It's a fun looking game for sure, and I suppose a cool way to make this type of gameplay more accessible for the casual folk. I'll definitely recommend it to my brother for his PS3, even though I know he won't like sandbox-type gameplay, just so I can have a go at no expense but it'll do nothing that Gary's Mod hasn't already done.

To the less enthusiastic people in this thread: sandbox gameplay is something you either love or hate. Personally I've spent upwards of an entire non-stop day in Gary's Mod (HL2) with a friend, building partially destructible forts with fully working, wooden trebuchets/catapults to bomb each other from the other side of the map. Or building a sort of dry-dock, and carefully letting a destructible wooden ship down into the water, only to see it fall apart after 30 seconds of sailing. This sort of thing either grabs you, or leaves you with a desire for more structure and less fiddly 'work'.

I suppose if you're on either side it will be incredibly hard to realise what the appeal, or lack of appeal is all about. Let's all keep that in mind in this thread

Quote from evilpimp :

Well its more of bad start, going past most racers, spinning Webber, getting a DT, pitting and serving DT next lap and then he just came back way behind heh.

Yes, but I mean that he (probably) wouldn't have fallen back to behind Webber in the first place, if he wouldn't have had to go wide at T1 after his bad start

Quote from samjh :

Just a bad start. Too much wheel-spin probably.

Actually, after the bad start he got caught up in the middle, had to go avoid-mode and went way wide at T1, ending up near the back of the pack. If he'd have just had that bad start he would've been sorta okay.

Quote from spanks :

the mazda is pretty damn rewarding

I just ran a 1:21.6 after feeling like there was no way to go any quicker than 22.x...obviously the guys in the 20's are just cheating.

Really though, I'm pretty happy where that puts me in relation to the qualifying times...but more important is I still have yet to actually race any more to raise my license level

Tried Silverstone Int yet btw? I'm trying to get some benchmarks to go by

Daniel I think you're an iraceophobe or something :P

Quote from titanLS :

I think the skippy is great for learning vehicle dynamics, but can see why a lot of people want to, ahem... skip it.

Me on the other hand, I like it. Unfortunately I'm still stuck in this "did too well in the rookie solstice and now I'm getting my ass handed to me on a regular basis" thing. Seriously. I've no problem being at the back of the pack, but when there's no one else there to race with, 33 laps by yourself at Jefferson gets boring pretty quickly.

My average finish is probably 9th, but my average car number is probably 2 or 3. I can't seem to break into the 54s but can generally do high 55s all race without incident. That puts me way off pace from say, Ross J Macgregor or Josh Carr, but those are the guys winning the races I'm getting put in. I'm not learning anything from them except that they show up in my mirrors at around lap 29.

Hopefully with more time I'll be able to pick up some speed and find some closer rasing in the skippies. Either that or I slow way down...

Maybe this will help, it's an earlier lap of mine: 54.732 I think: http://blip.tv/file/1218951/

I know there are youtube vids of Luke Mclean out there, but the guy is so damn fast that it might only help when you're at the point when only bending the rules of physics can get you faster times. Getting a 54 can be achieved relatively easily by having the correct line, being smooth and having your break points within reason. I dipped into the 54.5's by braking later at T1 and the final corner, but apart from that and some added smoothness there's not much more to it I think

Oh yeah, a lot of practice

Quote from thisnameistaken :

I used to get spooky awareness during sleep paralysis stuff going on practically every night, half-believed I was being abducted by aliens* and the whole shebang. Any one of those hundreds of experiences would be among the scariest things that have happened to me when I was asleep.

* Late '80s, early '90s when I was in my teens - no possibility of looking up what was happening to me on the web, didn't know anybody else it happened to, so I had to draw my own conclusions!

I never really get any 'scary' nightmares, but sleep paralysis happens to me every once in a while - right up to the point where, once, I was half-dreaming/hallucinating that a person/thing walked up to the side of the bed and bended over me after whispering some incomprehensible mumbling into my hear

All 'regular' cases of sleep paralysis were scary the first couple of times, and it's just annoying when you feel it happening over and over again (even on your side) when all you're trying to do in your half-drowsy state is to fall asleep again :P
These days when it happens - maybe once every 2 months or so, I just take on the challenge of trying to break free of it, which sometimes works quite well.

Whoa... I think the whole service just got nuked... I was in a race, then with about 10 laps to go everyone disappeared off the track, and I got disco'ed. The site seems down, so I guess something's up.

Quote from anttt69 :

The question is?, Is iRacing really Ten times better than any other sim on the market?? Sim racers, You decide.

What matters is not whether or not this is the case, but whether the value of the experience you get from iRacing exceeds the price you pay to obtain that experience, and it does for me. What that basically means is "yes, it's worth it".

iRacing is not 10x better than LFS, or rFactor or whatever. It's just really good, and regardless of the price, it still gives surplus value. The pricing is just not for everybody - it practically requires a great deal of dedication, devotion and time. If you're the kinda guy that just wants to have some fun racing online every once in a while there's no point to iRacing. If you want to have high-quality racing in a competitive setting which matches you with drivers of similar skill (no lapping people twenty times in a race because they can't control their cars) and generally love to compete - it's just excellent value for money!

An example is this race from last week: http://blip.tv/file/1208179

The races in the higher levels are just like that: super-clean and 95% of the people are generally very considerate. I know I can get a fairly similar experience in leagues, but these are the type of races we get every day - almost whenever we want. That combined with the integrated league system is what makes it worth the €95 I paid (for a year)

Quote from Crommi :

Edit: If you keep relying on one good race per week, you're hurting yourself in a long run. There's always something new to learn and eventually your luck will run out, putting you in a really bad position against guys who have been racing. Not to mention that every race is an oppoturnity to gain rating which in return allows you to get into high rated races for big points.

Listen to the man, those are wise words

The luckier you get, the harder you will fall once you really need to rely on your skill and experience. It's better to have a placing true to your own level, rather than finishing in a good position with a few lucky races.

Hmpf... it's not compatible with 64 bit OSes it seems, is there a work-around for this?

Neat!

Quote from DaveWS :

...

Nice time! you also seem to be 1st in Time Trials? Pretty damn impressive :>

Rules 1 and 2... shamelessly broken.

Quote from AlienT. :

Hey Viktor Sz. You are approaching Alien status mate, I've seen you racing on here and GTR2 online and iracing and your rather quick.......you are on my list of 'hated fast barstuads' .

What I find nice is that you get people like Dale Earnhardt Jr replying to peoples posts on the iRacing forum, helping with set up advise and likes.....jees i'm almost starstruck

He's a bit beyond merely approaching alien status :>

Daniel, I'm seriously tempted to race at 4am just to get into the kind of races you get into. I'm in the situation where I come home from work, then I can do two skippy races, one before and one after dinner. Both are in mega-prime-time with fields where every driver shits out 58's like nothing.

I'll give it a spin this weekend when the parents are out, and noone is home to whine about wheel rumbling at night :P

Quote from Linsen :

If you don't have any friends who are already into iRacing, simply request my email adress via pm to put into that "referring member" field and I'll gladly hand it out to you.

Capitalist pig!

Quote from csurdongulos :

I tried lime rock before already, but my best was something mid 59. yesterday I got into the 58`s quite quickly. I needed a lot more laps (like 15-20) to get mid 58`s, which came by altering the line through the left hander a bit. After that it was another 40-50 laps to get a decent lap together without major errors to reach 58.36 in time trial. Basically you don`t know where you pick up the last tenths/hundredths, you just have to keep lapping and going consistent. Eventually you get the hang of it.

I am really hoping to get 58.2`s soon, it is only a tenth away, surely possible

15-20 laps + 40-50 laps is like 1.5 hours of practice, and you're doing low 58's already?... that's quite nuts.

Quote from deggis :

Have there been any estimations how many people have subscribed for now? How many beta testers there were? Regarding that very much most people should have known those invites weren't for a free test, so simply beta testers * 10, should give some kind of idea?

Searching for drivers gives around 4030 oval drivers and 4060 road racers, although most of these will obviously be the same guys, there might be 500-1000 drivers who drive exclusively ovals or road.

I'm not sure if there's a more accurate way of searching for all drivers, but my guess would be 4000-5000 subscribers right now.

Quote from Joris :

For the coverage in the Netherlands we are subjected to the mercy of a guy called Olav Mol.

Don't diss the Olav, he makes everything seem interesting and has just the right amount of enthusiasm :>

Quote from NitroNitrous :

My PB Lime Rock Full / Pontiac Solstice Rookie is 1:03:7. Does somebody have a replay with a better lap? I know I can improve it, but doing a perfect lap is hard as hell

Only a lap with the old gearing, which is no help I think. Does anyone know if the old gearing is faster/slower? I have the feeling it's slower, but I'm not sure.

Quote from ATC Quicksilver :

It's temping to be a statistic junky and just not race for the rest of the week and hope to stay up at the top, but I enjoy racing way too much to do that. I am learning to drive clean races though, without making silly mistakes and getting incidents for running off the track.

Just to add to your statistic addiction: judging from your car # last race, your iRating is between 2200 and 3000, nice

Quote from ATC Quicksilver :

I know the difference, which is why I was suprised to get such a massive SR increase in only one race. But then I realised I finished 2nd to the guy who is leading the series championship, and it was the strongest field I have raced in.

The big SR increase is because the system gives you a boost when you go over a whole number like 3 or 4. It's to prevent you from going from, say 3.98 to 4.01 and then going into the Mazdas and spinning out twice and being back at 3.9x, thus being unable to race the Mazdas again.
I think it gives you 0.4 or so.

Quote from NSX_FReeDoM :

it does indeed.
its too wide for a street circuit.

I'm sure it would be a lot less boring if it were narrow like a proper street circuit, and seeing a train of F1 cars making their rounds instead of at least having some slim chance of overtaking!

Quote from tristancliffe :

Why do you pass out? How do skydivers cope?

Being slammed into the walls repeatedly due to winds, perhaps, although I don't know if that's the point mustang was trying to make