So many vmods, so many damns

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by frankwer, Feb 1, 2013.

  1. Alex Ball

    Alex Ball Registered

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    I think you're missing the point, Tim. It's not the 'GET MOD' thing that doesn't work, but the requirement to have all of the tracks before you can use the mod. I don't want to have to download 100's of tracks to just race on the three that I like.

    If I have Tracks A-through-G, and the server I want to join is current running Track A at the moment, but with B-H on rotation, I should be able to join and race on that server on Track A, B, C, D, E, F and G.. until track H comes up, which I don't have, and then I get booted. That's the rF1 way, and it's great.

    At the moment I cannot join unless I get out google and hunt down the track. It's really frustrating and it's only getting worse as more content is being released. I simply don't have time to go and look for all the beta versions, new tracks etc.

    So, either get rid of the requirement for all tracks in a mod, or make it so the 'Get Mod' function downloads the tracks too. The current way of doing it just doesn't fit the way sim-racers race.

    :/

    (thanks for taking the time to reply, though)
     
  2. frankwer

    frankwer Registered

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    I think ISI needs to get out of their coding shell and start to look into the real world situation.

    Discovering conflicts should be done on each item (car or track) and not as a package.

    And besides, i still get "missing gmt" errors, which is well known from rFactor and supposedly should be fine in rFactor 2.

    Don`t get me wrong, i love rFactor 2, but there are some huge issues that is not customer friendly. And if the hardcore fans think it`s fine, i guess the only customers of the game will be the hardcore fans.
     
  3. Alex Ball

    Alex Ball Registered

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    Meh, they can do what they want, it's their IP. It does put me off playing, though. It's a real shame as when you do get into a race it's fantastic. rF2 really does feel brilliant. I just wish it was a bit easier to manage!
     
  4. 88mphTim

    88mphTim racesimcentral.net

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    The issues have been taken in, and passed onto those who need to hear it. All I can ask you to do is keep posting when you think something still needs to be changed even if it has been posted before.

    Just because I reply with an 'answer', I'm not trying to say you're wrong.
     
  5. Alex Ball

    Alex Ball Registered

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    Great reply, Tim. :)
     
  6. frankwer

    frankwer Registered

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    Tim: Thanks for replying and i`m just a pain in the butt because i care for your product :)
     
  7. Bryan Birtwell

    Bryan Birtwell Registered

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    Howdy,

    I'm not looking to make enemies... however, I do have to say that the vMOD system works perfectly well. I also WAS a "poo-pooer" of the vMOD system.

    Scenario... You have the car... you have the track (old version) you try to enter a server and get booted.

    Without the vMOD system all you know is that you got booted.

    With the vMOD system you get told what is missing, and/or what needs updating.

    If people make vMODs with a whole bunch of tracks they will have problems because to run track "A" you may need to update your versions of tracks "B,E,U, and Z". To be fair, their vMODs may be for a league situation, where in that case I would say... "too bad, find another server to join... we didn't make the vMOD for you anyways".

    As long as people make their vMODs with one or just a couple tracks as part of the vMOD, life should be good. I make mine with one track per vMOD. The exception that proves the rule is the vMOD that's loaded on my server now with the Corvettes. But after this weekend, that vMOD will be in the trash anyways... And it will be back to real race cars. 8*D

    So... I think the whole thing works perfectly well for those who bother. As with anything, the more options you have the more you need to learn about the product you're trying to use.

    AE makes a series of race car games that probably would suit the people that can't/won't do the work that needs to be done to enjoy this game to it's fullest.

    My .02,

    Bryan
     
  8. corsa

    corsa Registered

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    I have to say... as a user, I love the new vmod system. If I download a vmod and it won't install, a few clicks will tell me exactly what I'm missing. Much better than in rF1, where I try to join and get booted and have no idea why. Was it using a different version of the mod than I have? Or a different version of the track? No idea.

    Plus, installing/uninstalling mods is a piece of cake, especially uninstalling -- no more digging through folders trying to figure out what i need to delete from each one to remove a mod... and no more multiple installs of rF1 to avoid this problem.

    It definitely takes some getting used to, but once it "clicks" it works great.

    The league I'm a part of doesn't seem to be having any problem creating vmods either, and we've had relatively few members have problems getting everything installed -- most problems seem to stem from the way the beta content all relies on other content and versions, so telling them to install ALL the official ISI content first usually fixes their problems.
     
  9. Alex Ball

    Alex Ball Registered

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    I don't think anyone thinks the way mods are installed, removed or updated is bad, just the link between tracks and cars. The system could still work just as we'll without that link in place. If your track is out of date then it could tell you, same for car, but I don't understand why I need other tracks that aren't currently being raced so I can join the current session.

    How does that benefit anyone (apart from my ISP who can charge me for more bandwidth when I have to download a bunch of tracks I do not want)?
     
  10. Alex Ball

    Alex Ball Registered

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    How about this for an example.

    Say in a few months somebody makes an Indycar 2013 mod. They make the cars, and all of the tracks. (http://www.indycar.com/en/Schedule) - 16 tracks, 10 road, 6 oval.

    In the current system, I would have to download and install all the great road courses, along with a whole bunch of ovals, just because 'I have to' - even though I wouldn't ever race on an oval because it's effin' dull. Yet they would be *required* to be installed anyway, taking up my hard drive space, cluttering up my in-game selection menus, just so I can race on the road-courses online?

    Seems a bit off to me.
     
  11. metalnwood

    metalnwood Registered

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    I have a feeling that in time, if it stayed the same, things would stabilise. Right now with little content lots of people are trying out all sorts of stuff that others may not have downloaded yet.

    When content matures the servers will settle down and you will have the selection of standard stuff, not the changing all the time scenarios we have with things right now.

    I think the only thing that is making things work for me right now is that I use the all locations torrent that keeps things up to date and gets tracks as they come out. With that I havent found I get on a server that I didnt have the content for.
     
  12. osella

    osella Registered

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    Unfortunately I don't like the whole vmod & rfmod system as a whole. But if the connection of cars with tracks would be removed I know I could live with the concept, that connection of mod with track is 85% of my dislike of the new system.
    Out of curiosity, what connection do you have that your ISP charges for actual bandwidth? Thought this only applies to mobile connection anymore :eek:
     
  13. Robert Gödicke

    Robert Gödicke Registered

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    Even though I do get along "ok" with the vMod system (except for most servers the Get Mod functionality doesn't work), I'm a little worried about the future of league racing.

    In rFactor 1 we got used to synchronize our league installs via SimSync Pro. It's such an amazing tool and so easy to use for the drivers that you don't want to use anything else.

    I can't imagine what a terrible idea it would be if we league admins would have to create a new vmod/rfmod for every track update/track addition/team addition/skin change/whatever. Or rfmod updates, same thing. With rF1 and SimSync Pro we got an idiot-proof environment (sorry for that term). I dunno, proof me wrong, but with rF2, I'm afraid we could be facing a digital hell for league admins...

    Public races? Don't care tbh. Like I said, for that, it's working "ok", but not great.
     
  14. peterchen

    peterchen Registered

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    What I don´t understand is:
    Why is the VMod a "must have" ???
    I mean: It could be usefull, for example when a full grid of cars (earlier a normal mod) requires a
    specific track pack to function properly due to crash or time issues (like in rF1)(what should be solved in rF2 but maybe never will be).
    But why the heck is this needed to start up a server???
    Why isn´t the dedicated server .exe able to manage car x,y,z with track a,b,c like it was in rF1?
    It´s so easy! Where is the problem?
    You have to had the specific tracks and cars anyways!
    Or even a few of them like some people mentioned here.
    Why is it now more close instead of being more open??

    Now even myself is curious why ISI is so quiet about theire system!
    Don´t you want that modders can take action as soon as possible?

    My wish: Please ISI, explain what on earth was your intention to establish this mod-system!!
    (I know you wanted to test specific track/car-combinations, but that is obviously not the hole truth)

    Greets
    Pete
     
  15. Nand Gate

    Nand Gate Banned

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    Exactly. And with the community managing a single torrent of locations, it is a no brainer. The only servers I CAN'T get into are private passworded ones, and private league mods, which I can get by visiting their site. If an author updates a map/location, it is the league/server admin AND players responsibility to upgrade to it. If a league/server is running an OLD version - stiff. You CAN find it but it is really the servers fault for not keeping up to date with the authors whose content they are using.
     
  16. Pits

    Pits Registered

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    We need the Vmods of course, on our 2013 ORA server if you go to the ora website you'll see a link to a webpage to d/load the current vmod we are running, all good and very little trouble.
     
  17. Diablo

    Diablo Registered

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    Sorry I am impatient, so if anyone after this post made my point already, please forgive me.

    Your explanation shows best, that this system is obviously poorly designed. Those words remind me of people swearing by Windows ME: "It is a great system, as long as you don´t run more than so and so many programs at once, don´t install too many of them in the first place. Oh and don´t forget to knock on wood and hope the moon is in the correct phase." ;)
    Edit: I forgot, my point being, it doesn´t scale well. And looking at those 20+ GB of rF1 content I still have, it damn well should.


    An interesting point came up earlier, why do we need that get mod button anyway? I mean it is obvious, that one cannot join a server, if you don´t have the necessary content installed. So the join button should provide that function, like:
    "You are about to join the server <put name here>, which requires you to download <content> of <size>. [proceed with download] or [cancel because i don´t have all night]". If the user wanting to join fullfils all requirements, just be quiet and proceed with the usual join procedure.
    And I do agree, that it should not be necessary to have all the content of the vMod installed, only what´s relevant for the current session should be treated as required, the rest being optional. This way people can choose if they want to download it all at once, because they "know" they will want to go on racing on that server anyway, or they opt for the quicker way of joining by only downloading the required content. On session switch the latter kind of people would receive a similar message and similar options to the above example.
    On a semi-related note, all of the checks should be done before one joins the server and not after. I just enabled
    Code:
    Unique Vehicle Check="1"
    the other day and I´ve seen some people getting booted, because they joined with an already present vehicle. Some never bothered to come back! The more polite way would be, to check those things beforehand and informing them about such conflicts.

    My 2 cents, for now

    Best regards,
    Marcus
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Feb 3, 2013
  18. Jorgen

    Jorgen Registered

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    I've been having concerns about the VMOD idea for a long time now, and it's good to see that it's not just me. However, I would like to say that I really like the fact that mods and tracks are all kept in MAS files now, and that they are associated with a unique ID and version number. This ensures that everyone has the same content. However, that is where it should have stopped. Why there is a need to hard-link an already uniquely identified and version controlled mod with one or more uniquely identified and version controlled tracks is just beyond me. If there is a technical reason for it, that's fine, but it should NOT be the responsibility of the end users to have to deal with it. Why not just hide these VMODs from the end users and simply create them when a server is started? After all, you do the exact same thing when you create a VMOD now as you did when you started a dedicated server in rF1 - pick a mod and one or more tracks, and give it a name.
     
  19. MaD_King

    MaD_King Registered

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    I have the same opinion, this system have to be like you describe, more permissive, and perhaps inform the user the mod have other tracks associated and indicating they are missing, but let connect if the current track is ok on the local installation.

     
  20. Kknorpp001

    Kknorpp001 Banned

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    I agree there are opportunities for improvements but really not as bad as it seems if admins use it correctly. For example, I haven't been online much lately but wanted to race the c6 online and saw ~ISR~ server but as soon as I saw that their vmod required me to download tracks other than the one they were racing I bailed immediately.

    I create vmod for only car and track I am hosting.
     

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