Wow, what a thrill! Belgium 1967 at night!

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by pleclair, Jul 5, 2013.

  1. pleclair

    pleclair Registered

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    Today was my first day of really trying wet and night driving...

    I first started playing rFactor 2 at build 198, and both of those type of races weren't really playable... at least, for someone starting, not knowing the tracks, it was too hard.

    I mean playing with full effects.. I'm not one who resort to cheap tricks to make something easier...

    Both of those type of races are now really fun to play! The spray is now perfect! I could easily follow AI right in it, instead of always trying to dodge it...

    I have driven the clio, skip regional, corvette, fr3.5, megane in storm condition at lime rock, and made pretty good times (Lime rock is like my virtual home track... I got many records on it on rf2rank, did countless laps on it... OT, that would be a very nice statistic to have, the time you ran a track, number of laps)

    One thing with the rain tho, you don't see the rain drops when inside the clio's cockpit (at least when moving, not sure when stopped), I think the other cars were fine.. I know the open wheelers are... the ones I tried, pretty sure the corvette and megane were fine too...

    Then I tried Belgium in pitch black condition, and then from dusk to night in the gtr and megane and boy that was a thrill!

    I made a discovery that should have been obvious, but since I play with HDR and have profile selected for all the tracks that I have one for... I usually found night or dusk races way too dark, and found my car's light way too weak for me to drive... I mean, first time I tried belgium with hdr on, I was like okay, I'm going to take a screenshot and submit that to the forum, I just can't play.. then I thought of my hdr profile.. disabled it, and it was then perfect! (with the lights off, otherwise, it's really hard to see, but that's obvious...:p)

    My only concern is with the megane so far.. the dash reflection in the windshield is overblown big time... you can't see the road if someone is following you... I will submit a video later for you to see what I mean...

    The lights that was every now and then on the belgium track made the dash reflect, it was an inconvenience, and was alright, but when a car is following you, it's way too strong... I had no choice to slam the brake and let the AI pass me, so I can drive behind... it was even better that way, I was seeing further away!

    Every day that I play, I someone manage to like rFactor 2 even more.. ISI you got me totally hooked!

    On a side note, I just passed 10000 laps a few days ago :)

    I sincerely wishes rFactor 2 succeed like no other sims.. so ISI have the funding to license bunch of tracks and different cars from all eras... all you have done so far with rF2 is pure genius.

    Well, I can't really make a small message can't I? Hope it wasn't too boring to read! :)

    EDIT: One thing about night driving tho, the light distance is fine, but object like reflective sign, track banner etc should be visible from further away... the llines on the road too.. think that's about it now!
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jul 5, 2013
  2. BazzaLB

    BazzaLB Registered

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    The problem with HDR profiles is you should be able to have one that works for all times of day otherwise 24 hour race is going to be very strange ;)
     
  3. GTrFreak

    GTrFreak Registered

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    Yea, I'm not sure if it's possible but I thought of something like this:

    When you make an HDR profile for a track you start of with 12.00 at noon. For every hour you make little tweaks to the parameters and save these. Then with some sort of function, as time passes, those 'different profiles' (values) blend together. Then you can achieve realistic and good to use HDR for all times of day.

    (not sure if blending together is the right way to call this, but I mean the parameters of one time of day change gradually into the next hour or so)
     
  4. Gearjammer

    Gearjammer Registered

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    I have yet to create an HDR profile, but my understanding is that it will always be for a 24 hour cycle. If you don't change some of the parameters, it will use what is there by default. If I am wrong, refer to someone who has created them in the past, they have a decent idea of how they work by now I think. :)
     
  5. pleclair

    pleclair Registered

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    I guess that would be a possible solution, but maybe its really much trouble for the benefits... hdr at night isnt really needed... while in a 24h race, if you really wish to have hdr during day, you could have it on, and organize your fuel to pit around dusk, to disable hdr profile... but again, leaving it off from the start is the best solution.

    I just ran some more laps at night with the Megane and it is really awesome... I have driven quite often on country roads with no street lights, and it is really a realistic experience. My best lap time at night is 3:47... not so bad considering my best lap time during day is 3:44... only a mere 3 seconds slower for this huge track.

    To race properly at night, you need to know the track very well, just like in real life, otherwise lap time are highly affected... or worse, end up crashing big time (specially in belgium where every crash is ending the car's life, and probably the driver's as well :p)...

    Racing at dusk is hardcore... it's a lot harder than racing at night, just like it is in real life... When the condition get to the point where the road is dark, and the sky is still light enough so the car light's aren't really showing, then it's really tough... I have yet to try other tracks, but Belgium is really something!

    In the final release of rFactor 2, it would be nice if the tracks objects including people, spectators cars, vans, would be assigned at random... say the people have a few different spots they can appear, same with cars, etc, so each time you load a track, those objects would have a chance at appearing at different locations.. also racing at night should have less people by the roads (on belgium and historic tracks) and in the grand stand in other tracks...

    This would create an even more realistic experience where each race session is different...

    Imagine racing Lime Rock, and you have different cars parked in different place in the car park, and people aren't being put to the same location every time... like the guy flexing muscle at the car park at Lime Rock... Imagine if you saw that guy at the last high speed corner for a change, you might go hey check out the dude flexing muscle at me, and miss the turn, crashing in the tire stacks nearby!

    The number of people should be within a random range, based on the time of day... so say Silverstone who have now about 50k visitors or so it was said, then it could be randomized to 20-60k during day, and less at night.. I dunno how much it should be reduced, but I would expect less people attending night time events... but I could be wrong :p

    Either way, I still feel at least Belgium should have less people by the roads at 3am :p

    But that's just little details, but would end up making a big difference in the experience we have... I understand it's not a priority, but would be a nice to have something like this happens in the end!
     
  6. ZeosPantera

    ZeosPantera Registered

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    From what I head on other threads and the [one I started] The HDR profiles can have different settings for every hour of the day. So you can find one that works 8 hours in a row then have four hours of different profiles for dawn and dusk and another 8 for night time OR 24 slightly different profiles if you are crazy.
     
  7. BazzaLB

    BazzaLB Registered

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    Well, in that case, it shouldn't be an issue which is good news.
     
  8. BazzaLB

    BazzaLB Registered

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    I tried some night racing but I actually find it rather dissapointing. There seems to be an extremely limited number of cars that will cast light from their headlights. All AI headlights are on, but only 1 or 2 seem to actually light up the area ahead of them. Those that do have no effect on under car shadows on the car in front. Its all very distracting with the light cone cast by close cars headlights going on and off. Is there an INI setting somewhere I can adjust as I am already running all gfx settings at max in game. I looked, but couldn't find anything.
     

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