Internet -> GP3

Now, I think it's time. These facts are taken for granted for this dicussion: 1) The international racing sim community is getting bigger and bigger all the time, and we're representing a substantial part of the market 2) Geoff Crammond is making GP3 3) GP2 was one of the all time great racing sims (at the time) 4) The end-users know what is required from a sim in order to have long lasting fun (internet leagues -> online and offline) 5) We have not, to date, seen a racing sim that fullfills all our requirements (like high ping values racing, some kind of verification of submitted results (for instance how many times a game has been saved)). Ok, all this leads to the following: 1) Geoff Crammond (and other sim developers) should listen to what we have to say! 2) We have an obligation to try to raise our voices and formulate certain wishes 3) If the above could be realized, we would end up with a sim that is very nicely suited to our needs, and we could have longer lasting fun, AND THE GAME PUBLISHER WOULD MAKE MORE MONEY. This last thing is very important, this language is the only language understood by the game publishers, namely money. In every other part of our society, the end-users have more or less great influence on the specs on a product. It's time we organize, and try to get through to the game writers. Now this raises several issues: 1) It's pretty sure that Geoff and other writers have limited contact with the internet community, at least it's not known that he has contact with us 2) We cannot contribute every one of us, we have to collect a nicely organized set of specs that we present in a orderly fashion to the game developers 3) Someone has to take reponsibility for the collection (there are several candidates on this NG -> with lots of authority 4) We have to find channels to the game developers, so that we can present our nicely organized set of specs. 5) Alternative channels to the games developers: *** magazines, phone, snailmail etc. I don't think we can use the publisher houses, they don't seem to have the genuine wish for a perfect product (remember when GP2 was released, it wasn't finished!). The developer, however, has this genuine wish for perfection. I would very much like to hear what you think of this... -- ---Asgeir--- Any information herein must be used with utter discretion and respect

Asgeir, I totally agree with everything you say..but - I think Papyrus' Grand Prix Legends (July release) will be the answer to our prayers.. To respond to your points: 1) > developers should listen to what we have to say! - I have been monitoring various newsgroups such as this, and the forum at the APEX GPL site at http://gpl.gamestats.com/ , and have been pleased to see that one of the game's designers, Mike Lescault, participates in the forum, answering questions and taking suggestions. Participants in the forum have brought up points that they think Mike(and the other developers) should know about (eg: someone questioned the accuracy of having six speed gearboxes back in 1967/68. Mike checked into it, and told us that some of the teams had them, some of them did not. Well, another participant corrected him and told him for a fact that was incorrect. Mike wrote back to say that although they could not correct this for the demo, the final version will be corrected.) This is just of many points that have come up, and that Mike has acknowledged. - Newsgroups are an excellent medium for collecting gamer's views and ideas. (Now how about a game being developed totally on the input of newsgroup members?!!) 2) > The end-users know what is required from a sim in order to have long lasting fun (internet leagues , online/offline) - GPL will have direct support for TCP/IP and IPX protocols. Furthermore, multiplayer mode has been designed to virtually eliminate "warping", which is a common problem with some games out there today. 3) > .. that Geoff(Crammond) and other writers have limited contact with the internet community, at least it's not known that he has contact with us - See above. Mike Lescault also wrote the following, on Mon Feb 16th: "We read each and every suggestion that we receive, in addition to monitoring r.a.s. and other newsgroups as well as other forums like this one. Due to the amount of comments and suggestions we receive, we cannot respond to each message. However, we definitely find the time to read anything our customers take the time to write and send off to us." - So they at least "claim" to be listening to us. I believe Mike because he has taken the time to respond to numerous questions on the APEX forum. (But just because they've read what we send them doesn't mean they're going to do anything about it, does it?) Like you said, Asgeir, the DEVELOPER has the wish for perfection, it is the Publishing House that rushes the game out full of errors. Last year, Grand Prix Legends was slated for a fall release (of '97), then got moved to Christmas, then.. and now we are being told JULY. Of course, many of us can't wait for the game to come out, but at the same time, everyone (to a tee) has said "I would prefer to wait a couple of months to get a polished game, than to go home today with a piece of crap." Of course, as the David Kaemmer and Mike Lescault have both said many times, the game will never be finished - there is always something extra that can be added, but is left out due to time restraints. To conclude, I think Grand Prix Legends will easily be the most realistic, challenging, and fun simulation available. The physics model was started from scratch, and the attention to detail that the guys at Papyrus have put into the game is absolutely phenominal. This will be the answer to every sim fan's dreams.. (Having said that, if you don't like classic F1, and you want to wait till next winter, Nascar3 will use the same physics engine and will hopefully include many of the ideas that were suggested to Papyrus but were too late to include in GPL.) But I'm a real RACING fan(Nascar fans take that to mean whatever you want!), and the glory days of Formula One is where it's at come July. Long Live Papyrus!!! D.B.

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> Asgeir, > I totally agree with everything you say..but - > I think Papyrus' Grand Prix Legends (July release) will be the answer to our > prayers.. > To respond to your points: > 1) > developers should listen to what we have to say! > - I have been monitoring various newsgroups such as this, and the forum at > the APEX GPL site at http://gpl.gamestats.com/ and have been pleased to > see that one of the game's designers, Mike Lescault, participates in the > forum, answering questions and taking suggestions.

Yes, I've noticed, and this only emphasizes how much Papyrus would like to make a perfect game. I just hope that they have made up something that makes life much easier for us when it comes to internet leagues. Not everyone has internet connection, so we some kind of a tool to verify results (and keeping track of how many times a game has been saved. The sim leagues are haunted by the cheat allegations... Papyrus has realized that in order to make a very good game, you have to listen to the end-users. I think that the developers might be a little over the top here. They live and develop using a network that is fast and has no load. This is rarely the case, networks are slow and with heavy loads. This must be addressed in the development of new on-line games. We must be able to play although we have pings of say 1000 ms (the game must extrapolate where the cars should be). Real time crash control demands ping times unknown to this time!!! I think we must accept the fact that in order to do world wide on-line racing, we have to remove the collisions! Christer Andersson has suggested ghost cars, I think this would still be immense fun. No, but still if they've read about it, and it has been described nicely through well founded arguments, they should be pretty stubborn if they don't include the idea in their sim... The only problem is that the internet contains SO much noise, insane suggestions and totally inhuman demands. This tends to *** the seriousness and well-meaning of a NG. I think they're flooded with suggestions. What we need is a "council" founded upon the people that genuinly want the best possible sims. We need to do a sorting of the suggestions, this is a tremendous task, but it would make it possible for the developer to use much less time on the trash. I think everybody can accept delays as long as we get informed (for instance, the developer can say "we have compatibility problems in the graphics departments"). And, I think one of the reasons for the delays is the fact that this physics engine is going to be used in a whole series of sims. And Papyrus would of course like this one to be right the first time around, so that the model gest acclaim from the very beginning. I totally agree, racing seems to be synonymous to GPL these days, when racing action lacks in the real world F1 (I think I saw just one pass for position in Melbourne) I just sincerely hope that Papyrus gets a flying start with their next generation of sims, so that the rest of the developers can see that Papyrus' contact with the end-users in fact produces a very good (sellable) product! Hooray! Hooray! Hooray! -- ---Asgeir--- Any information herein must be used with utter discretion and respect