GPL cannot be trusted: car performance degrades

This is long, and so bizarre, you won't believe me, but anyway, here goes. I have been practising hard at Kyalami in a Brabham. I struggled all last week to break 1:24. On Friday, I figured out what I needed to do to go faster, and managed 1:23.67 in an online race. To prove this no fluke, on Saturday morning I did a few training laps, times went 1:26, 1:25, 1:24.8, 1:24.2, 1:23.63. No problem. To see if my new skill was transferrable, I tried Monza, and immediately did a PB of 1:30.60. I really seem to be improving. But in the evening, and on Sunday, I could not break 1.25 at Kyalami. At Monza I drove two laps that I *know* were good (for me :), but GPL said 1:34. In an online race at Monza a friend commented that he should not have been able to outdrag me so easily out of Parabolica, and did I have a gearing problem? I hadn't changed anything. So I started analysing replays, using gpldump and plotting speed/distance graphs. I was doing normal speeds through corners, but on the flat-out straights I had *much* less acceleration, and there's nothing to do but press the pedal to the metal in these sections. In a reasonable lap at Kyalami, I always cross the start line at 167-168 mph. But now I was always at 162-163. What? I was having other strange problems. Automatic shifting came on by itself, without the box checked. In the pits, in 1st with the (analogue) clutch disengaged, the engine would not rev freely, requiring 50% throttle to get the tach off the stop, although in neutral it was normal, as if the clutch was binding. I checked the calibration; all was as it should be. In despair, and without much hope, I saved my setups, reinstalled the game, restored setups. Total transformation! My prevously leaden Brabham was now so lively I could not keep it on the track, and the brakes required *much* more pedal travel to lock the wheels. After about 20 laps at Kyalami (the car was so different I spent a lot of time in the sand initially) I was again in the 1:23 zone, and doing 167 mph at the start line. Told you you wouldn't believe me! I'd say it was imagination myself, but this was *not* a small effect. My faith in the comparability of GPL lap times across different systems is shaken. How can this happen? In paranoid moments, I suspect that while I was racing online, someone used the VROC permissions to hack a configuration file on my system and obtain an unfair advantage. But this seems far-fetched indeed. So, has anyone else seen something like this? Anton -- Antony Bowers -- Department of Computer Science, University of Bristol, UK. -- http://www.cs.bris.ac.uk/~bowers/ [address restored]

Hello, I'm Rob. I was browsing R.A.S. and was rather surprised to see another sim racer from Bristol. I live in the Stoke Bishop area, cya Rob

Are you sure that there isn't a calibration error with your steering wheel/joystick? / Fred

Antony, I have had similar incidents but all were corrected by re-calibrating my controls in both windows and GPL. I don't really know what the culprit is but historically, Papy sims have been quite sensitive to control endpoints: drift of the equipment could cause either full braking or full throtle to not be realized. They have recommended in the past to not fully press the controls to their extremes when calibrating, thus leaving a margin of error for thermal drift of the values. Regards, Jeff Haas

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>In despair, and without much hope, I saved my setups, reinstalled the >game, restored setups. Total transformation! My prevously leaden Brabham >was now so lively I could not keep it on the track, and the brakes >required *much* more pedal travel to lock the wheels. After about 20 >laps at Kyalami (the car was so different I spent a lot of time in the >sand initially) I was again in the 1:23 zone, and doing 167 mph at the >start line. >Told you you wouldn't believe me! I'd say it was imagination myself, but >this was *not* a small effect. >My faith in the comparability of GPL lap times across different systems >is shaken. How can this happen? In paranoid moments, I suspect that >while I was racing online, someone used the VROC permissions to hack a >configuration file on my system and obtain an unfair advantage. But this >seems far-fetched indeed.

I think the calibration of the wheel and pedals changed so that when you pressed the pedal to the ground you didn't actually got full throttle. I have seen this happend. /Magnus

yes Anthony, I get some wierd problems in GPL sometimes, too, mainly with the car pulling to one side. I have to re-calibrate in BOTH Win95 control panel and GPL (in that order) for it to be decent. Even after doing that once, the Brabham I usually drive was good, I switched to other cars just to expereince the new engine sounds available. I changed NOTHING, but many other cars I tried pulled to the left. Wierd. I just quit GPL, then restarted it later and everything was fine, again, after changing nothing from the previous time. Maybe something initialize wierd when it starts sometime, I don't know. But re-calibrating usually helps. I your case, it sounds like the controller may have been goofy. -_Dave

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> >This is long, and so bizarre, you won't believe me, but anyway, here > >goes. > Antony, > I have had similar incidents but all were corrected by re-calibrating > my controls in both windows and GPL. I don't really know what the > culprit is but historically, Papy sims have been quite sensitive to > control endpoints: drift of the equipment could cause either full > braking or full throtle to not be realized. They have recommended in > the past to not fully press the controls to their extremes when > calibrating, thus leaving a margin of error for thermal drift of the > values. > Regards, > Jeff Haas

-- Dave Schwabe The Aussie Toad -- Grand Prix Legends & Brabham site http://users.wi.net/~schwabe

Yea, me.........everynow and then, everything thing that used to be is zippo and a strange new car i have never been in takes over. I practiced for a week for online race at monaco and race nite, mr. hyde showed up and car wouldnt even turn left without smashing haybales. finally gave up, utterly pissed and it was not wheel calibration. next day, back to normal. there is def. something there that causes this jeykell & hyde behavior. c

I echo the calibration remark. I have experienced the same degradation of motor performance in GPl only to recalibrate the controls (both in windows and GPL) and voila--more speed. Tom Petersen

Hi Antony, I heard that switching vehicles will sometimes put the brake-help and shifting on, but would have thought the boxes would have been checked.. This has never happened to me. You could try checking the brake-help box, saving the options then go back and turn brake-help off to see if this fixes it. Of course you should repeat the steps with auto-shifting. Sounds like a prime candidate for GPL 1.1. Jason. > This is long, and so bizarre, you won't believe me, but anyway, here > goes. <snip> <snip> -- -------- Jason Monds "My other car is a Ferrari" http://members.home.net/gpl.mondsj/gpl - For my combined gas/brake setups (Please remove 'no extra spork' when replying)

You mentioned that you have an analogue clutch. Sounds like a calibration issue with the clutch. If the full range of motion of your clutch was not producing the calibrated inputs, it would cause the engine to fail to rev normally at one extreme and for you to lose acceleration and top speed at the other extreme. Perhaps you might try short calibrating your clutch device somewhat. Jack Rambo

...long enough that I'll *snip* The lower top speed and not revving freely issues both sound like calibration problems. Unfortunately, we don't have a "test calibration" screen, only a "recalibrate" screen, so it's difficult to tell for sure. It doesn't hurt to recalibrate once in a while. Particularly if you're using a controller that has "trim wheels." If you accidentally move one of the trim wheels, you'll throw off the calibration. When you do recalibrate, make sure your controls are centered before you hit the "Calibrate Joystick(s)" button. Also, pay close attention to what's going on on this screen. Watch the arrows as you move your controller's axes. Do the arrows move smoothly? If not, your potentiometers may be dirty or worn out, or you may be using DirectInput with the "Poll with interrupts enabled" checkbox selected. After moving all the axes to their extents, slowly move them to their extents and watch the calibrated values. Do they all reach 1.000 (and -1.000 if the axis goes both directions)? If not, you won't get the full effect of any control you assign to the axis. As for auto-shifting coming on by itself, there is a bug in GPL 1.0 that can cause this to happen when you go to the "Player Info" screen from GPL's main menu (the same bug can enable traction control and braking help, too). This bug will be addressed in the GPL 1.1 patch. Randy

Hi, <snip-o-rama> Which controller do you use? I have suffered similarly with my TM Formula 1. The problem turned out to be the brake pedal. Sometimes, when I pressed it, it would seem to physically bounce all the way back up but a signal of "pedal slightly pressed" would be sent to the machine. I could see this whilst recalibrating, the slider would go all the way right when I pressed it, but wouldn't go al the way to the left when I let it go. The result was I would be going down the straights with the Brake pedal slightly "on". This meant slower laptimes. I suffered this in IGPS Rouen practice last week. Before I solved the trouble, I was getting laps of 1m59-2m00. After solving it I got back to 1m56-1m57. What I did was recalibrate so that I still had the brake pedal 80% pressed down when I clicked "OK". This meant that when the brake pedal was released whilst driving, it was so far from the "minimum" point, there was hardly any trouble. I picked up as much as 15mph on the straights. Sorry for the slightly convoluted explanation but that's the best I could come up with :-) Might be worth bearing in mind if you have the same problem again. -- Cheers! Graeme Nash http://www.karisma1.demon.co.uk ICQ# 11257824 1998 Xoom GP2 League Champion

<great info znipped> -And when can we see this rumoured patch? I have some major problems getting the game to start (In another tred), and after reinstalling gpl I read the readme again, and it's dated 31. august. When was the last time a release had over 6 months between release and first patch? Sorry, I'm just a bit upset about my gpl.exe breakdown, and the rare and weird error it generates... JoHS

Automatic shifting comes on my machine quite often. When I go to options, none of the boxes are checked. When I go back to the car all is well?? Bob Agee

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> This is long, and so bizarre, you won't believe me, but anyway, here > goes. > I have been practising hard at Kyalami in a Brabham. I struggled all > last week to break 1:24. On Friday, I figured out what I needed to do to > go faster, and managed 1:23.67 in an online race. To prove this no > fluke, on Saturday morning I did a few training laps, times went 1:26, > 1:25, 1:24.8, 1:24.2, 1:23.63. No problem. > To see if my new skill was transferrable, I tried Monza, and immediately > did a PB of 1:30.60. I really seem to be improving. > But in the evening, and on Sunday, I could not break 1.25 at Kyalami. At > Monza I drove two laps that I *know* were good (for me :), but GPL said > 1:34. In an online race at Monza a friend commented that he should not > have been able to outdrag me so easily out of Parabolica, and did I have > a gearing problem? I hadn't changed anything. > So I started analysing replays, using gpldump and plotting > speed/distance graphs. I was doing normal speeds through corners, but on > the flat-out straights I had *much* less acceleration, and there's > nothing to do but press the pedal to the metal in these sections.

<snip> This might be a stupid comment (?) But: Are you certain that your controller is reliable? I have to recalibrate quite often when I experience the same.. Just my thoughts:) Matt -- ----------------------------------------- Matthew Knutsen "The Art of Legends" - GPL add-ons www.cheekracing.electra.no/GPL/simrace1.htm -----------------------------------------

>> This is long, and so bizarre, you won't believe me, but anyway, here >> goes. >...long enough that I'll *snip* ... me too GPL has now been out for five months and the patch still isn't out. When (approximately) can we expect to see the patch? (Hopefully before N3 is released - grin) -- ========================================================= John Simmons - Redneck Techno-Biker (Zerex12) http://www.members.home.net/jms1/index.html John Simmons - Barbarian Diecast Collector http://members.home.net/jsimm/diecast_index.html IGPS (Season 2) Director http://207.104.111.77/igps2/igps2.html If you want to send me email, go to either of the URL's shown above & click "Send Me Mail" in the contents frame. =========================================================

Absolutely! And this is part of the realism. As we are mostly not athletes in the peak of condition with years of racing experience and a super licence, it is not surprising we are inconsistent. I find the right socks particularly important :-) I'm glad you found out what the problem was though Tim (just down the road in Bath) >Others in this thread say they have seen similar inconsistencies in >GPL. If these are not calibration problems, my experience suggests >that the gameplay is affected by subtle subjective factors. If you >are tired, angry, have a slight cold, have had even half a glass of >beer, your chair has moved a bit or you are wearing the wrong socks :) >the game can seem quite different.

Yup, happens to me EVERY time I switch cars. It's quite a thrill to do the necessary stuff when you're on VROC with 2 or 3 minutes left in practice: Enter pits, press throttle - cars shifts gears ESC, Enter to exitpits click Options click on all three: Brake, Throttle, MAnual/Auto click Green click Options click on all three: Brake, Throttle, MAnual/Auto click Green click Green again. Ahhh, I've got control again... Jeez. EVERY time I switch cars

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|Hi Antony, | |I heard that switching vehicles will sometimes put the brake-help and |shifting on, but would have thought the boxes would have been checked.. | |This has never happened to me. You could try checking the brake-help box, |saving the options then go back and turn brake-help off to see if this

fixes |it. Of course you should repeat the steps with auto-shifting.

I think you don't need to select and deselect them. Just click Options and get round to the screen where it shows the driver aids, then make sure they are already Off and click Green. Then you're ready - no need to turn them on and off again. http://members.xoom.com/IanHill http://members.tripod.com/~IanHill

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>>Yup, happens to me EVERY time I switch cars. >>It's quite a thrill to do the necessary stuff when you're on VROC with 2 or >>3 minutes left in practice: >>Enter pits, press throttle - cars shifts gears >>ESC, Enter to exitpits >>click Options >>click on all three: Brake, Throttle, MAnual/Auto >>click Green >>click Options >>click on all three: Brake, Throttle, MAnual/Auto >>click Green >>click Green again. >>Ahhh, I've got control again... >I think you don't need to select and deselect them. Just click Options and >get round to the screen where it shows the driver aids, then make sure they >are already Off and click Green. Then you're ready - no need to turn them on >and off again. >http://members.xoom.com/IanHill http://members.tripod.com/~IanHill

Actually the green button does not appear until you click one of them. But you only need to click one on and off again and then hit the green button and this is then remembered for the new car. Alan http://www.chandler.u-net.com