Very bad road adherence physics

[pppoposition]

Hello there,

I just noticed this:

if Racer is supposed to be a racing simulator and not just another crappy Need for Speed thing ... then at least the car it ships with (Lamborghini) should perform reasonably well on the road. Most importantly, you should not be able to tell the difference between the real life on-the-road behavior and game-play on-the-road behavior. What do I mean?

Well, just try to accelerate to approximately 30km/h. And then apply the full brake. What happens in real life? The car stops almost immediately. And what happens in the game? Well, the car just slowly decreases speed, ... then it stops. This is just wrong. Don't you have that feeling?

Also, try to turn off the ABS. In real life, braking without ABS from 30km/h will make maybe a very little skid, but the car stops almost instantly. And in the game ... woohoo ... you can play skid games when braking from such a little speeds. Not even trying to talk about braking from 130km/h ...

Another thing: Try to accelerate to about 70km/h and suddenly turn the wheel all the way in some direction. What happens in real life? Your car will be firmly dragged in that direction and maybe it will make several spins until it finally stops. And in the game? The car almost doesn't slow down and the turned wheels make very little contribution to the actual bearing. Does it seem real to you?

And one more thing: If you happen to drive off the road into the sand (or whatever it is, e.g. around the first bend in Carlswood) ... you almost cannot control the car, even at little speeds. What do you think about that? To be honest, I don't have any experience with sand driving. But it seems to me just unreal. I think it can not be that bad. Is it really that bad?

Well, to sum up, at least on the asphalt roads, the Lamborghini car absolutely doesn't behave like a real car. I don't know what kind of cars you are used to when driving. But to me, considering the road adherence physics, Racer is definitely not a realistic game. Not in the present state.

 

[Harey]

Can I just start by asking you one question, have you ever driven a Murcielago?

And clearly you didn't notice, that Racer is a beta. (as in not complete). It just got a graphics overhaul, I think physics are next up.

Also the brakes in real life you'll find it quite hard to apply them 100%, in Racer its quite easy. The steering really depends on the car, most if you turn the wheel all the way will pretty much just make a wide turn, some will decide to make you spin out.

Sand driving, if its dry, you will find it quite hard to do, especially in a Lamborghini.

and it seems your making assumptions about Racer based on a single car, I'd suggest downloading a different car. Because to be honest, I don't think many of us drive that Lambo too much.

 

[Mr Whippy]

Pppoposition, are you using a wheel with force feedback and so on?

I re-worked the Lamborghini quite recently, and it does need a few tweaks.

Once of Racers weaknesses is the tyre physics at low speeds or transitions over the limit of grip.

However, I believe the settings it currently has to be inherently good...


Brakes issue might be a combo of the new brake balance changes. ABS isn't the best because it uses a poor algorithm right now.


So yes, there are some issues. However, in my vast vast vast experience in real life driving in ways to help catch out erroneous behaviour in car simulators when approximating behaviour, I can happily say Racer gets it generally and fundamentally right.


It's good that you are checking such things though. Racer can be improved more.


But I will just say. Go drive GT5 and do the same things, if you can. It's comprehensively worse in almost every test like this vs how a real car would behave... and that is meant to be 'good' apparently.

Hmmmm

Dave

 

[Stereo]

In the same situation the Murcielago seems to stop fine for me (30km/h -> 0) and takes about 1-2 metres. Can't see any difference with ABS on or off either.

If you hit Ctrl+4 you should get a Controls readout, partway down it lists "Actual brake%", try putting the brakes fully on, see if you can hit 100%.

As for the 70km/h then steer hard, I believe that's a natural consequence of the evolution of cars, understeer is what you want to happen when you do that. If a car is set up, suspension-wise, so it starts spinning when you do that, it's pretty nerve-wracking to drive.

Plus, the surface of Carlswood is very flat, which suits the Murcielago well, it's got hard suspension.

 

[camsinny]

I'd say your controls are ****ed.

 

[AMGfan(BPM)]

 

[richabc]

Can I just start by asking you one question, have you ever driven a Murcielago?

i did a couple of times... it drives perfect in racer
i guess for some people it will never be good enough what people will make on simulators..


the only thing i can say is that myself and a whole lot of other racer fans appriciate all the work thats done in the past..
keep up the good work!!

 

[pppoposition]

Some answers

I will try to answer some of your questions:

I know that Racer is beta. It has been beta for a very long time. Ruud and the others have spent quite a few years on it's development. But, for a product with such a long history, there are still very basic issues with driving on the roads. Don't you find that a major problem? Because, honestly, I do.

No, I have never driven Lamborghini Murcielago in real life. However, I have driven some other cars and none of them behaved on the roads as badly as this car in Racer does.

A common sense suggests that a car like Lamborghini should be able to stop very swiftly. It has wide tires, strong brakes. Its weight is about 1.5 tons, so it is comparable to many other smaller vehicles. I have driven some usual cars that you see on the roads every day of approximately this weight and ... it is no problem for them to stop almost instantly from small speeds like 30km/h. Also, they steer very well. So, I do not see any reason why a well made sports car should behave on the road worse than the average casual car. Do you?

Yes, I have tried some other Racer cars. In fact, I have tried many of them. And I must admit, that some of them drive better, more realistically than the Lamborghini.

I know that in Racer, the behavior of a car on the road depends on the car configuration and on the track configuration. I am aware of that. I have, for example, come across the Dodge Tradesman B200 (1976) car, which on-the-road behavior is in my opinion much closer to the reality. I accept that there might be such finely-tuned cars.

Unfortunately, that is not the case with the Lamborghini. I would expect that this car should be the spectacular example of what a realistic driving experience in Racer can be like.

Look, you have to impress people. Whoever tries Racer for the first time looks for something that will be interesting for him. He doesn't care for a few new cars or tracks or whatever you can manually install later. He just wants to see how well the game performs. Right after the installation.

And if you give him this Lamborghini... do you think he will be impressed? Do you think anyone will be impressed? Because at least I am not.

And what else do you have to impress people with? Graphics? Come on... this is a long shot and the competition is very hard. Car control? Okay, that's where Racer currently hits the spot. I personally like the mouse control very much. But will it be enough? You can have good controls, but if you don't have good cars to be controlled, where's the whole point?

Once again, to sum all up: I accept that some cars are fine tuned to behave better than the Lamborghini. But I still think that in Racer, the reasonable cars' steering and on-the-road adherence physics has yet to be introduced.

 

[The Wolf]

Although I personally applaud your pursuit of realism, I can't help but think there's an inconsistency in wanting realistic physics but enjoying mouse control of your driving. I can't really say they are mutually exclusive, but it somehow seems....ironic I guess (although I'm sure you're not the only one). Why do we have such a strong distaste for a car that "feels" wrong in the game, but are quite content to control it in a way that bears no resemblance to the real thing?

Just voicing my curiosity--comments are not meant to be pointed.

 

[Mr Whippy]

So you use a mouse for controls?

The brakes are off generally because of a recent change in braking power maths in Racer. Double the max_braking values in the car.ini file at front/rear wheels. The car.ini file needs updating.

The very low speed braking on the Lambo is off because of the poor ABS implementation in Racer (it works fine in most places, but just not as speeds approach zero). I am writing a script to offer better control, but it takes time.
The alternative is to turn ABS off at a higher speed, but then that isn't realistic either.


The Murcielago is one of the better cars out there for Racer. It has it's problems though, but it has been vastly improved recently. The old one was quite poor.

I'd prefer a purer car to be used to exhibit Racer because that is what Racer does best. It's hard to copy the Murcielago properly because Racer has a relatively weak AWD implementation. A McLaren F1 would be a better car perhaps, or some more racing type car.


All said and done, I've driven a Murcielago on track in real life, and I set the ini up for this car in varying conditions (rain/dry) as I experienced in the real car, and using the same track which I'm working on for Racer too.
Using my experience I'd say the car is as close as I can make it without Racer getting better, or me having access to a Murcielago to make many many measurements of it's setup


In any case, try see the issues you have as an opportunity to learn and try make it better! Racer is free for everyone and if we can turn the problems we see into solutions we will all have a really good and realistic driving game to enjoy forever! Yay!

Dave

 

[Cosmo°]

Feedback is always welcome here I would say, so good on you for speaking out. Although you didn't specify which version of the Murcielago you drove and what your controller setup is, etc. I can see your point about this being a less than ideal default car in some ways. Ruud has been reluctant to change the default car and track for some time now, apart from the addition of the Baja suspension movables and the garage track additions, the Lamborghini has been the choice for many years now and unfortunately it shows.

The updated version that is included in the latest v0.8.35 beta already has some factual corrections as well as a number of modern features that weren't present before. Dave is probably polishing it further when he finds some time for it these days and I suppose the next beta will get another updated version of the car as a result of that.

That doesn't change the fact that with AWD, ABS and TC being a bit of a hack in Racer at the moment, the Murcielago might still be a bit too advanced for it's own good - a simpler vehicle of the MX-5 variety for example would probably be easier to get to a higher level of realism. Maybe it's time we as the community have a discussion about future solutions for the default content slots?

From a sheer numbers point of view, the Murcielago's performance and handling are pretty good already. The way it feels and behaves can probably improved on any release out there, though there are limitations and compromises in the details. The AWD hack alone has a big influence on front end traction, we have relatively little control over this due to the lack of multiple differential support etc.

In any case, you might call it splitting hairs, but I feel that Racer is neither a game nor does it have to impress with it's default car and track as such - it's a platform for simulation development and if anything, the default files are meant to serve as showcases of how current features and technologies are meant to be used and implemented. Even in that sense, the Murcielago hasn't always been in an ideal state of course, but then again, Ruud has been told about an updated version long before it was finally included... so it's not like we wouldn't care about this matter, but things don't always move that quickly around here

You can also include Carlswood as a relatively poor example of modern track settings - it's not just the default vehicles that have become less and less coherent. It has all the right bits, but none are set to form a nice, balanced overall picture, because Ruud doesn't have the time to do that. Again, something we can work out in the community, spreading the load, if Ruud is in on it and we can have our updates and adjustments included and not collecting virtual dust for half a year

I guess the point is, if you're turned off by the default content instead of motivated to learn and do it better - as Dave mentioned, there are other titles that come with a more polished overall appearance, but you don't get any control over the background workings, you're only a passenger for the ride and if something bugs you, that's just your luck. Racer gives you that freedom to influence and fix things and feedback is the first step (after giving it a try to begin with of course).

 

[Harey]

I know that Racer is beta. It has been beta for a very long time. Ruud and the others have spent quite a few years on it's development. But, for a product with such a long history, there are still very basic issues with driving on the roads. Don't you find that a major problem? Because, honestly, I do.

Yes, I have tried some other Racer cars. In fact, I have tried many of them. And I must admit, that some of them drive better, more realistically than the Lamborghini.

I know that in Racer, the behavior of a car on the road depends on the car configuration and on the track configuration. I am aware of that. I have, for example, come across the Dodge Tradesman B200 (1976) car, which on-the-road behavior is in my opinion much closer to the reality. I accept that there might be such finely-tuned cars.

Unfortunately, that is not the case with the Lamborghini. I would expect that this car should be the spectacular example of what a realistic driving experience in Racer can be like.

Look, you have to impress people. Whoever tries Racer for the first time looks for something that will be interesting for him. He doesn't care for a few new cars or tracks or whatever you can manually install later. He just wants to see how well the game performs. Right after the installation.

And if you give him this Lamborghini... do you think he will be impressed? Do you think anyone will be impressed? Because at least I am not.

And what else do you have to impress people with? Graphics? Come on... this is a long shot and the competition is very hard. Car control? Okay, that's where Racer currently hits the spot. I personally like the mouse control very much. But will it be enough? You can have good controls, but if you don't have good cars to be controlled, where's the whole point?

Once again, to sum all up: I accept that some cars are fine tuned to behave better than the Lamborghini. But I still think that in Racer, the reasonable cars' steering and on-the-road adherence physics has yet to be introduced.

Honestly there are some aspects I notice more so with my new wheel (Fanatec Porsche 911 GT2). like my wheel is currently set to 720 degrees of rotation, yet unless the car I'm driving has the steering ratio 5 or less, I'll feel like I'm driving a car with a very loose front end, then there's the clutch (mind you I have driven plenty of manual transmission vehicles both rwd and fwd, even awd) but in Racer its pretty much all the way at the bottom, and the friction point is about the size of a pea, when it should be more to the top. Of course those are just my major gripes with Racer, that I can live with.

Like others I'm sure have said, Whippy did update the Lambo so if you haven't tried that out, give it a try (it should be with the newest version).

Just thought I would point out, that Tradesman van, was a GTA conversion by me lol. Trying to work out bugs I find with it, trying to gear towards an update for it.

Really a lot of us are more impressed with the graphics, compared to what they were. But plenty of us want to see the physical side of Racer get overhauled.

 

[Stereo]

The brakes are off generally because of a recent change in braking power maths in Racer. Double the max_braking values in the car.ini file at front/rear wheels. The car.ini file needs updating.

The very low speed braking on the Lambo is off because of the poor ABS implementation in Racer (it works fine in most places, but just not as speeds approach zero). I am writing a script to offer better control, but it takes time.
The alternative is to turn ABS off at a higher speed, but then that isn't realistic either.

First of all, jealous of you getting to drive a Murcielago on a track
Then, with regard to the brakes:
I think the braking numbers are still correct, it's just a new recommendation for how to set them up that's changed.

ABS off, 100% brakes puts the front wheels of the RX-7 into a slide so it's fairly easy to see how far it went.
On the left - old setup. braking_factor=1 for all wheels, 1850 & 800 coeffs for max_braking.
On the right - new setup. braking_factor=0.7 front, 0.3 rear. 2650 max_braking all around.
It seems like they perform essentially the same - 2650*0.7 = 1855, 2650*0.3 = 795, so it's a very slight change in balance towards the front. It's definitely not halved performance.

The ABS on the RX-7, in the same test, stops it about half a carlength earlier. (145km/h-0). But on the Murcielago it is a lot less effective, actually takes it longer to stop than skidding.

I think I'm going to write a simple track script for running brake tests that takes measurement & reporting out of the driver's hands so it's easier to compare this sort of thing. Will see how that goes.

 

[Mr Whippy]

I made a script but it stopped working, but that was doing 0-50 0-100 0-150 etc intervals...

One for braking would be very handy indeed.

The Lambo brakes need an overhaul. You need a lot of rear braking to get it to stop in a short enough distance, but then that makes it un-drivable with bends... thus I have a script to alter bias based on steering input which works really well!

Also the ABS cycles really fast as you slow down, and on the Lambo it just gets silly under about 20mph... again, I've scripted better ABS but it does weird stuff in some cases haha


All fixes I'm working on now we have scripting... just I'm not so good at scripting, not so good at knowing how real ABS etc works, and also not so much free time at the moment

Dave

 

[Stereo]

Well, I wrote a script, but when the script controls the brakes it supercedes built-in ABS, as well as other braking scripts (presumably depending what order they run).

I suppose it wouldn't be too inaccurate to have the script start at +20km/h from the highest speed you're curious about, then mark time/distance at each point (160-0, 100-0, 50-0) as you slow down past those speeds and eventually to zero. It just misses the initial weight shift forward. Maybe I'll work on a version that does it that way.

 

[pppoposition]

Just one, maybe the last update:

Yes, I use the mouse, because I don't want to buy a wheel just for some occasional playing. And I find the mouse control very decent. Its greatest advantage is to have full control over the steering and acceleration, which is not possible with keyboard. And since the vast majority of other car games (or simulators or whatever you call it) do not support this type of control, I am left with about the only reasonable option - the Racer.

I have tried everything I was previously talking about with the newest version of Racer (v0.8.35). And I used the Lamborghini that comes with it as a default car. So, despite the fact that it might have been recently improved, I think that its on-the-road behavior is still far from "acceptably realistic".

Now, I appreciate the discussion about the possible improvements. But ... I don't have the courage to start talking into it or maybe doing something on my own... You see ... I am just a user. I don't have the time to spend on Racer. I don't want to sound impolite, but that's how it is.

I just want to point out that Racer needs not just developers (Ruud) and volunteers (most of you), but also regular users. And I think that these have been "a little" underestimated until now, to say the least.

I know that Racer is free (for now), so it doesn't really have to have any business plan or something... But ... people developing it should in my opinion pay more attention to making it popular, user friendly, interesting ... amazing. I mean ... yeah ... you can have super projected lights and whatever, ... and it's nice ... to you, who know it's there.

But if some user just downloads the game and sees the Lamborghini's road "performance" ... man ... I can guarantee you that he probably won't keep the game for very long time... Is that what you really want?

Look, if developers create the game, then users are the ones who make it popular. Ruud cannot make it popular by himself. And neither can a handful of enthusiasts. All I am saying is, you need a user base... someone who will be interested in the game from an amateur point of view... And one of the easiest ways for you to achieve it is by introducing a really good car physics.

Final thought... what can happen next? Imagine ... someone accidentally comes across Racer on the internet... Downloads and installs it ... and eventually likes it ... And the next day he comes to his pals and says: "Hey man, check out this game I tried. It has awesome car physics, you won't believe it! Your Need for Speed junk or Gran Turismo can go fish!" Wouldn't that be wonderful?

 

[Cosmo°]

Without trying to sound arrogant, from what you wrote I think Racer might just not be your thing. It's not good for occasional playing, for downloading and using it passively. While it supports mouse control, it's not meant to be driven with a one. Racer's biggest strength (and perhaps weakness) is the fact that nearly everything content related can and has to be user controlled. If you download the beta and find youself saying "that's rubbish, I'll never touch that again", that's fine. You're not going to enjoy it, the community and Ruud are not going to benefit from that either. If you say "that's rubbish, let me see/show them how to make it better", then you'll fit right in and it might be a very fulfilling hobby for you.

We all try to do our best on everything we work on, there are countless hours put into all the free content you can find online and I think nearly all of us do this for our personal enjoyment first and foremost. We share because we're looking for feedback and exchange of information to improve future content, but I don't think many of us do this to please others.

You say you're just a user - we're all just users here, but apparently our definition of user is different. When I "use" Gran Turismo it's because I accept the handling nonsense, the tuning restrictions in exchange for a complete lineup of my favourite car in all colours from model year so-and-so. When I use rFactor, I accept the fact that it's stuck with all the good and bad stuff it features in version 1.255 (I think ), because I can drive in certain locations and vehicles. When I "use" Racer, I accept the disparity between different content and current bugs in exchange for a word in the development, for freedom to create content my way, learning and improving along the way.

Popularity is all good since it potentially means more community talent. I just don't think that somebody who tries the default vehicle, dismisses it and deletes Racer as a result would be the target audience in the first place.

 

[Mr Whippy]

The thing is, Racer is horrible with a keyboard because no time has been spent making a keyboard really usable in Racer as a control system.
Ie, console games and PC games that are released widely use lots of driving aids to help you out, ie, Forza 3 and GT5 have dynamic steering help, so they won't apply more lock than it thinks you need. Generally it works well, despite it not letting you actually do what you want to do.

No console/PC driving games have ever really supported the mouse as a control input, so you are lucky to have it. It does offer more control than a keyboard though, but now you have to respect that if you apply too much steering lock (about 1 inch from the centre of the screen), chances are you will be pushing into under-steer by adding too much lock.
Also, another problem you may encounter is that you can move from lock to lock in about a second with the mouse, in real life you need about 2-3 seconds, maybe even more... this means you might me generating circumstances that are simply never seen in real life, and make the car react oddly.

I cannot emphasise enough how much a good multi-turn FF wheel is for Racer.

When I first discovered Racer I had a 180deg MS wheel.

When I bought my Logitech Driving Force (180deg wheel for PS2/GT Concept), Racer was literally transformed. You actually feel connected.

Then I bought a Driving Force Pro with 900deg wheel, and once again, the level of FF was improved loads again.

And again, with my G25, the addition of clutch control and faster 900deg steering is simply amazing.



To try compare real life to driving in Racer with a mouse is simply not possible.

I will totally agree that Racer is completely horrible to new users if they come in without a FF wheel. Racer makes very few concessions for users without them. It does expect users to have wheels, and those without basically are left wondering what the fuss is all about.


To be honest, if you like car games, I'd recommend a decent wheel full stop. If you can save up for a 2nd hand G25, then it is well well well worth it!

Racer will be better by miles, as will all the other driving games you play. I simply can't enjoy ANY driving games at all without a wheel any more. I actually think I'm better off just imagining driving a real car and getting more excitement from it than bothering to play a game without a wheel! Yes, they make that much difference!

Dave

 

[Harey]

Dave I can only agree, I started with Racer, with a mouse. then got a wheel (Logitech Momo Racing 180 degree FF), and it changed completely how it felt, then I used to so much apparently, it broke so i got another, and used the old one as a clutch, and doing that, right there, improved Racer for me. then I got my Fanatec Porsche 911 GT2 wheel (900 degree adjustable FF wheel, clutch, 6 speed gear shifter) and again Racer felt even better.

Like Dave said, if you don't have a wheel with FF, you won't know what all the fuss is about.

 

[EngineOfDarkness]

Completely agree with Mr Whippy.

I started off with a mouse too, you can literally slam lock to lock in about half a second or less depending on your mouse sensitivity. Try to do that in a real car.

Though theres one point in racer which I find kinda weird, the sliding once you reach the tires limits. Then again I've never driven a Murcielago let alone slide one around the corner.

Well I did slide a car, but that was a frontwheel driven one with a ridiculously cheap 60/40 Suspension (got lift off oversteer). Well it was a crap car from a shady vendor (my first (quite literally my first car) and last "not stock bought" car. I'd rather buy stock now and tune myself). It did make me feel more in control (have never encountered sliding rears at that time, only in Racer ) than when driving in racer, but then again racer misses G-Forces, "butt" Feeling, etc...

But Mr Whippy already said that the tires might need an overhaul in Racer.