newbie question steering using the keyboard.

I couldnt find a faq dealing with this question, so decided to ask here. Every now and then I try to play a race game. With every game I tried I found it very hard to even drive slowly and just cruise along the track. I slip, bump into walls and am very happy its just a sim. I found that with all those games i was only able to steer hard left or hard right. No incremental steering at all. This was true for PC games, but I tried some gameconsole games as well. Of course my kids just drive and race as if they were born behind the wheel of a virtual racecar. With pc games I tried keyboard and joystick, never bought a wteeringwheel. With the consolegames I used the regular pads. Seeing that those games are almost pieces of art, beautiful moddeled, chosing betweeen different tires or whatever fancy things to do, I am very surprised that I never saw a game that enabled me to steer a little to the left or right, which is a basic part of the art of cardriving. The latest game I tried is a demo of race driver 2 (very recent game) Hopelessly trying to catch up with my kids ;), Gerard

Gerard Verhoef

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> > Seeing that those games are almost pieces of art, beautiful moddeled, > chosing betweeen different tires or whatever fancy things to do, I am > very surprised that I never saw a game that enabled me to steer a little > to the left or right, which is a basic part of the art of cardriving. > The latest game I tried is a demo of race driver 2 (very recent game) > > Hopelessly trying to catch up with my kids ;), > > Gerard > >

What kind of controller are you using? dh

Gerard Verhoef What kind of controller are you using? dh

I'd guess a keyboard. See subject. Andi. -- Remove only one zero to reply. "Dave Henrie" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:[email hidden]... > Gerard Verhoef > > > > Seeing that those games are almost pieces of art, beautiful moddeled, > > chosing betweeen different tires or whatever fancy things to do, I am > > very surprised that I never saw a game that enabled me to steer a little > > to the left or right, which is a basic part of the art of cardriving. > > The latest game I tried is a demo of race driver 2 (very recent game) > > > > Hopelessly trying to catch up with my kids ;), > > > > Gerard > > > > > > What kind of controller are you using? > dh

"Andi Cole" <[email hidden]> wrote in news:_15nc.912$wI4.104178 @wards.force9.net: > I'd guess a keyboard. See subject. > > Andi. > Subjects Andi? By the time I've opened the post, :) I've forgotten the subject....Uhmmmwhat was your name again? So...thanks to whatshisname...we can see what your problem is. TUrning a keyboard does not work very well. Get a good wheel or at least a joystick. Otherwise make very small quick taps on the turning keys. dave ........h.......

"Gerard Verhoef" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:1Q2nc.12023$EV2.97741@amstwist00...

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> I couldnt find a faq dealing with this question, so decided to ask here. > > Every now and then I try to play a race game. With every game I tried I > found it very hard to even drive slowly and just cruise along the track. > I slip, bump into walls and am very happy its just a sim. > I found that with all those games i was only able to steer hard left or > hard right. No incremental steering at all. This was true for PC games, > but I tried some gameconsole games as well. Of course my kids just drive > and race as if they were born behind the wheel of a virtual racecar. > With pc games I tried keyboard and joystick, never bought a > wteeringwheel. With the consolegames I used the regular pads. > > Seeing that those games are almost pieces of art, beautiful moddeled, > chosing betweeen different tires or whatever fancy things to do, I am > very surprised that I never saw a game that enabled me to steer a little > to the left or right, which is a basic part of the art of cardriving. > The latest game I tried is a demo of race driver 2 (very recent game) > > Hopelessly trying to catch up with my kids ;), > > Gerard >

Since the kb or most gamepads cant be setup as analog devices, how is the game supposed to know when you want to turn a little or alot. Since kb's aren't touch sensitive, its very hard to use them as steering and or throttle/brake device period. TO play any sims these days, you really need a decent analog joystick at a bare minimum to even attempt them. I've been driving with a wheel for about 6 years now, and I can't imagine going back to even a joystick let alone a kb.

Thanks for your answeres. I'll try to get a game where I (at the very least) can use my joystick. In the race car 2 demo i tried I cannot get the joystick to work at all. Gerard Gerard Verhoef wrote:

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> I couldnt find a faq dealing with this question, so decided to ask here. > > Every now and then I try to play a race game. With every game I tried I > found it very hard to even drive slowly and just cruise along the track. > I slip, bump into walls and am very happy its just a sim. > I found that with all those games i was only able to steer hard left or > hard right. No incremental steering at all. This was true for PC games, > but I tried some gameconsole games as well. Of course my kids just drive > and race as if they were born behind the wheel of a virtual racecar. > With pc games I tried keyboard and joystick, never bought a > wteeringwheel. With the consolegames I used the regular pads. > > Seeing that those games are almost pieces of art, beautiful moddeled, > chosing betweeen different tires or whatever fancy things to do, I am > very surprised that I never saw a game that enabled me to steer a little > to the left or right, which is a basic part of the art of cardriving. > The latest game I tried is a demo of race driver 2 (very recent game) > > Hopelessly trying to catch up with my kids ;), > > Gerard >

"Gerard Verhoef" <[email hidden]> wrote in message news:1Q2nc.12023$EV2.97741@amstwist00... <ultra snip> >No incremental steering at all. > Gerard I thought of flight simulators having a progressive turn when using a keyboard. Only problem is a steering wheel should respond as quickly and as much as you're able to turn it, whereas flight has air forcing resistance. Perhaps a small piece of software by use of a toggle switch to enable incremental turning? As long as the steering wheel makers don't complain.... Ideal as a back up if the wheel quits unexpectantly. just a thought... :-)

>Thanks for your answeres. I'll try to get a game where I (at the very >least) can use my joystick. In the race car 2 demo i tried I cannot get >the joystick to work at all. > Oh, well THAT'S different. The original post sounded like you didn't *have* a joystick or wheel. If you have a joystick, but it's not working in the game I'm sure someone can help you with that. Is it not recognized at all, or does it just not give correct values? Eldred -- http://www.umich.edu/~epickett Screamers League IICC League GPLRank -6.0 MoGPL rank +267.80 Ch.Rank +52.58 MoC +741.71 Hist. +82.34 MoH:na N2k3 rank:in progress Slayer Spektera lvl 72 assassin Slayer Spectral_K lvl 38 Necro US East

EldredP wrote:

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>>Thanks for your answeres. I'll try to get a game where I (at the very >>least) can use my joystick. In the race car 2 demo i tried I cannot get >>the joystick to work at all. >> > > > Oh, well THAT'S different. The original post sounded like you didn't *have* a > joystick or wheel. If you have a joystick, but it's not working in the game > I'm sure someone can help you with that. Is it not recognized at all, or does > it just not give correct values? > > Eldred

Yeah I have a joystick (mentioned it in the original post also), but in the race driver 2 game demo it simply didn't react at all and there was no control menu to get it going. At least I couldn't find one. So I've been looking for some other recent demo's and found GTR press demo. There it was no problem to get my wireless logitech working properly. I guess I still don't beat my boys, but at least I'm able to finish more or less alive. As a matter of fact I really was expecting the sim to be programmed in such a way that the left-right keys would do incremental steering, just like in the flightsim I play. But indeed you need to be kinda quick pressing left/right multiple times to make a hard r/l turn. On the other hand: you only make hard turns when driving kinda slow. Thanks again to all who took the time to answer a newbie question Gerard

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>"Rich" <[email hidden]> wrote > I thought of flight simulators having a progressive turn when using a > keyboard. > Only problem is a steering wheel should respond as quickly and as much as > you're able to turn it, whereas flight has air forcing resistance. > Perhaps a small piece of software by use of a toggle switch to enable > incremental turning?

Eh this reminds me of back in the days, you could buy a "steering wheel plate" that would fit over your keyboard. I think the game was Checkered Flag. It would simply work by having different keys incremented. So "H" would be the center, then 25% left would be "J", 50% left "K", etc... Hmm, thinking about it, that game had Hard Left/Soft Left/Soft Right/Hard Right so it wasn't that title. There was also a steering wheel that would clamp on a mouse to steer (still have a picture of one hidden somewhere on my HD) Really, you can buy a cheap racing wheel for under 20 bucks. Keyboard racing is USELESS and will always be. -- -- Fran�ois M�nard <ymenard> -- This announcement is brought to you by the Shimago-Dominguez Corporation - helping America into the New World...

FWIW "Viper Racing" has got pretty decent kb steering. You can even tune the speed at which the game responds to a keypress. But in the end - if you REALLY wanna enjoy racing games you GOTTA have a steering wheel :-)