The web site is still up, and the NR2005 mod still has a link.
A bit off topic, how was it that iFirst / iRacing could threaten people for giving away mods for NR2003, but they and Nascar didn't and don't sue online stores (many of the Ebay sales are from online stores) for still selling new copies of NR2003? Once Sierra gave up the Nascar license, local stores here in the USA had to pull the game from their shelves. I'm not aware of any attempt to stop sales of NR2003 on Ebay.
Back on topic, I still don't get why a web site would choose to use the LFS logo. Maybe they just though it looked nice.
They were "raided" back in May, 2006, but other than a short period of time (2 weeks?), they've always been up. They're located in Sweeden, where there are no laws against torrents and copyright laws aren't as strict. It was one of a few torrent sites that iRacing / iFirst couldn't threaten, much less sue. What's interesting is that there's an ad for Dish Network on their site in the legal threats section.
Getting back on topic, I don't understand why a torrent site would use the Live For Speed logo, especially one based in the USA, where copyright laws are pretty strict.
No pursuit mode in Porsche Unleashed. Some of the factory driver events had cop cars that would attemp to interfere with the players car during a long time limited event, but they couldn't actually stop or ticket a car.
5 of the 13 NFS games have pursuit modes, NFS3 - Hot Pursuit, NFS4 - High Stakes, NFS6 - Hot Pursuit 2, NFS9 - Most Manted, and NFS10 - Carbon.
I also doubt that even NFS fans think that NFS is realistic, although the canned drift mode in ProStreet looks fairly realistic. Regarding Porsche Unleashed, the top cars pulled 3 g's in turns without benefit of downforce (the game has downforce, but due to a physics flaw, it doesn't improve grip). In ProStreet, the top cars are pulling over 5 g's in turns. The reason most players like NFS is the pace, even if it's not realistic. The most extreme pace was the street-x mode in NFS8 - Undergound 2, which captured the feel of an indoor go-kart event. Example: n8sx.wmv
Not everyone is going to like a particular activity, regardless of the skill involved. Soccer is never going to be as popular in the USA as the USA's main sports, baseball, football, and basketball. It's a small minority that like racing games, and smaller still group that likes racing sims.
I don't see much of an issue. Usually left foot braking is done by having the left foot positioned over the brake pedal, if the left foot isn't there, the normal right foot brake reaction will prevail.
There are top race car drivers that left foot brake in open wheelers, and even some in sedans and Nascar type race cars (using clutchless downshifts), and it doesn't seem to affect their real world driving. Racing transmissions can be shifted without using the clutch, and there are race drivers that left foot brake and blip the throttle instead of using heel and toe to downshift.
"Some people shift with the clutch, some people shift without," Hemmingson explains. "There is no best way; they just do whatever works best for them. People that drive right foot gas, left foot brake usually find that it works better for them not to use the clutch. Then there are other people that drive heel/toe and use the clutch, but there is no set rule because people are better at different things.
"All you've got to do, basically, is burp the throttle. If it isn't loaded really hard, you can pull it right out of gear, and it will go right into the next gear--if it's done quickly. In a situation like going down into a turn, burping the throttle just unloads the torque on the transmission slightly, which allows the transmission to align itself with the higher rpm of the next lower gear, and it will go right in."
My only issue with Blackwood is that the racing line involves going completely outside the curbing on the second half of the lap, which violates the normal rules of sim racing which is two wheels on the track at all time, assuming that the curbing normally indicates the boundaries of a race track.
If real world Formula 1 cars can race at Monaco, I don't see an issue with with any of the LFS tracks for fast cars. Ebisu is another location with some very tight tracks (more like a go-kart track), but I don't know what classes of cars race there:
It would take quite a while for me to learn how to drive well from an external view, but there are good players of other racing games / sims that do use external views, although I don't know if there are any LFS players that use external view and will mention here at this forum.
The only time I use an external view is when drifting in games that have drifting, since I can't tell the actual direction the car is moving when it's drifting sideways on a track.
On the otherhand, if I had a 3 screen setup with a good peripheral view, I feel it would be better than the external view.
This depends on the players background. An expert radio control car racer is bound to be better with an external view than an internal view because that is what they are used to.
Getting back to the example of a real car being remotely controlled, what "deviations from total reality" would you consider to be OK? Should the force feedback at the players wheel duplicate the forces in the actual wheel or be modified to give better feedback of the grip level of the front tires of a car? Should the sound picked up by the in car microphone be modified to exaggerate tire noises as a means to sense that the tires are near the limits to replace the lack of feel from physical forces? Should the video perception of body roll and pitch be exagerrated to give a sense of the g-forces on a car? If the car has a high power to weight ratio, should traction control be implemented, similar to what is used for Formula 1 and the top GT classes in Europe, Japan, and USA?
Since few have seen the video exaggeration of g-forces, here is a video from Ford Racing 2, which exaggerates suspension movement, resulting in visual feedback of g-forces.
Underground 1 and 2, and ProStreet don't have any pursuit modes.
NFS4 - High Stakes - player can be evader or cop. Physics are bizarre, but pace is fast.
NFS6 - Hot Pursuit 2 - Player can be evader or cop, 1/2 of the career mode is pursuits. Physics are annoying.
NFS9 - Most wanted - Player can be evader only. Physics are better than NFS4 or NFS6. Open areas for pursuits.
NFS10 - Carbon - Player can be evader only (except online). Physics similar to NFS9, except muscle cars have a lot of oversteer. Open areas for pursuits.
If you like pursuits, there are 4 NFS games that have it. From my experience, the physics doesn't need to be realistic for pursuit modes, and collisions pretty much need to be damage off before pursuits are "fun". I doubt LFS will ever have pursuit modes.
Note that some real RC car racers still prefer the classic twin stick setup, as opposed to the newer trigger / side wheel setup, so twin sticks for a racing game, which is similar to remote control of a car, can't be that bad. After all, some of the top players in GPL used joysticks. If I'm slow, it's due to lack of talent / experience / interest. I haven't reached the point where the controller is going to make a big difference. Regarding the aids, I was faster with the aids off than on in GTR (using the wheel and pedals, which finally just quit working and are now thrown away). I'll use the aids to "learn" a new track and car combination, then gradually wean off the aids once I've learned the combo, saves a lot of time.
If I remember correctly, from a previous thread on this incredibly low powered race car, the turbo is there to maximize torque throughout the rpm range, and a flatter torque curve would make the cars less difficult to drive.
There must be some rule on maximum boost, because this could compensate for the small intake size. The proper way to lower compression would be shorter piston rod length, but there are probably rules about any engine mods, since this is a spec class.
I never heard of the MRT5 class of race cars before LFS, but I'm in the USA. In the USA, go-karts would probably be the most popular form of cheap racing. Then other than modified street cars, it would be Formula Vee's, Formula Fords, Formula Mazda (not to be confused with the new Champ car Formula star Mazda's which are similar to the Reynard, but use Ford-Mazda Duratech 2.3 liter engines modified by Cosworth with 300hp). Caterhams, Aerial Atoms, and Radicals are also popular, but these get expensive.
A better question would be is any sim that realistic, and in this case how close to reality is "realistic"? The real world has behaviors that go down to the molecular level, which is beyond what a PC based racing game could hope to model, so compromises have to be made.
In addition, there's the driver experience, since there's no feel of the acceleration forces, it's never going to be the same as real life. Visually exaggerating the roll and pitch responses would help here, but I've only seen this done in a "budget" racing game, Ford Racing 2.
Even in the case of a remote control setup for a real car, it's my belief that lap times would be faster with an external view than an internal view, because it would be easier to judge speeds, the cars reaction, and the cars position on the track, from an external view. An onboard view would be cool, but standing at a fixed position with a good view of the track, or a "chase" view behind the cars direction of travel (one not affected by the cars yaw reaction), would produce better lap times.
Regardless of what the general public thinks, the people who run D1GP (Japan) and Formula D (USA) that make the rules do not allow front wheel drive cars in their drift contests, because those people do not consider sliding the rear end with the front end under complete control to be drifting.
Handbrakes are used quite often in drift events, to initiate drifts and to decrease the turning radius while in a drift. Most of the high end drift cars have a rachetless handbrake lever that is longer and located closer to the driver than a normal car. Drifting is a combination of hand braking and power slides.
Due to limited space and smaller tracks at many of the Japan D1GP events, the speeds are slower. Even on the larger tracks, speeds rarely exceed 75mph.
Coefficient of friction, and the maximum reasonable amount of force a human can apply to the brakes, limit the amount of maximum braking force in real life. The materials used in discs and brake pads would effectively limit the amount of maximum braking force. In real life no one wants brakes that are overly sensitive, brake materials are choosen based on weight, speed, and grip of the cars they're used on.
In racing sims, since few, if any, players have force sensing / force feedback on the pedals, I don't have an issue with a maximum braking force. Then again, I don't have an issue with any assists as long as the assists don't give an advantage or if servers can choose not to allow certain assists. The more options in the game, the wider the audience, without taking away from the purists that will only run on the "no assists allowed servers". I don't see how it's in the best interest of the devlopers to diminish the number of potential customers as long as the core customers aren't affected.
With NR2003, some players put a switch on the router (or equivalent device) to turn it off and back on (these come back on quickly) to avoid a pile up. For the player that does this, all the other cars just dissappear for a while, and to others, that players cars just dissappears for a while, but almost no one will notice, because they're stuck behind the pile up which creates some lag effect and other players in front of the pile up aren't looking back.
The technology for a DCT is different than a "slush box" type automatic, but it is a "automatic" in the way it's used, which is why I mentioned them in this thread. DCT's could be called the "automatic" of the future, but they've been available in passenger cars for over a year.
Getting back on topic, considering the fact that auto-blip and auto-cut were just removed, I seriously doubt LFS will have an auto-shift feature, unless it starts including cars that represent real cars with modern automatic manual transmissions.
Formula 1 cars in the year 2002 (and 2003?) used fully automatic shifting (mechanical gear boxes with computer control of clutch, ECU, and and gear shifts).
VAG offers dual clutch transmissions (DCT) in these cars: Volkswagen (Golf/Rabbit/Golf Plus, Jetta, Passat and Touran), Audi (A3 and TT), SEAT (Altea, Leon and Toledo) and Škoda (Fabia, Octavia and Superb) models.
Zeroshift has announced their seamless shifter for use in street and sport cars. I don't know if or when a car manufacturer will use a zeroshift or similar AMT.
It depends on what the person likes. The fast pace in arcade racers, no matter how unrealistic, is part of the draw. What would encourage a player unfamiliar with simualtion type games to buy or play LFS. First there's convincing him to play any type of simulation game, then convincing him that LFS physics and online play outweigh the lack of graphics, engine sounds, and assists. LFS is a niche market game, the best for some players, but not all.
I already mentioned a 1990 Ford Mustang GT where the clutch was spun for over 30 seconds (backing up a steep hill), and there was no noticable effect (probably a lot of clutch wear).
So to answer the original question, the clutches in LFS are more prone to slippage and overheating than most, but not all cars (at least the ones I'm aware of). Crashes and low speed acceleration in a high gear with autoclutch on the main causes of clutch overheating in LFS; the other causes would be stuff like clutch kicking as when drifting.
The cars in LFS seem to have somewhat heat tolerant clutches. Better than the two cars from the videos shown in the how realistic is clutch overheating thread, not as good as a 1990 Ford Mustang GT where the clutch was slippped for about 30 seconds, smoked, and continued immediated to operate just fine (although it was probably the equivalent of 5000 miles of wear).
Conclusions about overheating from the other thread, overheating occurs from crashes or if accelerating from low speeds in high gears with autoclutch enabled.
Clutch overheating can occur if auto clutch is enabled and the car is accelerated from a low speed while in a tall gear, without any player clutch control inputs. I tested this with a LX6 and slowed to just under 10mph in 6th gear, which causes the auto-clutch to start slipping the clutch. Acceleration from this slow speed results in an immediage increase in rpm from 1000 rpm to 3000 rpm, and the clutch overheats. If autoclutch is off, clutch isn't allowed to slip and there is no clutch overheating.
Clutch overheating can occur after the clutch is damaged from collisions, and then is used afterwards. I tested by running in reverse at Kyoto Ring, and ramming into the AI. After the crash, attempting to accelerate overheated the apparently damaged clutch. When online in multiplayer mode, the variation in lag can amplify the apparent impact speed and the clutch bar can go red instantly. I didn't make a replay of this.
Full throttle upshifts and no throttle downshifts with auto-clutch do not cause significant clutch overheating if the upshifts are done at or near redline and the downshifts are done at slow speeds.
update - Spins do not cause clutch overeheating in LFS (or real life). I ran the LX6 and the FO8 at Kyoto Ring, and did spins at 140mph or more, even brushing walls to increase the severity of spins. No clutch overheating. My guess about the "myth" of clutch overeheating due to spins, is that the driver may forget to downshift and attempt to take off while still in a high gear.
Instead of having autoclutch enabled in low rpm situations, it should only disengage the clutch when the driven tires are not moving at all or are moving backwards (to keep the engine from being shut off). If the car is moving very slowly, the engine may be bogged, but momentum will keep the engine from being shut off.
Other than that, autoclutching should only occur for brief periods when shifting gears.
Autoclutch shifts should take longer than manual shifts.
What isn't clear to me is how players get into a high gear - low speed sistuation, other than spin recovery and forgetting to downshift before pulling back onto the track.
Anyway I now have two replays, first shows autoclutch overhating occurs with high gear low rpm situation, the second shows that overheating isn't an issue even when flat shifting the LX6 with autoclutch enabled.
Overheating of clutch with autoclutch enabled, caused by slowing to 10mph and taking off again in the LX6, never shifting gears or using the clutch, as described in previous post:
So other than multi-player collisions where the impact factor can be very high due to lag, I don't see clutch overheating as an issue with the limited testing I have done. Maybe some other cars are more sensitive.
I bought LFS because I mis-read the name and thought it was another NFS release.
I bought LFS because I was tired of all the fast cars in other racing games and I thought LFS stood for "Live For Slow" (as in all the cars in S1, except the LX6, which was made undrivable to punish those who would even think of driving such a fast car).
I bought LFS just so the developers wouldn't have to get real jobs.
That's an initial "low-ball" bid price, not the final bid it sold for. The buy it now price is 39.99 pounds, or almost $80(USA), so the UK prices for NR2003 are about the same as they are in the USA (otherwise I'd be buying from the UK and selling in the USA as a side business).
Must be similar to the Raptor 90 with all upgrades, similar to the one used in this video (the action starts about 25 seconds into the video).
Those type of helis are out of my league. If I go beyond the Blade CP+, the next one will be a Blade 400, $480(USA). Considering how often the experts crash those things, it's an expensive hobby. For now, all my rc heli stunts will remain in the RealFlight rc simulator.