The survey could show that there are too few people interested, thus laser-scanning disappears from the priorities list. It may also show that there is a viable market, and ISI may study a business plan. Then, they may propose their customers to fund the project in advance. If the capital reaches the expectations, then green light, otherwise refunding or partial refunding to cover the wasted working hours. Still too unrealistic ?
We have an investor link on our site... But what you're suggesting sounds too similar to this: http://www.racing-legends.com/news.htm, which didn't lead to anything. I don't think ISI would ever want to put itself into a position where it 'owes' the community a product. That's a dangerous strategy (in terms of the relationship if you fail to deliver).
But you have already some scanned tracks? Am I right? I read that on rf-pro website (f1 circuits, Nascar...Nordschleife ) A large library of Low-Def and photo-realistic High-Def circuit models built from accurate LiDAR surveys is available. LiDAR based track databases include most of the F1 circuits, North American Indy & NASCAR circuits as well as La Sarthe, Nordschleife and a Vehicle Dynamics proving ground with lane-changes, split Mu and low-Mu surfaces, a handling circuit with inclines and programmable surfaces. So next step is build a track from data that you have.
Then maybe have and agreement with data owners (for all laser scanned tracks that are beeing used with rF Pro) to release payed version for rF 2? Of course then, there must be some sort of verification so that there wouldn't be chance to get such track for free from someone else - some sort of verified distribution system (I hope you know what I mean). The data owners already have what they want and with having payed rF 2 content, there is a great chance for getting back some money and for you guys also a chance to have higher income. I'm more than sure, there would be a few dozen thousand or more simracers willing to pay 10-15 dollars per laser scanned track (of course I assume we talk about high quality track - something comparable to what iRacing offers).
Real racing isn't often somewhere you find people willing to share. It's difficult enough getting them to sign a piece of paper for something 40 years old, nevermind for something that their competition could benefit from now... Also, when you do that, you now have someone you need to pay. Where does that money come from? Same issue as discussed this entire thread. Someone has to pay, and you'll be talking a LOT more than 10 without a subscription.
Of course, that should be treated as an investment and not everyone from racing want to invest when there is no real reason for that... but, sometimes you meet people who might like such idea and could agree. Of course I don't want to go into details as I don't have enough knowledge for that. It was just a general idea (which you guys probably discussed already in the office)
I'm sure there are more that 10 simracers ready to pay for that. How many copies of rF1 has been sold? Since you are working in Marketing dep. I'm sure you are familiar with 'long tail' therm. I'm sure also, that most of hand-made tracks simply will failed competing against iR-like class tracks. So I can bet most of leagues will buy LS tracks for all members, sooner or later.
there are technical issues too. i mean "we" probably can find hundreds players agree to pay 5$ a really good track. but at this moment ISI don't have the platform to manage free and pro modding.
His '10' was referring to $10. As in, it would cost a LOT more than $10 per player if you you don't move to a subscription based system. You can't expect anyone to put money in something for people to buy without a guarantee it'll be paid for - and you can have 100,000 people say "I'll buy it" and end up with 150 that do. That's fine for a big company that can cover the losses with other projects. Nothing's perfect
Lazza, again, since I'm an admin of the league, I may say, I can force people to buy tracks which will be used for racing season. And I'm sure most of them will do that. Even if I am talking about Poland Second thing is long tail effect. Based on rF1 sells, I can guess that LS tracks would be paid by simracers without problem. But of course it is my guess. Result is depended on many factors, including marketing. ISI is not a mastah in this area though.
personally i think most of people would buy laserscanned tracks but we need a protection regarding "illegal" RIPs (few buyers and thousands users).
Are you sure they wouldn't just move to a league which doesn't try to force them to do things they don't want to do?
No, because it's not like we would force them do to something completly insane... our community (most of the guys, because of course we can't assume 100% of them will buy all ls tracks straight on) would welcome laser scanned tracks in rFactor (I know that because I'm also one of the admins in our community).
Yes, I do. I'm talking about community I am a member. About mature one. We found simracing as serious hobby, as opportunity to make mature sporting competition, as close to real world as possible. Of course there are leagues which do it for fun and want it for free. But I know a lot of leagues over the world which are serious as our is. If there are simracers which are ready to rent a content, I wouldn't afraid looking for ready-to-buy target for even lower price.
Even if for a full seasons worth of tracks you're forcing them to spend thousands of dollars? Sorry but, I don't buy that...
Well, iRacing members already paid hundreds or even thousands of dollars for tracks and no one complains...
I used to admin an iRacing league and it was not an issue for regulars to buy tracks they didn't have so I wouldn't see it being a problem for rFactor leagues or any other league's where content may have to be purchased (C.A.R.S maybe?) I think most gamers are now used to the idea of buying DLC.
Again, comparing a subscription model, which absorbs the track production costs, to a flat fee, is no comparison.
To give little perspect the costs of laser scanning and make it usable for track modelling in 3dsmax. - make contract with track company, schedule scanning equipment delivery to the site and prepare them - Scan and collect point cloud-, RGB- and videodata, syncronize rgb and videodata to the point cloud - vectorize point cloud, get rid of unwanted data (there is ALOT unwanted data in point cloud...), adjust resolution to make data usable and many, many additional hours of work BEFORE you can even start modelling your track and build textures from collected data. With about 3 km (1,9 miles) long, club-type track costs are around 20 000 euros (28 000$). And this is only costs of data collecting and post-processing. After that there will be costs of man-hours (sometimes hundreds of hours) of modelling. Modelling won't actually be sigfinically faster with this kind of data, maybe little bit more accurate. I was wondering if there is any sim-racing league in the world, whose members are ready to cover that kind of costs...