Post your initial impressions here

I'm not going to complain about the GFX. I'm not that superficial. What you guys have done so far is brilliant. Were money no object, I'm sure you'd be throwing Dx11 at us, as it is you've compromised and I prefer that to the alternative of a lovely pretty game that handles like a freshly whipped dog turd.

Speaking about physics, I think it's getting to the point where suggesting your opinion on physics holds more gravitas or is more accurate than another user's opinion should warrant an instant forum ban. It's boring, we'll never agree and until dozens of real world racing drivers come out and start laying down their real opinions (not $$ sponsored opinions) then we won't know and more to the point - IT DOESN'T EVEN MATTER THAT MUCH. When one guy in Spain is sitting at an office chair and another guy in California is sitting in a full on motion rig with triple screen how on earth are they getting an comparable experience? CAN they even get a comparable experience? I don't think so.

I like the force feed back. It's new and different. I won't claim I can feel this and I can feel that. I can feel the gears in my G25 moving about and I can hear it rattling around. Nothing weird there, I must have had some bat**** settings in rF1 because I didn't notice much difference in rF1.

Quick question: will we have the ability to run formation laps in rF2? I couldn't see it in the options, forgive me if it was actually there. It's a small detail but that's what I love about rF1 - the small details.

 

Yeah, glad I pre-ordered. Took a LOT less time to get my settings personalized than with RF1, and after doing a little read on G27 tweaks, have found the FFB to be fantastic (I set it up to about 3.00). I was driving with no sound (just to test) and could catch my rear when it was slipping from the FFB alone, which says a lot. When the rest of the physics get put in place (soft surface for offtrack etc.) I will blame ISI for all that time I DIDN'T spend with family and friends.... now, soon as I can be loud again (people sleeping), i'm going to, uh, do some more "testing"....

 

first post, first thoughts;
waited for madness of initial release to die down and found purchasing easy, had email straight away and no issues. Could do with some txt to let you know it's your email address you need to use to log in, but very painless and instructions on web were clear to figure out installing.

game itself; i think the FFB is good feels very direct and no lag, the vibration issue could do with a tweak so it's more force tugging rather than a rattle (i'm using G25). but generally i'm finding the cars really fun to drive .

graphics; ive got to a point where i'm happy with settings after a few hours tweaking. i know my pc is not state of the art but to me this is the area that needs most work. HDR is very harsh on my pc so turned off, shadows are jaggy even on max and blurring on so turned to low, and it feels like frame rates are very low for the amount of effects and detail on screen. It looks like there is great potential with the amount of detail available but it would be great if it can be optimised to give a better feel on lower settings.

not tried online yet, hopefully tomorrow for that one.

overall - great potential, some fantastic features, the weather, marbles, flat spots, general feeling through wheel etc, i never thought i'd say this but it's the eye candy at the moment that if it could take step forward would make a massive difference. Very much looking forward to seeing things evolve and it's great to be able to test at this stage and give feedback

 

I'm probably the only guy here loving the graphics. The trees, man, the trees. They're no longer cardboard. Well they are, but they look volumetric. Well ok I admit, it could do with a bucket load or 2 of ambient occlusion mapping. Bring in some of those codemasters guys to do it. That's about the only thing they're good at, heh. Throw out the dynamic sky, bring back static ones, and put better atmospheric perspective. That's instant track porn right there.

One thing I hated a lot in rfactor 1, was the "swimming" road textures caused by bland, repeating bump/specular maps. It didn't help that it didn't match up with the diffuse texture. I haven't seen this so far in rf2. It helps immensely with the sense of speed to see the road whipping by realistically.
Which is another awesome improvement. Best sense of speed in a game to date.

FFB is effing brilliant!!!

 

I just downloaded 60s cars at the moment. In general I like the sim, but the video issue at the moment is the most important thing to fix.

After tunning the video settings to get decent fps I started to set up the FFB. I removed all cockpit vibrations from the .plr file. Then I was able to concentrate on the feeling of the car. I was using Spark F1 car most of the time. The EVE F1 looks too long, and the plexi makes the driving very difficult.

I´m an old GPL player so I cant stop comparing both sims. I think the new tyre model is great, but the temp rise and fall too fast without any kind of violence treatment to the wheel. About FFB, I can't feel when the car is starting to loss grip, it feels like there is no weight. I tryied one of the F2 cars but FFB was 200% heavier than in the F1, so I came back to the F1 car.

I need to experiment with weather and other cars, those are my first impressions.

Another think I think would be really usefull is to get more info on the Multyplayer screen. There are just three MOD and 6 tracks and the server's list is about 100. I think it would be great to receive more info about the status of the race/practice/qualy, like time remaining, wheather, drivers.

 

Hmmm. I remember the first days of rFactor1 (when the product was nearly finalized before it was made available) and I'm really impressed with what they've accomplished here.

My game machine is about 3 years old (admittedly with a slightly newer video card) and I'm getting 40-60 FPS at 1680x1050x32 resolution, everything maxed out. My HD is probably well fragmented by now, but I'm not seeing any stuttering even during replays. Well, anyway, by category:

Graphics: I love the rain and fog capability, along with environment mapping and reflections. Driving in the wet really looks and feels different from any other sim I've tried. I set up a practice which changed from clear to full storm back to cloudy and was impressed at how the lighting and presentation of the rain changed right along. I do note that even though I started out with "clear" the skies had lots of clouds from the start, and those clouds didn't move as the storm came in. FYI. I also note what seems like gravel being dragged onto the track after a trip off course, with attendant sound effects. Very cool. The "stuff" coming up through the floor of the car is present on my installation as well, so it must be a generic issue. I haven't seen any of the HDR issues yet; I'm still experimenting with driving under different lighting conditions.

And I have to take a moment to ask: Why are people so obsessed with making use of every minute capability of the graphics card? I thought rFactor was supposed to be a driving simulation, not an art rendering engine. If you are taking the time to admire the paint job on a competitor's car, or count the grooves on his tires, you're probably not paying enough attention to that thing in your hands - the wheel - and its connection to the road. The graphics are plenty good enough to be immersive. Sit and look at the showroom if you want to admire someone's 3D modeling ability.

Sounds: To me, the most overlooked portion of most sims. You're focusing on the road, the curbs, the space between you and that other guy. Something needs to be there telling you about your peripheral environment, giving you that added sense of presence. Someone did a lot of work on the engine sounds, including backfires and coast samples. The effect heard when going into a tunnel or past a large building is spine-tingling, and adds more than I thought it could to the sense of realism. Really, modders need to take advantage of the superb sound engine in rFactor2, because it has a lot of capability which is waiting to be tapped. I do hear a few samples (on the Megane) which don't overlap very smoothly, but other than that, the sounds are a clear step forward.

Physics: No doubt there will be more argument about this than any other aspect of the game save graphics. Having driven ISI sims since SCGT I can see a continuous refinement happening. The cars provided with rF1 and rF2 at the launch are really good examples of what can be done with the ISI engine (not sure about the Formula Renault); with the new deformable tire model, I have a better sense of the car actually driving over a surface, instead of just four corners being lifted up and down by the suspension. Feeling the tires lift, settle and slide as I take a corner too fast is really a success of rF2; and I must again emphasize that the tire sounds are vital to the experience. The suspension is supposed to complement the tire dynamics, you know, not take the place of them, and that's more or less how it feels.

I know that at this point all we can comment on are the ISI-provided cars and tracks; but in the electronics industry we call this a "reference design" and it shows how certain things are done. One thing the ISI reference cars have usually done (to me) is feel like a real car, to the extent that any sim can feel real. Many mods focus on suspension and chassis numbers and not the gestalt which occurs when all the pieces fit together. And that's a hard thing to do. Whether they suit your driving style or not, the ISI reference cars are pretty decent examples to work from. The original GTR mod creators, the Historics, the Caterham - are all examples of how the ISI physics model can be tamed if you spend the time on it. With the new tire model I think the only things that need to be addressed are the suspension models; some things like the common MacPherson Strut are still not easy to model.

The FFB is pretty darn good out of the box. If ISI can get that instability problem fixed... I think it would be best if they supported a standard steering architecture sort of design, like RealFeel or Leo encourage, so that you don't have to play games with the parameters on every different car. I'm sure FFB could be a lot better on rF1 if I didn't get tired of changing stuff every time I load a different mod, and just leave it set to the default. The wheel should not have to be tweaked for every mod on the same sim.

Tracks: So we have a new track modeling paradigm here. Lots of things which had to be "faked" in rF1 are now part of the car and track design philosophy. I hope modders take note and start incorporating these changes, rather than just converting the mesh and letting 10-year-old track models suffer from the consequences. I also hope that everyone (not just ISI) pays attention to things like fences and collision objects; one small peeve I have is that sometimes you just want to blast around and learn the limits of the car/driver on a track (isn't that what invulnerable mode is for?), but you can get snagged in a fence or hung up on a curb and have to reset the session. All fine when you're in a real competition, but when just learning a track there should be an easy way to escape from these with some kind of "cheat".

Considering it's still very early days in the beta program, I see a lot of things to like. I may have some stronger criticisms once I get a few hundred more laps in, and some new content appears, but for now, I still think we have a great situation here, with a developer who cares about our input and wants to explore simulation in a world where arcade games are hard to avoid.

 

The physics, the tires, the feel of the car and the FFB are just AWESOME, this is as close to reality as it can be.

btw - i`m a real karting racer. I`ve been on many servers and the level of driving is poor. MB 4-5 cars arre realy fast and they are not complaining about anything.

The real focuses are the performance, collision and FFB centering fore. Also it would be nice to see what tires are used by other cars.

Thx and keep going. This is just another planet and i can undestand why most of people are complaining - the simply know nothing about real changing conditions on the track because before it was not presented in the sims.

 

I waited rF 2 to buy a new wheel, we didnt know when it would be released precisely. As for my talent with a wheel my videos on youtube speak for themselves.

 

Very impressed so far. Great sensation of speed, especially in the 1960s cars. Also loving the changable weather and lighting conditions. Looking forward to the next 6 months to see how it develops as well as helping get the bugs ironed out

 

LOL, Gjon; I'd ask for my money back if you didn't!

--Steve Smith

 

Complete awesomeness!

My driving is getting better and better... I love the historic F1 and started with EVE F3, now I'm driving a Spark F2 and got my first "clean" Spa lap.

I wish I had DSL

 

I like it.
But its too heavy for any computer. With a hd6870 it doesnt run too smooth.
I noticed that onboard, my right speaker sounds louder than the left one, why? The engine is at the back exactly.
From outside the car it sounds ok.
The car tends to fly easily.

The feeling is good, i like the "rubberness" of the driving, and also the new bumps on the track , and of course how it looks. Now the cars feels more alive.

 

Pardon the OT interjection... it's not an uncommon name, but are you by chance "the" Steve Smith of Four Wheel Drift fame?

 

Someone tried to tell me that RF2 was easier to work with than RF1, well RF1 had all it's files in 1 place, RF2 has files and folders in USERS AND Program Files folders....how is that easier, AND it appears that you cant move the folders either. i tried to move them to a larger drive and RF2 says no mods installed,

what a disappointment, i was really looking forward to getting into this. where are some modding tools, MAS.exe for example, and any other things we need to know.

i downloaded it, paid for it, activated it...........so now i just sit here wondering what to do with it, great

 

in the folders

 

rF2 has the performance of this , but the visuals from 1995 .

 

ok Jim, i'll go and have a look mate, thanks.

 

yep, eventually found them, gonna take me some time to get my head around the ModMaker.chm file, will have to read several times to get my head around it.

thanks for your help.

 

My initial impression is "it's probably really good, but I can't tell." I run a laptop instead of a desktop and since I'm a student, I can't financially justify buying a new computer just because one game runs slowly. I had a strong feeling my computer wasn't up to playing it (I have to play rF1 on low graphics settings to run smoothly), but I bought it anyway because I'm just too impatient. As it is, I can drive laps but the frame rate sometimes drops to low levels (guessing ~10-20). I might try playing it in a window but I think for now I'll just continue with rF1 and maybe try to get a summer job so I can upgrade to a decent PC without feeling too guilty.