rec.autos.simulators

Marc

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Marc Collins

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They've had them at Media Play for a few days now.

George Adams

"From the rockin' of the cradle to the rollin' of the hearse, the goin' up was
worth the comin' down."
___Kris Kristofferson "The Pilgrim/Chapter 33"

1) Graphics-- The graphics have come a long way for sure. I don't think the
screen shots come out as well as the actual game. I have not checked the
track textures, but the cars have both 256 and 512 textures. So if your
graphics card has enough memory you will get some nice graphics. If your
still using a Voodoo 2/3 then you will be stuck with the 256 size.

2) Physics/Setups-- The physics seem much better, but still have the Ratbag
feel. The setups now work more like you'd think they would. You actually
want weight on the right rear now.

3) Sound-- Sounds are pretty good even compared to the updated sounds for
DTR done by Dave Harrison. The crash sounds are a little off, but hear the
dirt flying up into the body during a slide is pretty cool.

4) AI-- the AI feels a little better. I had one come up hit me square in the
back. Which moved me up and he dove under for the pass. I think they are
tougher to beat than DTR, but I have not come up with a fast setup up yet to
know for sure.

5) Damage-- The damage is not as odd as before. So far I have not got the
slight tap in the front that would kill the motor. From what I have seen so
far I would think you could actually use damage online now. Of course
finding a race that way will be the hard part

6) Multiplayer-- This may have be the one area that took a setup back, but I
have a theory on this. So far all I have been able to run is thru Gamespy.
DTR2 now has Gamespy built in like F12002 has. The warp seemed worse than
the older game, but being new there wasn't a whole lot of servers to choose
from and I think that 95% of them were on dial up. After F12002 and now DTR2
I'm wondering if the bad online play is do to having Gamespy working with in
the game.

7) Added Features-- There is now a Modified chassis as well as the
Pro-Stocks and Late Models. The modified looks like a DIRT mod, but has the
offset driving position of an IMCA mod. Another new feature is mud. Now you
actually get mud flung up on you when a car is in front. At first I was
afraid that the mud was gonna be kinda of a joke, but its actually pretty
well done. If your just following a car you don't get a;a lot, but let them
slide up in front and it starts flying. Get in a big pack on a wet track and
you better have you button for the tear offs ready to go.  Supposedly they
have increased the cheat detection. They even give you an option of turning
it off to speed up load times.

Thee are few odd things that I'm really not sure why they were done that way
they are. For example during quick race the game puts a sponsor on all the
cars even add-ons. This is ok with the original skins, but if you have a
custom painted one you still get the logos plastered over the top. So far
the only known way to get rid of it is to create a new chassis and edit it
out. If they would have made it part of the skin.str file it would have been
much better.

Overall  Scale 1-5

                           DTR2                    DTR
Graphics                4                           2.5
Physics                   3.5                        3
Online                    3                            3.5  (may be tied
into new Gamespy setup)
Sound                    3.5                         1.5
Fun Factor            4                              3.5
Overall                 4.5                            4

So if you liked the first one open that sucker up. For the $20 price to me
its the best bank for the buck in PC ***.

MadDAWG

-Larry

well of course. Thats part of the charm. :)  Of course a few well painted
skins can do wonders.

MadDAWG

I feel like Mad Max everytime I play a Ratbag game!

-Larry

The low resolutions of Ratbag's graphic engine (and the incredibly low
polygon count) make them look worse then the good old modified .dat file for
Nascar Racing 1 that made them look like dirt track cars.  Really, they had
more poly counts back then.  Look at the stretched out car paints, it's
amazingly ugly and amateur.

1995!

--
-- Fran?ois Mnard <ymenard>
-- http://ymenard.cjb.net/
-- This announcement is brought to you by the Shimago-Dominguez
Corporation - helping America into the New World...

    Pete

yep I tried it last night and its pretty cool. not as great o an improvment
as the original was, but thats just because the current game is better.

MadDAWG