Quote from dawesdust_12 :

My boss used to work at a games studio building first party Nintendo games. When they hired a new programmer, they expected 6-8 weeks of uselessness as he gained familiarity with the code base. Then there's assigning this person a task. Then reviewing it to ensure that it is up to a reasonable specification.

Every person you add creates more channels of communication which takes time to manage. Eventually you hit the point where you have people who are literally responsible for simply managing management and doing gant charts just to be able to see what people are doing/when they should deliver something.

For god sake, I'm not saying that they should hire 50 people. I'm saying it's definitely not OK, that all the programming is done by one person. Scawen should focus on physics only, because that's his main interest I guess. There should be a separate guy for the graphics, and networking at least, 2 people for designing/maintaining cars/tracks, and 1 for building the site.

Not so many people, but with this build, you could actually move forward, and things would not settle because of the f*cking tire model.
Anyway, i think it's a bit too late for this. They should have expanded the team right away when S2 got released, and money was still flowing.

I respect Scawen for his technical skills, but he obviously sucks at project management, and this role should be taken away from him.

Last edited by Gabox, Tue 6 May 2014, 22:36.

Quote from englishlord :

I think Scawen is writing a program which will take over every computer and turn it into a racing simulator. A plague will then emit from the fans of computers and infect people, their hands will turn into racing gloves, their head will form racing helmets, their feet racing boots. They will not be able to eat, only pipe themselves into lfsworld for nourishment. The human race will face the prospect of spending the rest of its lives doing every type of race from 4 lap demo sprints to 24 hour endurance.

Whilst people are distracted , Scawen will empty everyone's bank account in a way iRacing could only dream of, only to find that with no way to spend it, Money is worthless. So everyone will timeout of the master server and go back to normal.

Hey, who said I'm the best in conspiracy theories!

Quote from Kristi :

The thing about LFS is the complexity of the program, that's the main reason Scawen wouldn't want anyone getting involved. It would take maybe weeks or months of teaching what does what and that means even more off-time and then you also have to coordinate all of the people not to mess everything up.

That was a good one man. I was laughing my ass off reading this...

Quote from Kristi :

@Gabox, your discussion about SR and whatsoever into LFS is total bullcrap, you don't even know what you're talking about. This game only provides you a website for communication and one for statistics and a master server for individuals to run servers. Which are INDIVIDUALLY ran unlike iRacing who own every gaming host, which limits the capabilities of the game at some point. It is a different approach and there is no need to try comparing the two. One of them is a wannabe professional simulator the other one is a simple racing simulator, guess which one LFS is. Try league racing and spend some time there, if you even get through prequalification, which basically works like a simple Strenght of Field system ran by people.

You don't have to explain, I do understand what the current situation is.
What I'm saying is that I would love to see LFS going in the iRacing direction. ie. a quality and consistent service run by professionals, instead of laggy and inconsistent user maintained servers, with their own set of rules and weird stuff...

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

Building software is not the same as bolting together a car. Building a car, adding more people can improve the efficiency. However, with software, communication is critical. With 1 developer, you have 0 lines of communication, thus that developer is aware of all design decisions and ramifications.

With 10 developers, you've made the lines of communication grow exponentially, which adds more delays due to requiring more meetings to coordinate 10 people, more time spent managing what each developer is working on, and more potential for conflicting design decisions to cause chaos.

It's a common middle management mistake to think that you can simply throw more developers at a problem to raise efficiency, defying logic, the opposite actually rings true.

Look, I'm an experienced programmer myself, and worked in teams consisting of 20-60 people. You can't convince me, that such an amount of people can't be managed, as I have seen it happening. All you need is a competent project manager, and perhaps some good methodology like XP or Scrum. It can be done, but the main problem here, is that Scawen don't want to get involved with this shit. Only god knows why.
You can also get away just be hiring very talented people, and you will see them creating quality stuff without any management. A good example of such a company is Valve.

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

Or that Victor's day to day role is very little as the current LFS online infrastructure doesn't require constant attention as it's reasonably stable and now quite resilient to attacks.

The current online infrastructure doesn't even come close to what iRacing has. It's a wreck fest, and now also a ghost town. Don't say, that there are no work to be done, because it's not true. We need a license system, safety rating, leagues, and much more....

Last edited by Gabox, Tue 6 May 2014, 09:50.

Quote from MadCatX :

How would you know, you haven't seen the devs' accounting books, have you? You're again making assumptions that support your argument but you have no evidence to back them up with. I assume you're talking about Vic? What's wrong with him taking part in another project if he feels underutilized with LFS?

What's wrong with that? Is this a serious question?
Come on dude, this project is going nowhere, and something like this is a great indicator of what is happening behind the scenes.

I myself very much doubt, that underutilization was the problem. It's more likely he was not happy with the money he received from Scawen.

Had they went with the subscription model few years ago, none of this shit would have happened.

Quote from MadCatX :

This is pure speculation and doesn't have much in common with computer software. It has been explained like gazillion times that more money does not equal better product or faster development.

Who said that bullshit?
Sure, replacing Scawen with 10 monkeys wouldn't help, but a team with 10 competent people can achieve more than only 3.

Quote from MadCatX :

The devs said so, practical experience from various SW projects supports this claim. iR hasn't invented anything, its just an MMORPG business model applied onto a racing sim.

It's not even MMORPG business model. It's called software as service, an essential part of cloud computing.

Quote from MadCatX :

The devs have never ever suggested that financial difficulties were an issue. If they had, they could have sold the whole product and move on. I imagine that LFS physics engine would still be worth a lot of money.

They are not honest to the community, and not even honest to themselves. Money is a problem, otherwise you wouldn't hear shit like a dev member had to take another part time job to make the living...

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

Except your comparison is imperfect:

The reason cars will eventually turn to electricity is not because it makes sense as current battery technology is heavy and requires a lot of batteries to provide adequate power. Never mind that batteries do have a finite life span, and do eventually fail to hold a charge.

Yeah, batteries currently have weak points, but still a viable alternative to combustion engines. Once they fix these issues, which will happen soon, there will be no reason to use traditional engines:

http://www.extremetech.com/com ... charges-1000-times-faster

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

Cars will eventually turn to being primarily electricity because we will simply run out of fuel. Oil is not a renewable resource (without millions of years of time).

No, they would turn electric anyway. Just think about the issue with the environment. It is also cheaper, and makes it possible to build safer, more functional cars.

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

iRacing aren't pioneers. They're just arrogant enough to think that people will pay them monthly for subpar physics. The wiser ones have abandoned iRacing as they've realized how terrible it truly is. Eventually iRacing will be left with a decrepit pit of users, crying every week, saying that "Kaermer will bring us good physics next build!"

And then the next build never comes...

I suppose it's been a while since you played iRacing. Give it a try, and come back sharing your thoughts. I think it's pretty good expecially with tire model version 5 (yes, they already managed to roll out the kind of complex tire model, that Scawen is still working on)

Last edited by Gabox, Tue 6 May 2014, 07:37.

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

Suggesting that iRacing "got it" would mean that all of us play iRacing and AC and LFS aren't required to continue development as everyone plays iRacing.

It's pretty obvious that isn't the case, so to suggest every racing sim to go to a service model, would be like suggesting every motorcycle to become a trike, because 1 manufacturer makes trikes.

But you do know, that in 20 years, 95% of cars manufactured will be pure electric? Why? If something doesn't make sense anymore, it is slowly replaced by a new, and more efficient paradigm. There are pioneers like Tesla, but others will join soon.

For me iRacing is the Tesla of racing sims...

Quote from axabaxa :

Think about it.. iRacing can not measure up to LFS when it comes to cost versus racing..

Yeah it is expensive but a quality service. And the quality is ensured by the monthly subscription fee, that allows them to keep the service healthy each month.

Pay once, play forever model is simply not efficient for massive multiplayer games like racing sims.

Check out my similar thread in the AC forum for more details:

http://www.assettocorsa.net/fo ... ac-is-not-a-service.8253/

Quote from Cornys :

Then he's come to the right place.

http://blacksportsonline.com/h ... 2014/02/Richard-Petty.jpg

LOL, indeed my King is him

Quote from CodeLyoko1 :

I wouldn't call it a miracle. good games tend to live a very long life. like CS1.6 which is still going. why? the game is good and has a great competitive or fun aspect where people simple come back for. Same goes for LFS. Same goes for rollercoaster tycoon

Yeah, but the long life will soon come to the end, if they don't change their hippie mentality.

Quote from GAVD999 :

Indeed and as Scawen posted a while back :

https://www.lfsforum.net/showt ... php?p=1833284#post1833284

Well, I was not aware that Scawen is still posting to the forum.
By reading this post from him, you have the impression that we are dealing with a bunch of hippies, who really have no desire to take responsibility.

If this is really the case, then we can officially declare LFS dead. It's already a miracle they managed to go this far with this sim.

Last edited by Gabox, Mon 5 May 2014, 07:41.

Quote from GAVD999 :

You have a point, however it is their business to run as they want. If they wanted to make a fortune they could have done, however they chose to keep it the way it is. The only targets the have to meet are what they choose and as long as it keeps paying the bills and making a bit of money it's not a bad way to make a living, doing what you enjoying doing with only yourselves to answer too

There is a difference between not getting rich, and not earning money at all.
The later seems to be the case now.

Quote from Sobis :

It will be even more funny to bash you when the tyre physics will finally be finished but the payment method will stay the same.

Do you think your sh*tty 25 bucks that you paid them in 2006, will keep them happy forever? If I'm wrong, and no development is going, that's only because they realized that they can earn much more money by getting a job.

Yes, they f*cked up with the current payment model, but it's not too late to change it.

Last edited by Gabox, Sun 4 May 2014, 20:38.

Quote from Fordman :

@gabox I think from the previous replies, you are not only barking up the wrong tree, you are in totally the wrong forest to be fair.

Scawen and his team as you put it, are doing what they want and how they know best, it's as simple as that, so there is not subscription basis like IRacing as you put it.

It will be, as they said from day one, a one off payment for S3, but thank you for your outset and make us smile

Fordie

Who cares what they said 5 years ago? Times are changing, and they have to adapt to stay in business.

Quote from Töki (HUN) :

Thanks for the laugh.

I guess you think that they are still f*cking around with the tire model.
Don't be so ignorant, and admit to yourself, that they are working on something greater than that.

Quote from CodeLyoko1 :

this was the funnies thing I've ever read.

I'm dead serious dude.

Quote from Eclipsed :

Then I feel sorry for your intelect... One does not have to be economy expert to see,that it will go totally wrong if devs will put subscription to sim,that's slowly losing player base (as we know,that most feel something promised and are disapointed to not get it,so they are leaving,leaving only true racing fanatics still enjoying racing).

LOL, just remember my theory, and enjoy watching it happen

Quote from Eclipsed :

I don't know what drugs are you taking,but you should decrease the dosage!

No drugs man. I used my bare intellect to figure this one out.:nerd:

We can all agree of the fact, there is no way that the devs have abandoned this magnificent sim.

So, here is my theory:

Scawen, and the rest of the team realized, that they cannot go further anymore with the "pay once, play forever" model, and they decided to change LFS to the subcription based model that iRacing has.

That's it, they are turning LFS to a continuously improved service. Of course, this cannot happen overnight, so the team is now developing the back end systems to support that, including advanced multiplayer features like leagues, licenses, safety rating and stuff like that.

It is easy to see that the subscription based, continuously improved service model is the future of sim racing, and any sim that doesn't follow this model, will die soon (including assetto corsa). Their original plan to declare the game finished by releasing S3 is obsolate, as there is no such thing as finished sim in this new era. There are always things to improve, and the only model that can support that, is iRacing's model.

So that's it folks, some competition is coming to iRacing which is great!

Last edited by Gabox, Sun 4 May 2014, 19:00.

Hi!

I had an 60 lap race sunday, with the FOX. For about half of the distance everything went good, but then my engine power started to decreese. At the end i felt that i lost 30% of the total power of the car.

I never experienced anything like that before. I knew that overheating the clutch can cause this problem, but my clutch was ice cold during the race.

Then somebody told me that i probably downshifted to early, and that was the cause of the problem.

Anyway, i don't want to make this mistake again and want to be sure about the cause of the problem.

Wouldn't be better if the damage screen would contain all kind of damage? Now i see only suspension damage there.

If there will be a fix right after holiday, i forget it

The tutorial section of the game aren't translated in my language (Hungarian).

OK, i understand now. Thanks for the information.

So the master server applies restrictions. My question is the same. Are there any documentation about the details of these restrictions?
Plus, what is the reason behind that? I think it would be better if these weight or power restrictions were built into the cars out of the box.

Last edited by Gabox, Wed 12 Dec 2007, 11:40.