What carsims do you have?

[Frank Oreskov]

I also only listed the current ones, if I had to list all my racing games, otherwise the list should include: Grand Prix Legends, Sports Car GT, F1 Challenge 99-02, Le Mans 24 Hours (both of them), Mercedes-Benz Truck Racing, Racer Free Car Simulator (I both made car physics and was moderator of the official Racer forum at now gone Race Sim Central). Besides them I have almost all arcade/simcade games since 1998 for both PC, Xbox 1+2 and PS2+3. Oh yeah I almost forgot, for the Amiga 500, by Papyrus: Indianapolis 500! Could be steered with the mouse (the Amiga almost only used digital (on/off) joysticks but with the mouse you had analogue steering!). Oh yeah and I also raced Stunt Car Racer, by Geoff Crammond if I remember correctly.

I think I remember having the Cart Sim, together with Monster Truck Madness 2 it was bundled with my first ever wheel, a MS Sidewinder Force Feedback wheel bought around year 2000 or 2001. That wheel lasted many years but sadly I don't have any of them anymore.

I also have GPL, and I used the wheel to race in the GPL Rally 2 at Race Sim Central roughly 10 years ago on Team GRrrr (Gene Rally which forum was also hosted at RSC), never raced there before, completed all stages (all made by Madcowie who also made some nice rFactor tracks).
The first cargame that started getting closer to simulation was Codemasters ToCA2 Touring Cars, those cars could actually spin out and required delicate steering (I used an old Logitech Wingman joystick, held right at the base for precision). Tiff Needell provided the voiceover, as he also did with the first of the only two official Le Mans games I know of. Both of which I funny enough just played last week.

I also have iRacing and tried it again but I simply can't understand when the rear is moving due to tirewall flex and when it's sliding (tested the LMP and the Type 79) so I'll never be able to race there

Rouke: Glad to hear it, to be honest I was a bit concerned when I read it, but I knew it would do no good to try and comfort you because the problem is lack of drivers not kind words.

[maiph]

I have iRacing but I dont drive it much any more. I dislike the fixed driving view, often meaning I am peeping out of a letterbox of a windshield heavily framed by a bunch of irrelevant cockpit and bodywork. I am a nose-cam or TV-cam driver. And don't get me started on their business model, compelling customers to invest further into content etc, it is just too corporate for my tastes. Plus it keeps telling me off for running wide and clipping apexes. Annoying and pedantic.

Rfactor2 seems much more lively and realistic to me and with its bouncy ride and changing conditions it is more immersive and more visually appealing too. Plus there is still a sense that it caters to the modding community, it is more 'of the people' rather than imposed and controlled from above. It still gets my vote.

I have Game Stock Car too, v1.0 , and yes it is like an ultimate incarnation of RF1, great fun, good frame rates but destined to fade away?

AC and Pcars I will wait and see if they develop the community momentum before I invest.

[Ray Walton]

Maiph my old friend, whereas I of course accept the subjective preferences of each person as to his favourite sim, I have to totally disagree with you about the cam views rather than from the cockpit when sim racing. We are SIM racing which means trying to simulate as accurately as possible what your would see and feel and experience as a real world racing driver. The more realistic and immersive it is the more I for one will enjoy it. Nose cam and other cam views are as they say camera views and purely for spectators and reviewers of course. So sure it is sometimes nice to use those views when reviewing a race via your replay file as that does give you different angles to see things like where you or another driver went wrong etc. For actual sim racing it can seriously ONLY be the cockpit view for ALL participants equally, and I know in the past of some serious sim racing leagues who enforced that racing view on all their drivers when racing. Sorry to be blunt but I really have to say that I feel those cam views are akin to arcade racing games IMHO, fun yes as we all know, but sim racing ??? Hmm come on now I think not.

Personally I have always been in favour of our league enforcing cockpit views but we never got that rule passed as far as I can remember. To me a cam view can give you in many cases an unfair advantage over others who are truly simulating the racing from their drivers seat in the cockpit and seeing more what a real world driver would see, so that is why I think ONLY cockpit in driver seat view should be allowed in league championship races. In fact as I remember correctly in rF1 you could set that as an enforced view when setting up the race servers. But that is just my two pennyworth and maybe that will start another active debate on this subject now

[maiph]

Ray, I totally respect and understand your point about trying to simulate the real driving experience. I chose to drive from nose cam precisely for that reason, to maximise my immersion. I have a decent sized (27") monitor but it is only about a quarter of the size of a real windscreen. To further reduce this active area by framing it with artificial static (or wobbling a bit) cockpit is in my opinion unrealistic because it is like looking into a miniature world, with a limited sense of speed. I want to see the track rushing by at the screen edges as this simulates real-world peripheral vision. If this gives an advantage compared to real-world driving then I contend that it is justified on the grounds that there are physical cues absent from sim-driving such as G-forces, we need extra visuals to compensate. But maybe we are just playing an arcade game, a boy's toy, one that we fellows seek to dignify by calling it a 'simulation'

[Rouke]

There is a (yet again) a big discussion going on over at ISI on this very subject. And even the most hardcore realism geeks cannot agree on what is most realistic because even within a cockpit there are so many different settings and parameters its just not going to be settled any time soon in this millennium.
1 monitor vs 3 is an obvious one. the advantage is so big it becomes a mute point rather quickly.

Personally I don't care what anyone uses. and I am far from convinced any other view is faster. tv cam defo is not faster as you lose allot of reaction time due to the nature of the axis of the behind-camera being slower then the direct input from cockpit. its just not as accurate.

Something never mentioned in these discussions though is safety. someone using a tv cam will see more of his opponents and judge critical situations quicker. Imo from a league pov that is a big plus!

But in the end its a personal choice of how to have fun. yes its a simulator but every individual approaches it in a different way. if that's nose cam or racing with track cams only, all the more power to them for enjoying it so much.
Plus, with peeps around like Costa with his eye problems I was always happy Legends never forced it so he too could be able to race with us.

But then again, I never was a realism geek to begin with, I do use cockpit but mainly because its the fastest view for me, anything else slows me down half a tenth here or there.
There's people racing in suits, and gloves, racing shoes and a helmet on, pretending to be real race drivers. that's the other end of the spectrum and I find that a bit sad.
(no offense if any of you do that lol, each his own)

[maiph]

Something never mentioned in these discussions though is safety. someone using a tv cam will see more of his opponents and judge critical situations quicker. Imo from a league pov that is a big plus!


There's people racing in suits, and gloves, racing shoes and a helmet on, pretending to be real race drivers. that's the other end of the spectrum and I find that a bit sad.
(no offense if any of you do that lol, each his own)

Good point Rouke, purists will hate me for this but much of my RF1 driving was done in chase-mode view. I won the twfc championship from outside of the car and quite a long way back, it was indeed better for safety and even for defending as I could see the car behind at all times and drive accordingly. I also felt I could better judge the direction of the car but lately I am doubting any advantage there. Re-learning my driving from nose cam or more recently from the roll-bar cam I found I am a bit quicker and can sense the changes of direction sooner. Roll-bar cam has been my choice lately just so I can see when the front wheels lock and it allows a view further up the road than cockpit, again for safety reasons this helps.

Unless you are racing in helmet and overalls you are not seriously trying to simulate real racing, and if you are thus equipped it is a bit sad I agree.

[DaleB]

You know, I've never really thought of running anything but the cockpit view, never really seriously tried running anything else. I've given it a quick try a few times but nothing to really ever get comfortable enough to run a race that way. For me when I try other views I lose the immersion factor and it's just not as fun for me and that is why I race. But I'm lucky too, I'm able to run triple screens and that helps with views and seeing others around me. To Rouke's point the discussion at ISI is pretty interesting, some of the projection systems with the curved screens look pretty damn cool too and less stress on your video (graphics) system.

[Ray Walton]

Spot on Dale. When I raced a lot with rF1 and iRacing I try to set up the FOV in the cockpit to simulate as near as possible how I would perceive the view if I was in the real world car. I also try to set up my in car seat height and position too so it is as immersive as possible. As to screen size for cockpit views then that has to be taken with consideration of viewing distance from the screen as sitting close to my 22" monitor gives me the same eye FOV as sitting farther away from a 27" screen but what would be nice is to have a 27" screen AND sit close to it but that cost money I do not have as a banker robbed pensioner.

Sure we know we do not have G forces but we do have very realistic FFB which 10 years ago we never would have thought it possible to have it so effective. So I can live without G force and with my old bones and joints I would not be able to race with that factor supplied if it ever could. About 6 years ago I tried some fun Go Karting with a fairly powerful Kart and I could not move for about a week, it was bloody horrible the bone jarring and the terrible stiffness of the steering that crucified my shoulders. So uncomfortable for an old git I would hate to have that on my sim racing programs but understand you young dudes loving it as I would have done too many years ago.

So yes bottom line is fun but I still contend that I would always vote for enforced cockpit views in ALL championship league races. There are many fun races around too where any view you want is and would be allowed. All for folk having fun but championship league sim racing is serious stuff IMHO and why I do not do it now as I would be a liability to others on track being so slow and with poor reaction times.

[Frank Oreskov]

Ralph: You raced with the chase view!? Wow, the way it moves I'd never be able to control a sliding car, well done!

I myself use the tv-cam on the 79's for one simple reason: safety! I can't see much of the track in the cockpit view and the shaking camera is not actually helping me drive better either, in fact quite the opposite. Besides, with one 24" monitor I can't get a real-world view that would be useable anyway. Try to make a copy of you monitor's frame and then take a seat in your real life car and hold it at the same distance, can you drive in real life with that tiny view? I can't.

Generally speaking (no flaming intended at all) I do know many people ridicule simracers who wear anything real-life racing related like gloves or shoes but that's not always fair in my personal experience. I started using some cheap Sabelt kart-gloves because the alcantara CSW wheel just doesn't feel nice to hold when I'm perspiring (and I don't even do that very much). In real life I also often need gloves but that's because my hands slip on the wheel, even though it's the Momo sportwheel from the 300+ hp LanEvo7-9 (factory made danish campaign models). If I get some proper pedals with a realistic brake then I'll use shoes for simracing too since I can't drive with bare feet, I can only just do it with the featherlight (and too low) gamepedals.

That being said though, for a real (life) challenge then a racingsuit and helmet could be worn for simracing since the helmet restricts your view and the helmet and suit retains heat and that's also something that will tire a driver during a race besides g-forces. Those racing in a comfortable arm-chair wearing loafers have it easy. Here I'm referring to an older video of a mature simracer racing GPL, named Crisso I think. I read he raced GP2 in the 70's and he's a stern advocate of H-gate shifters and clutch-pedals for all racecars, and he also did drive like that in the video.

On track though I think driving safety is paramount, and some things can help even out the drivers so we can all have some good fun races without excessive risk of crashing. Try to race a modern closed-roof LMP compared to an open one, or one of the better GT's. Good luck racing side-by-side thrue corners with that, let alone actually staying on track. I don't know how Tom and company does it but I now understand the new LMP rules for driver seating height and visibility thrue the windows.

[Leo]

All-my-carsims.jpg

[Ray Walton]

Have to add about the cockpit v chase v nose cam viewing options while racing. I have sim raced for many many years since in fact 1993 and only stopped a couple or so years ago due to being totally uncompetitive even with the back markers as I feel a result of age affecting my reaction and hand/eye coordination.

Anyway in all those years of course I tried all views and even ran a couple of arcade car racing sims too. In all that time I could never feel connected to my car from any view other than in the drivers seat in the cockpit. No suspension of disbelief with no in-cockpit views and I felt totally disconnected with the car and the feel of it, i.e. even the best sims of the time like rF1, NASCAR Racing and GPL etc all just felt like an arcade game to me until I got into the sim driving seat in the cockpit.

Sure all to their own but I do feel the full sense of an almost real world immersion factor is missing unless you are in the drivers seat when you race seriously with top sims like rF2 and iRacing. Nothing else I can add to this really but main thing is folk enjoy their sim racing and nobody should be allowed any unfair advantages in league and championship races. To me that wider peripheral view of the "arcade" type cam views does give a real and IMHO unfair advantage and why I am for only cockpit views being allowed for as near as possible level playing field fair racing. Sure enjoy the lovely fun of games like Need For Speed etc where mostly you drive form chase view but hey we all know that is just a fun game not a racing sim. Just my two pence worth guys.