F1GP/WC QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
WHAT MACHINES IS IT AVAILABLE FOR?
The game was first released on the Amiga and ST with the PC version
following around a year later. The Amiga and ST versions can both
be run
of disk and do not need hard drive installation.
GB: As far as I know there are two version of the game for the PC,
F1GP
on floppies, which is supplied on 4 high density disks with
optional
upgrade disks, and F1GP on CD, which is EXACTLY the same game but
on a
silver disk. Do not buy this unless you don't have a floppy drive,
since
it costs more and has no extra features. Quite what MicroProse is
playing at is unknown, but the CD version represents bad value for
your
money.
The game is now reissued by Digital Integration on the PowerPlus
budget
label.
DG: Having played both the Amiga and PC versions, I noticed some
important differences. First, some of the tracks are physically
different, Monaco and Imola at least. Second, perhaps because of
the low
frame rate or different control routines, the car is much, much
harder
to set up on the Amiga than the PC; it's very hard to feel whether
the
car has any under- or oversteer. It's also much harder to time the
turn-in points properly, as Ivanhoe's explanation of frame rates
above
predicts.
WHAT SORT OF PERFORMANCE CAN I EXPECT ON MY PC?
Here is a rough table of machine against performance:
CPU MHz Memory Detail Occupancy FPS
-----------------------------------
P5 100 8MB 4d T 33% 25fps (Squirty's w/ D.Stealth 24 2MB
VRAM)
P5 90 24MB 4d T 37% 25fps (Gizmo's tower of power w/ PCI
K64)
P5 90 24MB 4d T 90% 50fps (Gizmo's tower of power w/ PCI
K64)
486DX2/66 8MB 4d T 70% 25fps (Gizmo's Linux box w/ VLB CL5428)
486DX2/66 4MB 4d T 60% 25fps
486DX2/66 32MB 4d T 53% 25fps (Pete F's Dan4Win w/ Spea V7 VLB)
486DX2/66 ? 4d T 70% 25fps (MBP's under OS/2)
486DX 33 ? 4d T 90% 25fps (Graham A's)
486DX2/66 16MB 4d NT 35% 25fps (Nigel Bovey's)
486SX 33 4MB 4d NT 66% 25fps
486DX2/50 24MB 4d NT 95% 25fps (Paul Smyth's w/ ISA ET4000-W32)
486SX 25 4MB 4d NT 100% 25fps (a DELL)
486SX 25 ? 4d NT 80% 25fps (Nightshade's oldie)
486SX 25 4MB 4d NT 100% 23fps (Ben Lester's)
486SX 25 2MB 4d NT 100% 21fps
386DX 40 4MB 4d NT 100% 20fps
386DX 40 2MB 4d NT 100% 20fps (possibly optimistic)
486DX2/50 24MB 4d NT 100% 18fps (Paul Smyth's w/ ISA S3-924)
386DX 33 8MB 4d NT 100% 17fps (Gizmo's old faithful w/ T8900CL)
386SX 20 2MB 1d NT 100% 15fps (Max Behara's)
386SX 25 2MB 4d NT 100% 14fps (Stingray's)
386SX 20 2MB 4d NT 100% 8fps (Max Behara's)
It appears that as long as you have at least 2mb of RAM, the actual
amount makes absolutely no difference. The difference between the
DX2/66s above is attributable to graphics card alone; see the
difference
between Paul Smyth's machine with two different graphics cards
installed. DG: IMHO if you have a 486SX/25 or better with a VLB or
PCI
graphics card you should be able to crank the frame rate right up
without texture; a 486DX2/50 or better will add texture without any
penalty. A 486DX2/66 should be able to do linked play at 25fps,
possibly
with detail cranked down a bit, and a Pentium 75 or faster is pure
heaven. (Lots of memory is useful, for logging data to a RAMdrive
when
using the GPPerf and GPLap TSRs.)
The details level is shown by the amount of detail around the
track, 1d
being the lowest level and 4d the highest, the other detail option
is
the track shading, this is shown by T (track shading on), NT (no
track
shading). The average processor occupancy is as you go around any
track.
This is just a rough estimate, since tracks can vary quite a lot
(Phoenix and Hockenheim are quite stressful, with lots of buildings
and
tress), but the occupancy really shouldn't go above 100% very much.
The
final column show the speed in frames per pecond that this set-up
allows.
Even on similar machines, several things will affect speed. A
machine
with some external cache will outperform one without; the actual
amount
of cache is probably not going to make much difference. Graphics
card
performance also makes a big difference; a local bus card will run
much
faster that an ISA card, and some cards have better DOS performance
than
others (Cirrus Logic based cards are good, ET4000 and derivatives
are
even better; VLB and PCI cards will be much faster than ISA ones).
The general consensus seem to be that people would rather have it
running smoother, but with less detail, this shows one of the main
advantages of F1GP over IndyCar, in that it runs quickly on a slow
machine and smooth graphics are possible quite easily.
The Amiga version runs at a similar speed regardless of the
machine's
capacity, about 3-8 fps, depending on circuit and level of detail,
even
in the fastest 68060 system. (The latest F1GP-Ed and also
F1GP-Patch can
alter this, at a compatability cost.)
Does the performance vary on an ST? Mail me if it does.
So how does this affect lap times?
Short answer: it doesn't.
Long answer: it doesn't... directly. DG is in the fortunate
position of
having both a P90 and a 386DX/33 on his desk (well, okay, the 386
is
under the desk...), and loaded identical copies of the game up on
both
machines. The first and most obvious difference was that the game
does
not do a good job of matching "real time" (measured on a stopwatch
during laps on qualifying tyres at Monaco). The first tests were
done on
the 386. With 100% to 130% occupancy, the game's timer runs slow,
being
about three seconds behind reality. With all the detail turned off
and
the occupancy down to about 70% to 110%, it was about three seconds
ahead of reality. With the frame rate reduced and occupancy between
45%
and 75%, it was about 4 seconds behind. Then testing moved to the
P90.
With maximum detail and about 33% to 44% occupancy, the timer was
about
4 seconds fast.
Now, here's the crunch. Despite these differences, the lap times
reported by the game were very close, all in the 1:14.4 range. The
game
was noticeably easier to play at higher frame rates and lower
occupancies. However, with very high occupancies (more than 200%,
such
as on the 386 with texture turned on), the difference from real
time
becomes very noticeable; the whole game runs in slow motion, and is
potentially easier to play as you get much longer to react. Ivanhoe
Vasiljevich came up with the superb (and very lightly edited)
explanation below.
[...] a high frame rate [as opposed to occupancy] may have its
advantages (my opinion, not proven!):
Using a frame rate of 25 fps means that you have 25 possibilities
to
perform an action (eg. braking, accelerating) every second,
whereas
driving with 16 fps only allows you 16 `slots' per second, to
brake,
for example.
Assuming that a typical braking maneuver begins at 300 km/h (188
mph), this equals a speed of 83 m/s, so that at 25 fps you can
take
action (brake) every 3.3 m as opposed to every 5.2 m when using
16
fps. (Using an even lower frame rate naturally worsens the
situation. At 8 fps the distance between two points of action is
10.3 m!) During a normal lap including many braking maneuvers,
this
may affect the overall performance, not to mention techniques
like
pulsing the throttle.
In my opinion it would be best to turn off as much detail as
necessary and increase the frame rate as high as possible. (It
may
not look as cool, but honestly, who has got the time to enjoy the
beautiful panorama when chasing a new lap record?)
However, since the game's physics model is imperfect (after all,
it's
just a model), playing at different frame rates will reveal slight
differences in certain circumstances. Here's a short test done for
the
LFRS championship:
I ran three tests, each consisting of two laps round Mexico City.
Each test was at a different frame rate, and each lap was
consistent
with the other. I looked at the entry and exit speeds for the
Peralta (the final, awesome corner). All tests were done using
GPLap
5 to remove any randomized BHP or AI grip effects, under version
1.05, on a 90 MHz, 24MB Pentium, with a 1MB DRAM Orchid Kelvin 64
PCI graphics card.
Test 1. Frame rate: 25 FPS. Entry: 189 mph, exit: 190 mph. Gain
of 1
mph in corner.
Test 2. Frame rate: 18.7 FPS. Entry: 189 mph, exit: 188 mph. Loss
of
1 mph in corner.
Test 3. Frame rate: 13 FPS. Entry: 188 mph, exit: 186 mph. Loss
of 2
mph in corner and 1 mph before entry.
Probably one could also find example situations where 13 FPS or
18.7 FPS
were optimal and 25 FPS went slower.
Can I boost the frame rate?
You can boost the frame rate beyond the option screen maximum of 25
FPS
by using the GPFPS editor. More information is in the General
Information under the PC Editors section.
WHY DOES THE INSTALLATION FAIL ON THE PC?
When installing the game unpacks some large files. On a fragmented
hard
disk there might not be a large enough free block for them and the
Installation will crash with a very unhelpful message. Just run a
defragmenter on the hard drive, such as Norton Speed Disk or the
one
supplied with MS-DOS 6, the game should then install no problem.
You can
also try disabling SmartDrive, since it is reported to create
problems
too.
Another potential problem pointed out to me is that the game copies
all
the Data files onto hard disk before decompressing them, and this
effectively doubles the amount of space it uses at installation
time, so
make sure you have plenty of free hard disk space, as this will
cure
both this problem and the one above.
WHY DOES THE FADE BETWEEN SCREENS TAKE SO LONG?
We don't know, but it's awful isn't it? DG: On the Amiga I believe
there
is a patch to help cure this; on the PC I run from a Windows DOS
box
with the Exclusive option selected, which for some reason speeds it
up.
I think it must have something to do with timer emulation because
under
Windows/NT I have Hardware Timer Emulation turned on and it fades
slowly
again. Version 1.03 and earlier on the PC seem to use a different
fading
technique to later versions (bitmapped rather than palette) which
is
faster on faster machines. The Technical FAQ has some C source to
remove
the fading on the PC.
WHY DOES THE GAME SOMETIMES SLOW DOWN?
The graphics for generating the pit-lane are quit complex and so
your
occupancy will always rise when in the pits, though this isn't
usually
too much of a problem. The only other place where the game seems to
slow
is the back straight at Phoenix and the second straight at
Hockenheim.
The slow down at Phoenix is probably due to the large buildings it
has
to draw, the one at Hockenheim because of the number of trees. Turn
down
the detail if you notice a slowdown and don't like it.
WHY DOESN'T IT SAVE MY LAP RECORDS & SETUPS?
Qualifying records are only saved after a complete event; if you
aren't
interested in the race, you must still go to it, then immediately
press
escape and accelerate time. After a quick race, you must wait wait
until
it says "race over" and goes to the post-race menu. In both cases
you
will be able to select the "lap records" option and should see
"(Record)" in yellow under any new records. Race records set in
races
shorter than 100% distance will not count. To actually save them
for
posterity, you must exit to the main menu, go to "load/save game",
and
select "save track records". On the Amiga, you must load them by
hand
every time you start the game; on the PC, there is an option called
"startup files" which allows you to load names, setups, and records
when
the game loads. Sadly, it will not save them automatically; you
should
make sure you save any the records and setups if you have changed
them
before you exit the game.
WHAT IS THE BEST CONTROLLER METHOD?
On the Amiga, keyboard or digital joystick seems best.
On the PC, keyboard seems to be preferred by many of the top
drivers,
with analog joystick coming a close second. DG: The professional
wheel
systems (such as the T1 or ACP) don't seem to work wonderfully.
I've had
a few success stories but many people go back to the keyboard!
Javier Vizcaino provided the following information about using
radio
control units with the game.
It is [...] possible to change a transmitter used in radio
control
(R/C) to turn it into a PC joystick, and play F1GP. I've modified
a
few, and let me tell you that there is nothing similar to drive
with
these devices.
He also provides some information about PC game ports which help a
few
folks out. Note that if you're going to play games on a PC with a
joystick, you really should invest in either a decent soundcard
with
credible joystick ports [DG: my Gravis UltraSound is pretty good,
and my
SoundBlaster 16 also seems reliable a drift-free] or a dedicated
game
card.
About the game port, this is what happens. Game ports on the PC
can
be full (the initial good ones with a 558, still found on SB
cards
at least, four pots and four buttons), or half (cheaper chinese
solution, two pots and two buttons, simple joysticks). F1GP goes
well on a half port. The problem is that there are a lot of multi
I/O boards with Winbond chips including a half game port which
presents the missing buttons pressed. When F1GP starts
calibrating
the joystick, it stops till seeing the four buttons released (it
can't know if your game port is full or half); with the above
board,
calibration doesn't start, and you have to abort it with the ESC
key. So if calibrating the joystick the game seems to freeze till
you press ESC, may be you have this problem. Check with DEBUG:
i201;
if you see bits 7-6 at 0, the game port presents the third and
fourth buttons pressed.
WHAT IS THE SOUND LIKE ON A SOUNDBLASTER ETC?
Not all that much better unfortunately if anything the PC speaker
is
more irritating and thus more realistic! The Amiga sound is
reported to
be quite good with a good use of stereo, and the ST is as bad as
the PC!
The SoundBlaster support was improved considerably in versions
later
than 1.01, but is still quite poor.
DG: The Amiga sounds good even through a TV. The PC with 1.05 and a
SoundBlaster is okay if you turn it up real loud, but not a patch
on the
Amiga. A PC with MT-32 or other MIDI is pathetic, but the music is
better. *sigh* I don't know about the ST, but I'd guess it's better
than
a PC speaker and nowhere near as good as the Amiga.
HOW DO I MAKE THE (PC) GAME MORE CHALLENGING?
Aside from using the editor to speed up the opposition, the easiest
ways
to make the game more difficult are to turn of Traction and
Steering
Help, both of these options are listed off the Games Control menu,
in
the Accelerating and Steering menus respectively. With these off
the
game becomes a good deal harder, but it still leaves a lot to be
desired.
Several top Hall Of Fame drivers, both on the PC and Amiga, report
that
driving with Traction Help off, whilst harder, also improves lap
times
at many circuits.
I AM BORED WITH THE GAME, WHAT NOW?
Well it has to happen eventually, so what now? You could join one
of the
championships on the Net and learn to really hate the game or try
either
of these two very sad games...
Dodgems
The basic idea behind this one is to make your car indestructible
and
then wipe out the opposition as fast as possible. Top tip, go
backwards
quickly. This is fun for about 30 minutes whilst you do each of the
tracks and marvel at the difference of the courses when viewed from
the
other direction.
Jumping
A particularly rubbish game this, but set your cars up for no
down-force
and then drive over the rumble strip and become air borne and see
how
far you can get. Remember to save the games as you land so you can
show
off to your friends and family...
IS THERE A DIFFERENCE IN CAR PERFORMANCE?
With the performance set to Random or 1991 Levels the cars do vary
in
speed, except for the car you are driving. For this reason there is
no
point in choosing car No 1, just because it should be 10% faster
like
real life since the performance of human cars is always the same,
modulo
the BHP degredation mentioned previously.
WHY IS THE AI (ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE) SO RUBBISH?
Who knows, but it reeks doesn't it? There seems to be no real way
to
cope with this, except to learn what the other cars do, and avoid
any of
there stupid overtaking maneuvers. This is the main area that the
game
falls down in, since everything else has been really well written.
One of the areas in which to pay most attention is the pit lane,
since
the computer cars will quite happily pull out in front of you as
you do
150 mph down the lane and so cause a collision. Conversely, watch
your
mirrors as you pull out since they appear quite quickly if you are
in
the last pit.
On the track, they basically follow the ideal line unless
slipstreaming.
If you can get your front wheels ahead of theirs they do move over
so
perfect your drafting technique!
WHY AREN'T THERE EXTENSION DISKS?
At the moment there are no extension disks available and none are
likely
to become available, this is not through any fault of MicroProse,
but
due to the strict licensing agreements with FIA, who are in charge
of
the licensing of Grand Prix related material. MicroProse only
bought the
rights to the 1991 season so that tracks will have to stay at that
level.
WHO ARE THE DRIVERS MEANT TO BE, AND WHY AREN'T THEY?
The game comes supplied with a set of names which bear almost no
relation to the actual drivers names. This is because the drivers
would
probably want to be paid for there names, so MicroProse took the
cheaper
and more sensible option. The names that are supplied are meant to
sound
like names from the same country as the real driver, hence Carlos
Sanchez instead of Ayrton Senna. The correct list of names can be
found
at the end of the supplement to the game, and the names for 1993/94
season can be found on the Rec.Autos.Sport.F1 newsgroup.
CIRCUITS
Which circuit does it default to around the world?
Well, on the European version it selects Silverstone as the default
GP
if English language is chosen, Magny Cours if French is the
language,
and if the language is German it chooses Hockenheim, so it looks
like it
depends on what country you live in! Hence World Circuit uses
Phoenix
and the Italian version chooses Monza.
What are the best circuits?
This is a scored listing of the tracks as posted by readers of the
amigaf1gp mailing list and rec.autos.simulators. This vote is now
closed; Monte Carlo is the clear winner, not a great surprise!
Race Qualifying Total
1 Monte Carlo 41 1 Monte Carlo 40 1 Monte Carlo
81
2 Magny Cours 34 2 Mexico City 36 2 Mexico City
68
3 Spa 33 3 Hockenhiem 35 3 Imola
64
4 Imola 32 4 Adelaide 34 4 Hockenhiem
51
==Mexico City 32 5 Imola 32 ==Magny Cours
51
6 Monza 31 6 Silverstone 23 6 Spa
50
7 Interlagos 20 7 Suzuka 20 7 Monza
49
8 Suzuka 19 8 Monza 18 8 Adelaide
47
9 Hockenhiem 16 9 Spa 17 9 Suzuka
39
10 Adelaide 13 ==Magny Cours 17 10 Silverstone
35
11 Silverstone 12 11 Montreal 12 11 Interlagos
21
12 Phoenix 10 12 Estoril 7 ==Montreal
21
13 Montreal 9 13 Phoenix 5 13 Phoenix
15
14 Barcelona 3 14 Hungaroring 3 14 Estoril
7
15 Estoril 0 15 Interlagos 1 15 Barcelona
3
==Hungaroring 0 16 Barcelona 0 ==Hungaroring
3
Scoring: the top four tracks score 5, 4, 3, 1 points, with the most
hated getting a 1 point penalty.
Is there a track editor?
No, nor is there ever likely to be one. DG: I did hear rumors that
someone had turned Mexico into an oval, but don't have any more
details.
I'M IN LOVE WITH THE AUTHOR, WHO IS HE?
The author of the game is Geoff Crammond, he has been responsible
for
most of the innovative games to appear in the auto simulation
world, he
previously wrote the original version of Revs for the BBC Micro. It
was
based on Formula 3 racing at Silverstone (the old circuit without
the
Vale complex and with the chicane at Woodcote) and was developed
with
help from David Hunt (James Hunt's brother), who was racing in
British
F3 at the time. The track was quite accurately reproduced and the
game
played quite quickly. The game had practice, qualifying and race
sessions like F1GP, but it didn't have pits and you started your
practice and qualifying sessions out on the track! There was also
an
expansion pack released which contained four other British tracks,
Oulton Park, Snetterton, Donington Park, and Brands Hatch. Revs was
also
released on the Commodore 64.
He then wrote Stunt Car Racer for the Amiga/ST (and the PC,
although the
conversion is reported to be poor: 4 color EGA only; the port was
apparantly not done by Crammond) which was as it's name suggests
was a
stunt car racing game. The main aim of the game was to race another
stunt car around an elevated circuit, trying not to fall off.
Getting in
your way were large gaps in the circuit which had to be jumped by
hitting a ramp at the right speed. Too slow and you went down the
hole,
too fast and you cracked the chassis. When the chassis was fully
cracked, your race was over. The best part about this game was the
two
player serial option which allowed you to push your mates off the
track.
The rest of the programming team seems to be members of his close
family! The only other name that jumps out is that of Pete Cook who
wrote some of the best games on the Sinclair ZX Spectrum.
Interestingly
he was involved with the game Grand Prix from CRL, which attempted
to
simulate the management of a GP team. It was very simple but great
fun.
Outside of auto racing games, Crammond also made an excellent 3D
game
called The Sentinel, for Spectrum, C64, Amiga, Atari, etc, and it
was a
very nice idea. You were in a landscape, absorbing some objects,
teleporting from one place to the other, always trying to be out of
sight of a sentinel that was guarding the landscape. The goal was
to
have enough energy to climb higher then the sentinel (you were able
to
build little platforms) and absorb him and take his place. There
were
people who didn't like the game, but those who liked it were
addicted to
it. It would be nice to see the game in Virtual Reality, it would
be
easy to write.
WHAT DO THE REAL DRIVERS THINK?
There have been two drivers who have commented on the game, they
are
Oliver Gavin, and Derek Warwick. Gavin is a top F3 driver who,
according
to MicroProse, played the game on a friends Amiga before the race
at
Spa, and the went on to win it!
"Because part of the circuit is on the public road, Oliver
couldn't
practice on the circuit", explains Geoff, "so he used F1GP to
learn
the track, took pole position and won the race."
Derek Warwick on the other hand drove for the F1 team
Arrows/Footwork
(who helped write the game!) and gave it a glowing write up in
Autosport
Magazine, just before the Canadian GP (the 10 June 1993 issue).
There
was also an interview with the Footwork engineers. He gave some lap
times but they were very poor, and he had to drive with full help.
This
provoked a spate of letters to the magazine from people asking for
his
job, including the following, from the 17 June 1993 issue:
GIZAJOB
I read last week's Canadian Grand Prix preview - about Footwork
Formula 1's computer game - with interest.
I have been playing the game for several months now and was
delighted to read how accurate it is. Allen McDonald claimed he
could lap Montreal in 1m19s. Well I can lap in 1m17.627s so does
this mean I can take Derek Warwick's place if ever he feels like
having the weekend off.
J Mosley
Sheffield, Yorkshire
Also, a Canadian driver contacted him to say how accurate the
Montreal
course was.
WHAT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WC AND F1GP?
There seems to be no difference apart from the name, with the
version
numbers staying consistent with each other. The only difference is
the
loading screens (see separate question).
What are the WC gif files?
These files are used in the US version of GP, known as World
Circuit.
WHY DO I NOT SEEM TO BE ABLE TO GO SO QUICK SOME DAYS?
The game randomly degrades the player's car's horsepower from its
default of 716BHP, presumably to simulate changing track
conditions. The
latest GPLap (version 5.0) fixes this.
WHY DOES THE CAR STEER ITSELF SOMETIMES?
This effect is most noticeable in the pits, when the car is pulled
into
the correct lane as you drive past, though the computer 'aids' you
steering as you go round every course. The reason for this is the
Steering Help option set in the Game Controls, Steering, menu. This
feature is there to help users who driver using the keyboard or a
standard joystick, since they find it hard to make slight course
adjustments. The only way to disable this feature in a race is to
put
the car in the 'turning gear' you can then steer the car anywhere
you
want in the pits etc, thought quite why you would want to...
HOW ARE THE PIT BAYS ALLOCATED?
This is more of a general GP question than specific to the game,
but the
pits are given out according to the team's position in the previous
years constructors championship. There seems to be a bit of a bug
in the
game when you drive for the top team, in that at some courses it is
very
hard to get into the pit bay correctly! The corner is too sharp and
with
the steering help on, you almost always over shoot. DG: Can't say
as
I've noticed this, but then again I slow down on the pit lane like
you're supposed too.
One correspondant reports that he is working on a patch to alter
the
pit-bay allocation.
WHAT HAPPENS IF I OVERSHOOT MY PIT?
To put it simply, you cannot over shoot your pit (unless steering
help
is turned off) the computer will always try and pull you in. This
means
that you can be parked at very strange angles, but this does not
seem to
hurt your stop time, though the get-away may become more difficult!
(Of
course, some people would consider this cheating!)
One correspondant reports:
I've overshot the pit at Monza. The pit entrance is very straight
and you can build up enough speed so that the game won't actually
stop you.
LINKED PLAY
Why doesn't the modem play work?
If you own the Amiga or Atari ST version then you are out of luck
since
the modem support never appeared on either of these versions, the
PC
game is the only version with the support.
There is no modem support on the first version (1.01) but this was
added
on the updates 1.04 and 1.05, the link option needs two quite fast
machine to work well, on 386SX it is almost unplayable, and the
slowest
machine dictates the speed of the other machines; on a 386DX you'll
probably need a 16550 UART to get acceptable performance. If the
game
seems to pause a lot or you get regular (but not constant) link
data
mismatches, try reducing the frame rate on the slower machine by
30% or
more.
You should also be aware that if one of you has altered your
gp.exein
anyway (either by a patch or a TSR), then you must both be running
identical games. This means that:
The AI BHP, grip, peformances levels, and the player BHP, must all
match. The colors of the cars can be different (but of course
if
they aren't you may end up confused!).
Both gp.exes must have been patched (or not) in identical ways with
such
tools as GPFlags, GPBHP, WCF1GP, and other editors.
You should both run GPLap v5 or not (since this affects player BHP
and
grip).
If you use CCPit, make sure you both run with identicalparameters.
If you are also using the timesliced multiplayer feature, be sure
to
select the same number of players on both machines. If you
cannot or
do not want to, you cannot use CCPit.
If you forget any of these, you will almost certainly get "data
link
mismatch" errors. The best policy is to copy the gp.exe from one
machine
to the other, and also a batch file which is used to load the TSRs
and
start the game.
What are these modem menus?
On the PC, if you hex edit the .EXE file from version 1.00 you will
find
some references to modems and COM links, these menus are not
enabled and
you will have to upgrade to access the link option.
Can I play across a real network?
No. Neither IPX nor TCP/IP are supported; only the COM ports may be
used.
If you have a dialup connection to the Internet, you may be able to
use
the Internet Head-to-Head Daemon (IHHD) to play with someone on the
net.
You can find more details in ftp://cactus.org/pub/IHHD/.
In theory, one could use a null-modem cable to loop the COM ports
on two
machines together, and write a TSR which would transfer bytes
between
the network card and the COM port which isn't selected in the game.
So
far, nobody has reported trying this.
We tried to reload a saved game and it went nuts!
It appears that there are a couple of nasty "gotchas" in the linked
play
code. Doug Reichley takes up the story (slighted edited; Doug was
unsurprisingly rather annoyed about this)...
There is a bug in the linked code that is a real bitch. It
involves
having only one or none drivers (ie human) in the race.
In other words, both human drivers must be actively racing or you
will get a data mismatch error when the game is reloaded.
Obviously,
this is only if you reload the game during a race and one or both
of
the human drivers have crashed out.
This nasty little [bug] bit my friend and I over the past
weekend.
It was Monza and we were both trying to catch Schu who was
running
away with the championship (we have the AI turned up quite a
bit).
My friend crashed out real early. My car had so much oversteer
that
I was run down by the AI and passed for the lead [...]. I got
really
frustrated and crashed myself out as well.
Just as I crashed out, the modem link disconnected. I dutifully
saved the game as I exited the screen. When we reloaded this game
later, it gave us a mismatch error. There goes the season. The
latest saved game we had was for Belgium, but we had both crashed
out of that as well (however, the race finished, therefore, the
mismatch bug was eluded).
Well, we tried to reload the bad game with the mismatch from
Monza,
but it still had the error. We then selected to restart (the race
in
Monza), however, the 2nd bug came about. This time, he was me and
I
was he. This was quite interesting because both of our files said
we
were selected as ourselves. What was more strange was that,
obviously, I was in his car and he was in mine. In other words,
my
joystick controlled his car and his mine. When I hit N on my
computer, it said I was him.
Well, we tried to drive each others cars and ended up crashing
out
anyway. Needless to say, we just accelerated the rest of the
season,
handing the title over to Schu.
The moral of the story: if one, or both, human drivers crash out,
make sure that you finish the race! Do not save a game with only
one
human driver or else when it is reloaded, you will get mismatch
errors.
Is there any way to connect two computers other than null modem cable?
Javier Vizcaino suggested the following alternative method of
connection,
You can play F1GP (and other games) through a direct connection,
informing the game you are connected "Direct", and having a modem
at
each end. You establish the connection through a communication
package,
or from the DOS prompt, before entering the game. The link is done
from
modem to modem, through a direct telephone cable, with RJ-11
connectors
at each end. This has some advantages:
Easier cable than a null modem. You can have it built at a
telephone
shop. It can also be much longer than an RS232 cable.
No galvanic isolation to care about.
You can play with your neighbour, and talk with him at the time
through
the phone.
With external modems, you can observe F1GP exchanging packets.
Some computer/modem fun, without paying the phone call.
Of couse, there are some disadvantages:
A modem is needed at each end. But if you already have the
modems...
A more complex connection (probably some debugging/experimenting
needed).
Procedure:
Have the modems (2400+) connected at each end to COM1-COM4. If you
use
COM3-COM4 make sure you use IRQ4-IRQ3: F1GP doesn't recognize
other
hardware interrupts there.
Establish the connection: modems on leased line (we won't dial),
with
one modem calling and the other answering. This may be done:
With a communication program: set the port, set the baud rate,
connect
to the modem, inform leased line, make one answer and the other
call. Exit the program maintaining the connection.
From the DOS prompt. Edit a batch program at each site:
Calling modem:
mode com1:96,n,8,1
echo at&l1d>com1
Answering modem:
mode com1:96,n,8,1
echo at&l1a>com1
(Check if this is correct: I write without the DOS manual). Execute
the
programs and listen to the modems. Adapt the batch to your
requirements
and to your modems. Disable MNP/V42/V42bis (error
correction/compression).
Enter F1GP and make the program believe you have a "Direct"
connection.
Of course, inform of the same COM ports and baud rate than
before.
Note that you can change the PC initiating the connection,
since the
link was done previously. Connect on both sides. F1GP should
exchange packets and establish the connection.
If you try this, pass on your experiences to
jvizc...@colibri.tid.es
(Javier Vizcaino).
WARP SPEED?
John Robert Cole writes concerning edited GP.EXEs with enormous
horsepower settings (most editors can only go up to 999; in fact
because
of the way it's stored internally, it's possible to push it up to
1432
BHP). John calls this "warp speed" but I prefer to think of it as
"wrap
speed"; read on and you'll understand.
This is the where you can push the computer cars to their limit,
and
they literally explode. What I can figure out is the program never
expects the AI cars to go over a limit of 394 km/h, but if this
occurence happens their speed is instantaneously reset to zero. So
think
about this scenario your happily pushing Nigel Mansell down the
straights of Hockenheim at around 400 km/h, he hit's WARP SPEED!
but
your still doing 400km/h so the logical thing for the program to do
is
destroy his car. Funny maybe for the first time but thats about it.
Also it's interesting to go up alonside a driver while doing over
400km/h and clipping their wheels just enough to make them hit warp
speed and make them dissapear into distance.
[DG: I believe the exact speed is 411km/h, which is 256mph, since
255 is
the largest value a single byte can hold, so 256 becomes 0.]
WHAT HAPPENS WHEN I RESTART FROM A SAVED GAME?
Firstly, you can view a "replay" of the events just before you
saved the
game. So, a saved game is actually what is meant when people talk
about
"replays" in F1GP.
Next, the game will not let you avoid some things by restarting a
race.
For example, if the race is wet, reloading, even before free
practice,
will not avoid the rain. (It is possible to do something about this
with
some of the Amiga editors, but not yet on the PC.)
Also, one correspondant has reported that pit stop times stay
constant
too. If you are in a race, save the game, then pit, and get a bad
stop
time, reloading will not help you.
Christian Peper aka Dreams Email: j.c.a.pe...@research.kpn.com
PAV B38, +31-50-58(21054), KPN Research, the Netherlands
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