AC FINISHED: Formula Agile Championship 2023

[Taj Johal]

I too have love / hate relationship with this car.

At first it seems impossible to drive, especially if I don't know the track like last Bharain last week, never drove it before until just before going online. Start wishing we were driving the slower F3s or doing shorter races. But I'm usually do my normal thing of overdriving. As soon as I slow down, channel my inner Sir Jackie or Prost, try to drive smoother, the car comes alive. Although I'm still way slower than the fast guys.

In the first half of the race, it was a frustrating experience, was looking for an excuse to quit. But once I started to stop over driving I really got into the car and the 60mins. flew past. Braking into turn 10 became fun, never got it right, but still an enjoyable challenge.

As Carsten said earlier, throttle control on the exit is very important, considering the power to weight and no TC, that's no surpise. It really does not like full throttle on bumpy exits, Bharain is known for that and caught me and a few others out. Maybe the diff settings need investigating?

And driving offline against the F1 greats is a great experience, the car skinnners did a great job there, just wish there was Red 5 and a Rothmans Williams

It is a frustrating and challenging car but not a surpise if you think of it as a mini F1 car. I do understand Ernie's frustration but I do hope more join in.

Now I just need to find time to learn the next track

 

[hiptic]

need info for the Emperor account

 

[HF2000]

need info for the Emperor account

Hi hiptic,

We would love to have you but it's for premium members only (see tab PREMIUM, 11,99 euro/year)
So if you want to join this championship and also the other events that we organize (see tab ESPORTS), then upgrade your account and fill in your real name in your RD account/account details in the field Real Name.

If you have done that, post here again or send me a PM and I will reply with the necessary information.

 

[gearwhine]

Nothing other than word of mouth i guess on my part. It's only what I see posted. When I get back home on Friday i I will look at all the tracks and try to get information that may be helpful. Reboot project i know have done one of them and they are highly respected. I will look into it

I was practicing for the upcoming Albert Park race in Austraila, premature i know. But i was just trying to get a head start until i found out we are not using this round of the F1 season despite maybe half a dozen versions of the track for AC out there. The same goes for Monoco which i have to confirm after some research has the same issue as Albert Park in that the origins of both these tracks are conversions from other games. Frustrating for the many of us that download hundreds of good quality mods thinking AC is the complete package to find that only the original game is 100% acceptable on RD racing club. Every mod that is "fit for use" on RD has content borrowed from other sims and adapted for use plus the download section is full of skins etc for these so called unusable mods. Surely it is time for RD to get real about AC origins and where it is as a game today and maybe lighten up a little about who or why certain content can or cannot be used. Without these mods, very few of us would still be playing an eight year old game. I have not heard of a single racing community being sued for use of converted tracks, probably because it is seen as an AC track if it is actually now playable in AC. On a final note of my rant on this unmovable topic, can anyone tell me how many tracks of this F1 season we are not going to be able to use for what is in essence a fantastic idea and a great opportunety to make use of AC for what it is best at. Doing everything!

 

[stigs2cousin]

I feel mostly the same, it would be rally nice to have the calendar with the tracks we will use in advance (as it is irl in the series)

My workload varies greatly so that on high times my time (and motivation) to practice is limited.
Having the shedule in advance means that I can learn tracks I don´t know when I have the time to do so.

Refering to which tracks are acceptable on Race Department, where can I read up on the policy?
Is there a list of politically correct tracks we can use or does the series coordinator decide on the fly?

To be clear, I do not advocate for the use of pirated content, I just want to know how to recognise the "legal" stuff. Up to now I use allmost exclusively downloads from Race Department, can these be considered "legal"?

MFG Carsten

 

[HF2000]

I was practicing for the upcoming Albert Park race in Austraila, premature i know. But i was just trying to get a head start until i found out we are not using this round of the F1 season despite maybe half a dozen versions of the track for AC out there. The same goes for Monoco which i have to confirm after some research has the same issue as Albert Park in that the origins of both these tracks are conversions from other games. Frustrating for the many of us that download hundreds of good quality mods thinking AC is the complete package to find that only the original game is 100% acceptable on RD racing club. Every mod that is "fit for use" on RD has content borrowed from other sims and adapted for use plus the download section is full of skins etc for these so called unusable mods. Surely it is time for RD to get real about AC origins and where it is as a game today and maybe lighten up a little about who or why certain content can or cannot be used. Without these mods, very few of us would still be playing an eight year old game. I have not heard of a single racing community being sued for use of converted tracks, probably because it is seen as an AC track if it is actually now playable in AC. On a final note of my rant on this unmovable topic, can anyone tell me how many tracks of this F1 season we are not going to be able to use for what is in essence a fantastic idea and a great opportunety to make use of AC for what it is best at. Doing everything!

I totally agree with you that using the exact tracks as the F1 is highly preferred. But as RD we have to take legal rules into account.

We're not only using tracks from original games. We using also mods that have been ripped off other games with permission of the original maker because RD has to obey the legal rules for that.
Unfortunately, there's no such legal version of Albert Park, apparently.
If you have proof that one of those versions you have seen, can be legally used, please let us know. We would be very happy with that.

 

[abecede]

On Racedepartment we always take care to only host content that has no legal issues, so yeah, RD content is pretty much always okay. Other websites may or may not have content safe from a legal point of view which sadly is a bit of work to find out.
For example we have an Albert Park / Melbourne version which sadly is quite old and therefore not up to modern standards: https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/melbourne-grand-prix-circuit.2498/
Then there is another version online on different sites which is pretty much a direct rip from Codemasters F1 game, so we won't use it.

Han and I found a track which at least has a bit of the spirit of Albert Park, and we'll use it for round 3: https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/circuit-dajaccio.55200/ - a wonderful creation by @doublezero of a real life location using real life streets with very well fitting track parts that "should exist" in real life, but sadly don't

I'll update the championship page in the next couple of days of course.

Regarding usable tracks that's pretty much it: If it shows to be a rip from official content of a different game, we won't use it. So we'll try our best to showcase a track which fits the theme, and thereby appreciate the hard work that content creators have invested to let us enjoy their awesome tracks to race on.

BTW: we're still looking for a track for round four (Baku), since the track we have on RD does't have a well working pit line. Suggestions (via direct message to me) are welcome!

EDIT: oops, @HF2000 was faster than me

 

[gearwhine]

On Racedepartment we always take care to only host content that has no legal issues, so yeah, RD content is pretty much always okay. Other websites may or may not have content safe from a legal point of view which sadly is a bit of work to find out.
For example we have an Albert Park / Melbourne version which sadly is quite old and therefore not up to modern standards: https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/melbourne-grand-prix-circuit.2498/
Then there is another version online on different sites which is pretty much a direct rip from Codemasters F1 game, so we won't use it.

Han and I found a track which at least has a bit of the spirit of Albert Park, and we'll use it for round 3: https://www.racedepartment.com/downloads/circuit-dajaccio.55200/ - a wonderful creation by @doublezero of a real life location using real life streets with very well fitting track parts that "should exist" in real life, but sadly don't

I'll update the championship page in the next couple of days of course.

Regarding usable tracks that's pretty much it: If it shows to be a rip from official content of a different game, we won't use it. So we'll try our best to showcase a track which fits the theme, and thereby appreciate the hard work that content creators have invested to let us enjoy their awesome tracks to race on.

BTW: we're still looking for a track for round four (Baku), since the track we have on RD does't have a well working pit line. Suggestions (via direct message to me) are welcome!

EDIT: oops, @HF2000 was faster than me

That version of Albert park is the version i have and it works fine. It is no older than all Kunos tracks and the only issue i see is that it only has 20 pits. Is that the problem?

 

[gearwhine]

@doublezero tracks are all fantasy but are of the highest quality imho

 

[HF2000]

That version of Albert park is the version i have and it works fine. It is no older than all Kunos tracks and the only issue i see is that it only has 20 pits. Is that the problem?

Fine with me. I've raced this version in testing for the multiclass and apart from some less realistics looking graphics I found the track quite similar of what I was used to in the F1 2016 game.

We have now 18 participants.

 

[gearwhine]

Not my call but would be nice to run as many tracks as we can. Keep the doublezero for a spare for later maybe?

 

[RasmusP]

Most was said, but I'd like to give a few quick words to the discussion.

Frustrating for the many of us that download hundreds of good quality mods thinking AC is the complete package to find that only the original game is 100% acceptable on RD racing club.

I know it was a "rant", but this is just completely wrong. Fat Alfie's work, Donington, Road Atlanta being the first top quality mod tracks that come to my mind that are heavily used here.
Road Atlanta is even lidar scanned afaik!

Every mod that is "fit for use" on RD has content borrowed from other sims and adapted for use

Also not true at all. But some modders share their work to create awesome stuff more efficiently.
The "great" modders put that info into their download page.

plus the download section is full of skins etc for these so called unusable mods.

They are in a weird spot indeed. The thing is that if you create stuff for illegal things, your creation isn't illegal.
Is it morally bad? Yes, absolutely.
But we simracers tend to ignore the rights of the original creators for our enjoyment.

If they are replications of real skins or if they contain any real sponsors etc, they are in a grey area.
Same for tracks/cars that would require licensing if you'd sell them.

Surely it is time for RD to get real about AC origins and where it is as a game today and maybe lighten up a little about who or why certain content can or cannot be used.

You can't lighten up about this. There are 3 categories:
Illegal, grey area, legal.
RD allows the legal and from my knowledge also the grey area.
But RD will never allow illegal mods.

If you want RD to lighten up about this, we'd need to change the law.

I agree though, that the laws are quite ancient and I think we all feel the same way about content that will never come to a game with the company owning the original content being rich and not giving a flying f*** about all this.

I have not heard of a single racing community being sued for use of converted tracks, probably because it is seen as an AC track if it is actually now playable in AC.

That's what many users of illegal torrents said, until they had to pay 4k € for illegal downloads. I know 8 households that had to pay between 800-7k € within my circle of real life friends/family.

Germany decided to go against them and boom.


The biggest issue here is not about RD getting sued though. The issue is that in the future, games that support modding might not get support from the industry (no licenses for official content etc).

So maybe we would be able to enjoy the illegal content now but won't see another sim like AC again.

Refering to which tracks are acceptable on Race Department, where can I read up on the policy?

Sadly nowhere. The policy is no illegal content but there's also no control from moderators.
We as a community come across downloads and report illegal content.
Then the moderators will look into it.

To be clear, I do not advocate for the use of pirated content, I just want to know how to recognise the "legal" stuff. Up to now I use allmost exclusively downloads from Race Department, can these be considered "legal"?

Already answered it in the part above, I guess. You can as much consider them to be okay as much as you trust the RD community to report the illegal stuff.

If the content is "mainstream" and is online since more than 6 months, you can consider it to be okay.

If it's a track nobody cares about but you visited it randomly on some holidays as a kid, only ever saw that track in another game some years ago and it's online since a week, it might be illegal.

 

[abecede]

@RasmusP thank you very much for this detailed and imho very accurate description of the way things are. You spoke my mind, but in a much more eloquent way than I could do it

 

[gearwhine]

Rasmus, you did of course make very solid points about the mods and legal use. I think what i mean by borrowed content is that every mod has basic Kunos engine use plus items like cars and other stuff that are owned bu Kunos, are everywhere legal or not. I totally agree with you about Fat Alfie tracks as an example of course. The bottom line to all this is that Kunos and controlling company do not give a toss about what is or is not used. The reason? try 110,000,000 euros revenue since launch all those years ago. I just feel RD worries more about it than anyone else including Kunos. I do respect your level headed view on the subject but i feel no remorse downloading mods from places other than RD. In fact, they are some of my favorite mods.

 

[gearwhine]

I will add, i only pay for mods that are original like VRC or RSS but again, i have no worries downloading skins that are not legal for these cars.

 

[stigs2cousin]

OK then, all is said and nothing cleared up. (But it can´t be either)

So, what do we do for Canada, Mr Markus Masi, racedirector, Sir?

Seems like the populus is content to use the not so nice, older but legal version, how do you decide?
I´ll take a look now and than will add my humble and soft voice( Muahahaha) to the discussion.

 

[abecede]

So, what do we do for Canada, Mr Markus Masi, racedirector, Sir?

Canada is in June, so I don't really think about it right now. For next week, after having discussed it with Han, we'll do the 2x25min sprints (2nd race reverse grid) on RD's Melbourne Grand Prix. The Circuit d'Ajaccio may still be one of the tracks for us in a future round.
I'll try to set up the practice server in a few hours from now and will of course post a new thread on the forum.

And I hope I won't be seen as a Michael Masi who according to Mercedes boss Toto Wolff has been a "liability" to Formula One and he also stated that Masi did not take well to receiving feedback or criticism from anybody, as well as suggesting that he had acted disrespectfully at times towards some drivers in briefings.

 

[RasmusP]

I just feel RD worries more about it than anyone else including Kunos. I do respect your level headed view on the subject but i feel no remorse downloading mods from places other than RD. In fact, they are some of my favorite mods.

Thanks, I try to be as respectful but on point and "correct" as possible. If anyone of our club ever feels disrespected, it's down to language barriers
It's true that RD worries more about it than other places, most users and Kunos. You forgot one very important group though:
The modders! I highly doubt that people like Fat Alfie would create their wonderful works if RD wouldn't try to be the big moral "good guy" with still by far the biggest user count (afaik).

Kunos doesn't have to care a lot since they got everything checked by lawyers before publishing the game and they aren't responsible to whatever is done with/to their game.

Our club racing part of RD is a very small part of RD and while it's loved by lots of people, including Bram who's enjoying his favourite Mini Fridays currently, the big part are the forums and the download section.

The bandwidth is hitting a hard limit since months (years) so I guess not hosting illegal content isn't a problem to generate enough visitors and downloads for ads to sell well.

The "only" downside of all this is that our little club can't race with all the content out there. We'll have to accept this or race somewhere else. But I've been "somewhere else" a few times and.. I'm still here

But I totally get that you're enjoying "illegal" content too. And I agree that a lot of this is debateable! I really don't think that the creator of Albert Park for F1 2020 dislikes seeing his creation in AC.
AC isn't in development anymore so he won't get hired to create the track for AC or whatever.

Also he gave up his rights to Codemasters, afaik. So he'd probably enjoy seeing us using his creation. I personally would!



This all reminds me of YouTube videos where "music teachers" are using parts of famous songs to teach people about the awesome music but then get copyright striked.
There's absolutely nothing positively about this apart from fewer people getting to know great music.

What needs protection though is work from modders being uploaded by others or converted without asking for permission (and getting it).
There were/are even cases were people would sell the FREE content of others at a different place...


Anyway, difficult topic, with complex laws and moral perspectives!

 

[stigs2cousin]

AH, well, may have have mixed up Canada and Australia there.

(Or as a german Football coach once said on prime time TV, Melbourne, Alberta all the same, main thing it´s in Africa

I have tried both track right now and aplaud your decision to take Albert Park.

The spiritual relationship between the two tracks eludes me completely except for memories of my (checkered ) youth I´d really like to forget:

 

[stigs2cousin]

And about the Masi comparison, don´t take it personally please.

It was in no way an affront to your person, it´s more my general (and sometimes disrespectfull) big mouth talking here.

So, looking forward to another "run between the walls" aka "the Boring company"

See you Carsten