Quote from axus :

I see you have just read the topic and replied. I see you come from RSC too. illepall

My Apologies, I am currenly in alpha stage of development. As an Alpha version forum poster, Some features are missing or at an early stage of implementation. Particularly 'irony' functionality has not been updated since early demo days, also 'sarcasm' and general 'fooling around' are high on the priority list for a total re-write. If you believe that my attemts at humour may have been taken seriously, please PM me with a detailed 'oof' report.

Quote from george_tsiros :

Someone might misunderstand my previous post as boasting about being "uncrashable".

I did. (at least that you were less crashable than us)

Quote :

This is not the message i am trying to convey. I am constantly analysing the surrounding area and vehicles for any potential danger. Not a single moment i rest assured that "i will brake early and safely". I always drive having in mind "what if i brake and it starts skidding?" "What if there is something i haven't yet seen?", and i am alert constantly.

A most comendable attitude.

still doesn't make your theory about hand positioning less wrong

Quote from george_tsiros :

If you see "F1" anywhere in my post, please tell me, because i distinctively remember i tried to examine the daily routine driving.

you gave some pseudo scientific theory about hand positioning related to muscle control - the same muscles are used to turn the wheel in an F1 car as in a road car - so my point about F1 using 9 - 3 hand position is totally relevant to your post

Quote :

Thank you for your deconstructive and harsh critisism.

you are most welcome - fwiw, the reason i was harsh and critical is that you were expounding some obviously (to me) flawed theory that if taken as correct, could make someone a more dangerous driver - that is a serious issue, and not the place for niceties and good humour.

Quote :

You (or Moss) wouldn't last a minute in greek traffic without a crash. I've proven myself worthy countless times having avoided being smashed to bits(and having saved numerous ignorant lives that pop out "apparently" out of nowhere) by the general chaos and disorganization around me. The only time my car was in an accident was when it was parked. I've spent every single day since i learned driving to analyse everything that can be analysed, from the length of the car to the color of the car. I've gone karting with some guys who were all the time gloating about their mad skillz and pwned them the first time i raced round that track. I have avoided cars coming up from behind me, sliding with brakes locked, while i was waiting at the light. You can guess how, but in the time i had gone out of harm's way, you wouldn't even have geared in first. They (4 girls in a tiny car) just grazed the rear right of my bumper.

So you are a self proclaimed great driver - and none of us would have survived what you have - not ever, coz we are all rubish compared to you...
none of which makes your original post any less wrong, stupid irresponsible, dangerous etc.
When i was a kid, my dad used to drive his car with his hands on the top of the wheel like in your fig6. The thing is that he had arms like popeye, So for him the loss of muscular control between the different hand positions was less significant - maybe you also have arms like popeye... that still doesn't make your theory any less wrong, false, etc.

Quote :

shut up.

you shut up... fool :mr-t:

Quote from sgt.flippy :

Yes, I'm stupid, everyone here knows it by now.

But those cyclists have rules too, and if they would obey their own rules, the drivers wouldn't need to be so defensive. I don't know how it where you live, but over here, cyclists (on a roundabout for example), they just cross the street (while there is painted on the tarmac, and there is a sign that tells them they have to stop). Is that normal then??

hehe. here in Scotland, most cyclists seems to ride on the pavement because there are enough idiot driver to make the roads too damn dangerous - i gave up cycling years ago because i refuse to cycle on the pavement, My biggest fear was moms on 'the school run' who seemed to ignore anything smaller than a bus as 'not a threat to my kiddies'.
I havn't seen nearly as many cyclists missing stop signs and jumping red lights as cars - I guess cycling gives you a hightened sense of your own mortality

Quote :

About the children, I know you should be carefull, and keep to the speeds, but I'm talking about unsupervised children, wich can suddenly ran onto the streets from let's say two parked cars. You can't see it, you can do nothing about it, but guess who gets the blame huh?

Supervised children can also run into the road - somtimes because they've just been told not to !!!!. You can do something about it - you can do your utmost to minimise the severity of an accident if one should happen... if you see kids on the pavement ahead, prepare for a surprise attack - and don't forget to beep you horn and swear at the little B*****ds when they do stupid things

Quote from axus :

Come on guys,

This forum was always loosely moderated and the moderators were never stupidly strict like on RSC. But I now see one or two threads getting locked per day, and with good reason too. On the one hand, I blame it on people not thinking before they make a new thread... on the other hand I blame the people who actually post in these dull threads. If no-one posts in there, the thread starter will eventually get the message.

The flamewars that went on every few weeks seem to have disappeared, but now its stupidity left, right and center. As Scawen said a week-or-so-ago, this forum was never intended to be a kiddies' playground. I urge both forum members and moderators to take a stand against this. Have a sticky with a more comprehensive version of the forum rules in the general discussion. Don't post in stupid threads to tell people how stupid they are and for the love of god, the whole forum doesn't need to jump on a demo racer using a crack. Not helping him and reporting his post so the moderators can deal with it will do.

I'm really left speechless by some of the threads started. I know that this comes with the territory and LFS has grown a lot but the moderation and community needs to grow with it to keep this forum tidy and pleasurable to read as it used to be (barring the flamewars).

This is getting on my nerves - every day there seems to be a new thread about how many threads are getting locked :-t

Moderators please lock this useless thread!

Quote from sgt.flippy :

Am I the only one bothered with that? I wonder if I'll ever get a week off work for whiplash and instant death

i think you might get time off with an injury, but death would send you to the graveyard... of course you could end up strapped to a chair for decades, pooing into a bag and being spoon fed baby food.

Quote :

... And about the child... I know it's harsh, but I feel a lot of accidents with children happen not because of the drivers, but parents that don't pay attention to their children. Now everywhere in Belgium, around school areas, are limited to 30KM/H. That's just insane...

Its not harsh, it's ridiculous. Children have to be given freedom and some responsibility if they are to learn and develop into adults - would you have them chaparoned by an adult 100% of the time ?
Unfortunately children often cause accidents - they are children, they are sometimes irresponsible, they have less sophisticated awareness of danger etc.. Drivers on the other hand are adults and should know better. If a child runs into the road and dies in an accident in which a driver was being irresponsible, the accident may have been the childs fault, but the death could have been avoidable BY THE DRIVER!. If the driver could have avoided the child by driving at the correct speed or paying full attention or holding the wheel correctly, then it's them that will have to live the rest of their lives with that death on their conscience.

Quote :

The thing with pedestrians these days is, they seem to be the greatest, and drivers are the fault of everything. But if you look how those children on their bikes, drive on the streets, crossing streets where they should stop, but they just cross because they EXPECT the drivers stop anyway... That's just plain wrong.

I've seen as many cars doing stupid dangerous things as pedestrians and cyclists - it's human nature to take risks. The difference is that drivers are in charge of a very dangerous piece of machinery whereas pedestrians and cyclists are not. As a driver it is your responsibility to be 'defensive' and safe, and obey the rules - they are there for good reasons, even if you're not willing (or too stupid) to acknowledge those reasons...

Quote from Hyperactive :

...But going straight at 100kph doesn't take too much steering. Unless I get into an accident...

Well, thats the WHOLE point !!!
Thats the whole point of most rules of the road - it's not what happens in normal conditions - it's what happens in extraordinary conditions e.g. when a stray pedestrian turns a straight road into an instant high speed slalom...
or the guy coming the other way has a seizure and veers into your path at 70mph...
having both hands on the wheel in a 'correct' position could be the difference between a week off work with whiplash and instant death, or years of remorse and emotional pain after killing a child... !

Quote from george_tsiros :

How do you grip your wheel?

I will try to start a thread discussing about the optimal way to hold the steering wheel of a (real life) car. In the process i will demonstrate and try to give good reasons that some of the current trends are sub-optimal for safe relaxed daily driving.

I will start with an assumption, that the arm...snip...

Wow, what a bunch of ignorant misinformed DANGEROUS drivel !

Do you have any understanding of human anatomy ?
Where you are placing your hands in fig6 , it's mostly the muscles of the wrists and arms that control the wheel. When the hands are placed at 9-3 or 10-2, it's the much stronger muscles of the upper back, shoulders and chest that do the work.
Your hand placement also makes it more difficult to feed the wheel without crossing your arms - this also reduces the level of muscular strength you have to control the car.

You would think with all the millions thay have for research that the F1 guys would have their wheels designed for maximum control ? where do they put their hands ? yep at 9 - 3

Quote from MZWiZard :

Yes it was VCS indeed. You were logging on and off and the last time it said in red "JOOS -main", which means you run a modified version of some kind and we will NOT allow such things on our server!

It is not okay to go try out "mods" on public servers, unless specific told it is okay by welcome msg or other.

If you feel this is not correct, please go to www.vcs.dk and post in our "miscelleneous" and we will treat you with respect and take it from there.

Pretty funny, first you state publicly that the guy is a cheat, (an assumption based on ignorance), and then you tell him if he has a problem with this, that he should go to your forum - lol. Aside from the fact that the forum is run by folks who have demonstrated poor knowledge of LFS (or very low level of intelligence?), it's a foreign language forum. Telling him to take his problem there seems like a pretty daft suggestion !

Maybe you should just apologise to him here ?

Quote from keiran :

erm ...

Did you really take this sentence completely out of context, and then interpret is as meaning "The marbles are there because of Montoya". If so, maybe less time on track, more in the classroom would be a good plan

Quote from keiran :

Why should it be Montoya's fault for the marbles ? illepall

I dunno, you tell me? seems like an odd question though, and has no relevance to anything I have said

Quote from ayrton senna 87 :

u look at all the replies from the rosberg thing, the real racers say 'yea rosberb was stupid' and the simmers say 'monty was stupid'...

Which real racers are you talking about ?
LFS 'pros' lol, semi amature karting enthusiasts, or highly experienced and respected F1 drivers ?

In the itv highlights programme, there was an interview with Coulthard - they asked him if is was Rosbergs fault, he said (paraphrasing) that it was a difficult call, but that Montoya was being very optimistic with his attempted pass.
IIRC he also implied that it would have been difficult for Rosberg to yeild in that situation without crashing out due to the dreaded 'marbles'.

I guess you know better though - I mean, you're the guy who never shunts other drivers by accident, only on purpose right?

Personally, I thought that it was naive of Rosberg to try to hold his line for reasons of self preservation - let Monty past, he will crash out later anyway .
If what Coulthard said about the marbles is true, most of the blame lies with Montoya.

@becky

The thing that i found most enlightening was highlighted by figure3 in that article. I was doing some spring/mass stuff on gameboy, and it kept blowing up on me. So I instinctively started introducing more damping, and the sort of techniques you were suggesting. That approach doesn't work, even though is seems like it should !. Fig3 shows that for the given time steps, the curve with the least change can be the one that blows up (e.g. the most damped one can be worst !).

So the only way to fix things is either to have a faster 'sampling rate' or use a more complicated/accurate method of guessing where everything should be at the next time step e.g. Runge Kutta etc.. The more complicated 'integrator' uses up more resources, but allows you to use a much lower clock for the physics. I suppose the most efficient balance between fancy math and brute force depends on the specific application, and the likelyhood of it blowing up.

Quote from Becky Rose :

@col - what's an integrator in this context please? (not mocking, i'm a techy but not a scientist ).

read the article i linked to - it explains it better than I ever could
It starts off very easy to understand, showing you how even the limplest video games use a version of a Euler integrator. It then gets much trickier - so you would probably need to look at other references, but its a good introduction i think.
fwiw, I'm very much a techy/creative rather than a math/science person, so I find this stuff has a steep learning curve (steep like a cliff )

Quote from pricorde :

Hi there, I'm the Rigs of Rods developer.

Scawen got it right, I need a high rate of simulation steps to avoid instabilities. The trucks have a bit too much flex, but making them stronger would require even more steps. Keeping the trucks heavy helps also to keep stability.

Event the wheels are made with beams, so you have also tires flex!

The physics simulation is indeed at fixed rate per second. The advantage is that on high end machines this boosts fps because you do less physics pass par frame. On low end machine, the physics can not be simulated realtime, so I slow the time in the game (the game is in slow-mo) in order to avoid instabilities....

My (limited) understanding is that, as you have already noted, switching to a Runge Kutta (or even higher order) integrator will make a huge difference to instabilities. Euler integrators blow up all over the place.
It would be interesting to know what kind of integrator is used in LFS ? Scawen ?

Here is a good article on the issues of physics models 'blowing up'
(two versions of the same paper - one in pdf)
http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20000215/lander_pfv.htm
http://www.darwin3d.com/gamedev/articles/col0499.pdf

Quote from P5YcHoM4N :

Or to put it basicly, we are paying for tech demos to show off a graphics card to sell it to people. So we're just paying to do what marketing do?

I have considered that, but I don't agree.
They are not tech demos - they have to be games, and the metrics by which the GEEK WAR is won/lost depend on them being 'games'.
The delusion that the whole process is based on is that "the fancy hardware makes the 'games' 'better'. " illepall

Some interesting stuff about the state of the games industry in this thread

Heres some of my thoughts...

[warning] LONG RANTING POST FOLLOWS [/warning]

I've been playing games since 1980, I've been programming since 1981, although only professionally (gamboy advance) since 2002.

I have strong opinions as to the reasons for the current situation in the mainstream games market.

There are lots of little reasons floating around, but there is one BIG FAT REASON that outweighs the others by a huge margin !!! It all comes down to that old favourite passtime 'keeping up with the Joneses' otherwise known as GEEK WAR

In the old days, is was Atary2600 vs coleco vision vs binatone etc, then it was C64 vs Atari800 vs Spectrum vx BBC micro... then AtariST vs AMIGA...
Each of these eras saw folks buy into one or other of the competing systems, then spend the next few years arguing with their friends about which was the better system. For this argument to have any weight, the combatants had to have something more substantial than subjective ideas of gamplay and style, so it has always been about software and more importantly hardware technology rather than content. Arguments like "Z80 is better than 6502 coz it has more instructions and runs at 4Mhz"... "C64 has hardware sprites and sound and Andrew Braybrooke"... "Spectrum has Ultimate play the Game", "AtariST has midi... so there... humph" etc. GEEK WAR had begun.

The big change has happened for a few of reasons - as the hardware has got better, it has become possible to produce much more complicated games with larger worlds and far more 'assets' - requiring more time and much more money to develop, this gradual development has made it more and more difficult for small teams and individuals to compete in the game market....
However, I think that the Main issue is the switch from static platforms like C64, ST, Amiga over to flexible component based PC hardware. Suddenly instead of a hardware hike every few years, its been every few months !! This accellerated flood of new hardware updates has been accompanied by Extremely aggressive marketing - and increasing prices.

The marketing convinces the Gamer that they have to have the latest card to really enjoy their games (i.e. WIN GEEK WAR).... they buy the card... their existing games don't improve... suddenly, they are in a sticky situation - they have made a (major) investment, they want to show off to their gaming buddies to WIN the next GEEK WAR BATTLE, and they also need to satisfy themselves that there is enough of an improvement overy their (5 month) old card that they haven't wasted their money... Sooo they need a new game that can use the new features of their fancy new card....
The game companies soon learned that the only way to ensure good sales it to fulfill this need - not for a good game, but for a game that will show off the latest graphics hardware !!!

You see it all the time even in the LFS forums - "great game, but.. oooh.. I wish they would improve the graphics." followed by a reqest for implementation of whatever fancy feature that plyers hardware supports. The sad thing is that as graphic tech has moved on over the last decade or so, each incremental improvement has made a smaller difference to the overall 'quality' of the graphics, while at the same time making a bigger difference in the resources required to develop a marketable game.

The only way things are going to change is if everyone stops buying into this process. I for one have !!! I've stopped buying pc games, the last game I bought was LFS, I don't play pc games other than LFS, freecell, minesweeper and the odd game of online othello or poker. The only time i buy a gfx card is when I Have to for a new system, and then its the minimum spec that will run LFS at a reasonable refresh rate and resolution.
Don't get me wrong, I still love games, just not the glossy crap thats out there now - the only company that is doing anything remotely interesting is Nintendo (but there are other issues with them - even more difficlt for small dev teams...)
....
enough for now

Quote from Blowtus :

this whole 'flex' business appears to have become a popular point to latch onto as the cause of all failings. I don't really see how myself, has anyone suggested why it would have such a great effect, or is it just something complicated sounding that hasn't been modeled at all?

IIRC bal00s post was about the much less popular 'drivetrain flex' as opposed to chasis flex (which seems to be a favourite cure-all ).

Play in the drivetrain causing a continuous variation in torque - which has the effect of blunting the 'knife edge' between not enough and too much.

seems like this could have an effect on the handling of the more powerful cars depending on diff settings?

Last edited by col, Fri 2 Jun 2006, 23:30.

If you are really worried about other people using your skin, rather than making a big deal out of it here - which won't do much good IMO, why not petition the devs to have some kind of selectable locking on skins ?

Right now skins are public, so its pretty reasonable to expect others, particularly novices to pick one they like and use it - getting all high and mighty with them seems a little OTT to me.

FWIW, I think it's kind of flattering to think that someone likes your skin best out af all the ones they've seen, so, why not create a seperate version of your(teams) skin for 'guests' - then if you see someone using your personal one, you can suggest they use the 'guest' one ?

Quote from Hoellsen :

You might wanna check LFS' credits.

Ah so you are a beta tester... So why didn't you beta testers report that the cars were unbalanced before there was a public release so things could be tweaked without effecting LFSWorld?

Quote from Hoellsen :

Don't take it for granted we're getting a S3 alpha only because we have a S2 alpha.

I wasn't taking anything for granted - please re-read my post again. Regarding the possibility of releases after S2 Final, I made some suggestions about what might happen by extrapolating from what has happened in the past, I then used the phrase "no-one knows for sure."


Anyway, I'm getting sick of being misrepresented - so:

Assuming that its possible to add ballast without invalidating replays and hotlaps

In my opinion, adding a Ballast feature ASAP would be a good thing - and should have no negative impact.

I vote for Ballast NOW.

Making other changes (tyre width, power etc.) to the cars in a patch would have much more significant consequences, and although I think it would be better if some of the cars were more closely matched, making changes that would effect hotlaps and invalidate replays at this point would be a mistake.

I vote for other balancing in the patch with the next physics update (when hotlaps and replays will have to be reset anyway)

Quote from Hoellsen :

Well, if you are saying "(maybe) after s2 final", what is there other than S3?

I'll have to assume you are new to LFS.

LFS is a work in progress, each full version is preceded by a series of public alpha releases. So although the final S3 release may be as much as 3 or 4 years away, the first S3 alpha release could be as early as a year after S2 final possibly even sooner, no-one knows for sure.

So, IF Scawen decides that he doesn't want to make 'car balancing' changes before or in the S2 final release, we would probably have to wait at least 12 months very probably more, until the first S3 alpha.

This is a reason to support the inclusion of a Ballast feature which would not have an effect on the hotlaps, replays or on any existing leagues etc., LFS World would not be reset, so it could be released as soon as it's working - if it became a priority then some time in the next few months would be possible.

Quote from Hoellsen :

Col: you are saying balancing should be done for real only when the physics are done. They won't be done until S3, so you are also saying no balancing until then.

No I am not - please re-read my post (again). There is no mention of S3 anywhere !

I suggested that it is very unlikely that any changes in the cars will be released at least until the next public physics update. I also suggested that Scawen may decide to wait longer than that. I certainly did not mention S3 anywhere.
I also said that there might be no further car balancing until after S2 is released (exact words were: "possibly not even in S2 full release !"). I have no clue how you manage to twist that to mean 'col doesn't want balancing until S3 final is released in 3 or 4 years time'. Particularly as I made no suggestion that I think things 'should' be that way, just that they might be.

Last edited by col, Fri 26 May 2006, 22:54.

Quote from Hoellsen :

col: you are suggesting no changes before S3. And S3 might very well be 3-4 years away. Not changing anything would be a big put off for new and existing customers and thus be a bad marketing choice.

Am I? - first I knew about it

If you feel that you need to completely misrepresent my point of view in order to support your own arguement then maybe its time to re-think your own position ?

Quote from Carlos H Wrobel :

...
ballast = good option, even if the cars get + balanced, but we need at least a good start...

if we reduce fzr tire size and give more power to XRR, we will get a better balancing... there are many ways to reduce the cornering speed or the acceleration or anything, i think the point isnt how to do this...

Well, I think that if everyone agrees that we want ballast, it could be with us as soon as the next patch/update - the other stuff you're talking about is unlikely to happen until at least the next physics update ! - possibly not even in S2 full release !
In fact as has already been suggested, because physics changes can make a difference to handling and performance, and could even necessitate small changes in some or all of the cars design, Scawen may decide that trying to balance the cars further at this stage would not be a productive use of his time - e.g. he makes the balancing changes with testing and incremental updates == lots of dev time. These are released along side some physics updates in the distant future. Then the Aliens get their hands on them and discover that because of some arbitrary new variable of the updated physics engine, car X is suddenly faster than the rest ! (this kind of thing has been happening since early demo days ). Suddenly all that dev time was wasted, and the discussion and arguements on the forum continue !

The more folks argue that ballast just won't do the job, the less likely it becomes that we will even get that !

I guess what I'm saying is: aside from all the discussion about the merits of ballast vs. tyre changes and power changes in cars. Ballast could happen pretty soon if Scavier decide to do it - other updates will not happen for a much longer while !

-------------------------

Something else I noticed is that the FZR is by FAR the most popular of the gtr cars* - so the lap times are swayed even more in its favour, and even with this extra advantage, the average wr times (averaged over different tracks) seem to be only about 1 second faster than e.g. XRR. IMO you wouldn't need much more than 50 - 75 kg and a heap of practice to make things a LOT more balanced. It may not be perfect, but it will be a huge improvement

*I noticed that for example on the configs you have driven online you have somthing like 10 times as many laps on FZR as on XRR or FXR - not surprising that you find FZR to be such an advantage