F1 2010 Formation lap

[Ondrej Kapal]

I maybe missed informations about it, but will the race procedure including formation lap?

 

[Dustin Barton]

I love T4RG4s comment on twitter - presumably in response to the question "what formats will F1 2011 be on?"

"almost certainly the same formats again (PS3 & 360 most definitely and if a couple of people buy it on PC... PC ) "

You do get the impression from some PC fans that game developers owe them something - that the PC version should be different/superior to the console version. They don't appreciate the truth that there wouldn't be a PC version at all without the console versions.

While many people are simply expressing their opinion on the Codies forum, there is a lot of trolling going on, and its all by PC "fans". I'd take it as a backhanded complement - people usually attack what they feel threatened by. If they didn't see F1 2010 as a threat to their sim of choice they wouldn't attack it.

Exactly. Naturally the PC version will support a higher resolution and other graphical advantages, but people can't honestly expect to see 24 cars online in the PC version but only 12 with the console. This was also a limitation of FOM I believe. It's just things like that which get on my nerves, but thankfully counter arguments against PC elitists pop up rather quickly.

 

[David O Gorman]

No its based on the amount of people using each system, as there is a smaller pc base than console base and an if equal percentage of each base are willing to accept a crap game, in number terms more console users will accept the bad game and they may well be enough in numbers for that game to achieve profitably.
Wasn't meant to sound elitist ,its just a numbers game.

And by what is the best option that can be used.
So if you pick dedicated servers versus p2p which is best
If you pick input methods which is the best available in accuracy versus jack of all trades
If you pick ease of use which is best in plug and play

I could go on ,for some it will be the console configuration and for others it will be the pc configuration same as all things in life
So if a game is brought out that recognizes the best of each platform and uses that system surely the end result is a better game for
everyone that buys it console or pc after all nobody from pc gets to play console users in the same game.
How ever if a game is designed for 1 platform and just ported to another without any thought of that platform and its abilities its hardly surprising that people get pissed off.
Just in case people think im being elitist maybe ye should look at the post i made here regarding rfactor
http://www.racedepartment.com/rfact...-space-incorporated-add-your-questions-2.html
2nd post by me, and id be delighted if they brought a version to the console that used the console strengths without loosing its identity as a sim on a more difficult settings.
I also posted something quite like it in the gtr 3 thread,and if you look at a lot of users posts on codies forums you see that the guys wanting the game to be more sim also want it to be accessible to users more accustomed to arcade games.
It is certain people that want it to remain a console version with no extra features that sim gamers of both console and pc gamers might like.

Console users can also have dedicated servers which would mean they also could have 24 cars online,in this case both console and pc users loose out.

Actually SynGamer is it your opinion that the extras that people on codies forum are looking for ,proper driver animation,safety car ,formation lap ,24 cars online etc are stupid points of view period or stupid based on the fact that this is a console game primarily.

 

[Andrew Macpherson]

I'm a moderator on the official forums so I've been dealing with people complaining about the lack of FL, SC, and RL for over a year now.
...
If they want FL, SC, and RC, there are a handful of other games (PC only I think) that they can play right now. No F1 games features "Live the Life'

what are RC and RS?

Anyway, I agree with you about safety cars and such, but I think we could have honestly hoped for 24 cars in the PC version, since the only reason for the 12 car limit is technical limitations on the consoles. As it is, I will probably wait for a bargain bin sale (like when Dirt 2 went for $10) and play around against the AI during week 13 or something

 

[Dustin Barton]

What is FOM? All I can think of is figure of merit. Also, while we are defining acronyms:what are RC and RS?

Anyway, I agree with you about safety cars and such, but I think we could have honestly hoped for 24 cars in the PC version, since the only reason for the 12 car limit is technical limitations on the consoles. As it is, I will probably wait for a bargain bin sale (like when Dirt 2 went for $10) and play around against the AI during week 13 or something

FOM = Formula One Management, basically the people Codemasters (CM) have to get everything approved by.
FL = Formation Lap
SC = Safety Car
RL = Recon Lap

RC was a typo, sorry. As for 24 cars online, I believe the issue was with fitting the extra 12 cars online in the garage for players and having it be fair. Or something like that. I'll try to find the official word from T4RG4 (Steve Hood, Chief Designer).

 

[Andrew Macpherson]

Ah, I do recall reading about the garage issue. But honestly, I feel this is mostly an excuse. Using the peer-to-peer system used on xbox-live/games-for-windows-live I don't think they could support more than 12 cars. That would require dedicated servers. They have their business reasons for wanting to stick with GFWL, which rules out dedicated server support.

If the garage space issue was really the only thing preventing 24 car fields I'm sure they could have found an acceptable solution, such as ghosting in the pits and/or just cramming everyone in much more tightly than normal (no big deal since steering in pit lane is automated anyway). Given the colossal effect it would have on game play (and a nice marketing hook) versus a pretty minor realism/licensing issue, I believe they could have implemented this if they weren't committed to GFWL.

 

[Danny Asbury]

Yes, the garage thing is an excuse. If you guys haven't noticed, most Xbox racings games come out with one or two of these phantom reasons why certain things couldn't get done. I remember Dan Greenwalt saying a few wierd things as to why Forza couldn't support more than 8.

As for 12 players, I honestly think that's great. I really thought it would only be 8, so those extra 4 players are a bonus to me.

 

[Dustin Barton]

Ah, I do recall reading about the garage issue. But honestly, I feel this is mostly an excuse. Using the peer-to-peer system used on xbox-live/games-for-windows-live I don't think they could support more than 12 cars. That would require dedicated servers. They have their business reasons for wanting to stick with GFWL, which rules out dedicated server support.

If the garage space issue was really the only thing preventing 24 car fields I'm sure they could have found an acceptable solution, such as ghosting in the pits and/or just cramming everyone in much more tightly than normal (no big deal since steering in pit lane is automated anyway). Given the colossal effect it would have on game play (and a nice marketing hook) versus a pretty minor realism/licensing issue, I believe they could have implemented this if they weren't committed to GFWL.

Blur (360/PS3) can handle 20 cars online so I don't think it's an excuse.

 

[David O Gorman]

The issue was the p2p net code couldn't handle 24 cars ,they might have been able to squeeze in 15 - 16 but then they ran into an issue with FOM as some teams would then have 2 cars in the race and others only 1 so it is now 12,T4RG4 or one of the others confirmed that this was the reason even though the garage spaces was a rumor going around for some time.
After all there is 24 cars offline with no extra garages.
Look at COD MW2 ,the max players it can cope with is 18 and some of those will camp and thats p2p
where as on PS3 Mag can handle 64 players with dedicated servers ,same with pc games with dedicated servers will host ,well im not sure the max but id imagine closer to MAG than F1.

In all honesty this time ill stick up for F1 regarding blur able to handle 20 cars online as bur has no sim or much racing merit at all however fun it might be for a quick race,found it getting very old very quick.

It'll be interesting to see how F1 handles full stint races offline with the ai ,that has been an issue in rfactor with ai slowdowns although with some editing the effect can be minimised.

If the game is as good as they say and they can capitalize by adding missing stuff on the next version then 2011 will be one to look out for,but its just hard to see from a technical point of view how stuff can be added without taking away other things with regards to no hardware evolution on the consoles.

 

[Dustin Barton]

If the game is as good as they say and they can capitalize by adding missing stuff on the next version then 2011 will be one to look out for,but its just hard to see from a technical point of view how stuff can be added without taking away other things with regards to no hardware evolution on the consoles.

This is the great thing about consoles though, developers can focus on optimizing their game engine(s) with each new game. They have a defined set of parameters to work in and don't have to worry about new hardware (like with PCs). That's why Uncharted 1 looks good and Uncharted 2 looks great. It'll be interesting to see what the DIRT 3 team can add to the EGO engine that the F1 2011 team can take advantage of.