Sailing with slicks - the rain is broken in rF2 thread

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by Remco Majoor, Feb 1, 2021.

  1. DmitryRUS

    DmitryRUS Registered

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    Forget all the improvements. ISI dropped their product in the middle. Next comes the business model with a good marketing "improvement" ploy. Content is sold under the banner of good physics. The community can be developed in online competitions. But as a modding platform, this product was never born.
    About the rain effect. The old Assetto corsa visually looks much better with rain and is developed by the community.

    No one ever listened to me when I criticized graphics and rain. At the same time, having such bad graphics you need to have a very strong processor.
     
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  2. hitm4k3r

    hitm4k3r Registered

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    The thing with Sol and CSP is that most of the stuff is just visual. I know that physics are in the works but at the end it isn't more than the rain stuff that got developed for rF1 by the community and you have just less grip. At the end of the day it's all over the place. It looks nice yes, but what else is there? Cars need to support it, tracks need to support it, AI needs to support it and it isn't part of the package. How big is the chance that I will get online and get a proper rain race like in rF2? Should we make a guess? The community manager isn't working smooth aswell, so people who consider AC and it's rain support a better package are only telling half of the truth from my perspective.
     
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  3. nolive721

    nolive721 Registered

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    There are workarounds by editing files to make the physics work in the wet in AC
    But it’s true that’s it’s not straight forward and not possible across the board yet
    But oh boy how beautiful it looks on my plasma TV lol
     
  4. Mitch9

    Mitch9 Registered

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    CSP rain is in development but for whatever reason people treat it as if it was already a thing; that´s their problem. Support won´t really be a big issue once it´s out.
    The big thing for me is having proper wet racing lines; if those can be made to work in ac then it will be a better package than what rf2 currently offers (cause there´s already aquaplaning in ac :D)
     
  5. mantasisg

    mantasisg Registered

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    It can be made, but devs are pussies for causing any challenge for the players. Already proven by ACC.

    I actually made a mod for AC a while back a Goodwood track, wet version of it. I used some tricks to imitate puddles and different friction levels on certain spots to create a necessity to change racing lines. I did that several years ago and pretty much forgot about it. Bit more than a month ago I was invited by UK Caterham club AC community to join them racing in there. It was epic ! The racing dynamic was epic, great challenge, and very good for sport.

    I could get it done just the same for rF2, but I'd also need to split the mod into different track version, because surface roughness parameters doesn't seem to work correctly, or at least I haven't found way to get expected results, which would be to put it simply - smooth when wet = bad grip.

    By the way, there is aquaplaning in AC @Mitch9 ? Since when ?
     
  6. Mitch9

    Mitch9 Registered

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    since... not so long ago? take that with a grain of salt; just tested that again and I´m not sure it´s quite aquaplaning, but it´s also not the old lower the track grip trick going on.

    also what´s the point in making a wet mod for an rf2 track? getting the wet and dry lines to behave accordingly would, imo, make the biggest impact in rf2 wet driving
     
  7. Ef123

    Ef123 Registered

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    Huh, AMS2 is a joke. Shouldn't even use that in the same sentence as ACC.

    ACC was better than RF2 2 years ago, today it is even better. It has by far the best rain implementation ever. The wet line, rubbered line, rain drying up, collecting etc. And whichever sim is 2nd place, is not even close.
     
  8. mantasisg

    mantasisg Registered

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    I took a look at youtube for that supposed aquaplaning in AC, definitely something else, unsure what it was.

    Also whats the point for wet track mod for rF2 ? None, because it shouldn't be needed to what is SUPPOSED being simulated. Exactly that is why I didn't do it, also perhaps I didn't advance with rF2 moddign with blender that much yet. But it would be the only way to achieve "wet racing lines", because roughness parameters doesn't seem to work correctly. https://forum.studio-397.com/index.php?threads/roughness-of-tdf-works-wrong.62503/ <<< Well there are people who might say this is assumption. It is, I consider possibility of not knowing something. But just like with other rF2 possible issues, saying that there is no issue is often an assumption too.
     
    Last edited: Feb 20, 2021
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  9. hitm4k3r

    hitm4k3r Registered

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    I think you missed my point a bit. For cruising around on your own it could very well offer a nice rain driving experience. What I highly doubt is that it will ever become part of the package, so that it get's forced in MP across all servers. Currently I take part in an AC league and I am using CSP and SOL. For what ever reason I have white textures, that are supposed to be snow across the track with 40 degree track temp in an MP lobby. Maybe you see now, where this is going? I know that it is the season setting btw, but at the same time I know that other people on the server are driving in perfect sunny conditions. There is no cohessive experience with this and I am allmost 100 % sure that it will never be on the same level as wet weather racing in PC2, ACC, AMS2, rF2 or even Race 07, unless Kunos does something about it or unless the community offers something similar that the community did with the Battlefield games in recent times.

    It's apparent that AC isn't designed for this as much as people are claiming how bad Kunos were, while I am not taking away from anything the community has done btw as I think that it is great. Aquaplaning alone doesn't make good wet weather racing. With the affore mentioned games it's part of the experience by design, wich is a completely different level. If people don't understand that there is a big difference between the user having to go to a forum and download extra stuff to get feature XYZ in a sim compared to just downloading the sim and having a go in the rain when ever they feel like it, online or offline then I don't know what else is needed. It's the same thing when people point people to the gear shift mod here in the forum and claim that rF2 has a proper transmission and clutch modeled in. It's nonesense. The possibility is there to use it but as soon as you get on a server it becomes obsolete. It's not a game feature of AC, simple as that.
     
  10. Remco Majoor

    Remco Majoor Registered

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    Pretty easy to just dismiss anything as a whole, which is useless to the discussion. Lets just say this is not about which is the best sim. This is simply about how rF2 can improve their rain.

    ---

    Interestingly the wet line was mentioned many roadmaps ago, but never was implemented. Just like a lot of stuff they say "we'd like to add that" but then they have their resources somewhere else and then forget about it. Aquaplaning and the slippy rubbered line are the 2 biggest things in my mind ATM.
     
  11. mantasisg

    mantasisg Registered

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    I stopped expecting anything few years ago. At least I told to myself that as long as they mess with UI they will not get any of the sweet stuff. And then there came their virtual le mans which they had to redflag, and then it was clear that S397 will also have to grind a lot on bugfixing.

    Many things that comes is eSports related, which means that they probably make more use of this sim by having the esports, than just having a relationship with normal userbase.

    That would be some of more complex things to implement, I imagine.

    There is one thing that I fail to understand. I can't understand how the puddle maps textures would be used to to map the water depth physically. Someone could fact check this, I think Marcel said it would be done in "big RaceDepartment interview", it was long ago, I might mistake it to something.
     
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  12. Remco Majoor

    Remco Majoor Registered

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    Wouldn't that work the same way as height maps work for normal maps?
     
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  13. Mitch9

    Mitch9 Registered

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    I think you missed my point there too mate, I´m not saying that buying a game then downloading addons is a better experience than just clicking play and enjoying the driving, or that ac was desinged with rain in mind but the expansion capabilities on ac can go really far, and ultimately I find it easier to set up than RBR.
    Regarding multiplayer, I can´t say anything about it since i´ve never set up a server myself; no idea if you can enforce the realtime weather (or a specific one), or how far you can go to make a cohesive experience "out of the box", though this should be easier to do in a league.
    (btw the visual "snow" was never meant to affect weather temps)

    Never said that either, read again. The point is that while RF2 was designed with rain weather in mind, at this pace AC is going to have a more comprehensive rain experience sooner than RF2.
     
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  14. DmitryRUS

    DmitryRUS Registered

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    I didn't talk about the physics of rain in AC, I talked about the rain rendering graph. RF2 has the best physics. But the graphics are terrible and very difficult to modify. The graphics engine is very old and the developers are trying to revive it. It won't help. I predict that in a couple of years the developers will report the news that due to the deprecation of gmotor2.5 they will create or buy a new graphics platform in which they integrate rF2 physics. This integration will last 3-5 years, and then it will be abandoned. It will not work to modify.
    The philosophy of the first part of rF1 was simplicity. Now, just to put the lights on the track, you need to sell your soul. Some crutches.
    The AC graphics are very simple and fast. I am doing a winter track, which is not possible for rF2.
    [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG]

    [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG]

    [​IMG] [​IMG] [​IMG]

    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
     
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  15. hitm4k3r

    hitm4k3r Registered

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    And you are trying to tell us what exactly? That they should add ice shaders so that we can pretend that we are driving on ice while we aren't? Because that's my experience with SOL and the whole "dynamic" weather thing in AC and there are quite a variety of games allready that do what you are looking for. But that's not how it should work for rF2, atleast considering how it presents itself as as simulation driven by realism.

    Just to give you another example: I just watched the last video of Empty Box racing ACC in the wet with changing conditions while the track started drying up. At one point he wondered why there suddenly pops up a dry line. The problem is that it isn't as dynamic as in rF2, so the texture/shader or whatever they used suddenly changes and it just isn't at the level of dynamics that you see within rF2 when it comes to track evolution.

    Now to sum it up: there are alot more layers to the whole concept of weather simulation in racing sims than just adding a nice looking shader and adding virtual tires with less grip. I am pretty sure S397 could come up with something similar if they hadn't to worry about budgets. The question is what's the point if the physics aren't there and if the content isn't there? They simply have enough work to do with the rain stuff alone that renders snow and ice physics useless at this point. There is so much potential for this kind of stuff with dynamic temps, humidity, fog and wind and adding more sophisticaed partice effects. If I just want to have a nice immersive iceracing experience I boot up Dirt Rallye. And this affects all sims btw. There isn't one single sim that get's wet weather racing nailed and they all have their strong and weak points.
     
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  16. DmitryRUS

    DmitryRUS Registered

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    I'm only talking about graphics. After completing physics, they are geniuses and will do it, it will work as it should. Again, I'm only talking about the graphics engine, the graphics in rF2 are terrible. Tracks take a very long time to load. The rain effects are very bad, although they were originally added. Ambient lighting is even. A live track with a pre-paved trajectory, the direction of scratches on the asphalt is nonsense. Drying of a wet road starts from the center of the vehicle.
    Again, I'm talking about ridiculous graphics.
     
  17. mantasisg

    mantasisg Registered

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    First of all superb screenshots from AC. I think for what rF2 is rather bad is for its screenshot mode absence, you can't easily produce lots of nice screenshots that would sell rF2 graphics better. In my personal opinion I find rF2 graphics better than AC even with SOL, but it takes good content and thats also in real time graphics from the cockpit, when it comes to screenshots, replays, and even third person view rF2 is not impressive in many cases. That doesn't mean that it looks terrible as you say, thats too heavy word at least for most well made content of rF2. We also don't know how much S397 was able to work on rF2 in past several years, we don't know how it worked with Luminis, we can't be sure how much more improvable rF2 graphics are, as well as anything else about it.

    Tracks in rF2 are usually more detailed, has more life going on, even though billboard tree usage, sparse usage of bushes and not having 3D grass in various tracks, and perhaps lacking extras... There is indeed lots to comment about rF2 visually. I think good criticism should be taken as good criticism.

    They load a long time only first time you load them. Then they load faster. Then they load faster again if you choose them second time in a row.

    I don't find most rain effects that bad, but some are poor, there are also million of visual things that happen in rain many people doesn't even notice IRL. The biggest downside of rain is not graphics to me, but hit on performance, and then also lack of physics features.

    Some more AO probably would please anyone anytime.

    What do you mean by pre-paved trajectory and direction of scratches on asphalt ?

    Drying road from the middle of the cars depends on how fast cars are driving and what kind of aerodynamics they have IRL, but surely, it seems thats how it works in rF2 anytime. IMo not a deal breaker, but surely a thing to wish for. We must also consider that for that to work a lot more dense physical road mesh would be required in many tracks, and it would also probably cause increase of reasources usage for drying to be calculated, which would have to use at least double calculations, assuming that now it calculates just from single point in the middle of the car (but I don't know how it really works).
     
  18. hitm4k3r

    hitm4k3r Registered

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    Stating that the rFactor 2 graphics engine is terrible compared to AC, considering what it does out of the box while the most things done in AC are achieved simply by using 3rd party apps, shaders and filters is a bold statement. There are quite a few ways to look at this. For one thing AC with SOL and CSP has it's own problems and the system isn't without it's faults. If you watch closely at for example red cars you will notice that they don't appear red and have a purple shimmer - the purple shimmer effects everything in the game and is pretty apparant in your screenshots. I hate to dissapoint you but my world isn't purple. Cars are overly reflective, especialy at night and contrasts are too high across the board. That's with default settings.

    For me some of the stuff rings a bell going back to the early days when cars in rF2 appeared white during darkness and when this forum was a trading board for custom HDR profiles. We've been there and done that allready, even in rF2. Again, if S397 only had to concentrate on graphics and nothing else they could achieve similar things, but they are running a business and every desicion has financial consequences. If they didn't care for anything else but graphics they propably would have used UE4 when the switch to DX11 happaned and screwed backwards compatibility for everything. I am still able to use the early VLM tracks wich is great in my book and an achievement on it's own considering how the game looked in the past and how it looks now. Another point is what they are trying to achieve. When the virtua Le mans event was broadcasted there were times when I couldn't believe that I was watching a game, because it looked real. Whenever I watch AC replays or see some of the screenshots that people post, I am never tricked to believe that it is real. The reason for this is pretty simple: AC, CSP and especialy SOL are aiming for a cinematic look. rF2 on the other hand doesn't. And know what's even better? Everything works out of the box without having to download 3rd party apps and lurk through menus with thousends of subpages and little boxes to tag. That's my take on the terrible graphics engine :)
     
  19. DmitryRUS

    DmitryRUS Registered

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    In AC the graphics evolve over time. I say everything to the fact that over the past 10 years rF2 has been developing very slowly graphically. RF1 graphics look livelier, brighter, there is a separation of the foreground into the background. With the texture of a photo, background objects can be stretched to brighten the image. RF2 graphics are flat. Recently, only machines have acquired the volume. The environment remains level. The foreground and background merge. Asphalt and grass sometimes turn in tone. Bright, dark shadows from sunny weather just cross the road. In cloudy weather, the environment turns gray. If it rains, the environment is light and the road does not reflect the sky. These problems have always existed and ISI could not find a solution. The transition to DX 11 gave no results.
    Here's an example of typical bright daytime weather, comparing a track from four games. Poor rF2 balance. I'm talking about the balance of the image, the environment, the light. Even the light from the rubber of the wheel merges strongly with the halo of the car.
    With such faceless graphics, the system requirements for the video card are very high.

    It is very difficult to create tracks, working only with textures kills a lot of time and in the end the result is not worth it, it is impossible to achieve a beautiful picture. Environment and texture detailing is ineffective.
    The system of reflections in the game is very complex. Reflection planes for each object? I think this is stupid.
    Accelerated Simulation? Why Simulate Rapid Traverse? The tracks from the wheels must draw this trajectory themselves, depending on how the tractors are stacked. This is exactly the question of dense road mesh modeling. Maybe you need to find a new solution for this shader?
    [​IMG]
    Here is a link to my old gallery where I tried to achieve a dynamic road in textures. Old developments. 10 years have passed and almost nothing has changed. Even with the switch to DX11
    https://postimg.cc/gallery/V045ccb
    This is my test track in RF1, it doesn't look bad.
    [​IMG]
    I have always looked forward to the dynamically changing road and ground work in rf2. Ten years later, the game suffered a major setback. How so? Physics 10/10, graphics 3/10. I don't think everyone is happy with the schedule. In this case, I would be more pleased with the rF1 graph and the rF2 physics. Why are you reinventing the wheel? There are third party graphics engines that I think can be adapted. Old content will not be dragged into the new graphics engine by itself, it will need to be adapted anyway. How many new tracks and cars have come out for RF2 in 10 years?
    I spent many hours modeling tracks for rf1. I was thinking about switching to RF2, waiting for dynamic rain, exquisite graphics, work of the earth's surface and, as a result, a graphics engine with crutches, which is not easy to learn. Even a simple balance of color and light cannot be found.
    This is not an angry message. This is just my question of not understanding.
     
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  20. hitm4k3r

    hitm4k3r Registered

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    I think now we are getting a big closer to the real issue. No offence intented, but just because YOU aren't able to achieve your desired results doesn't mean that the engine isn't capable of what you are looking for. Get a decent PC, crank up the graphics with the most recent build and content and you get an idea what an artist with the right knowledge and talent can achieve.
    20210307171936_1.jpg
    Any track artist who is able to set up a scene like this will have no issues using the proper combination of materials, textures and maps creating the stuff that you are trying to achieve. But as said, the question is why anyone would do it in first place if all you do is pretending to drive on ice while loose surface racing isn't modeled. Seems like a waste of time at the current moment unless you start implementing loose surface racing as iRacing has done it. Everything else is a waste of ressources. I know we have different POV on the subject of what a gfx engine should do as you seem to be fine with purple environments, but I don't give much about the AC cruising community. They can drive a virtual car for hours during something that pretends to be rain while speaking to the camera. But that's not my cup of tea and propably the reason why I am using rF2 and not AC when actually racing in the wet.

    Just FYI, I worked as a LD myself with LDR engines where everything is baked in, so I know that it makes no sense to compare it with modern HDR engines. I know what you are trying to achieve, but the thing is that modern HDR engines don't work like that, especialy with dynamic TOD. If you take a look at Targa Florio you should be able to notice that you can use background images, but modeling the landscape and surroundings is the way to go from my POV (something that is done for the new TF, Mores and Willow Springs). It's not a limitation as you seem to undestand it, but the advantage of it. There is a reason why LDR engines are a thing of the past. Next to that I would give you the advice to to read up on the subject of albedo maps before you claim that there is no ambience and sky reflection. Tracks that were setup right in that regard in first place are still perfectly usable. And there is a reason why the scene in rF2 had a turquoise tint until a couple of patches ago.

    I don't say that there aren't shortcomming in the rF2 gfx engine - as with any engine - (reflections, shadows, particels and sky rendering most noticable in rF2) but there is a big difference between claiming that it is terrible and simply lacking the knowledge of how to achieve something, while infact it is pretty powerfull for an inhouse engine. If you look at ACC and it's graphics issues and abysmal performance optimization, let alone the pretty bad VR support, you have your answer why S397 went with their own engine. They have it all in their own hands and they are independend. When they need a certain feature, they can implement it without having to deal with the mercy of a 3rd party developer. Anyway, we steered quite a bit offtopic and I don't think that we will ever agree on everything. But I think it's important to note that this engine as moved quite alot in terms of visual fidelity and still is. Rain is just one part of it. An advice that I allways give is to boot up the last ISI build and compare it to what we have now. GL&HF. :)

    Btw, regarding that comparison video: first of all I think AC looks crap in that video because everything seems to be made out of plastic and there is a wierd blue shimmer over everything, especialy the trees. And using crappy ripped content, that isn't setup properly to work in rF2 to prove your point doesn't help either.
     

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