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Rec.Autos.Simulators Archive

THE history of Sim Racing! BUT...

5 posts by 5 people · 28 Mar 1999 - 02 Apr 1999

Swindell 28 Mar 1999#458635
[link lost in import] This page is absolutly fantastic! Jo Helsen has put together one of the most comprehensive web pages charting the route along the history of our beloved hobby :) I think that all the sims on this page have been mentioned under my previous topic "How long have you been doing it? When was your first time?" thanks to you guys, but we still can't say when sim racing was 'born'. How do we go about establishing specific date? One way is to maybe find out which is the most popular sim that people were playing back 'then' (eg pre-1989?) and the release date of that game will be the day in question. Any other ideas? Rob
Don Hancock 29 Mar 1999#458779
\ I would bet that most publishers have their release dates in some database SOMEwhere. Just find out who the publisher of a specific game and get ahold of them (unless they're defunct - in which case you'll have to PRAY someone might still have the box). You MIGHT also try the copyright office in case they copyrighted it! "Gunner" ORSA Bronze #78 Navy Dodge truck
Dennis Brow 29 Mar 1999#458780
>thanks to you guys, but we still can't say when sim racing was 'born'. How do >we go about establishing specific date? What is the criteria for a sim? Clearly there has been a continuum of "realism" over the years of creating racing games, and some of them now are really good sims. Where do we draw the line to say "every game that has these features is a sim?" With all that in mind, I vote for Night Driver, from Atari, 10/29/1976 (see it at http://www.tc.umn.edu/~johns594/arcade/klov/N/Night_Driver.html) It has a steering wheel and gas pedal. How realistic! :) It came out when I was 3, so I never played it (though I played the Atari 2600 home version a bit). The next month came 280-Zzzap! (play it on MAME) in 11/76, possibly the first game to be based on a real car (the Datsun 280Z). I'm sure it was a totally realistic driving model. :) The first driving game I though was pretty realistic (as a 9-year old) was Turbo by Sega in 1981 (http://www.tc.umn.edu/~johns594/arcade/klov/T/Turbo.html). I was really hooked on OutRun (Sega, 1986) and liked that you had brakes and a shifter, could do burnouts, the car actually looked like it was turning, etc., but it still wasn't much of a sim. Virtua Racing (Sega (again!), early 90s) was the first 3D (polygon)-based racer I played, and I loved it. It really set a new standard in graphical and control realism IMHO, at least, for an arcade game. Finally, after I learned how to drive and did some road course driving schools, my vote for "realistic enough for me" (using a wheel and pedals) goes to Indycar Racing I by Papyrus. I upgraded my 386 to a 486 just to play it back in 1993. It was so different than arcade racers that I found it really frustrating and basically ignored it for 6 years! Now it really screams on my 400Mhz box! :) Actually, now I'm into GPL and IndyCar II (aka CART Racing). -- Visit the Classic Home Games Museum at ns2.apmtech.com/dbrown/museum Nothing I say is officially endorsed by UNC. Hooray for alumni accounts!
dschw 30 Mar 1999#458936
An interesting read, but no mention of the Papy Nascar series or the NROS but the inclusion of CPR?
Jo Helsen 02 Apr 1999#459623
Hello, nice to see that I got some hits.. :-) To answer your question: I'm perfectly aware that these titles were not included, but I *do* mention that I only included open-wheel racers in the second paragraph (?) I had to draw a line somewhere or I could have included just about anything. Cu, Jo Helsen 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 =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

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