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 you know._
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 486DX/66 on his desk and a 386DX/33 under
it, 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. This is what happens when you
simulate a continuous system with a discrete model; you get rounding
errors.
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. However, this turns out to be a bad
idea because the game can and up quite badly confused. On the Amiga,
the nasty side effects are more subtle; the general consensus is that
it's okay to boost the frame rate from 8 to 10 frames per second.
Visit the Amiga F1 web page to find some editors which can do this
(see the "index" article).
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 DOESN'T THE GAME WORK UNDER WINDOWS 95?
WHY DOES THE GAME EXIT IMMEDIATELY BEFORE EVEN THE TITLE SCREEN?
The answer is almost certainly insufficient conventional memory. The
game itself requires about 600000 bytes of free conventional memory;
if you don't have enough it will typically exit immediately without
even printing a warning message.
Windows 95 is a common culprit. Bill Gates has chosen to deliberately
mislead users, telling them that Windows 95 will solve all their DOS
memory management problems. He lied. The good news is that the vast
majority of users can solve the problem themselves, by editing their
config.sys and autoexec.bat files to ensure that DOS device drivers
aren't loaded if Windows 95 can supply protected mode equivalents;
this usually means CD-ROM and network drivers.
As an example, here are my configuration files. My (sanitized)
config.sys is:
SWITCHES=/f
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\himem.sys
DEVICE=C:\WINDOWS\emm386.exe noems ram
LASTDRIVE=z
FILESHIGH=60
DOS=high,umb
DEVICEHIGH=C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND\ansi.sys
My (again sanitized) autoexec.bat is:
@echo off
path
C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\COMMAND;c:\bin;c:\dos;c:\usr\bin;c:\game\f1gp\bin
set MIDI=SYNTH:1 MAP:E
set SOUND=c:\sb16
set BLASTER=A220 I5 D1 H5 P330 T6
c:\sb16\diagnose /S
c:\sb16\sb16set /p /q
WHY DON'T THE TSRS WORK UNDER WINDOWS 95?
If you're finding that TSRs such as GPLap and GPPerf aren't working
under Windows 95, you probably have the "protected" option in the
"memory" tab of the game's "properties" box turned on. You must turn
it off for the TSRs to work, otherwise the memory protection will
prevent them "seeing" the GP.EXE.
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 should choose Monza (but apparently it
chooses Phoenix!).
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. There are quite a few talented people working on it, though.
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 mismatch_es, 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.exe in
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 _identical_
parameters.
* 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 1.05 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:
o Calling modem:
mode com1:96,n,8,1
echo at&l1d>com1
o 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 Javier Vizcaino
<[email hidden]>.
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: [email hidden]
PAV B38, +31-50-58(21054), KPN Research, the Netherlands
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