GP3 -It is comming!!!!

According to a German Pc-magazine, Geoff Crammond is currently busy working on Gp3. Unfortunatley, no more deatails are available at this time. We can assume that GP3 when it hits the market will overshadow everthing that we have seen so far including Ubi-Softs F1RS. It should support the Vodoo 2 chip and also include a force feedback option. Lets hope and pray that we get it soon. Andy

Hey sa ! You burnt the following into my screen : Hey man we're talking about a product with most of the work started a loang time ago ... And it's Geoff, do you think he knows about 3D accelleration :-) Hope you're right but still pessimistic

hehehhehehahahahheheheoihgoiahdfonadkvlalva....wait let me pick myself off the ground....yea yea....its coming....ooooooh hehehehe...yea lets hope the great one see's fit to include RAIN this time....hehehehe..oaoaohehee..ggggeeeezzzz this is too funny. GP3 will be out when Voodoo 3 comes out in a couple of years or so...... And whats this hoping and praying bit...usually hopes and prayers are applied to something a bit more serious than a piece of Vaporware. Pierre PAPA DOC legrand Pierre PAPA DOC Legrand Infamous Pink Flamingo Pilot...

He has been working for more then 6 months and Microprose doens't want anybody to know about it. With GP2 they were rushed to bring it out. Due to the haste some important options were left like: wet races, radio talk,etc. Bart

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> According to a German Pc-magazine, Geoff Crammond is currently busy working > on Gp3. Unfortunatley, no more deatails are available at this time. > We can assume that GP3 when it hits the market will overshadow everthing that > we have seen so far including Ubi-Softs F1RS. It should support the Vodoo 2 > chip and also include a force feedback option. > Lets hope and pray that we get it soon. > Andy

I wouldn't expect it until Late '98 at the earliest (Dec'98). More than likely early '99. Marc. -------- To replay via e-mail, remove ".spam" from the end my e-mail address (Tyring to avoid junk mail)

>hehehhehehahahahheheheoihgoiahdfonadkvlalva....wait let me pick myself >off the ground....yea yea....its coming....ooooooh hehehehe...yea lets >hope the great one see's fit to include RAIN this >time....hehehehe..oaoaohehee..ggggeeeezzzz this is too funny. GP3 will >be out when Voodoo 3 comes out in a couple of years or so...... Couldn't get the lid off the Prozac bottle this morning huh?

Get it soon!!!!!!!!!!! It's Geoff Crammond, the perfectionist for God's sake. It will be ages. But you are right it will be the best and it will be worth waiting for. Stuart PCKid DownUnder

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> According to a German Pc-magazine, Geoff Crammond is currently busy working > on Gp3. Unfortunatley, no more deatails are available at this time. > We can assume that GP3 when it hits the market will overshadow everthing that > we have seen so far including Ubi-Softs F1RS. It should support the Vodoo 2 > chip and also include a force feedback option. > Lets hope and pray that we get it soon. > Andy

LOL! If recall correctly, GP2 was delayed again and again, and was finally released WELL behind schedule. Joe

Its just too bad that a year after they release GP3, the first computer that has enough horsepower to run GP2 will be in the design stages!

Well someone should email the perfectionist and make him aware that F1 races are run in the Rain...fancy that...eh. Maybe he will deem us worthy of having a sim with Rain. Also let him know that his menu system is only just better than F1 RS....and they are both neck and neck for dumbest....maybe one of them could buy ICR2 and see a brilliant menu system. Also let him know that the aerodynamics of GP2 were off.. Then you can also say that I agree with you that GP3 is gonna be brilliant WHEN it gets here...sometime in the next century. Now dont get me wrong...I loved GP2. But it wasnt perfect...Crammond is NOT GOD......and GP2 SHOULD have been patched to have rain. Thankfully now I have F1 RS I have rain in F1 and GP2 is deleted...all is well there is a God. Pierre PAPA DOC Legrand Pierre PAPA DOC Legrand Infamous Pink Flamingo Pilot...

> LOL! If recall correctly, GP2 was delayed again and again, and was > finally released WELL behind schedule. Yeah, and it was still released early unless you could somehow see where you were going in VGA mode. I hope GP3 will be usable immediately this time and not 18 months after release :)

races are run in the Rain...fancy that...eh. Maybe he will deem us worthy of having a sim with Rain. ... and GP2 SHOULD have been patched to have rain. << Gp1 did have rain but was pretty well ignored as it was just about undrivable. There are actually rain sounds in the sound files suggesting that rain was at least hoped for the Gp2 release. I think that rain needs to be quite intricate in its implementation or its not worth the bother. Simply reducing the grip factor and adding a visibility haze with other ancillary wet graphics and sounds is too simplistic for a good wet race experience IMO. I think that a simulated rainy race weekend needs to have ... 1) Variable weather. With periods of wet and dry, or harder and softer rain. 2) Drying track function. With a dry line coming in and out of play in response to the weather conditions. 3) Different conditions at different sections of the track as is so often the case in real life. 4) Water run-off across the tracks that also is common in real life. 5) A race weather report for the crews so that a wet race strategy can be planned. These things will not be easy to implement to an acceptable standard. I'm happy to wait till someone can do it right. The simple hard-rain-throughout-the-race approach is smacking of under development IMO and its time that sim race makers took the next step in this area. well there is a God. << I also have F1RS but as yet haven't been able to get to run at all. I'm waiting for some hardware upgrades to hopefully solve the problem. It'll be interesting to see how well they have done the rain - as well as lots of other things of course. Just curious, have they implemented any of the above or is it just the simple rain model ? Phillip McNelley The Grandprix 2 Unofficial Manual http://www.powerup.com.au/~philmak/GP2MAN/

that has enough horsepower to run GP2 will be in the design stages! << I'm not so sure this'll be the case this time. A majour reason that Gp2 is so slow is its advanced non-3D graphics. Sure by 3D standards they are a bit dated, but when you consider and compare them to other 2D graphics they are truly outstanding. The best of their type. At the time Gp2 was written 2D graphics like those meant a great load on the CPU. But this is not the case any more. No doubt Gp3 will be 3D graphics enhanced - possibly to take advantage of the Voodoo 2 chips. If this is the case you may well see a great leap forward in the look of the game, possibly ground breakingly so as the Gpx series has so far been. But given that this time such advancement will not be at the expense of the CPU you may find that it runs fine right off the bat on current-for-time-of-release systems. Frankly, if Gp3 was little more than Gp2 but with 3D accelerated graphics and a functional network system I would be more than happy. Phillip McNelley The Grandprix 2 Unofficial Manual http://www.powerup.com.au/~philmak/GP2MAN/

I think you will be pleased with F1 RS's implementation of Rain. heheheh...Oh yea....F1RS is gonna make you smile. How about at SPA where some parts of the track are recieving spitting rain, where its not wet enough to switch to WETS but wet enough to reduce the grip. And mind you in my race it was only raining near the pits and thru EAU ROUGE...(btw EAU ROUGE IS MINDBLOWING especially in the Rain.)... Well read the description above...the graphics arent quit there yet as far as seeing a drying line but its close. heheheheheheh....ooooh yea. How about during a race it starts up...but only in a part... Dont see any rivers like what Ive seen at Spa...but keep in mind I think we are gonna have to wait for Voodoo2 for the power to see those types of clues. yes this would be nice and a small version of this is in F1 RS...but no where near what I imagine your looking for... Nah I think you will be impressed with the solution that Ubisoft came up with....its a great comprimise. Ive watched a bunch of F1 and live in an area where we get over 60inches a year of rain...the rain in F1 looks right and feels right when you are driving thru it.... One question on my mind is the difficulty of driving on slicks....its impossible in the sim to drive fast in the rain on slicks. All I have to say is that if the sim is modeling this correctly Im EXTREMLY more in awe of Senna than I was before. Pierre PAPA DOC Legrand

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>>> Thankfully now I have F1 RS I have rain in F1 and GP2 is deleted all is >well there is a God. << >I also have F1RS but as yet haven't been able to get to run at all. I'm >waiting for some hardware upgrades to hopefully solve the problem. It'll be >interesting to see how well they have done the rain - as well as lots of >other things of course. Just curious, have they implemented any of the >above or is it just the simple rain model ? >Phillip McNelley >The Grandprix 2 Unofficial Manual >http://www.powerup.com.au/~philmak/GP2MAN/

Pierre PAPA DOC Legrand Infamous Pink Flamingo Pilot...

> Frankly, if Gp3 was little more than Gp2 but with 3D accelerated graphics > and a functional network system I would be more than happy. Ditto!

> I also have F1RS but as yet haven't been able to get to run at all. I'm > waiting for some hardware upgrades to hopefully solve the problem. It'll be > interesting to see how well they have done the rain - as well as lots of > other things of course. Just curious, have they implemented any of the > above or is it just the simple rain model ? It looks as though it has the varied conditions but I have not seen it do anything other than***down so far. I think it's a function of the randomly generated "Humidity" setting for a race.

I would not

LOL!!! DM Phil Bower wrote... Its just too bad that a year after they release GP3, the first computer that has enough horsepower to run GP2 will be in the design stages!

Maybe he'll take a leaf from Bill's book and call it GP2000 Regards DM ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- To reply please remove < .nospam > from my e-mail address ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---- "Error, no keyboard - press F1 to continue." - PC Bios Message Marc wrote... I wouldn't expect it until Late '98 at the earliest (Dec'98). More than likely early '99.

Jeezuz, Phillip!!! How about a bucket of water being thrown over you every ten minutes by an assistant!! What you are requesting/expecting would require a whole new sim called "F1RS: Wet Version"!! -- Bruce (at work) "Laziness is nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired." (Jules Renard)

assistant!! << That would seem a little too much I must admit. But then again ... So long as the assistant angled the water so it hit you from the correct angle and direction then it might be OK. :-) "F1RS: Wet Version"!! << Are these things really asking too much ? *** Variable weather. With periods of wet and dry, or harder and softer rain. This should be quite easy using a random number generator and a few lines of code. First establish if a session will be wet or dry if dry then pass over the wet weather routine. If wet then generate a random number between 1 and say 5 to set the number of different weather periods in the session. Then random generate the length of time for each weather period using either a predetermined arbitrary maximum and minimum time or else random generate such a max and min. Random generate a time period to change from one period to the next so that abrupt weather changes dont necessarily always occur. Expand or contract the total weather profile to fit within a predetermined timeframe or just leave the last weather state to continue indefinitely, or cycle the whole weather profile - whatever. And there you have it. A random weather generator with different periods of weather type over a given time span. This is really very easy to do and I dare suggest that anyone with only a moderate amount of programming experience could do this. *** A race weather report for the crews so that a wet race strategy can be planned. Once the weather profile has been generated as above then you can easily write a short program to convert the profiles into a weather report and forecast. You can even include a random error component so that the weather reports are only approximately accurate. ( Have you even heard of a 100% accurate weather forecast ? ) Once the weather profile and report were generated you should be able to save and load such at will. This is because one will need to be able to send a copy of the weather under which you raced to others if you want to encourage off-line racing competitions. Everyone in such a competition will of course need to use the same weather profile. Apart from the random weather generator you could also include a manual weather profile writer for folks who would like to make up their own profile - for a competition or whatever. With such a manual system you could reproduce the actual weather conditions that occurred in a real world F1 race and transfer that to the sim. All of this is not that hard to do. *** Different conditions at different sections of the track as is so often the case in real life. This is hard to do. You could leave this out if necessary. A lot would depend on the type of terrain mapping system used by a particular sim. Some systems would lend themselves to this better than others no doubt. A simple x:y coordinate system could be adapted for this. I have a better system in mind, a variation on an x:y system but won't bore you with the details. In any case this is not a major item. Itd be nice and certainly could be implemented but would require more work than the simple random generation concepts from above. Some random generation would still apply of course. *** Drying track function. With a dry line coming in and out of play in response to the weather conditions. This is a major desirable function of a wet weather system. Its implementation depends very largely on the track mapping system used by a sim. Its interesting to note though that CartPR, just for an example, has a road mapping system that shows a different colour track on the most used line. A simular thing could be used for the dry line idea. Whether or not and to what extent a track has a dry line is simply a function of rate of rain falling less the rate of rain dispersing over time. These figures shouldnt be too hard to work on. There are at least two functions of a dry line system. A visual one and a grip factor one. The visual one can simply be a matter of a program implemented lightening of a built for the purpose track texture. The grip factor can be tied to the texture lightening function ( but not necessarily ) and coupled to a tyre type wet weather grip profile. Such profiles can be obtained from the tyre companys. I fancy a separate track grip and visual track plan as sort of separate files to which the car model routine refers. With such separated underlying profiles you could do a number of different effects, including dry lines, dirty off lines, different traction base-lines for different and/or even evolving conditions. And the basic design is relatively simple. Heck you could then literally just paint a colour coded track plan and use to RGB components as function values. If you want to make different traction profiles for a track simply paint the tracks grip plan. Etc etc. *** Water run-off across the tracks that also is common in real life. This could be another ***e but perhaps not. Run off zones could be included in the above grip profiles ( or have their own grip profile plans ) to which the necessary visual effects could be tied. Not easy to be sure but I think implementable. So I dont think Im being unrealistic in expecting professionally trained programmers to solve these matters, some of which seem basically simple. I ve only ever done basic and visual basic programming which I know is not worthwhile for things like this. But still it gives one at least a little insight into what can be done unless of course Im massively self deluded which is always a possibility. :-) I think developing a realistic wet weather function would be something an enthusiastic young ( or not so young ) programmer could take under their energetic wing and nurture to completion. Something to get their teeth into to make their mark and excel at. It has to be someone who loves the subject though. This makes all the difference I think. Well thats my 2 cents ( or maybe even 4 cents ) on the matter FWIW. Phillip McNelley The Grandprix 2 Unofficial Manual http://www.powerup.com.au/~philmak/GP2MAN/

hehe Well you better buy F1 Racing Sim cause it has variable weather during the race...fun fun fun....of course its rather difficult to change the setup and the weather report is not all it should be... But all in all F1 Racing sim is bad to the bone... PAPA DOC >Well thats my 2 cents ( or maybe even 4 cents ) on the matter FWIW. >Phillip McNelley >The Grandprix 2 Unofficial Manual >http://www.powerup.com.au/~philmak/GP2MAN/

(snip) the weather report is not all it should be... (unsnip) In other words, it's realistic? :-) -- Bruce (at work) "Laziness is nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired." (Jules Renard)

Phillip, what you are desiring is not impossible, by any means but one has to take into account the additional work needed to include it and, equally as important, what *gets left out* in order to provide a comprehensive changeable weather feature. It is situations such as this that cause developers to tear their hair out/go bald at the age of 22/bug out and become hermits! They also are accountable (these days) to the beancounters and the marketing people (witness the release of GP2 "before it was finished" and CART:PR, before it was started!) How nice it would be to have the "ultimate" sim but each of us has our own conception of "ultimate". With regard to F1RS, I would prefer to see the developers work on (a) fixing the menu system and (b) fixing the start/first corner slowdown....if that is possible. There are no graphics "improvements" that I personally desire so the next in order for fixing would be an editor for the names/teams/nationalities and then a paint program. But them's *my* preferences, which are most likely completely different to someone elses. That's why programmers/developers suffer anxiety attacks :-) -- Bruce (at work) "Laziness is nothing more than the habit of resting before you get tired." (Jules Renard)

..... Well, if you look at the average weather forecast over here, there's no need for ANY kind of programming here. They are wrong 60% of the time, so a collection of general forecasts and a random pick would do :-) ... What will really make the difference is how well he gets payed... <G> Let's hope... JoH Please remove *anti-spam* from the email when replying. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= When everything else failed, we can still become im- mortal by making an enormous blunder.... John Kenneth Galbraith =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

> (witness the release of GP2 "before it was finished" and CART:PR, before > it was started!) LOL, hehehehehehehehehehe.