Okay! I am about to vent some frustration here, and express what I've
been hoping for from one or more of the sim producers. So far, all my
pleas to them have been rebuffed, so maybe I will feel better after I
tell the world.
First, let me say that I am eagerly awaiting Papy's historical F1 sim,
in which I suspect the cars will be much more fun to drive than modern
F1 cars. Modern Grand Prix cars, in my humble opinion (based on my vast
experience driving F1 cars in GP2) are too darn grippy. There's no
margin for error when you get near the limit; one instant it's sticking;
the next instant, it's gone.
If the Papyrus ICR2 dynamics model is accurate, modern Indycars are much
more "tossable" than current GP cars, and I find them much more fun to
drive. Hopefully 1967 GP cars will be even more tossable, and more fun.
However, I want current sims as well, because I very much like running
on the current tracks before and after the real races; it really helps
me relate to the racing on the real tracks. Being able to race with
several friends in current cars, on current tracks, would be the
ultimate!
Unfortunately, development of both of the best open-wheel sims, ICR2 and
GP2, seems to have reached a dead end. Both are very good in many ways,
but both have some significant weaknesses, IMHO. Despite the
ground-breaking histories of both sims, I consider ICR2's lack of
network play and GP2's lack of Rendition support as major deficiencies
in today's world of sim racing.
Here's my vision of the Ultimate Racing Sim.
It would be Rendition-ready, and multiplayer (up to, say, 8 players)
with modem play, as well as TCP/IP (i.e. internet) connection built in.
In networked mode, it should be capable of having one PC on a LAN acting
as a gateway (via modem) to allow play between all the PC's on the LAN,
and other PC's elsewhere on the Internet. (This is a feature available
in a recent Kali95 beta).
Rendition support is a must. Anyone who's played both GP2 and the
Rendition-ready ICR2 cannot fail to appreciate how much difference
direct support of a 3D card makes in the feel, driveability, and quality
of visual display in a racing sim. GP2's texture-mapped graphics,
realism, and visual and audio detail are markedly superior to the
original ICR2. But the Rendition version of ICR2 blows GP2 away, both
in terms of visual impact, and in terms of playability, due to hugely
superior frame rate. All this is as a result of ICR2's taking advantage
of low-cost 3D hardware technology.
For those of you who haven't experienced ICR2/3D, the difference between
it and non-Rendition ICR2 is as great as the difference between the
original IndyCar and ICR2. We *gotta* have 3D support!
I don't care too much if my Ultimate Sim runs in Windows 95, but if it
does, it should be as robust and stable as in DOS mode, and there should
be *no* performance hit.
The Ultimate Sim's menu structure should be similar to NASCAR2, with
ready access to all important options without leaving the track, or
disconnecting from other players. Dropdown menus for multiple selection
fields, as in N2, are very nice.
It should have a garage with all the adjustments in ICR2, plus maybe a
few more like the damper and spring settings in GP2. Setup sheets like
in N2 would be nice. Tabs could lead to multiple sheets, since there
would be too many settings to fit on one sheet.
When you load a setup file, the sim would remember (and continue to
display) the name of the last one you loaded, and also, if you modified
the setup since you loaded it, display a caption to that effect. If you
attempt to leave the track, or load another setup, without saving a
modified setup, it would warn you and give you a chance to save the
setup. The ability to review, compare, print, rename, and delete setup
files is of course taken for granted.
Telemetry or on-board data recording would save all the pertinent data
for each lap, if desired (as in GP2) and would allow graphing it, or
exporting to a text file for manipulation in spreadsheets such as Excel.
Current sims allow the user to create new carsets, and to modify paint
schemes. The N2 style of managing carsets and driver names would do
fine. Enterprising sim racers have even found ways to modify the shapes
of ICR2 cars, and even create new shapes. My Ultimate Sim would have
these capabilities built in.
Now, for one of the most important features. Like ICR2 and N2, The
Ultimate Sim would be extensible; that is, it would be possible to add a
new track, or a variant of an existing track, and the sim would
recognize it. Most importantly, it would be possible to create entirely
*new* tracks, so that when CART suddenly decides to race at Texas, or F1
comes back to Watkins Glen (I'm joking, Mr. Ecclestone!), or Roger
Penske builds a new track in New Jersey and stages a GP and a CART race
there the same weekend (just kidding, Roger), we (admittedly, with lots
of hard work) can replicate the new track and race there too.
Of course, we'd need to be able to edit the existing tracks, to
reconfigure the corners at Homestead (like Ralph Sanchez is going to do
to the real track), say, or remove that pesky Interloop from Watkins
Glen when we want to run Indycars there.
It's obvious by now that I want this to be a multipurpose sim. Why
should I have to shut down one sim and start up another to run first a
GP car at Monaco and then an Indycar at Cleveland, when almost
everything except the shapes of the cars and tracks, the names of the
drivers, the engine sounds, and the vehicle dynamics, are (or could be)
identical?
The missing piece we need to do this would be configurable, or at least
selectable, vehicle dynamics models. Since all vehicles are subject to
the same laws of physics, basically what the sim would need to provide
would be the ability to define the mass, mass distribution, horsepower,
aerodynamic characteristics, braking power, tire adhesion, fuel
capacity, and some suspension geometry parameters for each type of car.
I'd like it to come with vehicle dynamics parameter sets for F1 cars and
CART cars. Even better, it could include sets for cars from
steppingstone series such as Formula 3000, Formula Ford, Formula
Atlantic, Indy Lights, and the IRL, so we could learn in less
challenging cars and work our way up just like real race drivers do.
If the vehicle dynamics sets were editable (the way carsets and tracks
would be), then enterprising people could create sets for Trans Am,
NASCAR (such as Winston, Busch, and Craftsman Trucks) or maybe WSC and
Le Mans cars. Obviously, editing would have to be accompanied by
ironclad security that ensured that multiplayer races were all conducted
with identical vehicle dynamics models on all machines, to prevent
someone from defining a 1000 hp GP car or an 1100 lb Indycar.
Of course, all this means we could just as easily run a GP car at Laguna
Seca as run an Atlantic car at Monaco. Geez! What a shame! <giggle>
Well, ok, we could have each track have a default type of vehicle (and
associated race rules - oops! Guess we'd need a rule set selector/editor
too) for each track, but let the user choose any other type they wish.
Of course, this is all just a fantasy. I realize that commercial
reality makes this impossible. First, there is the licensing issue that
seems to have killed further interest in CART on the part of Papyrus.
How would anyone ever get licenses for one sim from the FIA, CART, the
IRL, and the various snotty tracks who seem to think they are something
special?
Further, why would any sim developer want to release such a sim? Such a
fully configurable core racing sim engine would kind of obviate the need
for new sims, wouldn't it? We could all just create new tracks and
tweak the carsets and vehicle dynamics models to follow developments in
the real world from year to year.
Of course, this would be a lot of work; maybe the sim developer could
release new "SuperPacks" each year, containing relevant updates,
charging a reasonable sum so we could all stay current and they could
stay in business.
And, as hardware development keeps giving us new capabilities, new
releases of the core sim engine could include enhancements like a
virtual reality driver's view, more sophisticated modeling of suspension
behavior, the capability for multiple vehicle dynamics models in one
race (i.e real differences between a Jordon-Peugeot and a
Williams-Mecachrome) and other cool stuff. Jeez, maybe the sim company
could even make some money here.
One other thought: some perusal of various ICR2 and GP2 sites on the Web
reveals significant grass roots development projects under way to come
up with utilities that allow creating new tracks (not just modifying the
scenery on existing tracks, as is now done to create "Texas" out of
Charlotte, or "Anderstorp" out of Watkins Glen). Already there are
Trans Am and IRL car images for ICR2, and a broad assortment of '97
carsets for GP2 and ICR2.
If commercial sim developers don't work towards the dream of the
Ultimate Racing Sim, will the more technically-oriented of us sim
drivers do it anyway?
Well, thanks for enduring my rambling. We can dream, can't we?
Alison
Return address: [email hidden]
Remove the * to email me (this is a spam blocker)
http://www.nh.ultranet.com/~alison
: Okay! I am about to vent some frustration here, and express what I've
: been hoping for from one or more of the sim producers. So far, all my
: pleas to them have been rebuffed, so maybe I will feel better after I
: tell the world.
<excellent suggestions snipped>
BRAVO, right on. I am sure that there will be a few whiners when your
ultimate sim hits the shelves, but you covered just about all I have
ever wanted in a sim (even came up with a few that I missed).
I'll wait in line all night to be one of the first in the door when they
announce its release!
--
**************************** Michael E. Carver *************************
Upside out, or inside down...False alarm the only game in town.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=<[ /./. [- < ]>=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
As much as I hate to say it, I don't think the rendition will be the
card most supported. The 3dfx cards are cheap and seem to be getting
a lot of support lately, I haven't really heard anything about
rendition lately. Of course if Microsoft ever gets the problems with
Direct3d worked out, maybe it won't matter.
A game with as much networking capability as you suggest would
probably be programmed in Win95, because it tends to be easier to
write network code with, at least for lazy people like me.
That's a tall order. Do you do any programming? It sounds like you
do. But remember one thing. Game developers don't program games to
BE real, they only program them to look and feel real. I wrote a car
sim program once that took all the physics straight from the textbook,
exactly how it would be in real life, the problem was it was
impossible to drive. There have to be tradeoff's in computer games.
Realism, graphics and accuracy are often sacrificed to keep speed
acceptable. However with all that said. The idea you suggest would
lend itself extremely well to Object Oriented design and programming.
I can almost hear Visual C++ calling me.
You're talking about a year or more of development with a good sized,
well educated development team. I doubt its possible to get that many
folks together to work on something like this that may never make them
a dime. Interesting thought though.
/////////////////////////////
/ 1997-98 /
/ Kennesaw State Ice Hockey /
/ /
/////////////////////////////
