Yep, actually, according to studies I've seen, the "correct" FOV is actually dependent on speed! A high FOV gives the most accurate perception of speed *at low speeds* (which would also be useful because you can see where you're turning in a tight corner!), but a low field of view is best for high speeds. They found on average, 55 deg was best at 60 mph, and 85 deg at 30 mph.
Which raises the question: why don't sims have FOV as a function of speed as an option. Would it be too wierd, or make some people projectile vomit - especially combined with Neils' contraption?
While the 301 is designed well, to accelerate fast etc which is all good. The few times I've been in one it only annoyed me though. I still don't see the point of these things other than to add a sense of occasion at an Expo.
It just feels odd because when braking it tilts forward but as it is doing this motion, if anything, the G force are in the wrong direction.. Then again there really are no G forces to speak off, you can't have any sustained G info on this type of system.
FOV might indeed be ideally speed dependent, but that might also confuse! (and perhaps cause sickness to some..). The smaller the FOV, the more sense of yaw, the larger the field of fiew, the more sense of speed. It is with high FOVs that I can't control slides, yet with lower FOV you see the nose starting to point somewhere and you can see you better apply a correction.
No experience with FD specifically, but in general I believe those motion simulators are mostly bullshit and a complete waste of time and money. I guess I can see how multi-million $ simulators that are fully enclosed and move the whole apparatus may work somewhat convincingly, but these "cheap" ones do nothing but throw you around generating forces completely unrelated to what happens on the screen.
Just think about it, the main force used is gravity, since that is the only force you can use to exert a constant pull. To make use of gravity, you need to be tilted. The first obstacle is of course, that the maximum force that can be simulated would be 1G, but even that would be unrealistic, since the downward force (gravity) that you normally experience additionally to the longitudinal and lateral forces is "used up" by that point. Also it would require a tilt of 90° which is quite a bit more than realistically achievable, so the actual acceleration that can be simulated is even lower.
However, the much more serious problem are the forces generated by the tilting process itself. If you go from acceleration (tilted back) to sudden deceleration (tilted forward), the movement you experience in the transition can be the complete opposite of what you want. Obviously this can be minimized by designing the motion simulator to have it's main rotational axis "in" your head, so by tilting forward actually your body moves backwards below you while your head remains mostly stationary, but even then you still suffer from the rotational forces itself.
E: Basically what Niels said, that will teach me to leave the reply window open for so long
The 'correct' FOV depends on the overall width of the screen(s) and how far away from them your eyes are.
Unfortunately, the vast majority of people don't have 180+ degrees worth of screen coverage - most of the time, only 25-50 degrees or so.
Using the 'correct' FOV, you will not get an accurate sense of speed at such a small FOV, as you can't see peripheral movement. You also can't see anything of what's next to you for the same reasons. With such setups (low physical FOV) the ingame FOV is always a compromise between accuracy, sense of speed (for racing games anyway) and how much of what's around you you need to see.
In an ideal world, everyone would have at least 160 degrees of screen coverage - ideally 360 degrees - and then the 'correct' FOV can be used properly and you will get an accurate sense of speed.
In the words of King Julian...
'They're nothing but giant pansies... Where do you giants come from?'
"uhmmm...New York"
"ALL HAIL, The New York Giants!"
AndRand, You are probably talking about this simulator:
It was a nightmare to drive it. The lag was about 1 second, I turned into a fast corner, then straightened the car, and after that there was a feel of lateral g-force.
I have quick experience with FD301 too, and it was more shaky than gradual. Plus longitudinal accelerations was much stronger than lateral. I was working with the guy who owns (probably the only one in Poland) FD301 and we was trying to set up the parameters of the forces. We was trying to increase lateral forces but there was problems with it because it causes FD301 to do the oscillations (just like a FF steering wheel at high FF settings).
I was hoping that FD will help me to fell then my back is stepping away, but to be honest I wasn't able to feel that moment. Maybe that's why they introduced FD401, which has the yaw angle simulation.
Is it possible to set range of values outcoming from LFS rather than those in FD301? Maybe the range outcoming from LFS was too small so multiplying multiplayed noise values...
Technically, I think you're referring to DFOV (display field of view).
The thing you alter with the software in a sim, usually called FOV, would be GFOV (geometric field of view). Which according to tons of research - some in driving sims - very much affects accurate perception of speed and distance.
Yeah, that's pretty much what I was trying to say. You're only really going to get an accurate perception of speed when GFOV==DFOV and it's large enough to display what you'd see in your periferal vision.
The dynamic alteration of GFOV in games is used quite a lot, and can help when done properly (ie not like when you press the nitros in NFS). Curved/fishbowl GFOV (higher values on the edges of screen than the centre) is used in a few. Motion blur is often used as well (usually badly).
The problem is, all these tricks need to be subtle or the illusion fails completely. It's very hard to get a good balence between subtlety (sp?) while actually making enough difference to prepresent perception properly.
I've yet to find a game that achieves it, and I doubt it's even possible. Proper speed/distance perception is one of those things that only works for the few people who have the right hardware - for everyone else there must be compromise.
- I think you can assign FOV to keys 
