The popularity with the younger generations is, I'm sure, down to the simple fact the they can play and play and play the FREE demo. once thay've played that to death they'll be hooked (mwahahaha)

alternatively - if an adult gamer is casually surfing about they are (IMHO) less likely to click "download demo" than a 14-yo looking for something cool and free to do.

there is a new track day venue opening in norfolk, it's based at sculthorpe near fakenham and incorporates 2 full curcuits (1.6m,3m) and cheap prices, open pitlane too!

if you're local check it out!

http://www.provamotorsport.co.uk

I think with a few months to organize we could probably have a UK LFS track-day! that would be damn cool!

iv'e spent the rent money on steering wheels before lol

Quote from ColeusRattus :

Perhaps the easiest way to introduce anyone to the subtileties (spelling? too lazy to check :P) of online racing would be a video tutorial. But to keep the filesize low, it could be something like a review where the most important rules are shown, and all with spoken explantions.

And you have to watch it mandatory, if you want to join your first online race. AT least, if it is not too long.

kinda like maybee a scripted replay of a really cool looking race (top class GT's or something) to enhance the 'WOW i want to do THAT' factor,

it goes through the start procedure , with strategic pauses along the way with a caption and some good 'indicating graphics' overlaid to highlight what to look for, follow through t1 and all the accidents that might happen(cold tyres, etc), down the back straight (slipstream safety) all the way round and through the pit's should do ya,

make it an entertaining watch and people will want to emulate what they just saw an experienced LFS player do. ie avoid the accidents and be responsible.

hmmm might not work on some tho'

the momo goes for about £35-40 new (wait 'till before x-mas for best deals)

and the DFP is about £50-60 new

they are both good wheels and aside from a few little issues with pedal calibration (many, many mods to fix but it can almost always be solved with a driver update and tweak) that aren't a problem on later model DFP (mind u, my momo never gave me any probs )

It's just whether you'd like to have up to 900 degrees of rotation

those extra degrees of motion make a HUGE difference to the way the game feels, precision and control are improved when you're steering wheel and the ingame one are perfectly syncronized, the reality factor is improved too.

the road cars use mainly 720, the GT's are 540, I Think the SS cars are 270 or 360 (450?) so a momo would be cool for single seaters.

both of them are quality products, shop around

BTW with the DFP there's the added bonus of trying GT4 on PS2 (yeah, i know!), it's worth it for the 'ring!

a manual is only any good if you read it! Ignorance is the biggest problem, the type of racer that we're all against is simply the ignorant ones.
ignorant of the respect others are willing to give them, ignorant of the respect they should have for others, and ignorant of the basic good practice of driving.

some of my most enjoyable races have been while 'towing' a noob about, having started nice and easy i soon found after 10ish laps that we were actually racing, (he beat me once or twice too! )

and some of the worst online experiences iv'e ever had was in a server full of peeps all thinking they were the 'nuts, but i promptly got banned as a wrecker for getting rear ended for avoiding an accident! many hours of grrrring followed

it just shows that in order to introduce something to help better driving standards. it would be very difficult not to discriminate against totally 'honest' drivers.

a radical would be awsome (not to metion 'gap-filling') in LFS,

what about a company like noble sports cars, fairly smallish company that produces very competent machinery that would fit into LFS beutifully.

most kitcar companies would be perfect for collaborations with, in exchange for allowing the use of their car in the game they could maybe give out special 'promotional' editions of the game with their car in it, for potetial customers to take home and enjoy. LFS is one of the few games that could be flexible enough to do that with, and besides kit cars are aimed directly at the sports car enthusiast. perfect!

not entierly, more of an 'extrusion' of the idea we've both got!

you could call it agreement if you like, but i'm not normally like that here

we need a way to filter out the idiots who don't actually want to play the game properly, WITHOUT filtering out would be players.

i don't think it's quite right to ask £24 to play the game and then to find you've got to pay £15 just to play on decent servers, THAT will discourage more new players than anything. and if they will spend £24 on a game just to feck about with, they're probably gonna pay £15 just to 'beat' our new 'protection' system, i got a feeling they're sad enough to.

i'm kinda thinking that with a rating system that would be a real part of the game, would benefit us all, i mean if we're all concious of our personal rating, then we'll more than likely want to improve it. even a noob with a rating of 1 would like to improve it, and they will if they stay out of trouble. the finer points should be worked out to give a noob the benefit of the doubt so as not to penalize them for simply not knowing what was expected of them.

what about a system of rating where the better you're own personal rating the more effect it will have when rating somebody else, that means that even a whole team of 10-20 idiots with negative ratings wouldn't even be able to TOUCH a noob. maybee once your're rating goes negative you cannot rate others at all. although even the super-rated shouldn't be able to destroy any users rating in one go, it should take at least 10-20 ratings to make a real difference.

since it would only be for access to certain servers nobody ever really looses out, except the idiots of course.

Last edited by Theafro, Tue 13 Sep 2005, 16:13.

to be honest you're all right, some of the time, like i said before the cars all need to be treated differently, and modelled differently.

the only reason ANY of those pro's can shift flat is because the car is designed to do that, be it electronic or mechanical design. I don't think we can say that you can flatshift a GTR or cannot do it in a GTI, it's merely down to what you're driving, and i'm driving LFS, so i'll lift 'n' blip for now 'cos it feels good.

BTW i can't remember EVER seeing a drag-racer shift flat (not like we are talking about - with manual gearboxes), 99% of drag racers use a auto-box, those who don't use 'em are almost certainly driving a road car, auto's are perfect for the strip due to a few things - no clutch to burn out or cock up shifting with, very very little actual break in power when you do shift, you've also got a torque converter so they'res not a massive amount of power instantly that would spin the wheels. (well not like a sidestepped clutch anyhow )

aha were getting somwhere now, (i wish i could rename this thread too!)

it strikes me that most people are afraid of tests ingame, that's fair enough the tests in gt4 are a serious pain in the butt, and not REALLY all that imaginative. I think to base any tests on speed would be pretty unfair to a LOT of paying customers.

the option of a LFSworld ratings system would be a nice idea to explore, If it was as simple as logging on to LFSworld, highlighting a particular driver and then rating him.

Imagine if you will, you're online and sombody is being a prat, you could pop down to LFS world and give them a poor rating, it sounds like it could turn nasty but it should only affect their rating in a small way, although if there are LOADS of people rating them badly, then they're probably the type of person LFS can do without.
if each individual rating was only held for a month or so, if they decide to drive clean they would get their rating back to normal faily quickly.

i feel it would work both ways, should you feel you've had a great race with somebody then head to LFSw and bump up their rating.

introduce a filter when joining a server (obviosly the qualifying rating should be decided by that particular admin) and within a week or so you'll have the good more or less seperated from the bad.

the rating system is based purely on whether or not people like racing with you. speed is irrelevant, so a noob (as long as they're racing fair) will have no problems at all (hell, they probably won't even notice!)

if we all share ideas we may find a worthy solution that's good for all (but most importantly for LFS)

Last edited by Theafro, Tue 13 Sep 2005, 15:32.

Quote from Hallen :

Boris, what everybody is trying to say is that it depends on the car IRL. Some race cars have standard H type transmissions with clutch, some have sequential with clutch, and some have sequential with all the gadgets to allow flat shifting with no clutch.
For a standard car like the GTi, flat shifting will cause damage eventually IRL. The clutch, the engine, engine mounts, transmission mounts, drive shaft and differentially will all get hammered over and over again causing damage. You will always lift and blip when shifting in these cars. The point is not necessarily the max RPM's you hit, but the rapid change in RPM's that happen during this manuever.
For some sequential boxes, you can upshift without using the clutch, and some you need to lift and some you don't. Sports cars with sequential systems usually require that you use the clutch for downshifting and that you match revs by blipping the throttle. However, if the rules allow, just about any pure race car can have systems that allow for flat, no clutch shifts using the different methods listed above.

You put that far more lucidly that i ever could of, bang on!

the main thing to consider is that all the cars are different, you should take into account that the UF1000 shouldn't have a speed limiter, so, even if you're just revving it hard you'll star to cause damage (usually it's the valve bounce that naturally limits the rev's i can hear that ning,ning,ning noise like it was yesterday )
whereas the GTI + turbo's would certainly have ecu's onboard and thus almost certainly have some rev protection.
the full on racers would all have programmable ecu's which are all mappable for all sorts of inputs and uses like speedlimiters, rev-limiters,throttle cut,Anti lag and of course that 'orrible traction control.
it's just a case of reflecting what sort of system that car would really have.

it's not really that the standard sets produce less actual cornering force, it's more that the tweaked sets out there may simply suit you're style better.

agreed about the LX's and racabout, not a very forgiving set at all, but with a softer rear they really dig in and go!

a test won't get rid of wreckers correct, and it will discourage some noobs, but to be honest it'll only discourage those who don't wish to progress with the game.

Iv'e NEVER said i didn't like noobs! in fact i'm still not all that far from noob status myself. BUT i've spent the bast part of 18 months playing this game and once you've done a couple of thousand miles you've seen the difference between a noob and a wanker, it's the wanker's with no respect, and no intelligence that we should be concentrating on.

if we develop an 'Us Vs Them' attitude then we'll only end up lonely online

oh and the test would be to get onto PRO or QUICK servers, you can still pay your £24 and drive all the cars and all the tracks, you just won't be allowed into a pro server until you have a professional attitude.

I personally don't care how fast you are, just if you're enjoyable company to drive with, THAT is the ONLY thing that matters IMHO

Last edited by Theafro, Mon 12 Sep 2005, 18:32.

It would mean that pro's stick to the pro servers, and noobs would stick to the noob servers. and i suppose it would mean that you end up racing against those of you're own ability. we wouldn't want it to get in the way of a players progress in LFS, but i think something like that would be more than acceptable. hmm this might turn out to be a good idea after all

I've found that the only meber of the fairer sex that has actually tried my LFS rig (clutch and all - chuck 'em in at the deep end!) she took yo it quite well and has now started driving lessons, "i think i could probably get the hang of this driving lark" she said just before she scared herself whitless with the FXR.

still no shag tho'

i still think we need something to really make the point about good driving, i'm suggesting that the test's be more like missions, with little stops to point out some flags 'n stuff on the way. to a motorsport nut, all this stuff is pretty obvios, but to a young noob it's just stuff that keeps flashing up in the middle of their game.

make 'em run a 'race' but with a scripted series of incidents and flags that HAVE to be understood and heeded in order to pass, not based on how fast you are, just that you understand what the flags mean, and can avoid trouble before it starts. the current tests are quite fun for a breif whille but soon get boring, I think something that would take about 10 mins to complete (less than one race worth!) and would give valuable emphasis on safety.

this might all sound a little off-putting but to be honest if it's organized properly we will only be putting off those who aren't prepared to take this at least a little seriously, (and besides, it's not quite as extreme as out pricing it - that'll only increase the level of crackers/cracks )

Quote from CI-Man :

I am starting to regret giving this game and its community a chance allready. Sadly its not the idiots that are putting me off, its people who are still not willing to accept most new members are sensible adults and treating us all like children instead.

Kindest Regards Tim

I'm frankly worried that you feel that way, i certaily don't mean to be elitist but there is a big problem with the standard of play online, and a FEW little trials just to make sure you understand some of the things needed to clean up the servers.

it would be foolish to base these trials too much on speed because we all drive/learn differently. it should not just be fair to noobs but actually usefull to them.


BTW Kegetys. slickmod kicks ASS

yeah but it's the kind of bodge i enjoy perfecting!

:homersimp

yeah man, the reason you see a lot of this behavior IRL is the VAST amount of electronic gubbins those cars carry, to be fair LFS is rather missing some of the finer points changing gears, so we do have to treat things a little differently.

Tho' i'd quite like to see what happened to a GT car if you unchecked the 'rev cut on downshift' option in it's ECU, and started 'flat shifting' in it!

Quote from Shotglass :

the problem is not lack of driving abilities the problem is lack of common sense ... and you just cant teach that with a few driving tests

Sometimes, the ignorance you see online simply comes from not nessecerily knowing what is expected of them. ok there's a brief message in game message. but most kids just want to drive a cool car about and do some cool stuff,

it would be nice to set the 'tone' of the game BEFORE they're set loose onto the servers. it might be tough nut i've got the idea forming for a series of tests, one for each 'class' of car, there are a few things that need to be done to make it work tho' :

it needs to be fun
it should show and test the main points of good online behavior,
it mustn't deter would be buyers
it should add to the experience of LFS

i dunno, it might work but starting off in the begining with a couple of quick tests (not base too much on speed tho') before you can race on the demo servers and a further one to drive the GTT,

when i say test i would prefer it to be in the format of an enjoyable excersise in racecraft like staying between 2 (improved ) AI about 60ft apart. maybee 'accident avoidence','How th start' and a 'flag useage' tests would be interesting!

my impression of the current situation over there, is quite a sad one, i'm saddened by the sight of THOUSANDS of soldiers (all armed) piling in to new orleans, and THOUSANDS of ordinary people, lost, hungry, and feeling ignored by their own government, all WALKING out of new orleans. WTF went through bush's mind when he heard that the levy had broke, i wonder what he was thinking when the local govenment asked for funding for better protection from flooding? it kinda sums up a lot of the things that get my goat about the 'states(i'm not anti american, i'm anti idiot)

i prefered tristan's one with the horse!

Erm i think i should piont out this particular thread is simply a figment of my stupidity


the pitstop test is rather irritating but it's neccecary to do a pit run at least once before a noob goes online and careers into the pit at 100 and wipes a few unsespecting punters out, it's not a biggie but neither is the test

like a big interactive (but somehow scripted) test that could piont all those things out and make sure that they are understood by the testee,
not a simple thing to organize but it could have some value in discouraging those who can't take driving in LFS seriously enough. i have a feeling that those who do not want to take the test would be more likely to have accidents online