What is the Purpose of Simulations?

[Ole Andreasen]

Im waiting for a "Clean up your room" simulator. Ill buy it for my kids to help them master reality.

 

[MarkR]

Im waiting for a "Clean up your room" simulator. Ill buy it for my kids to help them master reality.

Ahem:

 

[Nick Gregory]

The primary purpose is to incite arguments on forums like this over which one is better than the other.

 

[theravenousbeast]

The primary purpose is to insight arguments on forums like this over which one is better than the other.

You mean incite

 

[Ole Andreasen]

Ahem:

I don´t believe it... Amazing. Instabuy - even without VR..... Kiiiiiiiids! LOOK WHAT DAD HAS FOR YOU!

 

[farjam]

I don´t believe it... Amazing. Instabuy - even without VR..... Kiiiiiiiids! LOOK WHAT DAD HAS FOR YOU!

There is a "job simulator" too, with a good VR support , and somehow one particular part of it was like one of my previous jobs lol
Great tool to teach responsibility
____________________________________________________

There are lots of things that i can't do in reality (like jumping in a fighter jet) or i can't do without heavy frustration and fatigue (for example driving a real car more than a few minutes, i'm not talking about a race car, a normal car, the easiest one to drive) , but i can do all of them in the virtual world of sims and i'm f**** enjoy it! like jumping in any car , truck or jet that i want , i only need a few FFB tweaks (i have to make the force very weak, very weaker than normal) and probably a button box in the future

 

[callumjtc]

I could drive my Alfa at any track I felt like, in a sim. In real life, I a) don't have my licence yet and b) the only tracks I can access easily are Silverstone and Brands Hatch. So I suppose I use my sims to do the things I can't (plus I feel superhuman sliding a 917/30 round the Nurburgring )

 

[Angeltheartist]

To begin with great article. For me it gives me a release from my everyday life issues , work,family.bills the list goes on. When i put on my VR headset its like opening a door to a new world where all that matters is me and the car and track i decide to race . Everything else takes a back seat , "no pun intended" . Finally for me it also helps me with my job . A big part of my job requires a lot of driving in really bad traffic and uninsured drivers. I've been at my job for 18 plus years and only got into one accident which i was the passenger. Even at 50 years young (like fine wine or really good aged cheese) i catch stupid drivers doing stupid driving two to three cars ahead of me. So in closing driving sims have helped me greatly. Just my two cents.

 

[justfdl]

Well, never did offroading in my life, but after reading all these success stories I do wonder, having played spintires quite a bit, should I have a go with my Civic at the currently wet and muddy lawn of my neighbour?

 

[Chris Haye]

... to drain my bank account and alienate my friends and family!

Great article.

 

[MarkR]

Well, never did offroading in my life, but after reading all these success stories I do wonder, having played spintires quite a bit, should I have a go with my Civic at the currently wet and muddy lawn of my neighbour?

I'd say this makes you uniquely qualified for the job. A Civic and an old Russian jeep are almost identical after all - engine, wheels, steering wheel etc the rest is just details.

One other simulation suggestion. If you have VR a couple of hours in Creed for some boxing simulation might be helpful in case your neighbour is upset about the lawn and bigger than you.

 

[Mark Ratzenbacher]

Someone mentioned playing guitar. Now i am absolutely 110% sure and its prooven that you cant learn it from playing a Guitarhero-style of software and using a plastic controller. Almost the same goes for racing, i am afraid.

There are many reasons why simracers cant replicate their times in the real world counterparts. Sims simulating physical reality can give a good approximation and thats what is motivating me today. I like to race a track in my sim before watching a real actual race. Its good for research and completes my experience of admiring motorsports.

Most of us need to have to accept though that we cant control machinery at the edge of possibilities, even if software is fooling us that we can. Those limits are set by the count of algorithms our cpus and gpus can handle. The universe is to big to be simulated and we living beings have a limited range of sensoric realization of input as well.
I still get the same great overvelvement now than back then when sitting in a simulator, be it from Namcos Pole Position race cabinet in an amusement park in the 80s to current-gen race sims, or from Sierras Red Baron to X-Plane. My mind is and was always telling me: "This IS the real thing"

When used for the right purpose, sims are just so cool. Theres a car-mechanic game which i'd like to have had as a kid. But then theres sims of war, or even more absurd ones like Tubestar (simulating to become a youtube star) that in my eyes do more harm than good.

 

[justfdl]

I'd say this makes you uniquely qualified for the job. A Civic and an old Russian jeep are almost identical after all - engine, wheels, steering wheel etc the rest is just details.

One other simulation suggestion. If you have VR a couple of hours in Creed for some boxing simulation might be helpful in case your neighbour is upset about the lawn and bigger than you.

Reporting back, all went well, but I have to admit I kind of cheated having mounted snow tires on the car. I struggled a bit but pulled through nicely when I almost went in the fish pond dodging the bird shot, guy has a bit of a temper with his sicilian heritage. Going to have a beer with him next week when he cooled.down. The front lip and the hood needed a repainting anyway because of stone chipping.

Although having VR I'm not sure about the boxing thing, beeing about a foot taller and almost twice his weight I'm not to scared as long as he doesn't have his shotgun nearby. Staying cautious I probably should train some superhot though?

 

[KittX]

Someone mentioned playing guitar. Now i am absolutely 110% sure and its prooven that you cant learn it from playing a Guitarhero-style of software and using a plastic controller. Almost the same goes for racing, i am afraid.

There are many reasons why simracers cant replicate their times in the real world counterparts. Sims simulating physical reality can give a good approximation and thats what is motivating me today. I like to race a track in my sim before watching a real actual race. Its good for research and completes my experience of admiring motorsports.

Most of us need to have to accept though that we cant control machinery at the edge of possibilities, even if software is fooling us that we can. Those limits are set by the count of algorithms our cpus and gpus can handle. The universe is to big to be simulated and we living beings have a limited range of sensoric realization of input as well.
I still get the same great overvelvement now than back then when sitting in a simulator, be it from Namcos Pole Position race cabinet in an amusement park in the 80s to current-gen race sims, or from Sierras Red Baron to X-Plane. My mind is and was always telling me: "This IS the real thing"

When used for the right purpose, sims are just so cool. Theres a car-mechanic game which i'd like to have had as a kid. But then theres sims of war, or even more absurd ones like Tubestar (simulating to become a youtube star) that in my eyes do more harm than good.

I'd say it can both help each other if you do both - the real thing and simulation, and if you compare and examine the results of real/sim car behaviour.
Back in the day, when I had my first car I practiced many things this way: first (say, learning to do scandi flick) attempt to scandi flick in a real car, notice how it behaves, then find a sim car that behaves similarly, practice in a sim, then practice in a car again. If the results are similar and what are expected => success. If not - notice what's different, find a sim car that does that, back to drawing board. Also reading some books on car handling and balancing is a good help, too.
For me, that kind of practice proves to have positive results. The purpose of such practice? well, first - save money if something goes wrong or if something breaks along the process, and second - to ease off the emotional context - if you've done it many times even in a sim, not just to stupidly repeat it, but noticing every detail in the behaviour - then you start to notice same details in the real car behaviour (and vice versa) and the attention/knowledge takes the place, which was before occupied with emotions (panic, scare, fun, etc).

As for playing guitar - I've never played guitar but I have musical education, and I've played piano for 20+ years. It can be similar to simracing, but I'm afraid sim cars are more advanced than sim guitars, and even than professional studio VST instruments/samplers which contain 40 gb of samples just of one instrument. It doesn't still pick enough nuances to sound "alive", and also the approach of playing the real thing and the virtual thing is completely different. You cannot make virtual instrument "sing". But for the technical part of learning, say, piano, even simple keyboard and VST instrument are fine. With that, you're training your muscle memory, the same way I've trained my muscle memory in a sim cars, while controlling on edge, perventing snap oversteer etc. The virtual thing here doesn't have emotional context (at least that much), you're not scared of doing something wrong, so you have to have real life experience. But for training muscle memory and instant reactions, and for training the brain to pick more details, process more information - it's spot on.
For the rest - as in theory in driving, you must study musical theory, even practicing singing the scores, etc. So yeah, if you're playing only Guitar Hero - it's like you're playing Mario Kart.

 

[flykas]

I play sims because they let me do things that are much more difficult to do in real life. Like, for example, becoming a rally driver at 32. Sims made me learn many thing about real life driving, like how the weight of the car affects the handling and how you can manipulate it, what to do with basic oversteer and understeer, how the vehicle get less stabile under braking, etc. I love rally driving the most but this is not very explored in sims, I like rbr very much, but I think it could get so much more realistic at this point.

I am not sure, but I think my first experience with simulation was with "Screamer 4x4" at first I liked very much how realistic and calm everything looked. No oversaturated colours, no turbo buttons etc. And then the gameplay was strictly realistic with no handholding, and you could operate the diffs, transfer case. I liked it so much. It is still good, now maybe Spin tires comes closest to it, but it lacks real momentum of the car and manual gearbox.

 

[ArkanHell]

In few words, for me and looks like for a lot of people if you read the other posts, the purpose of simulators is break the money barrier and change imposible dreams into our daily reality.
Anyway i wish someday i can buy me a Caterham and ride Nordchleife on it .

Regards.

 

[justfdl]

As for playing guitar - I've never played guitar but I have musical education, and I've played piano for 20+ years. It can be similar to simracing, but I'm afraid sim cars are more advanced than sim guitars,

I'm pretty sure there's a game you play with a real electical guitar, a guy at my work place showed it off at the last lan party, you even had to tune it and all that. Sadly I'm completely useless when it comes to music games so I didn't really check it out, surely someone here knows more in detail about it. He only learned playing with the game and he's been getting good enough to play in a band now even doing some local gigs.

 

[Raikku]

Racing&driving sims are much like porn.

 

[wombat999]

The Aviation industry have been using 'Simulators' for longer than I can remember and the Royal Air Force had their 'Link Trainer' IIRC pre-1939.
I well remember a 'Driving Simulator' from 1994, as big as an Airline 'Flight Simulator' and operating on similar lines.
In our case PC 'Simulations' are unlikely to replicate real life, even with VR.
However, AC, PC2 and RF all save me from the clutches of the revenue gathering Victoria Police and avoid bending and denting my road car(s)..........

 

[FeltHat]

I don´t believe it... Amazing. Instabuy - even without VR..... Kiiiiiiiids! LOOK WHAT DAD HAS FOR YOU!

https://store.steampowered.com/app/246900/Viscera_Cleanup_Detail/ and this one after Tidy, kinda more hardcore