Hello Drivers/People, this Thread is hopefully in the correct Forum Section and the Goal is a Conversation about LFS and other Racing Games that are available right now or will be in near Future. Feel free to reply but please try to stay on Topic and do now start flaming or simular Things. Thanks alot and enjoy.



What do we have now?

Looking at the Market now you could simplified say there are 3 Genres:

1. Games for Kiddies or for those that just want quick Races or just some Fun and enjoy Stuff like cool Cars/Graphics/Game Modes (NFS for Example)

2. Games for Pro´s: like LFS!, Nascar (Papyrus because everything else is
crap ), GTR, GTL and so on where Skills are needed in order to survive the first Corner.

3. Everything together: Grand Tourismo 4 is a good example and maybe LFS is going the same Way.


Ok now what do we need to create a Game like mentioned at 3.?

1. A good Engine (good Pyhsics, good Graphics, everything as complex as possible)

2. Many Tracks and many Cars to waste alooot of Time with and to get used the every Combo, creating Setups, Tunning, add/remove Parts and so on.

3. With 1. & 2. in your Mind you can have/create alot of Game Modes/Series like Rally, Drag, Nascar, Road Racing, F1, GTR, Free Roaming...you name it.

4. A good Singleplayer Part, like Missions or Tournaments and this needs good/exelent AI.

5. a good Multiplayer Part, easy-to-use Serverbrowsers, a good Chat System and not to forget a good and stable Netcode.

6. Community and Updates are very important to keep the Game alive as long as possible. Improvents never stops until the Devs stop the Work, are rich enough and go to Holidays/Pension.


Ok now these are some basic Things and the Problem is now to get everything togehter. Many Things can happen, many Problems to deal with and Hurdles to master until the Game reaches the Point where it can be released.

Now imagine Grand Turismo (maybe GT5 who knows) would be available for the PC one Day what do you think would happen to LFS?

I will leave that in the Room and everybody can think about that.

I think LFS is pretty much simular to Grand Turismo by its complexity (the Way it goes tells me its going that complex), the Idea of giving as much People as possible can the Possiblity to do whatever they want to do.

For now i think the major Game Companys are either stupid or blind because they only focus at one kind of racing but once they will mention that and having in your Mind that the Hardware is getting better every Year and they have more Money and more People to create Games faster its possible that even this Situation changes once.
Now dont get me wrong this is not something to make Pressure on the Devs or anything like that but these are my Thoughts and i want to share them and see what other People think about this.

Ok now just a last one, imagine it could be possible to add some Parts to your Cars to make em faster, like adding Slicks or a Turbo or simular to the GTi for example so you can keep up with the TBO Class, wouldnd that be great? Hmm?
Im not talking about that sickO-NFS-tune-my-ride-to-death-and-beat-everybody-else but a clean & healthy tunning Option to expant this game even more. It could be set by the Admins so there should not be a Problem from my Point of View.

As you can see LFS inspires me and thats for the first Day i played this Game. I see the Possibilities and im really looking foward to a Game that beats everything that comes out from big Companies like EA or SIMBIN or even smaller Groups like LFS Devs, NetKar you name it (again).

I may forgot alot of Things or i may see some Things wrong but i need to sleep now because i emptied my Head and i need it

Edit:

Quote from myself :

Games comes and goes and the quality is getting better day by day, game by game and other developer teams will learn from the Devs of LFS as well so there could be another game that is worth the comparison in future and that could be sooner then we think it would be. I love LFS and i know its still WIP and this state will be for a long time since there are only 3 Devs. Thats ok from my point of view because i think good things needs time to grow up (and LFS is great so far not to say incredibly) but in case you want to reach as many people as possible can and having in your mind that its still a game and youll probable never get a perfect sim you have to think about the fact that you cant lock things like that (chase view) because it should be realistic.

http://www.lfsforum.net/showthread.php?t=10695


Greetings
[FM]^Plaztikman

I think LFS is nearer to GTR and N2003 then Gran turismo. LFS hardly trys to do everything, theres what 6 tracks? and 19 cars. What it does have is pretty realistic physics/handling, which gt doesn't.

Also what you're describing sounds like drivers republic, which looks set to be a very cool game. People build bits for cars, and the cars. you can design your own drive train, or download some other guys design. So pretty much most major cars will end up in it. Unsure on tracks through, but that will proberly be opened up to the public as well.

Gran Turismo doesn't have good physics (you kidding?), good graphics (easy on the contrast bob!).

Has good tracks, and lots of cars. But they try to hard to have so much. The tracks they spend time on at least. But cars? It is just about licensing their brand and design. No sounds or any specific performance attributes are really taken over from the real thing. Hardly a simulation other than eye candy and unrewarding car collecting with hundreds of life-altering missions that are meaningless. I've beat all of them, and look how happy I am about it? But I really wont go into that

All I can say is that what makes a good racing game (and specifically simulations which are the only kind of racing games I will enjoy extensively) need:

Multiplayer and Physics, that is where simulations can shine and grow in this very slim market. LFS takes top honors of that.

Best fun racing game there is, without doubt, IMO, would be Mashed unleashed, MicroMachines style top down 4 player racing! Great fun i fyou got mates round for a drink (Or a smoke)!

Mashed was indeed lots of fun.... But personely I think flat out is the best fun game , talk about t1 smash ups

Deja vu over here.

Gran Turismo and realistic physics don't belong in the same sentence, especially in GT4. I fired up GT3 a few days ago and was AMAZED how much better the low speed tire physics are compared to GT4, you could actually control the car with your gas pedal instead of getting infinite understeer. Try creating a 700hp RWD monster in GT4 and do a donut with it. What? Can't? That's "real driving simulator" for you!

I think GT series should be called semi-simulators, because they do have some very realistic physics in them, but some are horribly wrong (GT4 low speed tire physics etc). Not to mention, you can't really call a "sim" as a sim if you have no damage model whatsoever.

Oh yeah, if you want to try the best sim there is for PS2, get Enthusia. It really seems to be awesome.. been trying to get my hands on it but it's tough to find because it didn't sell well. Console kiddies thought it to be too hard and that's what caused the bad sales, not to mention GT4 was released at the same time and idiots believed in Sonys "The Real Driving Simulator" marketing like mindless sheep. There was actually a 900 degree steering wheel with clutch being developed for Enthusia with changeable wheels, but it got scrapped due to the crappy game sales. Check the later part of this vid to see the wheel in action -> http://videos.streetfire.net/s ... e6c-90fb-08734232ca85.htm

well actually i had not the possibility to go in GT4 with a wheel but with my gamepad it feels great and pretty simular to LFS (weight transfer, corner behavior and so on). It could be realistic in case theres a damage model and im asking myself how many would do the 100% with a damage model? Or even reach 50% or whatever? And Enthusia looks great for me as well. I think ill get it one day

Quote :

3. Everything together: Grand Tourismo 4 is a good example and maybe LFS is going the same Way.

I'm sorry, no. May I suggest lowering the crack intake?

Quote :

Ok now just a last one, imagine it could be possible to add some Parts to your Cars to make em faster, like adding Slicks or a Turbo or simular to the GTi for example so you can keep up with the TBO Class, wouldnd that be great? Hmm?

Yeah about that... no. Seriously mate---drop the crack, mkay? I'm getting worried about you.

Quote :

I think LFS is pretty much simular to Grand Turismo by its complexity (the Way it goes tells me its going that complex), the Idea of giving as much People as possible can the Possiblity to do whatever they want to do.

[insert image of a velociraptor flying behind a planet and subtitle: "wtf r u doing?"]

Quote from spankmeyer :

I'm sorry, no. May I suggest lowering the crack intake?


Yeah about that... no. Seriously mate---drop the crack, mkay? I'm getting worried about you.


[insert image of a velociraptor flying behind a planet and subtitle: "wtf r u doing?"]

Quote from MYSELF :

Hello Drivers/People, this Thread is hopefully in the correct Forum Section and the Goal is a Conversation about LFS and other Racing Games that are available right now or will be in near Future. Feel free to reply but please try to stay on Topic and do now start flaming or simular Things. Thanks alot and enjoy.

in case you do not understand what im going for - stay out and theres no reason to insult me for this.

Hmmm, it is much too late for LFS to become like GT4. LFS would have to stop being a simulator if it were to drop low enough on the scale to compete in the same space as an arcade game like GT4.

What are you doing then? For me it looks like trying to suggest to change LFS to something it isn't and never will be. Don't worry, no Gran Turismo will ever beat LFS as a simulator, GT isn't the driving simulation it claims because it has to sell and it will ever never be realistic and hard to learn and drive. It's a joke for simulation, allways been and allways will be, end.

The perfect game?

Sim City 4 with Street Racing options for me please.

Quote from Blackout :

What are you doing then? For me it looks like trying to suggest to change LFS to something it isn't and never will be. Don't worry, no Gran Turismo will ever beat LFS as a simulator, GT isn't the driving simulation it claims because it has to sell and it will ever never be realistic and hard to learn and drive. It's a joke for simulation, allways been and allways will be, end.

Well i dont think GT will ever been available for PC anyway but simular games with the same complexity will be there soon. And thats what im talking about. Im not about to compare LFS or want to have it like another game but im talking about the Number of Tracks and Cars that GT offers. I dont really like to have more brands in LFS as well because i really like the non-brand Cars in LFS and thats how it should go on. But the BMW & the RAC shows its possible to add some as well as an alternative option.

Yeah, I bought GT4 after seeing the M3s etc, thinking how cool it was going to be to flog em. It was a huge disappointment to see the physics were a big step backwards (I don't remember for sure, but it felt as bad as GT1 probably was), there didn't seem to be any difference between Arcade- and Sim-mode physics, but worst of all, there were no Sim tires!
What a waste of time and money.. In GT3, it was easy to ignore the flawed physics if you pitted the cars you like against each other with sim tires, you could actually trailbrake etc.
E.g. the R34 GTR really took effort to extract good times from, and its oversteer on demand, almost anywhere along corners really made sense and immersed you into driving the thing. It was actually fun playing.

But GT4? Almost nothing but eye candy. It's a disappointment, as opposed to ho-hum because Polyphony Digital had so much resources, and yet they sell out to corporate demands rather than stay true to that tagline "The real driving simulator". It's become really misleading.

The bulk of the GT track count are millions of permutations on each circuit. Also, the cars are all that (400 cars, of which 350 are bloody Skylines).

There's been so many threads about this.. LFS is being developped the slow but sure way: all the essentials first.
You don't pick up a scale model and start gluing and painting things at random. You have to have a good plan that prepares for everything ahead of time to avoid having to repeat work down the timeline.

When you invest time and work into achieving something, only to have to repair or undo&remake it all over again, and could've predicted it, you've just wasted your time.
It's counterproductive.

Quote from Matrixi :

There was actually a 900 degree steering wheel with clutch being developed for Enthusia with changeable wheels, but it got scrapped due to the crappy game sales. Check the later part of this vid to see the wheel in action -> http://videos.streetfire.net/s ... e6c-90fb-08734232ca85.htm

It looks very nice, I think I might buy that game, I thought it wasn't that good, but it actually looks nice. Could anyone tell me how it exactly is?

For me the best game I have, and the only one I'm still playing is LFS. But I'm feeling it's time for a change, but I don't really know what game to play. I like mafia very much, but those old cars are such a downside for me. GTA is nice, but it doesn't run that good on my comp, and it's such a hassle to get the button config program running good. Help me I wish I still had NFS Porsche, I'd like to give it another go for a few laps, oh well other NFS's... kinda sick of those, and they just can't cut it anymore, and I don't feel like there is anything I need to do in those games anymore

Quote from Breizh :

Yeah, I bought GT4 after seeing the M3s etc, thinking how cool it was going to be to flog em. It was a huge disappointment to see the physics were a big step backwards (I don't remember for sure, but it felt as bad as GT1 probably was), there didn't seem to be any difference between Arcade- and Sim-mode physics, but worst of all, there were no Sim tires!
What a waste of time and money.. In GT3, it was easy to ignore the flawed physics if you pitted the cars you like against each other with sim tires, you could actually trailbrake etc.
E.g. the R34 GTR really took effort to extract good times from, and its oversteer on demand, almost anywhere along corners really made sense and immersed you into driving the thing. It was actually fun playing.

But GT4? Almost nothing but eye candy. It's a disappointment, as opposed to ho-hum because Polyphony Digital had so much resources, and yet they sell out to corporate demands rather than stay true to that tagline "The real driving simulator". It's become really misleading.

Well sad to hear that GT4 is more worse then GT3 and a disappointment for many people in that case for sure. I have GT3 as well but a week after i got it, GT4 has been released so i never touched it after that. I cant say whats better and i dont have a wheel to really make a statement on that. But in the end i really enjoyed the game and it wasnt that bad compared to many other racing games. But even with my gamepad i was able to feel some differences between arcade and simulation but these were not that big so i have to agree on that point I dont know how its with a wheel and there are so many options for the FF, deadzone and so on which makes me think that many just wasnt able to find a nice setup or balance there. But i could be wrong on that, anyway the idea counts for me and im looking forward on what GT5 will offer us

There's always the next game, yeah, but look at the current track record: PD doesn't really cater to the players' preferences as much as Sony's guidelines.
Just a matter of demographics.. GT got too big for corporate to take any chances.

Quote from sgt.flippy :

It looks very nice, I think I might buy that game, I thought it wasn't that good, but it actually looks nice. Could anyone tell me how it exactly is?

Here's a quick summary of Enthusia:

The good:
Nurburgring
Car sounds
Physics - Very good but a bit too sympathetic to recovering oversteer
A.I - It has it's flaws but if you treat them like actual opponents rather than cornering aids they can give a good clean race.
The attention to detail put into each car resulting in each one handling very differently

The OK:
Graphics
Game structure - A bit bizzare but I strangely enjoy it.
GUI - A bit awkward but you'll get used to it

The bad:
Car setup - it just sucks, plain and simple
No car damage
Menu and ingame music
Really hard with a joypad - this game needs a DFP

To sum up, GT is a game that kids itslef it's a sim, Enthusia is a sim that kids itslef it's a game.

Buy it and enjoy.

i can see alot of good points here and i have to bring another though into this. the main idea of this thread is how we, the community included the devs could learn from other games in order have a better product one day. maybe the suggestion forum might be better for this but i would like to keep this gerneral in a way somehow if you know what i mean. just ideas nothing more. comparing lfs to other games is very helpful to bring things foward from my point of view.

If you try to cater to all possible target groups and possible markets, your product/program/art/music will end up as a tasteless, soulless, watered-down-compromise that won't satisfy anyone in the long run.

Peace and nuts!

Quote from spankmeyer :

If you try to cater to all possible target groups and possible markets, your product/program/art/music will end up as a tasteless, soulless, watered-down-compromise that won't satisfy anyone in the long run.

Peace and nuts!

i totally agree with that point and what im talking about or what i mean is a healthy disscusion about that. At least its the Devs dessision what things are good for the game or not. But keep in mind its still a alpha version and many games have things that could be good to add as well at a certain point if you know what i mean. I want to create a new way of thinking about that suggestion adding from the community given to the devs in another way. I mean sharing ideas and collecting these things in a thread like this without making clear suggestions at all.

And for example: Nascar Racing 2003 has a nice option where you can setup things/filters like maximum ping, minimum laps/races on a certain track in order to bring more fun for everybody. So the end of this is there are servers for beginners that learn how to handle this combo but there are still pro´s or others with more experiences that could help those people somehow. Then on the other side there are pro servers where you have to have a number of laps and/or races to be able to join these server. But still there are servers for everyone without anything set-up so everybody can join like usual.


ps: i like (pea)nuts peace

When S3 is done, LFS won't be the perfect game. It WILL be the perfect sim.

The only things LFS needs is a V8 sedan (like a German Vectra), a pickup, a 4X4 and an van. Oh, and a NASCAR and BTCC style car.

Quote from duke_toaster :

When S3 is done, LFS won't be the perfect game. It WILL be the perfect sim.

The only things LFS needs is a V8 sedan (like a German Vectra), a pickup, a 4X4 and an van. Oh, and a NASCAR and BTCC style car.

More cars don't make a perfect simulation. GT4 believes otherwise, but I think S3 needs to be a big reconstruction with graphics and innovations in order for it to keep its pace. Most importantly, the damage model is a big plus to have worked on. I was just driving the FO8 and slammed into a tire barrier at Kyoto. I only wish I could've seen it with way more dust, particles, and flying objects. :o