rec.autos.simulators

Wow!
CMR is a truely great game. The car and track physics are superb. It's
even got a Rally School to teach you how to drive rally style, handbrake
and all. Wonderful. Now I just have to learn how to master it.
Paul

What kind of game is this? Is there a demo to find somewhere?

--

If you want to reply to me in person, please replace nospam with swipnet in
my address.

Best regards,

Richard

I agree almost.
The game is fantastic, the physics aren't GPL quality, but the gameplay is
just awesome.
I would rate this as the best racing game since Grand Prix came out on the
Amiga and I am a big racing game fanatic.

I want to take back what I said about the physics. Once you get off the
track CMR's a bit ropey. You seem to be able to drive through trees, and you
ought to turn over when you do some of the things you do. Still, it's a lot
of fun but definitely an arcade offering,
Paul

I'm tellin ya those guys at Codemasters really have the whole package about
racing down for the general public. Toca never got the praise it deserved at
how great multiplayer racing was with it, by far the best much better than
GPL in that term no question. And CM is just an extension of that.

BH

Sorry Mark, you know I don't mean to offend. I probably overstated it - after a
couple of hours of intensly technical GPLing, CMR seemed too easy - I fear that
Codemasters may have made the gameplay easier because they got so many people
saying TOCA was too hard. I didn't find this with TOCA - it was hard from the
start and got easier with practice. I like CMR very much. It's light years ahead
of Screamer, RAC Rally Championship and International Rally Championship for
ground physics, car dynamics, graphics, sounds, general realism and almost
everything else. But I disagree that the cars handle as well as TOCA. I haven't
got on to expert mode yet and I suspect that it's better in that, but I feel that
in intermediate mode the cars are rather easy to get out of trouble. On the road
it seems to handle pretty well (is there a rally driver out there who could tell
us?) But off track, I'm not so sure. Charging along in a muddy field ought to do
serious things to your grip, I ought to get stuck and have to get the car towed
out, but I found that I'm able to race along pretty fast over what looks like a
bog. When you catch a bank full-tilt you hear a thud but your speed is not much
affected - in TOCA you just can't drive through obstacles. If you have a collision
you car will react reasonably appropriately (except that it recovers after the
crash - how I long for a real damage model in TOCA2). When you lose the car on the
outside of a corner down an adverse camber bank (like 30 degrees) you ought to
lose just a little traction - well enough to turn the car over, I would think.
When you drive into a six foot bush the car shouldn't behave as if nothing has
happened. When you strike a tree full on you shouldn't be able to continue in the
same direction - I would have thought that the car would grind to a sickening halt
pretty soon afterwards.
So is expert mode better? - knowing Codemasters, yes it probably is, but I would
rather start off at that level. Who's got to expert level and how did they do it
and are there any short cuts?
That I have to muck around to get into expert mode and get to the extra cars etc
etc is what makes this short of the full ten bob note. Look, I paid my money, I
want the full experience and now - I don't want to have to earn. At least with
TOCA, you could ignore all this nonsense so long as you knew the JHAMMO cheat, and
the road handling was actually very well modelled indeed - as you yourself have
conceded, together will a whole load of top TCC drivers. I would like to see what
the top rally drivers make of CMR. Maybe I'm way out here, but I have to say that
the game lacks the precision handling necessary for TOCA.
The graphics are great (love the way the suspension looks) and the ***
experience is excellent.
Paul

TOCA, GPL and CMR are 3 completely different and very good products. I don't
think it's possible to say one is better than another - it's like saying oranges
are better than apples, but bananas are crap. I like all three and for different
reasons,
Paul

I like TOCA a whole lot...however, the net play left a lot to be
desired.  I tried it twice...with 2 different people, and the warping
was an absolute nightmare.  I have ISDN, so bandwidth wasn't an issue.
Two tries was enough.

GPL on the other hand, has excellent net play.  I've raced with over a
dozen people at a time, and it was wonderful.  I saw some warping but
it was minor, and I assume that modem connections were the cause of
the occasional warp.

--

Neil Yeatman          
Ajax, Ontario, CANADA

% I like TOCA a whole lot...however, the net play left a lot to be
% desired.  I tried it twice...with 2 different people, and the warping
% was an absolute nightmare.  I have ISDN, so bandwidth wasn't an issue.
% Two tries was enough.

% GPL on the other hand, has excellent net play.  I've raced with over a
% dozen people at a time, and it was wonderful.  I saw some warping but
% it was minor, and I assume that modem connections were the cause of
% the occasional warp.

I don't really think the modem connections would necessarily be the
culprit.  More than likely the warpers were further down the stream from
the host and thus their ping (latency) rate was too high.   It would
look like we may need "regional" hosts to allow full fields to help cut
down on warping.  Even then it may not work since some people's ISP may
go through a different cloud or two before they meet up with the host's.

--
**************************** Michael E. Carver *************************
     Upside out, or inside down...False alarm the only game in town.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=<[ /./.  [-  < ]>=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

I've raced TOCA on a direct telephone line on TOCA's own modem to modem protocol,
IPX and TCP/IP. The first one was great with almost no warping (almost as good as
LAN play) but with the other two the warping was nearly as bad as with internet
which really surprised me. We used Windows95/98 dial-up networking to connect the
two boxes with TCP/IP and IPX. I can't understand this - I can only guess that the
computer-computer connections suck out a lot of the bandwidth.
Paul

Well, I think offering kids a phone number with charges simillar to sex
lines is
the worst thing, any game developer has ever done. OTOH, the stupid copy
protection
pisses me off even more. Can't run the "game" on my new system, getting
the dialog
"only with original CD". Code"master", get your act together!

l8er
ronny

--
Toys'R'Us '99: "So, would you like a hand gun with that action figure,
kiddo?"

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