My First (Simracing) Car

[Itamar Yativ]

For me the first sim was Indianapolis 500: The Simulation.
The sim that I started to try and drive 'well' was NFS 3 when I tryed to out run the cop's.
But the sim that I really started to learn what is 'race driving' was LFS with the mighty XRT.

 

[windfox911]

Grandprix 2 but I was wake up 1998 with GPL with the first Nordschleife in game!!
Every year I hope for news.... who makes a second GPL?

Exactly the same for me. Grand prix 2 in 1994 in Jean Alesi's Ferrari and then the GPL revelation. Really fell in love with the accurate physics and this historic feel all over the game, and all the mods which came afterwards. The Ferrari was my favorite (and a bit less difficult than the Lotus). I now stick to AC in VR and have limited leisure time otherwise I would have reinstalled GPL...

GPL 2.0 would be tremendous
Assetto Corsa with all original content + mods is coming quite close from what we had in GPL (except the global atmosphere) :
The Bazza's 67 Legends car mod is good, still needs to be a bit more polished

We could almost do the original '67 championship with the following available track mods :
Kyalami 67 by ACtrack reboot is good
Monaco 66 by ACtrack reboot is very good
Zandvoort (Sandvoerde 60s in RD by Sergio Loro) is very good
Spa 66 by ACtrack reboot is tremendous
French grand prix was in Bugatti Le Mans, successfully replaced by Rouen Les Essarts in GPL. We have the Rouen Les Essarts track in RD by Dr Maboul which is good but does not have exactly the 60's look. It has the correct layout but incorrect elevations in some places of the circuit.
Silverstone : Kunos original
Nurburgring : a fairly good Nurb 67 track mod exists (by Rainmaker) (named 65 but it's 67 layout)
Mosport : the 2012 version on RD is OK because I think the layout has not changed since '67 (but lacks the historic look and feel)
Monza : Kunos original
Watkins Glen : the mod by Liski we have in RD is very good but the Boot Classic layout is not exactly the same as the 1967 layout, and it lacks the '60s look
Mexico : the '67 layout does not exist for AC (at least I could not find it)

If someone is willing to organize such '67 events in AC, I can help and support (not enough time to take the lead).
In the meantime, I try to attend every '67 F1 online event I can find...

 

[Kevin Bradley]

had a BBC Master and played Revs on it, and played Geoff's GP on my mate's PC, but something I spent a lot of time on around 1991 was Saloon Cars on the Acorn Archimedes.

So my answer would have to be a Vauxhall Astra.

@ears I had this game too! My parents wouldn't let me have an amiga, so my brother and I were given an Acorn A3000 (more educational, apparently).

For those that don't know, Saloon Cars was an Acorn exclusive game by a company named 4th Dimension. It was mouse controlled, so it was like having an early wheel! Right click for accelerate, left click for brake, mouse movement for steering. Manual gears by pressing a number key on the keyboard! It was absolutely great!

@ears, did you have the expansion pack that included Donnington Park, Oulton Park and the fictional seaside track?

 

[DeltaDart0276]

It was either RFactor or F1 Challenge 99-02. In F1C, It was likely either a Ferrari or a McLaren. No idea about RFactor. It was heavily, heavily modded by my dad.

 

[destinationriver]

I played three games back in the days on my PS1... don't know which came first: F1 97, Colin McRae Rally 2 and Gran Turismo, the original one.

F1 97: Sauber C16.
It was 2009 or 2010 when I played it (yes, I was 9 and 10 then playing still on my fathers PS1). I was a huge Vettel fan then and as there was no Red Bull in game, I chose the car that looked most like it. Which was obvioulsy the Sauber. F1 97 had that feauture that you could rename the drivers, so I named my Sauber driver after Vettel and pretended to drive the Red Bull.

Colin McRae Rally 2: Subaru Impreza 22B
What should I say, I simply liked the look of the car. That was my critera when choosing a car back then. I was 6 or 7 and so thankful for the evenings playing this game with my dad. Crappy graphics, crappy physics, but it was freaking awesome.

Gran Turismo: Chevrolet Corvette C2
Playing this game with my cousin for hours, always the High Speed Ring, always the Corvette, as this was the best Level A ranked car avaivable in Arcarde Mode. Also lovely memories.

Which leads me to:
Special: Gran Turismo 5

Not my first game, but my first virtual Nordschleife experience. I have never driven this track before, and GT5 had an extra campaign for it. It was with the 1954 Mercedes 300 SL Coupe. So I kept this car also in good memory, as this was the first car with which I completed my first complete virtual Nordschleife lap.

 

[Ricoow]

The first time I thought "this is simulation" was RACE The WTCC Game, driving Seat Leon around Valencia track. I know so many people hate FWD cars, but i loved that car and played a lot of online races and championships with it.

Oh boy this car, in Race 07 (its successor) I drove it a lot since it was one of the few cars that I was actually could control with TC/ABS off on a keyboard

 

[After_Midnight]

Jeoff Crammond's Microprose gp1.

Same on my side

 

[ears]

@ears I had this game too! My parents wouldn't let me have an amiga, so my brother and I were given an Acorn A3000 (more educational, apparently).

For those that don't know, Saloon Cars was an Acorn exclusive game by a company named 4th Dimension. It was mouse controlled, so it was like having an early wheel! Right click for accelerate, left click for brake, mouse movement for steering. Manual gears by pressing a number key on the keyboard! It was absolutely great!

@ears, did you have the expansion pack that included Donnington Park, Oulton Park and the fictional seaside track?

I sure did! Saloon Cars Deluxe! There was an oval on it too I think.

They expanded the gameplay a bit too - remember you could roll cars in Saloon Cars Deluxe? They had a little animation that made it look like the car was rolling over.

Yeah I remember when I'd ordered the Deluxe, it was a proper can't wait for the postman every morning, I was really excited about it!

I remember there was a text file where you could change the AI cars' names. Their surname appeared on the back of their car so we had a lot of childish fun giving them all rude names.

 

[Kimmo Kokkonen]

Found old video of my first track project

Memories...

My first Grand Prix Legends track mod

The same track in GTR2 & my BMW 2002 TII Turbo + 1000bhp

 

[Eckhart von Glan]

Dad bought F1 challenge 99-02 and a Saitek R440

nice, my second wheel for pc and my son's first racing game on gamecube

 

[Eckhart von Glan]

endless hours of nascar 2 where you could save games smack in the middle of the race, so recreating a full grid 500 miles race was easy to do in the 15 min time slots two small kids gave me, you spread it out over a week or so ... also loved how one could already paint one's own cars and put them on the grid, did one for every member of the family, best one a pink panther version for my wife

 

[Cyberdutch01]

Jeoff Crammond's Grandprix 2. 1995

 

[Kevin Bradley]

I sure did! Saloon Cars Deluxe! There was an oval on it too I think.

They expanded the gameplay a bit too - remember you could roll cars in Saloon Cars Deluxe? They had a little animation that made it look like the car was rolling over.

Yeah I remember when I'd ordered the Deluxe, it was a proper can't wait for the postman every morning, I was really excited about it!

I remember there was a text file where you could change the AI cars' names. Their surname appeared on the back of their car so we had a lot of childish fun giving them all rude names.

Yeah, that was it - the Duluxe version!! I remember that same feeling - waiting for the box to come through in the post with the 3.5 inch floppy disks inside!! I think the company were based in Sheffield or somewhere and they packaged the box in a jiffy bag. I never got into editing any files or anything like that, but then again I was only about 11 or 12 at the time.

It was a great game for its era. I remember working through from the Astra GTE to the BMW and then on to the mighty Sierra Cosworth! The progression through the game was really well structured. I remember the cars had upgradable parts, tires and so on. I still remember the game really fondly now. It brings back great memories of when me and my brother were kids.

Did you ever get Stunt Racer 2000? That was another really good driving game for the Acorn. Brutally hard though as I remember - especially the later levels. Not sure I ever completed the single player mode on that one.

 

[Hanzaleski]

From simracing De Tomaso Pantera from GT Legends:

And just bought Momo wheel with GT Legends and later downloaded Nordschleife and later elaborated clutch from another old wheel/pedals atached and it was marwelous!

 

[Sim Strata]

The red car in Crammond's Grand Prix World Circuit.

 

[Durge Driven]

Indy 500 having to manage tyre temps
SCGT chassis and tyre feel was crazy good
GPL sliding clutch and mad burnouts
F1-2002 for Simbins GTR Racing 2002 heaps of online in this

 

[Isaac Chavira]

1998 Granturismo - Mitsubishi 3000GT. I had that thing tuned to 984hp.

 

[Carson Engemoen]

Drove the Lotus Exos 125 in Asseto Corsa and i knew i needed a wheel. 2 and a half years later and 1000+ hours and im loving it. (Looking back that car is complete crap lol)

 

[TrumpetReich]

Nascar sim racing on PC for me

 

[Robin_NL]

For me it was REVS on the C64 in 1984(?)
I was 14.
But the real dedication to driving(not crashing) in a simcar came with Grand Prix Legends (back then with joystick) and the Lotus 49.
Way too difficult in the beginning but super rewarding when you got the hang of it.
My favourite sims are/were RBR, LFS, Assetto Corsa, Automobilista.

Cheers
Robin