I have a Logitech G25, love the fact that LFS is pretty much the only game that supports the clutch pedal properly. Currently have the wheel set to 720, but practically all the cars in the game handle poorly and unrealistically. I know the tyre model is STILL in development, but the current one should never have been released. Its terrible. At the moment, its easy to spin any car in the game at very low speeds, it feels like I'm driving around on ice most of the time. There is almost no grip, regardless of the car setup. Braking causes skids at low speeds too - real cars do not do this! I hope this huge wait is worth it - Z28 is showing its age now, and even cheap racing games have decent car handling and physics, such a shame LFS is being left behind.
Fed up of poor car handling
The setups your using are probably setup to be fast in LFS, rather than in the real world - if you perfectly replicated a real car in LFS with an exact setup chances are it'd be pretty close and a lot more understeer prone just like the real thing, but to be alien fast in LFS you need an alien setup. For example, the default setups that ship with LFS are slow, bouncy, understeery, but they seem pretty realistic to me.
The default setups are fine for driving like you would do on roads in real life, but last time I checked, the game is called "Live for Speed", and is styled as a racing game. Having default setups that are unworkable at racing speeds is kinda silly. Don't get me wrong, I like the setup options, but there's just no point in them if you need to tweak them just to get anything out of the game. There just seems to be no middle ground - the slow cars don't handle well at high speed, they all understeer massively, and the faster cars suffer from oversteer at low speeds. Below certain speeds, all cars handle pretty much the same... for example, you're not going to oversteer a Ferrari in a car park driving at 40mph... but the faster cars do this all the time in LFS. Its only at higher speeds that difference in car handling is really noticeable. Cars are way too twitchy, even with all the sensitivity turned down. And when you go fast, cars are unresponsive. This just sucks the fun out of it, and removes the racing element.
For the record, I like racing games, I play lots of different ones and LFS just feels wrong compared to others, despite the many flaws and faults found in others that LFS does not suffer from.
Its just I find myself playing with the track editor and creating skills tests rather than blasting about, because that's the only thing the game really excels at.
NetKar Pro still has some very interesting low speed physics "features", like being able to slide backwards on sand for a hundred metres at 5 kph while in 5th and full throttle.
Sadly you've made the mistake of assuming that difficult is unrealistic, and that easy is realistic. LFS's tyre physics are at LEAST as good in most circumstances as any other sim's, and miles better than most.
What you are struggling with is the sense of speed and acceleration. You think you're going slowly and being smooth, but if you look at the speed of your inputs and the speed of the car, you'll find you're hurling the car about at speeds it wouldn't be able to corner at. Play with the field of view to get a sense of speed you like, and spend some time adapting to the lack of g-forces on your body.
LFS is probably too good when it comes to braking and acceleration, as real cars don't have as much grip, especially once the wheels lock. LFS is also easier than real life on the transistion from not-sliding (more than is required to generate grip) to sliding; real life has a 'snap' that LFS doesn't.
In short, the problem is you, not the game.
I agree with Tristan there. Sometimes I found myself thinking "How could the car slide in that speed" until I realized the speed was way bigger than it had seemed to me. The sense of speed is not very realistic unless you play around with FOV or buy an extra big screen or multiple screens.
Which ones?
Post a replay. We'll critique your driving, see what you're doing wrong.
The lack of G-forces is often mentioned as a handicap in sim racing but the FOV effect is, I think, much under valued. Looking through a wide angle lens at the world greatly distorts ones perception of speed and yaw angles. For those who might not have given a lot of thought to FOV or understand it, below is a link to a discussion I wrote for our club:
http://www.slowdrivers.net/ind ... s/23-the-setup-academy#36
http://www.slowdrivers.net/ind ... s/23-the-setup-academy#36
After tryng GTR Evo, netkar Pro and rFactor, I have the opposite experience than OP. In LFS, especially with slicks, the amount of grip is just amazing. 
So what kind of FOV would you recommend? I play at 1440 x 900, full-screen. I usually drive from interior view, or from "front wheels-only" view.
As an addendum to my OP, I've just skidded the XR GT on the second-to-last corner on Blackwood GP at 40mph, on a setup that is meant to provide as much downforce as possible. I'm sorry but you can tell me this is one of the most realistic games out there, but I completely disagree - looking at that corner, it should be possible to take it comfortably, exiting at 50mph or so. Taken wide, its quite a nice corner to take at average speed before cutting back in for the finishing straight. I'm done with this now... Say what you like, this isn't a racing game! It does make a nice slow driving simulator though, perhaps has its uses in teaching people basic driving techniques, and nothing more. If it was possible to make huge maps to drive on, perhaps with automated traffic, etc, it would at least serve a purpose... I look forward to the VW being added at some point, and some better track editor features. That's this game's killer feature... the "racing" element sucks.
...have you ever driven a real car before? Where did you get this magical "50mph".
Have you ever taken a real car around an aggressive corner at 50mph? If so you'll understand that 50mph isn't "slow" and a lot of forces come into play...even at a measly 50mph.
I run that resolution at 90º FOV, it seems to me to be the best setting. Also tried 95º for some time, but didn't liked it too much.
I don't recall the XR GT having downforce for starters.
It's almost certainly your driving. Have you watched good laps on LFSWorld?
And which other games have you played. Many out there are very unrealistic, with grip 'boosted' to make it feel satisfying (in the hope that people don't notice saloon cars cornering at 2g).
It's almost certainly your driving. Have you watched good laps on LFSWorld?
And which other games have you played. Many out there are very unrealistic, with grip 'boosted' to make it feel satisfying (in the hope that people don't notice saloon cars cornering at 2g).
Obvious troll is obvious.
Your posts from a year ago seem to indicate you were quite happy with LFS, or at least enough to make an autox layout, having played LFS for "a long time."
Your posts from a year ago seem to indicate you were quite happy with LFS, or at least enough to make an autox layout, having played LFS for "a long time."
I think the idea, particularly with the road cars in the game, is that the default setup resembles how the car would behave when it left the factory. That set up may therefore be tuned for road use as well as track use, rather than specifically for either, which can deteriorate racing performance. I'm no expert though, so don't quote me on that. I just thought it sounded like it could be the case.
I agree however that LFS has never shined for me as a racing game. For a long time, LFS has been my dicking about simulator of choice, while I turn to the likes of rFactor and Race for actual racing. I could drift or experiment with setups all day in LFS, though.
I think my main problem with LFS has been the really soft feeling the steering has. I asked before, and the answer I got is that the tires are 'softer' in LFS than in other games, which is what makes the steering feel the way it does. For all I know, that could be realistic. But if I'm driving a single seater to the podium, I really want something which feels tighter than what's in LFS.
I remember the cars being damn hard to control with the default KB control setup and car setup, apart from the XFG. But with a wheel and gamepad, LFS is absolutely amazing. So much, that because of trying it on my PC, both of my brothers have bought S2, and so has my cousin.
^ this ^
If you look at the G you can produce in LFS, it's actually a little high (~5%) than similar cars would produce in real life with good tyres. They have more than enough grip - you just don't feel it.
rFactor's single seaters are a joke. LFS is far better, and also has a far more real steering feel.
Edit: rFactor is actually a joke in every way.
agree, sense of speed makes wonders if you make some effort to adjust the game. Though I keep changing FOV all the time, anyone running 23 inch monitor with 1920x1080 resolution, who can recommend good FOV? cheers
Unless there has been a magical tyre patch update since I last played (there hasn't), from my extensive use of racing in XFG/XRG class for many hours each day I can catergorically say the entire last section's corners(so as you go under the tyre bridge, brake for the right and then have the left before you go up the hill over the start finish straight) can be taken at 50mph.
Comparing the XFG to my previous car (1.4 Corsa), when set up similarly (lowered with decent suspension settings) I can say that the physics are about 90% spot on.
The issue is with you, not the game. If you can't figure out the speed and the sense of speed, then that's your problem. And if you want to throw your toys out of the basket and complain, and stop playing - then you do that.
When I drove the Skip Barber formula car in iRacing on the skidpad I observed that the outside tire would heat the edges up more and the inside tire would heat the center of the tire more. This was with a symmetrical setup. This makes since because the outside tire has a bigger vertical load and more pressure is needed when a tire has more load. In Grand Prix Legends the effect was just the opposite. The outside tire would heat up and the tire pressure would increase causing the outside tire to be over inflated. It could be the difference between cross-ply bias tires and radial tires. I did all my racing before radials so maybe someone can help me on this.
In LFS I see neither effect. Temperature seems to have little effect on tire inflation and more vertical load increases the size of the contact patch but does not seem to change the temperature profile of the tire. I have noticed that most of the fast setups on street tires use under inflated tires. This makes their handling feel soft and sloppy. However, inflating to the point where the temperature profile looks realistic reduces the grip. I like the sharp, quick handling of the higher inflated tires but then the lap times suffer. I hope the new tire model eliminates these issues.
In LFS I see neither effect. Temperature seems to have little effect on tire inflation and more vertical load increases the size of the contact patch but does not seem to change the temperature profile of the tire. I have noticed that most of the fast setups on street tires use under inflated tires. This makes their handling feel soft and sloppy. However, inflating to the point where the temperature profile looks realistic reduces the grip. I like the sharp, quick handling of the higher inflated tires but then the lap times suffer. I hope the new tire model eliminates these issues.
I have always stuck with 92 FOV.
I can only agree here, tried some similar things (seat ibiza) and it is (not surprisingly) "spot on".
lol... :rolleyes:
Fed up of poor car handling
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FGED GREDG RDFGDR GSFDG