Hello there,
Nice work, and congratulations on the extremely thorough and detailed Quick
1st Look.
Very Impressive.
CART World Series hasn't been released for PAL PlayStation yet, but I look
forward to it and playing its Link Mode features.
Likewise NASCAR 98, even though if I'm not mistaken it doesn't support Link
Mode racing.
I don't know if I can be considered a hardcore Formula 1 fan, but I have
posted and detailed my disappointments with Formula 1 '97 on the Newsgroups
since its release.
In no way is it a terrible game, nor bad, its just that its just that its
disappointing when you consider the number of areas that Formula 1 '97 has
less features, more slowdown, polygon glitching, and shorter draw distance
than the far from perfect Formula 1.
In many instances Formula 1 '97 feels crude, rushed, and poorly executed
with some of its problem worse than those experienced in Formula 1 when
Link Mode racing.
The Split-screen Option in Formula 1'97 is a good example, it's is pathetic
compared to the fine efforts of Infogrames V-Rally.
Feel free to contact me to swap fastest lap times and car set ups for
Formula 1, Formula 1 '97, and eventually CART World Series.
HIgh revvingly yours,
Pasene R. Faifua.
http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~stuartc/
RMIRANI <[email hidden]> wrote in article
<[email hidden]>...
> I've gotten both and had a few hours to check them out, but don't have a lot of
> time to type, so here we go. Bottom line, I recommend both highly, but for
> different reasons, and I'm returning NASCAR 98 today. NASCAR is a fine game
> for those who love NASCAR, but it falls far short of what these games do in
> providing a combination of fast racing excitement and a challenging
> simulation.
> F1 CE is the update to last year's very successful Formula 1 from Bizarre
> Creations/Psygnosis. There have already been extensive posts from the
> hardcore F1 fans in Europe who have been banging at the PAL version, and I
> would recommend reading those. My impression initially was that the game does
> not seem that different, and that acceleration is still not completely analog
> -- it's a rather peculiar analog/digital hybrid, where letting up on pressure
> decreases acceleration in drastic increments rather than a gradual decrease.
> And when you take your foot (or finger) completely off the gas, the car just
> stops, it doesn't roll to a stop. This was a little disappointing to me.
> Still, a little more time spent with the game reveals a number of small but
> significant improvements. Best of all as far as I'm concerned, despite the
> acceleration issue I brought up, is that overall control with the NegCon
> seems much improved over last year's F1, and the CPU AI has been beefed up.
> The front end series of menus is also considerably better, and the practice
> mode actually makes good use of the second announcer: he guides you through
> each circuit and lets you know what to anticipate, whether it be tricky double
> turns or long straights. Probably a frill for the F1 vet, but an excellent
> feature for newbies that helps with memorization of the track and improvement
> of times. To satisfy the hardcore, you can hit "start" during your practice
> session and have access to telemetry readings for your last lap.
> The graphics, as I said, at first don't seem that different, but the cars look
> a lot nicer, though they still look somewhat "pasted" on the road in an
> external view (and even the nose view to some extent). I booted up my copy of
> last year's F1 for comparison, though, and found the graphical difference to
> be more dramatic than I realized. Much less pixellation and better looking
> textures on the whole.
> There is draw-in, as people have noted, but it didn't seem terrible in the
> initial circuits I raced. There are more options for car setup, and the
> overall feel of the racing and presentation remains exceptionally well done;
> even the second announcer, a feature I normally dislike intensely since I find
> it a frivolous use of developer resources, seems to blend in well. The CPU
> pitting seems a little more realistic, though I haven't fully tested this out
> yet, nor have I yet come across some of the onerous bugs others have
> mentioned. The game is definitely more challenging, with damage affecting
> your performance much more significantly than in F1, so I would recommend the
> game for people looking for a challenging sim racer.
> I remember all the complaints Bizarre Creations received last year on this
> newsgroup. I do get the impression that they listened and made some notable
> improvements and didn't just do the EA "reheat, repackage, add second
> announcer, new rosters, and a few dubious new features" update. The CPU AI
> seems much better and the element of damage makes the racing a very different
> experience. Still, there will undoubtedly be issues raised by many, as it's
> pretty hard to get a really solid sim in a RAM constrained machine like the
> Playstation. I would have liked a better in-the-car view myself.
> CART Racing from Sony is by the same folks who worked on Rally Cross and worked
> with Singletrac to do Jet Moto. Anyone who's played those games knows how
> well these developers model vehicle physics, and how difficult the learning
> curves for their games can be. CART is right along the same lines: no foot
> on the accelerator and go, go, go. You must take turns in ovals and road
> courses properly and precisely, and any collision or brush against the wall
> sets you back much more than your standard arcade racer, even in arcade mode.
> You're likely to find as you attempt to get going that you'll probably have to
> cut your races short at first and hit "restart", just like Rally Cross. This
> doesn't sound like much fun, but the arcade and rookie modes (with no damage)
> do a good job of allowing you to get comfortable with the feel of the cars and
> the courses.
> The cars look good and have a good feel (have a better feeling of weight than
> either F1CE or NASCAR), which is probably helped tremendously by the
> authoritative sound in the game, which employs something called X360 from
> Sony. I have a pretty pedestrian surround sound set-up, but the cars (once
> you turn the generic metal music off) can really be heard in front of and
> behind you, and the bumping of and overtaking of other cars has more aural
> impact (maybe too much at times) than most other games.
> The biggest pluses for CART Racing are the sheer sensation of speed combined
> with the challenging simulation aspects, and the AI of the CPU opponents.
> Simulation racers can be great fun but can be a real chore, as anyone who's
> given a Papyrus sim on the PC knows, and of course frame rate has been an
> issue with those PC racers. Frame rate in CART racing is terrific, and the
> CPU gives you a good challenge, even in arcade mode -- those cars go after
> you!. In fact, the arcade mode is one of the most satisfying combinations of
> arcade and sim I've seen in this type of racer -- you don't have to take into
> account all the variables you do in a sim, but the car physics must still be
> taken into account as you make turns and attempt to pass. It's as if Namco
> and Sega's AM2 developers joined forces with Papyrus to provide high speed,
> white knuckle excitement in the trappings of a sim. The arcade modes in F1
> and NASCAR are really afterthoughts by comparison, where you can just drive
> over anything and everything and play bumper cars.
> The biggest minuses in CART Racing are the graphics and the rather imposing
> learning curve in simulation mode. Sony in several of its games hasn't
> hesitated to strip graphics quality down to provide more meat on the AI side,
> as evidenced by games like FaceOff 97, GameDay 97, and Jet Moto (Rally Cross
> was a great exception, though even there the cars looked odd in the external
> view). The graphics in CART aren't terrible -- the cars mostly look decent to
> good, but the circuits have a very limited and washed out color palette and at
> least one road course I raced had some notable glitching and pop-up on one of
> the straights. It isn't as bad as your average PC sim (prior to 3D cards)
> where you had little to no textures or background detail, however -- there's
> good detail, it's just not very bright, unlike F1 most notably. I'd still say
> that CART looks no worse than Andretti Racing (or much of NASCAR) and even
> manages to look as good as the original F1 in some instances.
> Another small graphics point: as the car approaches (and exceeds) 200 mph, the
> screen shakes noticeably and the fake sky ahead looks as if it may break up.
> I noticed this, but now I don't pay attention to it -- it may bother some
> people though. I find the sensation of speed is well maintained, unlike
> NASCAR where you seem to be entering some weird time warp at high speeds and
> nothing is moving.
> The front end in CART is outstanding, with difficulty options ranging from
> rookie to hard to URNOTE (I don't even want to think about the last one),
> arcade and simulation modes, as well as damage/no damage. Driving with damage
> is quite difficult, though you can get some great crashes if you like that
> sort of thing. There are several car setup options, which are well presented,
> though (just going off the top of my head here) there may be slightly less
> customization possible than in NASCAR or F1. Maps of the courses highlight
> passing points and trouble spots, a very nice touch. No on-the-fly camera view
> changes possible with the Negcon though. You get very clear readouts of laps
> remaining, fuel, and position in the race for all angles, and the in-cockpit
> view seems more satisfying to me than in F1CE or NASCAR.
> The CART manual
...
read more »
I got the chance to play a few games last night on CART.
Very fun game, the car has a really good feel to it.
Im kind of embarrassed to admit that I was always in last place, even
in arcade mode. Guess I need some practice.
I had an awful time getting through the street course (the 2nd race of the
full season). I think I spent more time in reverse than any other gear.
I think the engine noise is really poor. It has a very synthetic sound
to it (reminds me of replay mode in F1). And that after hearing such
great engine roars during the startup (I suppose sampled sounds take up
too much ram).
Replays are kind of weird. The screen goes all dark, and the viewpoint
switches to fixed locations where the cars pass from right to left with
a kind of repetitive pulsing sound. These viewpoints dont catch the
action well at all.
Overall though I love the game and look forward to playing it this weekend.
--
John Shepardson
Yeah, and the lack of yellow flags doesn't help either. Especially
when you're in first place, two laps from the checkered flag and you
end up coming around a corner and slamming into a car that has stalled
in the middle of the track. Where was the yellow flag to warn me of
this car, no where, because CART doesn't have yellow flags. What an
oversight!
--: CCS #712 - '96 CBR600F3 (racebike) :--
In real life, they do have a lot
On Tue, 07 Oct 1997 15:19:04 -0700, "John P. Wilson"
It takes my Mad Catz wheel/pedal combo just fine, does a fancy
calibration on it and everything. The sim doesn't say it takes it, and
I got a little worried when I first started it up. Because I was going
to take it back if it didn't handle a wheel.
I think it is a fantastic sim; the best thing out presently for
Indycar. Rahal, Herta, Moore, and Pruett were apparently advisers for
the project, and it sure looks like it- the handling is quite
fantastic.
One new touch- if you do a "7% race" or "23% race", or some such, the
fuel is figured at that rate, i.e., you may start with 35 gallons of
fuel, but you burn it proportionally faster, so you still have the
same number of pit stops. At first this seemed wierd; now I like it.
It was always a cheat racing short races knowing all the AI cars were
fully tanked...
