F1 2010 Is the AI too easy?

[Kristopher Alcordo]

I have about 1 day and 20 hours til I can play the game but I saw a lot of videos that showed the AI to not be too much of a challenge. Is this true or are they faking it by saying they were on expert but really weren't?

 

[Ryan Vickery]

Fuel/Tyre sim are huge factors, if you race with them you will be slightly slower than the slowest cars at the start of the race, but... all the cars drive slow when they are around each other, when they are defending or attacking they seem to be quite clumbsy and that is the best/easiest time to overtake. Once the field has spread out a bit they will drive a lot faster then.

If you're finding it too hard and want to compete more, simply turn off the fuel or tyre sim, or both. It will make your car alot faster. If you're finding it too easy, then make sure that they are on, and dont be so aggressive with overtaking at the start of the race, id put a bet that some people pull off overtakes that would cause big accidents if it were real life, in order to pass a bunch of cars at the first corner, i know because i've done it myself.

I find a good balance for being competitive in a start car, dynamic race but still a decent challenge is this. you wont win races if you drive clean, but you will be able to have a good battle in the mid field, and maybe a points finish.

Expert, then customise

Fuel sim off, Tyre sim on (should be on as standard for expert), damage to visual, reduced flag rules, AI on legend. The longer the race distance the more realistic it gets, as ive said the AI cars don't really pickup any pace until they have spread out a bit, as they drive slower when they are battling for position a lot.

 

[Billy Davies]

Hmmm I think it very much depends on the track as to whether the ai is any good or not. Playing 40% race distance on Legend difficulty in career mode.

For example in Monaco, after a lot of practice I put it on 14th after qually, during the race I was just slow in comparison to everyone around and finished 20th.

Go to Montreal, same game settings, nothings changed. In qually (thanks to a bit of rain) I put the car on pole (in a lotus????). Race day is dry, so I expect everyone to come chraging past me. No. Following a 28 lap race I bring it home in 3rd. Alonso and Vettel were just alien quick while the others couldn't keep up.

Thing is, I know monaco but I've never done a lap of Montreal before this game.

I'm sure it's just how much time the devs have put into balancing ai at each track. Some they're awesome, other's they're a bit ****.

 

[Tim Brook]

Like Bram, if I know the track I qualify well. Some tracks I can keep up and some I cant. I was well off the pace in Spain, couldnt match their pace at all. 5th at Bahrain (2nd in race), 6th at Malaysia (3rd in race), 17th at Monaco and some others with poor results, 1st in Istanbul (1st in race). It's on as hard as it gets in a Sauber.

 

[Lars Strijdonck]

I think in general peoples speeds are so much different. I can confirm that in either the "Demo"or Steam version Ai behaviour is identical. I am now in the Williams and with a damaged front wing ( its not completly of) you still easily lap in the 1:14:5's in race trim round Montreal wich to me seems a bit off. However the whole athmosphere i get from the game is great and with some patching it will get better. As some one notited in this topic, some how the flip comes and you just know how to drive the game from that moment on the Ai is pretty easy to beat.

I honestly havent ever come across an game with good AI. At leat in F1-2010 they have some spacial awereness wich makes the racing decent fun.

 

[Ryan Vickery]

I find that on every track, there is a sector where you can alot drive faster than the ai and make up time in qualifying or the race. In montreal i was much faster in the first sector of the track, like over a second. Originally i was racing with tyre/fuel sim off to compete, but now with the upgrades the lotus seems fast enough to compete top level with them on, i put the car on pole at istanbul and montreal, my laptimes with tyre/fuel sim off were far too fast, in comparison to the beginning of the season. I also managed pole at monaco which was considerably faster than the ai with a 1.16.3.

Mid season seems quite a contrast to the start of season, im sure the AI are getting slower, because i don't really think i'm getting faster. Put the car on pole in valencia in the rain (out of sheer luck for putting in a lap last minute when the track had dried slightly), but then in the dry race was so much faster in the last sector that i pulled enough lead to pit on 3rd lap and comeout as 2nd place (button) was driving passed, then on to win the race by quite a big margin.

Driving with expert (tho customed to have damage on visual, reduced flags, and early season no tyre/fuel sim) and Legend AI.

 

[Graham Byford]

I may have already posted this but I cannot remember....anyway

Fuel Sim: when turned on it doesn't scale with the race distance, if you do a 100% race distance your fuel tanks are 100% full at the start. But if you do a 50% race distance your fuel tanks will only be half or 50% full and so on down to 10% race distance/fuel. Your lap times will show this in the early laps of the race.

 

[Omen1972]

From the perspective of someone playing it on the easiest level, and as something of a novice player, I must admit to finding the AI sometimes very erratic, there are many times when the AI can be as skillful as you would expect a driver to be if trying to take or hold position, but also I have found more often than not they are more likely to spear you off the road, not break and ram you, or simply take you out, for no reason. I know the AI skill level is at it's base lowest for this level but even so, I do feel more often than not the AI is not as as good, or should I say, as challenging, as I'd want it to be especially considering that the game is not supposed to be a simple to play even at the easiest level.

 

[Ryan Vickery]

The most annoying thing the AI does when you're driving close to them is to completely block the road in braking zones, so no matter how well you try to avoid them you cant always brake fast enough to not smash into the back of them. Countless times i have been trying to not crash into them to have them simply put their cars into the path of destruction, seems they would rather die than lose a place.

Contrary to the rule that you're allowed 1 defensive movement across the track, they have no issues about continiuosly planting themselves infront of a faster/overtaking car, meaning that you sometimes have to risk a penalty in order to take a position and simply muscle your way passed.

I have no issues with muscling my way passed cars anymore, seems they don't play by the rules then neither will i.

 

[Rob Simms]

I have played with the ai on different settings. It seem like they are track specific. I had trouble with the ai at cat and monaco on amateur so far. Then on other tracks, I'm about to lap the back of field on amateur.

 

[Skroting]

I've been finding the game too easy myself, but I found just the right challenge last GP when I qualified in 11th and finished in 12th. For the next GP I turned on Fuel Sim and I didn't stand a chance. I was left in the dust in the start and fell from P12 to 18. After a couple of laps the cars ahead of me where so far ahead I couldn't even see them on the track or on the map. The ones behind me formed a train right behind me. I just gave up and quit. I tried again but without FS. This time I managed to stay in 14th after the start, but the guys in front of me disappeared and the guys behind me where just waiting in line to attack me. It's no fun being the slowest guy out there, so I quit again. Next time I'll set down the difficulty a notch.

This was on Catalunya where I'm quite competitive. I'm number 15 on the Leaderboards for this track, which isn't super, but it's decent. It's strange that someone can claim to have wone 14 of 19 races with the same settings. Winning under these conditions feel as realistic as it happening with a Lotus in real life.

I also noticed a huge difference in the time trial car and the career car. With Lotus in TT I quickly got down to 1:20.9, but the best I could do in qualifying was 1:24.7. I guess a lot of the difference in performance lies in the upgrades I haven't got yet.

 

[MADscuderia]

I've been finding the game too easy myself, but I found just the right challenge last GP when I qualified in 11th and finished in 12th. For the next GP I turned on Fuel Sim and I didn't stand a chance. I was left in the dust in the start and fell from P12 to 18. After a couple of laps the cars ahead of me where so far ahead I couldn't even see them on the track or on the map. The ones behind me formed a train right behind me. I just gave up and quit. I tried again but without FS. This time I managed to stay in 14th after the start, but the guys in front of me disappeared and the guys behind me where just waiting in line to attack me. It's no fun being the slowest guy out there, so I quit again. Next time I'll set down the difficulty a notch.

This was on Catalunya where I'm quite competitive. I'm number 15 on the Leaderboards for this track, which isn't super, but it's decent. It's strange that someone can claim to have wone 14 of 19 races with the same settings. Winning under these conditions feel as realistic as it happening with a Lotus in real life.

I also noticed a huge difference in the time trial car and the career car. With Lotus in TT I quickly got down to 1:20.9, but the best I could do in qualifying was 1:24.7. I guess a lot of the difference in performance lies in the upgrades I haven't got yet.

This exact same thing happened to me!
It seems that a lot of people are reporting issues in Catalunya. I don't know if Codemasters heard that teams usually test in Catalunya so drivers are very familiar with it and tried to emulate that, or what happened, because in the previous 4 races I was having a decent challenge, qualifying around 15-18 with the HRT and finishing best at 11 (on a weird race where Lotuses and Virgins scored points, and I ended up ahead of Ferraris, Williams and Mercedes; I think it was the pit stop bug).
So I reached Catalunya and it was just horrible. The practices, I was struggling to post a time better than 20th and I was running 1:25.6s! If you go check, thats FASTER than the actual HRTs qualified with this year.
Finally, I qualified 17th (this is I advanced to Q2, but then I couldn't do anything at all to escape last place). Started the race and my elephant car was overtaken by 1 car only because I was weaving left and right not letting anyone past me, very unsportsmanlike but all I could do. By the end of the first lap most of the cars ahead were too far to be seen on the minimap as I struggled for grip everywhere on cold tyres and full tanks, while everyone behind me was waiting to get past, with the occasional sound of someone losing their front wing under my diffuser.
It was clear to see that whoever I could hold behind me would get past in the first pits. So I ragequit and start again.
This time I turned Fuel simulation off. It was a completely different tale at the start, I could keep up with the other cars and even try an overtake at turns 4 and 5, but then it started happening again. Everyone was easily faster than me by 2 seconds. Huge train behind me, the people ahead pulling away.
After many frustrating attempts, I decided to give it a rest and try again some other day.
It was no good, I was still being taken like a newbie, so I had no choice but to turn the difficulty down to newbie levels. Only then I could finish the race, which I set to 10% race distance (or whatever's the minimum) cos I couldn't see that damn track in front of me a minute longer than I had to. Finished 9th, didn't care it was unrealistic for an HRT, because I was done trying to be realistic in a game that refuses to be.

The AI in this game is nothing brilliant. They're pretty dumb, even. Many times they don't stick to the racing line at all but the game compensates by giving them unrealistic amounts of grip and acceleration. They rarely make big mistakes, compared to real races where in average 5 cars don't finish, so far I think in 5 races there have been like 3 DNFs and I caused two of them (and by caused it means a stupid AI drove into the back of my car and put himself out of the race).

This game needs a big big patch. I still don't know how beta testing gave it a green light. It feels like such a work in progress...