I can GUARANTEE that if the devs started to develop LFs in a way against what THEY wanted their interest would soon disappear. their motivation would soon fade, and you would be left with a half finished sim with no commitment from the devs.

It;s like playing guitar in a James Blunt cover band. It may please the masses, but you'll soon lose interest and give up.

I can say what i like or don't like about LFS ... BUT i understand that if teh devs started going against their own principles LFS wouldn't last more than 2 months.

It's horse's for course's fella, some people get "hard" for max realism, and find it fun, it leaves others cold, which is why some people (me included) are more than happy to sit the in front of a Tupolev TU-154 panel with a huge manual in front of me, and just press buttons for hours on end trying to get the damn thing to start.

I think LFS has turned a corner in it's development, it's not longer the "fun" "casual" "game" you (Shaun) first played all them years ago, it is evolving into something more along the lines of a flight simulator.

I think the community will become more and more segregated, the hardcore sims fans loving it, and the "casual" gamers leaving it for something else.

However, I do see the market for LFS lite (stripped down lite version), and LFS max (full on sim junkie version), because not everyone wants the balls to the wall realism we are now getting.

Anyway Shaun, how'd ya get on with RACE07?

If you want millisecond gear changes, motion blurring and "hang-time" (whatever that is), go play Need for Speed.

If you want proper racing, play Live for Speed.

LFS are in a catch 22 situation.

If they continue this development they could exclude casual developers, but if they develop the game for casual gamers they will soon lose interest.

I think the market is huge, and untapped regarding sims. OK there isn't a million real life racers in the world, but I would hazard a guess that 60% or more have no experience with hardcore sims. Thats where LFS may need to improve it's marketing.

Quote from epp_b :

If you want lame arcade crap, go play Need for Speed. If you want proper racing, play Live for Speed.

Hmm....I'll let you off because you don't have many posts, but Fordman isn't "into" lame arcade crap, he's been playing, and loving LFS since the year dot.

I can see where he is coming from, and does have a point, it just depends which side of the fence you are on.

Boo This Thread... Boo

Quote from Intrepid :

I think the market is huge, and untapped regarding sims. OK there isn't a million real life racers in the world, but I would hazard a guess that 60% or more have no experience with hardcore sims. Thats where LFS may need to improve it's marketing.

The market is not huge, it's actually pretty limited, "we" (the hardcore sim lovers) are in the minority, heck even Flight sim "jazzed things up" to appeal to the large scale gamer population.

Casual gaming has come a HELL of a long way in recent years, because people (real people, not emo kids locked away in their rooms for days on end) just don't simply have the time to invest in a full on sim experiance.

LFS doesn't offer that casual gaming experiance like it used too.

Quote from AndroidXP :

Well in that case, I yet have to find a public server that has forced cockpit view on

Dead Men Racing and Team Orange - Public Drift seem to have it.

I mean huge relatively. I understand a driving sim will never achieve GT type success... but if u look at GT/Forza... it's still very sim orientated, yet VERY popular.

Also you look at the world motorsport scene at the moment. I am only guessing, but I don't think that many real racers are THAT into sims... mainly because they just don't know about them.

Since becoming a simmer I have learnt the MASSIVE benefits it can give a driver. If your minted it teaches you how to improve your data analysis, while if your a low budget racer it gives you valuable seat time.

This is the untapped market LFS will naturally have to start advertising itself too if it will want to continue funding what they are doing.

I think asking the devs to develop LFS how you want is only going to end in LFS becoming a mess.

Personally I believe the developers can only do what THEY want LFS to be... otherwise the waters will become muddy.

I say have faith with what Scawen and co are doing, and if you don't like it... tough!

Quote from Fordman :

If I wanted realism to that effect, I would jump in my own car, and do a track day, or pay for racing license and go for it.

Thats just what I do want from LFS, as I really don't have the time/daylight to do it for real......LFS is just getting better and better.

Now if they could just take away the "vote to restart" while I'm winning after the fastest guys have crashed out, I'd be even happier lol

Simon

you're just out of practice, fordman. i can shift very quickly most of the time. you dont even need to lift fully off of the gas w/ the Formula bmw. I want lfs to be as realistic as possible without getting rediculous. i have no clutch pedal, but if i did, i'd use it... so i say lfs should go as fas as it can without alienating too much of the community its already a niche market, but i havent been unhappy with any steps sofar. I'm looking forward to race groves, marbles, brake fade, engine's exploding, parts falling off, oil/fuel spills, weather, and all of those things that make racing pleasant.

I'm surprised that you find it less fun now.

I must say that I enjoy LFS now more than from long time, I think it was S1 or before it when I felt is as much of fun again.

Felt that S2 was bit too arcade to tell the truth, without much of engine damage, tires with ton of grip but without much of bite back it felt rather easy and uninteresting, but now we got solution to engine department and also tires bite back properly as you need to keep some pressure in them

But it sure is different and I understand that it is not anymore something we could say easy afternoon racing, it is more of simulation, you need to drive more like IRL.

Can't agree fully on gear change being slow, it is tad with autoclutch and you need to use full range of manual clutch, but when manual clutch is set well it is rather nice and quick.
Also clutchless shifting with FBM is quite quick when you do it properly.

I do prefer LFS for realism and I do hope that we see damage that matches to real life and much more, I believe our view differs a bit there.

Still I don't think it will stop fun and easy racing, only people need to slow down a bit, you can't push all engine gives in future I believe, but still you can have fun races, one just need to focus to keep car intact too

If you flat-shift or mess up the blip, then the gear changes are slower. Get the blip right and they are just as fast if not faster than before.

I can somewhat relate to that statment, although its not that I don´t like the direction LFS took it´s that I don´t agree with the way it has decided to take that direction.
Take the two major changes towards "realism" many have moaned about lately which is the forced cockpit view and the clutch heat. Most of you will have to agree, that the way LFS forced you to also use the cockpit view while spectating and even during replay was flawed, and the same goes for the clutch, which, while in principle is a good idea, feels a bit rushed and broken or at least 30 years old and seriously worn as far as the physics of it go.

Lately and not so lately LFS started to feel like a mystery TV show in that it always brings up new ideas without leading any of the several earlier subplots to a conclusion. This works fine for something like the X-Files or Lost, for a racing sim however its quickly gets annoying to have to deal with the same flawed collision detection for 2 1/2 years while new features keep comming that arent fully though through either.

Quote from danowat :

I think the community will become more and more segregated, the hardcore sims fans loving it, and the "casual" gamers leaving it for something else.

However, I do see the market for LFS lite (stripped down lite version), and LFS max (full on sim junkie version), because not everyone wants the balls to the wall realism we are now getting.

Perhaps the answer lies in incorporating the various evolutionary changes and enhancements into server side options, like we already have for forced cockpit view. That way, the devs only have to produce one product, and that product has enough flexibility to suit all tastes.

Keep the various options in the game and let the players themselves decide how hard-core or casual they want it.

I know what you mean. I got the patch then had a go at south city classic reversed in the FZR. I use Biggie's blackwood set, so my screen was really bouncy and harsh with the updated view physics. Turning down the amount of head tilt per g (somewhere in view options) helped a bit, but I still completely lost my bearings coming out of the chicane one time, because my line was a little too out of control.

Around about the 4th race it started feeling fun again, but it sure has changed completely. Before, if I turned the force feedback down and put a little engine restriction in the GTRs felt pretty tame, but now the sheer speed seems like more of a barrier than before.

I think you're right that a part of the game has been .. excised. Some surgery took out the easy way you could lap at benchmark speed without breaking a sweat in the slick cars.

I guess if you want to do the equivalent with what's left of S2, you can use the TBO cars to have some close pick-up racing. It might just attract a new crowd of drivers looking for the most realism in a package that doesn't get out of shape too easily.

You asked

Quote from Fordman :

Has it got to real to actually enjoy?

and that's where there is going to be an opinion divide, because each person's answer to that depends on what they enjoy about LFS.

One other thing I noticed is that with the extra "weight" in the transmission physics, the car handling is a lot more precise around the limit. And with the clutch, well I had to back off a few laps into my first race, but as soon as I consciously went a bit gentler when slamming it into gear, the little heat slip delay went away.


To the idea of LFS-lite*, basically if you like the old LFS so much, just keep driving it?

I was one of the guys, who whined about the forced view. I have learned to live with it, and it doesn´t show up, to much, on the servers out there

I don`t know about this clutch thing. I can still drive my favorite cars, so it`s really not that big a problem for me. But I said the same things, as Fordman, on our own forum, a few days ago.

I worry mostly about the many Lfs friends, and racers, that beeing the ones we haven`t met yet The racers to bee !

But I also joined the satisfied racers club, that club that want it a bit harder !!

We have finished this discussion, more or less, in our forum, and we are all looking forward, learning to cope with the new clutch and view.

I can follow Fordman in his worries, about Lfs trying to hard, but it is all up to the devs - No more, no less.

Maby we end up with "all the bling" is only available in pro mode, and it gets easier in the other modes. That would be a nice solution

But for sure - I would want the possibillity, to drive the hard way. But I would also want a possibility to just drive for fun. I think we well get more choices Or I hope we will, so new starters in S3, can grow, with the best simulator, out there !

This is my personal oppinions.

It is a bit of a shame when an LFS stalwart such as Fordie has such objectionable opinions about the direction LFS is going in (although he is fully entitled to them). But we've got to remember that LFS is and was always going to be a simulation rather than just a mere game.

However i think Dan hit the nail on the head in his post

Quote from danowat :

It's horse's for course's fella, some people get "hard" for max realism, and find it fun, it leaves others cold, which is why some people (me included) are more than happy to sit the in front of a Tupolev TU-154 panel with a huge manual in front of me, and just press buttons for hours on end trying to get the damn thing to start.

I think LFS has turned a corner in it's development, it's not longer the "fun" "casual" "game" you (Shaun) first played all them years ago, it is evolving into something more along the lines of a flight simulator.

I think the community will become more and more segregated, the hardcore sims fans loving it, and the "casual" gamers leaving it for something else.

However, I do see the market for LFS lite (stripped down lite version), and LFS max (full on sim junkie version), because not everyone wants the balls to the wall realism we are now getting.

To be honesty Fordie you probably play LFS more than me these days, but then again i'm one of those hardcore nutters who'll happily spend 3 hours of an evening sitting in a stationary F16 Falcon going through preflight checks/weapon checks/navigational and weather charts etc before i even fire the thing up.

But i really like Dans idea of an LFS lite and an LFS max versions. GPL managed it to a certain degree of success so why can't LFS.

If i'm being honest i actually find LFS too soft at the moment and at times i hanker for the low speed grip issue of pre patch S i think it was ? (but lets not get into that argument) It was certainly more challenging then, and if anything harder to pick up for a newbie than it is today.

At the end of the day nothing in life ever stays the same, when things change you either accept it and adapt or you reject the change and leave. The choice as always is yours to make.

I change gears as fast as usual with my G25 with the last test patch

With so many complaints about real race vehicles - F1, Karts, Touring , MotoGP etc... - becoming way to easy to drive and boring as a spectacle i find it surprising that when something becomes harder, and more hardcore there seems to be complaint about that as well.

I am, in NO doubt that the only reason you have seen this AMAZING support and continual development of LFS is because the devs have a vision for what they want it to be. If they didn't have this vision LFS S1 would have been final, and the devs would be doing something else.

The idea you have these guys dedicating so much to provide the most realistic simulation possible (and FINALLY we are starting to see LFSs potential) is friggin' awesome, and you should consider yourself lucky we have people like this.

I am gonna join the ride and see where LFS ends up

I'm middly amused to see at batch of veterans whining out the patches are 'too hard for them' when all the newcomers like me are much happier now...

Quote from Riders Motion :

I'm middly amused to see at batch of veterans whining out the patches are 'too hard for them' when all the newcomers like me are much happier now...

I believe that veterans have more easier to criticize than newcomer which is new and kind of adjusting to party so they might be bit afraid of open their mouths, specially when there is always 3 veterans to bash and flame newcomers that dare to say something negative

Quote from JTbo :

I believe that veterans have more easier to criticize than newcomer which is new and kind of adjusting to party so they might be bit afraid of open their mouths, specially when there is always 3 veterans to bash and flame newcomers that dare to say something negative

I'm not personnally scared of peoples who have '2003' next to their nickname.... I think everyone deserves the same respect on this forum, but I'm still amazed to see so much peoples crying their frustration loud when they know this is not an arcade game...

Oh Fordman comes from Norfolk, just ingore him. Drives a 1.8 litre focus? Lies, I tell you! They don't even have roads in Norfolk!

Quote from Fordman :

This new clutch thing? what is that all about. I have never seen a car, any car change gear so slow, ( whether manual clutch, auto clutch, manual blip. ) Jesus I can change gear faster in my Ford Focus 1.8 petrol, its wrong.

I don't know that the fun is gone from LFS, or that LFS is heading the wrong way (the opposite of that IMO), but the above's definitely true.. I can shift this crappy 1994 Nissan Pick-up diesel manual gearbox about as fast as the GTRs in LFS do.
Definitely something wrong.

In addition I think there should be scraping noises when the clutch is misused. It's the same sort of feedback as engine valves getting out of shape or different tire scrub/squeal sounds.