, and with the pc optimised for games, some detail
turned down, and with some AI running, I get decent enough fps.
Certainly acceptible to me?

I also have a Celery 333, and GPL flies along nicely. Virtually all
games from now on will push hardware further and further. GPL pushes
hardware quite a bit, thats technology for you? Unfortunately a 200mmx
pc is just not cutting edge hardware anymore? Its a fact, get used to
it, cos less and less games are gonna run on that 200mmx.......

Gee, name a game that slows down, or suffers a performance hit when
lots of things are happening in the game? Where do I start? Thats such
a ***e? Try virtually every game you (or I) have ever played?

If you think GPL's graphics are fairly simple, then tell me what game
has complex graphics? IMHO the graphics are pretty good, maybe not the
best ever, but they certainly do the job. Oh, and my 12Mb V2 card
seems to move the graphics ok? Do you have your's set-up correctly?

Can you name me a game with *perfect* collision detection? I cannot
think of any? GP2? No, fraid not. F1RS? no, not here either! You let
me know if you think of one.....Once again I think GPL does just fine
here, you smack a car at high speed into a fence/wall and see what
happens, the car normally gets pretty mangled? Do you expect the car
to just bounce off so you can carry on? GPL is definitely not an
*arcade* game where you might see this happen.

Why do you put the game in accelerated time, (speeded up) then leave
the room for a while? Why not just pause the sim? or leave it in
*normal* speed? Would you "pop to the loo" if you were really
just about to race?

The real cars didn't have auto gears, the auto option is a driving aid
for those not so gifted drivers? Do you have a clutch on a real auto
gearbox? Why not try using manual?

If you crashed badly in real life, you would probably die? I know
which I'de prefer.......It is actually meant to indicate a tv camera
view, when you crash badly, the tv camera no longer works, simple.

IMHO, Sierra did the right thing by not including FF with GPL. I do
not think it adds a great deal in its present form, and can actually
detract from the feel of serious racing sims.

Hmmm, feels pretty good to me on grass, normally if I've crashed or
spun and am on the grass, I have little or no grip, and find it very
slow to get back on the track, I have to tip-toe carefully or the car
spins or slides all over the place? And gauges, they are actually
fairly accurate. Most cars did not (and still do not) have speedo's?
And the gauges do actually model engine temp, oil pressure, etc, so
they do provide a purpose too.

I thought you were using auto gears, so why worry what gear you are
in? And any decent driver should automatically know which gear he is
in at any point on the circuit (after some practice of course) and
generally doesn't need to look at the gear lever? But if I *do* look
at my gear lever, I can tell what gear I'm in, maybe its your graphics
card?

It will, keep trying.....(still wondering how you are down shifting
too much if using auto gears?)

I agree GP2 had great sound, but GPL's sound is good too? Not a
problem for me? (You can hear the opposition in GPL too, but
couldn't in GP2?)

ok.....

Agreed, so why are you giving it so much grief? Why not pick on one of
the other (even less perfect) games/sims....... And can you name me a
*perfect* game/sim?

Like I said, don't like GPL? Find it too hard? simple....Don't drive
it. It's *YOUR* choice.......

8-)

*Peter*   #:-)

The graphics are the smallest part of the work in GPL. And as the V2 is not
doing the triangle setup, it's only doing the rendering, but a big part of
the graphics setup is done by your lowly CPU. Live with it or upgrade...

l8er
ronny

--
How to get rid of censorship in German game releases
<http://www.gamesmania.com/german/maniac/freedom/freedom.htm>

          |\      _,,,---,,_        I want to die like my Grandfather,
   ZZZzz /,`.-'`'    -.  ;-;;,_              in his sleep.
        |,4-  ) )-,_. ,\ (  `'-'     Not like the people in his car,
       '---''(_/--'  `-'\_)            screaming their heads off!

I'm a designer and use G3 Macs so the PC is for games, web and spreadsheets
etc. At the moment the only real use for extra horsepower is more drivers in
GPL. I'm no tightwad just not a waster.

No problem here at all but they will lose thousands of sales for people not
wanting to upgrade yet. Not everyone is ready to dump a 200 - 300mhz machine
for one game.

Your suggesting I should.

That's like Unreal processing every creature just so it doesn't slow down
when they arrive. Maybe others will start doing that but I doubt it. In
reality the game needs to be MORE comprehensive not less. You don't question
scalable graphic options to allow for diferent machines so why is scalable
AI such a terrible idea?

In your opinion. I see lots of things that don't seem that advanced. re:
post concerning grass, collision detection etc.

The only game in existence that you can run in 1024x768 at 25fps but drops
to 5fps if you add opponents and you think I'm stupid for questioning it.
Can you imagine getting Half Life home to discover it ran perfect while you
ran around on your own but if you added enemies it was reduced to a crawl.
There would be a riot.

The box says 166 min spec and anyone would assume that it's graphics that
would suffer to up the framerate, not that you will have to drive alone in
order to make it playable. No where does it say 450 needed to have a race.

Dean