If you have no experience in any form of motorsport of any kind, then yes, sims are beneficial. If I hadn't ben playing GT and Forza for a couple years before I started racing school I would've been hopeless. I think they helped a lot. They allowed me to understand what my instructor was telling me.
Once you've been racing for a while, it kinda falls off. I can see the usefulness of sims for learning the basic idea of new tracks, and to some extent fitness (some of the bigger professional rigs give your arms a good enough workout), but you won't learn anything on 'em from a purely driving perspective. That said, it's better than doing nothing.
If you're looking for something to prepare you for the track, then iRacing is probably the best bet, followed closely by LFS. I suggest iRacing because it has the most accurate tracks and you will probably find the one that you will be driving. IMO this is the biggest benefit a sim can offer.
Once you've been racing for a while, it kinda falls off. I can see the usefulness of sims for learning the basic idea of new tracks, and to some extent fitness (some of the bigger professional rigs give your arms a good enough workout), but you won't learn anything on 'em from a purely driving perspective. That said, it's better than doing nothing.
If you're looking for something to prepare you for the track, then iRacing is probably the best bet, followed closely by LFS. I suggest iRacing because it has the most accurate tracks and you will probably find the one that you will be driving. IMO this is the biggest benefit a sim can offer.
Unfortunately they seem to have increased the price of the Pure. A couple months ago the MSRP was 200, now it's 250.
Oh well.
If you order the Porsche "pure" with the pedals and shifter as accessories it turns out as $300 even. You don't need the dongle to play on PC, they added a USB cable to all versions of the Turbo S.
If you have G25 pedals you can forgo the Porsche pedals since the "pure" comes with an adapter for the G25 and Microsoft pedals. So $250 if you have G25 pedals already.
Not really. The Jim Russell arrive and drive series I do is about 6 grand for 10 races with all the practice sessions and you get top level karts. You also get professional coaching as well so it's really worth it. It's perfect for someone like me who's willing to get karting experience before moving to cars without committing too many resources to it.
Everyone does! All the footage is up here: http://vimeo.com/gregoryevans/videos
The Aveo?! You can't be serious! It's the most miserable little car I've ever seen. I'm also pretty sure that it's one of the top 5 slowest cars in the US right now.... 0-60 in like 12 seconds I think. That's Beetle slow!
I'm having it just for the lulz.
Where are you?
Karting's quite strong out here in the Bay Area (California). We've got the ProKart Challenge, the Jim Russell Arrive and Drive (what I just finished doing), the Jim Russell Rotax Challenge... and numerous clubs.
In December I'm doing a 4-hour endurance race at Infineon. So far we've got 3 very fast drivers, but we might get a 4th. I ended up finishing 3rd in the championship in the Russell series this year.
Here we are leading my rival:
I would take a look but it says I've got the wrong version. As far as I know I'm current.
Looking into used slicks or semi-slicks from top end club racers might be an option too. They tend to throw (sell) perfectly good sets of tires away after a weekend - they've still got plenty of life left in them, just not "front running" life.
I think that shot is from the menu background (whatever car you have selected is displayed in the background in various scenes).
I've got a cat, a dog (a Schipperke, google it), a horse (Arabian), and a corn snake.
And since everyone likes snakes, here's a picture of Luke.
He's a little under 4 feet long.
And since everyone likes snakes, here's a picture of Luke.
He's a little under 4 feet long.
Last edited by MadCat360, .
Darn man. Sorry about that.
Yikes, that's gonna require some big sponsorship! Have you got any "out-of-the-blue" offers yet? You're doing quite well in that Commodore, you'll find the funds I'm sure.
Cool dude. Are you likely to be signed by a team for V8 or would you have to bring funding to drive one?
You can get flats? 
Agree, but only for 2 and 3. 3 was better than 2 somewhat, but 1 had the best story. That actually made sense and made you want to find out what happens next.
The video isn't great. :\ It sounds much smoother in person. Not very loud, but so silky smooth. It sounds like it's running on butter.
If you go up to it, you look in the engine bay, and there's nothing there! The engine is fuel-pump sized...
A purple hedgehog gun that fires pink needles which combine into a grenade-like explosion. Awesome.
Halo's vast amounts of fun. The best was the first, but 3 is still a time muncher. ODST's firefight mode is the most fun co-op I've had in a long time.
Saying you hate Halo is like saying you hate steak. Millions of people disagree. Halo is steak.
Halo's vast amounts of fun. The best was the first, but 3 is still a time muncher. ODST's firefight mode is the most fun co-op I've had in a long time.
Saying you hate Halo is like saying you hate steak. Millions of people disagree. Halo is steak.
Yeah, that one worked really well on my headphones. Forget night and day, that's dark ages and information technology!
I was just trying drifting and it's a little boring. It's too easy. The car gives you so much time to react it's criminal. In real life you gotta be correcting before the thing even starts to make tire noise. In this, you can just let it go and go and go for over a second before you react and it still comes right into line.
Maybe I'm doin it rong but it feels really relaxed and easy.
Maybe Forza is a good simulator, but something about it just doesn't click with me. When I play LFS, rFactor, IRacing and even Shift to some extent, I constantly have little snatches of flashbacks to my real life driving when something happens, like a slide or a missed apex or something, and I can draw upon that real life experience to help fix it. In Forza, I don't get that. As a result Forza is "just a game" and doesn't really engage me on that level - I think of Forza in Forza terms and not in real life terms.
Maybe I'm doin it rong but it feels really relaxed and easy.
Maybe Forza is a good simulator, but something about it just doesn't click with me. When I play LFS, rFactor, IRacing and even Shift to some extent, I constantly have little snatches of flashbacks to my real life driving when something happens, like a slide or a missed apex or something, and I can draw upon that real life experience to help fix it. In Forza, I don't get that. As a result Forza is "just a game" and doesn't really engage me on that level - I think of Forza in Forza terms and not in real life terms.
I just popped a few of my favorite tracks into Audacity and I was surprised how many were affected by this loudness. Some less than others but I'm sure all would be improved without it.
Yes it does but I was referring to the model poly count when I said "almost identical". If you look at the fender curves, you can see almost no difference in terms of blockyness (at least I can't). I think the "10x the polygons" claim was only for photo-mode models. I think the in-game models are basically the same.
The FM3 boards are awash with people claiming it has "the best physics ever". LOL
Irony!
Now that I've been made aware (not an audiophile), I hate this! Such a stupid thing to do.
My dad, who is an audiophile, says they do it to make it sound "better" on the radio and get people to buy the CD. I kinda get that - radio quality sucks anyway, but why do it on the CD?!
They're for comparison of the car model... which looks almost identical, except for the wheels and the metallic paint.
My cat clawed my foot and I bashed my knee on my wheel mount because it startled me. I caused a big wreck in Eau Rogue in Grid because of it. I had a big bruise for like 3 days.
FGED GREDG RDFGDR GSFDG