Some comments regarding RBR pacenotes

[Warren Dawes]

Since we have had a few negative comments about the "accuracy" of the Pacenotes in our Rally Club events lately, I thought I would post my comments (some I have made before ) in defence of RSRBR.
It is well known that there are a few dodgy pacenotes, especially with the reverse default stages. However, we should bear in mind:

1. The default pacenotes were made for the default stages, not the reverse ones. However, if we only use the default stages and not the reverse ones, things would get very boring and we'd lose interest and variation. So the odd dodgy pacenote (eg. at Falstone II) is a price we pay to have so much more variation available to us. Mostly they are ok anyway I think, just put it down to some realism where co-drivers make occasional mistakes.

2. The above errors, mainly at Falstone II, is most noticeable with the 3D pacenotes. A couple of them are pointing the wrong direction, but the verbal pacenotes are correct. However, most of us don't use 3D Pacenotes anyway, it's not very realistic.

3. The distance callouts are sometimes not ideal to suit our driving style. You can adjust this though, in the Options menus.

4. We should all remember that the default pacenotes are made to suit the default RBR cars with default good weather, on normal surfaces. Of course they will not be ideal when the weather changes, or the track surface has been changed. Again, I see this as realistic, in any real rally, drivers must adapt their braking points and speeds to suit the prevailing conditions.
We also have to adapt to the car we are driving. Obviously a WRC car will need different pacenote calls to a FWD low powered car.

I think it may be possible to modify the pacenotes and to make custom ones, but that is a very difficult and time consuming task. Changing voices is not too demanding, but not sure how to adjust the actual call speed for a turn.

My approach is to just accept some inaccuracies in the pacenotes, and use them as a guide. We have all been damaged by the odd dodgy pacenote call ( I even manage to get lost due to lack of a co-driver call ), but that is part of the variability and risk of Rally driving.
It's a small price to pay for the huge amount of extra variables and content available through using RSRBR.

If someone does manage to come up with a set of custom pacenotes, that would be great, but it won't detract from my enjoyment of using RSRBR.

 

[Alastair Walker]

Bugger, seems like hopes dashed again

 

[porridge]

Now it shouldn't look that bleak for RSRBR users. Sounds like a good old selector.bat is only needed to swap the pacenote txt files. Unpractical? Maybe, but if there's a will, there must be a way.

I don't have RSRBR installed at the moment, but were I to guess how to sort things out, I'd create a separate folder for new custom pacenote txt files, and name them appropriately by the stage name. Then a simple ms-dos based batch file would do the copying for you (eliminating the tiring manual copy-paste processing). Easy in a way, because when playing with RSCenter you'll spend your time in the Windows desktop anyway.

The way I see it, the only problem that may happen is that the Codriver Pro utility crashes if a certain "trip meter" is exceeded. This is highly unlikely, because I don't think the utility really would give a flying toss about any of these things, but better spread needless hysteria in order to prevent any more disappointments. ;-)

So, let's imagine a separate pacenote folder (e.g. /Maciek Handwerker/Pacenotes/RSRBR), in which there would be following files among others:

bisanne1.txt (stageID 43)
bisanne2.txt (selector would copy the file as 43.txt to the Pacenotes folder)
rallyschool1.txt (stageID 71)
rallyschool2.txt (selector would copy the file as 71.txt to the Pacenotes folder)

And so on. If some custom stages would replace Cote d'Arbroz (like I think they would), then the selector would copy any given txt file as 41.txt.

Easy. Would work 100% surely on Windows XP. I can show you an example selector file soon, in case anyone's interested to see what I mean by all this.

 

[Łukasz Demolin]

Oooooooor you could just modify the packs and save them as different ones. Then, before the start of a non-standard track, you would just select it using the built-in pack selector in the mod, from the handy drop down menu. Nice, clean and hassle-free .

As I said - it needs some working around, but is still usable with RSRBR. I am very curious how does it handle BTB tracks too, haven't heard anyone mention them.

 

[Rick Bamford]

From what I understand the Czech guys and rallyesim guys don't get along to well any more either, which is a REAL pity, so it seams sharing information and techniques doesn't happen as we would like. Makes things like this a bit hard as crossing over between the mods means re-inventing a patch or plugin to modify something that someone else has already put so much work into. Why can't we all just get along:wink:

 

[Damien Jones]

Makes things like this a bit hard as crossing over between the mods means re-inventing a patch or plugin to modify something that someone else has already put so much work into. Why can't we all just get along:wink:

Wait....I'll grab my violin and play some sad background music :tongue:

 

[porridge]

Oooooooor you could just modify the packs and save them as different ones. Then, before the start of a non-standard track, you would just select it using the built-in pack selector in the mod, from the handy drop down menu. Nice, clean and hassle-free .

As I said - it needs some working around, but is still usable with RSRBR. I am very curious how does it handle BTB tracks too, haven't heard anyone mention them.

Well, to consider that there are also some other custom stages + plus the BTB stages (those do work, use the cote slot), using the utility's drop-down -menu would not be that nice, clean and hassle-free. To switch between original and reversed, fine, but not really when the others come along.

I've already more or less worked around this problem.

Anyway, yesterday I did pacenotes from scratch for Rally School II to test myself, and it really didn't take too much time to build some sort of rough idea. I say rough, because the co-driver mod used wasn't really planned for this piece of genius. I could have easily done 2km stage in double-quick time (meaning 20mins?) if some better video capturing software would be available. Wasn't too impressed with Camstudio. Any ideas? Something that would capture THE DESKTOP in full or a fixed range.

Of course, the other method is to record yourself by attaching a mp3 player to a microphone stand, and then get the info from the trip meter on a separate drive. Must try that later.

But the utility is just phenomenal.

 

[WorkerBee]

Why use a video ?

Couldn't one simply drive, switch to desktop (this halts the game) and edit the pace notes in one's favorite editor ?
Switching back to the game (window) resumes the game and so on.

 

[porridge]

You're absolutely right, WorkerBee, but let's not play down the huge advantages of video capturing altogether as I do feel tempted to ask: why not use a video?

Back in the olden days when I did pacenotes for couple of BTB stages, it became quite clear that the best (quickest) way for a lazy person was to capture video of me driving a stage at "a good pace". And to maximize the easiness I used "the helicopter angle lite" to judge the tightness of turns better - without too much of revising.

I watched those videos at about 50-60% speed so that I could keep up with it, and wrote everything relevant to a piece of paper instead of typing with notepad. (It's not too nice to type with comp anyway when I happen to use the dreaded 8-finger system.) And if I couldn't keep up, I could always rewind the video. Now try to rewind a game. (I know very well how to rewind a game: Break hard, put the reverse gear on, and full throttle.)

Indeed, when I was younger and on fire, with this system, not to mention the semi-professional use of abbreviations I could write down seemingly complicated stacks of pacenotes with ease. And if there was something that should be looked into, why not watch the video again. 10km stage for instance with lowered speed took just over 10 minutes to watch. That's not a lot to be watched again in full, is it?

And only in the end something like Notepad would come along, as I would use it when I had something concrete on paper (and lots of it).

I'm not saying that using videos is the only way, but it's one way, and may I add that it might just save your life. ;-)

 

[porridge]

http://www.mediafire.com/?48bs7j2cbhk2ve3

The RSRBR pacenote selector to be used with WRSMP Codriver PRO. Supports all the stages in RSCENTER apart from the BTB country packs. Should be free of any errors.

In "NoPacenotes" folder there is also the stageID map for RSRBR. If you look closely, you can see why this kind of a fix had to be done in this way.

Extract the pack to ...\Codrivers\"co-driver name"\Pacenotes\. DO NOT USE THIS FOR MACIEK HANDWERKER FOLDER, create a new co-driver folder instead and try things out there. Creating a shortcut (to desktop) for the batch file is naturally recommended. Consider the system as open source, you can open the batch file with Notepad and others, so you can edit things freely for your own purposes. (For example, you can take out Custom stages in order to free up slots for BTB stages.)

This small utility uses the command line window so Windows XP (and older) is the only guaranteed OS. If it works seamlessly either in Vista or even 7, great. If not, that would be just a shame. I'm not a programmer so any advanced "coding languages" are way out of my competence. Do report if things doesn't seem to work for you.

When you do pacenotes for any stage, never edit the numbered files, always edit "the properly named" files ("HarwoodForest2.txt" and so on). When you've edited a pacenote text file, you always have to load the stage with the selector to hear the edits. The system in place is for your own good in a sense that it's highly unlikely that you could accidentally mess up your work or even delete important pacenote files.

Any BTB work has to be manually added to the selector by editing it with your preferred word editor.

-----------------

Top tip.
You can test the utility first by choosing number 1 in the selector. If it works, it will load a high amount of txt files to Pacenotes folder. Secondly, choose Sweet Lamb (number 3), and check 20.txt that it says "#Sweet Lamb" at the top. You can revert back to original state by choosing 1, and now 20.txt should be for "#Harwood Forest I".

If all this works, then there should be no problem whatsoever.

 

[Pete Mull]

You're absolutely right, WorkerBee, but let's not play down the huge advantages of video capturing altogether as I do feel tempted to ask: why not use a video?

Back in the olden days when I did pacenotes for couple of BTB stages, it became quite clear that the best (quickest) way for a lazy person was to capture video of me driving a stage at "a good pace". And to maximize the easiness I used "the helicopter angle lite" to judge the tightness of turns better - without too much of revising.

I watched those videos at about 50-60% speed so that I could keep up with it, and wrote everything relevant to a piece of paper instead of typing with notepad. (It's not too nice to type with comp anyway when I happen to use the dreaded 8-finger system.) And if I couldn't keep up, I could always rewind the video. Now try to rewind a game. (I know very well how to rewind a game: Break hard, put the reverse gear on, and full throttle.)

Indeed, when I was younger and on fire, with this system, not to mention the semi-professional use of abbreviations I could write down seemingly complicated stacks of pacenotes with ease. And if there was something that should be looked into, why not watch the video again. 10km stage for instance with lowered speed took just over 10 minutes to watch. That's not a lot to be watched again in full, is it?

And only in the end something like Notepad would come along, as I would use it when I had something concrete on paper (and lots of it).

I'm not saying that using videos is the only way, but it's one way, and may I add that it might just save your life. ;-)

I'm currently recording stages to check the accuracy of the notes and to 'learn' the stages and I think the video approach is really good for this. In real life I was using a small piece of software that would allow me to make my own fonts with custom symbols so I could just type the note up and print them in my own style.

You could also turn down the volume on all the other audio in a stage then take the audio track and pass it though a piece of speech to text software and automate that side of things :wink:

Pete

 

[samekyo]

I was just looking for a way to use Codriver PRO with RSRBR. Could You please reaupload Your utility (unless there is any other way to make it work). Thanks!

 

[porridge]

I guess you refer to my small "utility". Oh, I don't know... I may still have the files somewhere but I think it may not make sense to share them anymore after all these years. Not that it wouldn't work with RSRBR2015 because I know it would... ...unless you're using Windows 8 in which case it wouldn't work. And of course, since there was only a fraction of the amount of classic format stages available back in the day, technically - if nitpicking - you could make a case for it not to work very well. But apart from those minor setbacks, it would work. At least one time out of a hundred.

All in all, I'd probably have to make some changes to "the code" and that is something I can't see happening as it would require testing and quite frankly, I've become extremely lazy. But, if #MayweatherPacquiao gets made, I promise I'll look into it. So chances are that I may never have to look into it.

This is a bloody interesting thread, by the way. Lots of porridge with some hide-behind-the-couch material, I definitely had a lot to say back then.

 

[samekyo]

Yep, I came here kinda by coinsidence, and I was supprised how well You guys managed to get into how things work in RBR. I am using win8, so no luck with Your utility anyways. Thanks anyways, and thank You for writing a reply. Frankly speking I expected it will remain unanswered. Have a nice evening!

 

[Warren Dawes]

Yep, I came here kinda by coinsidence, and I was supprised how well You guys managed to get into how things work in RBR. I am using win8, so no luck with Your utility anyways. Thanks anyways, and thank You for writing a reply. Frankly speking I expected it will remain unanswered. Have a nice evening!

Hi samekyo, Not sure if this helps what you are looking for, or if you have already researched this topic, but just in case it helps.
My understanding is that the best approach to Pacenote improvement is gained through workerbees programme, have a read through these topics:
http://www.racedepartment.com/forums/workerbees-rbr-plugin-support.203/

I've been out of RSRBR for a couple of years now, so I'm not up to date.

 

[samekyo]

Hi Warren! Thank You for Your suggestion. I am aware of Peacenote Plugin from WorkerBee. I am using it at the moment. The reason why I was interested in Codriver Pro plugin was the fact, that it has great peacenotes done by real life codriver. I am not talking just about sound files, but the actual peacenotes (description of stages). Those are very detailed and I am very bad with editing default peacenotes (which have many, many mistakes). Thanks once again!

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

I've been out of RSRBR for a couple of years now, so I'm not up to date.

Regarding that...

We have a Group H rally coming up, and a shorter season in RDRC *nudge nudge, wink wink old boss!*

 

[maciejk]

is there anyway to get rid of pacenotes that are assigned to certain stages, ex. NewBobs Snow in RSF has a different voice than the original guy, what this does is interferes with my custom pacenotes that are different language, is there a way to have my custom pacenotes work with stages like this?
What actually is happening is we have the pacenotes assigned to the stage that is doing the talking, plus the custom language guy, usually he just counts distance like 50, 100, or so

I'll answer my own question since i figured it out, double click with left mouse button to bring up the pacenote menu and make sure you select RBR.ini for both fields save and that's it.