true statement especially when discussing true simulation versus immersion. i have had on my to do list for a long time to go back and try rf1 mods with ffb turned off or even with gamepad. we laugh at people who don't use ffb but there are many many people out there who don't even want it and also many using gamepads and they are fast also. in the end, perhaps they have more enjoyment than us because not confusing ffb with physics. of course rf2 ffb is so good i could never give it up.
^ Not a huge fan of seperate motion platforms for just the seat. Feels very disconnected because you are being moved left, right, back, forwards from your pedals and wheel and screen(s) and it can only mess with your precision and feel of the car because of this. I can sort of understand the logic behind it, to try and simulate what the g-forces would do, that is push you left, right, back, forwards but you should be static inside your seat and only feel the forces. That's why full rig motion platforms (that is, seat, wheel, pedals and monitor on the actuators) should be the only option if your going to have a motion rig at all.
I have and i thought it was great at the time but it gradually became very tiring. It was only after thinking about it all that i realised it's really not ideal.....no, not "not ideal".....detrimental, to your performance and gets worse over time. It makes the feeling of g-force realism become intimidating to you and not in the realistic sense that because you feel so much force you would irl slow down. No, it's because a) it hurts from over straining (lol) and b) you are constantly having to readjust your wheel and pedal inputs because the motion seat keeps changing you position relative to the devices and you both don't know and cant input the correct inputs, which goes a long way to hurting your confidence and thus you're unable to commit to the corners properly and thus lap times. I went to Paris for a sim convention (flying, racing) about 2 years ago for some work to do with flight sims and i got to try a huge variety of motion platforms. For the flying sims, they are all full body motion platforms and some were absolutely mind-blowingly immersive with full enclosure and high degrees of motion platform movement (they were selling them for £60k+ if i recall correctly...if only i had the money ). But it's the racing motion platforms i want to talk about. At the time, i wasn't into racing games (not compared to how i am with rf2) and it was about 6 months before i bought rf2 beta (which as it did for everyone here...changed their life! lol). So i was no where near to the driving skill and understanding that i have today....but tbh it's not all that difficult to drive games like codemaster dirt, although it does present it's own challenges of course. Point is, a particular rig i tried playing dirt had a seat only motion actuators. Now i have more context (from a more recent experience) that explains what i was experiencing back then in paris. Prior to that experience i had played the very same dirt game and although i didn't play it constantly i was proficient at it compared to how i was in paris. The whole experience was fun at first because your so impressed by being thrown around in the seat but it soon got tiring and frustrating as i just couldn't drive as well as i could at home. You really had to work a lot harder because you couldn't really tell if your inputs were the inputs you intended, so you ended up having to kind of constantly see-saw the wheel around the general position you wanted it in hopes it would average out at the correct input (which again is just not good). Hope you get the idea.
I understand why people make the decision to go this route though, as it is both cheaper and easier to build. If i were to build one i would have probably also gone the same route if the budget dictated but i have some amount of experience in full body motion platforms from university to boot (more so recently). And it really puts things into perspective being able to compare the feel of both types of motion platforms....aside from being able to feel a lot of force in both, the overall difference is...significant. I can see him make mistakes, lack of confidence and braking too soon due to his motion seat. I bet he would easily shave off 2-3 seconds (if not much more) on his average lap time if he turned the motion seat off. I've been trying to think of a good analogy for the difference between a full body motion platform and a seat only motion platform. One is a load cell brake (and if you don't have one perhaps you can't appreciate how significant of an improvement it is over a potentiometer based brake pedal) whilst the other is a standard potentiometer brake pedal with an underlying but constant spiking/fluctuation issue.
I agree that with out motion I too would be much faster, BUT, with 80% less feedback, immersion and realism. There are times that I am well down the grid but the last thing on my mind is to turn stuff off. Over the two years I have actually improved my driving skill to a point that I am now driving without any aids. I hate bumpy tracks, it throws me around and are very distracting, but that goes hand in hand with hating that particular track. ISI need to take a bow for this new body flex FFB they introduced as it simulates perfectly on motion. I don't agree with changing steering and pedal positions. Mine is in the same position now for a long time. Only had to move it once due to monitor position. It is not long before you forget about the moving seat and stationary steering.
I think you misunderstood what i was saying about the steering and pedal positions. I didn't mean you need to change them (not sure why you thought i meant that) but that when using a seat only motion platform it causes inaccuracies in your wheel and pedal inputs because as the seat moves around, so does your body, which moves your legs and arms which affects your pedal and wheel inputs. I guess it depends on how aggresive your seat only motion rig is and how big the range of motions are because if there relatively small to my experiences then of course the negative affects are reduced whilst still giving you some "seat of the pants" feel. If i were to consider a motion rig it would have to be full bodied (monitor attached too but if not/can't it's not that bad i guess) like the one from Vesaro. I tested their rig at the gadget show event (28 seconds in) and it felt very good compared to my experience of the seat only motion rig only 6 months earlier in paris. You will have to forgive my rather aggressive inputs at the wheel in the video simply because it was my first time in iracing and driving an f1 car at spa taking the corner at Les Combes and Malmedy. That and i was exponentially worse at driving compared to how i am now (thank you ISI ). I would honestly consider buying their type of rig or making from one from scratch with more manoeuvrability and more degrees of freedom when i can save up enough cash.
I understand your point and you are correct. Thought you meant the actual position, my bad. I added a TH8RS and with the braking motion I sometimes gear one gear down too many.
I know it can be hard to hear something like my opinion, especially when you have exactly what i'm talking against but i can understand why you wouldn't want to turn it off because (so long as it's not set too aggresively) the added feel can be rather nice to the overall experience still, for sure.
It would be far better if he had the thing setup even close to properly. He has multiview on but hasn't rotated the side screens to get the correct angle. He has left head movement on! The seat simulates the head movement you get, you don't need two lots. No wonder he is making it look quite difficult. I agree the pedals and wheel ought to move with the seat and would be the first modification I would do. He doesn't have the third actuator to simulate slip and hop which is the best feature of this type of motion rig. It looks like he has the actuators moving far too much. Lastly and this applies to all the motion rigs, the pivot point is a compromise. The seat of your butt is correct for a single seater with a nice balance. For a gtr the pivot point ought to be under the gearstck, as that is roughly where the C of G is. And each vehicle is different in that respect. I think both the videos show that putting a motion rig together and actually configuring it to aid simulation rather than just be a gimmick feature is quite a job. Maybe ought to set things up right before you add the final touch of the helmet, driving gloves and full harness. *cough* You would be so pleased with the performance of that £40000 Vesaro with it's 2x 7970s lol.
even the vesaro isn't that great because of the low degrees of freedom and relatively low ranges of pitch and roll movement. The knock on effect of which it feels more like a vibration rig than a motion platform. Good point on the head movement! To add, even without a motion platform I half the amount of head movement. It can be too aggressive at times and can interfere with the visual cues of the cars subtle pitch changes.
Is very true, odds are far less in your favour if you try to make a career (let alone get paid, even just to scrape by) in motor-sports if a) you have the talent but b) do not have the money, compared to sports that require much less of b). That being said, if you truly think you have the talent and/or ("or" because skill > unrefined talent) can acquire the skill with practice (and lots of it) and it is your absolute passion, you owe it to yourself to try every avenue to get into the sport....for as long as it takes. There is a strong correlation between a persons outlook (i.e. their psychology) on life and the odds of creating self-fulfilling prophecies. If you don't believe it is possible then you will have handicapped yourself from the very beginning. Of course i say "strong correlation" because it is not always the case that people match their desires and beliefs equally with the effort, discipline and determination required in order for their said desire(s) to become actualised (e.g. laziness and day-dreamers). One of my favourite quotes: What's interesting about the first paragraph in the quote is that people can react very differently to it, that is some immediately see a lot of pessimism after reading because they fixate on the fact that it is true, they are going to die and for whatever reason their is some quantity of regret in them, whilst others get a massive boost of positive energy of "i can, should & WILL do what the i truly want to do and i'm gonna start right f**king now!".
I can't believe anyone buys the versaro tbh. They don't have any news for 2013, be surprised if they are around for much longer. It just seems sooo pricey, and selecting x-fire for their top of the range model wouldn't fill me with confidence that they knew what they were doing with the rest of it. Add to that the poor range of movement.... really who does buy that for £40000? You would have to be very rich and very new. As was said before motion rigs are going to hurt your times. As long as it is for the right reason (ie better immersion, higher simulation level) it doesn't matter unless you get butthurt by not winning online. My last modifications lost me times but increased my feeling of immersion and that was just moving my screens so close I have to turn my head for the apex. I just tell myself everyone else faster might as well be using chase camera and a gamepad..... cos I is living it brah.
