All cars, all tracks, full championships?

Johannes Rojola

Johannes Rojola

Registered
I am little bit worried of the current state of sim racing. While technology allows us great physics / graphics platforms, we don't get content any more. Now when new sim racing title is made, it mostly just consists random cars and random tracks (even from different era's) having no idea of bigger picture. Sure rF2 vintage Formula cars try to break this pattern, but I am still skeptical whether we get full season or not.

Last great sim racing game I remember playing was NASCAR Racing 2003, and almost for 10 years I have been seeking for a replacement. A simulation that has full package of simulated gameplay and series championship.

For gaming stand point I have to look into another games that have real content in them, it is quite sad because I have always enjoyed racing simulators more.

In a sense, simulators are more real life today than before. It has just become a thing of renting your favorite car and few hours of track time. What I want to experience as a player is a world of championship racing in a series that is a version of well established real world series. That is something that I could never experience in real life.

Just some thoughts :rolleyes:
 
So funny that I woke up this morning with a thought of asking this exact same thing.
Is there any plans for single player content with full championships, some sort of career mode, maybe a possibility to drive championships against AI mixed with humans (that would be an instant hit)?

I loved the "hotseat" option in GP series with AI taking over your car when a friend was driving and the other way around.
I know thats not the most sim like feature done, but it was fun.
Now that there is already an option to continue your race from replay and AI takes over the other player vehicles if there is any, I dont see this one for example being a far stretch.

Fun little things like that can make a difference.
 
It would be almost impossible to get a full season of anything. Even the licensing for the F2 championship gave ZERO tracks. rF2 is and always will be a modding platform, we're trying to provide some good, varied content, and I would hope some mods can fill in the gaps we either can't license or aren't willing to pay extortionate fees for.
 
Is there going to be a championship that can be build by players them selves, choose tracks, choose cars, choose rules, which can be saved and counts points etc...?
 
Golanv said:
Is there going to be a championship that can be build by players them selves, choose tracks, choose cars, choose rules, which can be saved and counts points etc...?
Click to expand...

ohhh I like this idea :)

Be great for GT championships, choosing classes of cars
 
Tim Wheatley said:
It would be almost impossible to get a full season of anything. Even the licensing for the F2 championship gave ZERO tracks. rF2 is and always will be a modding platform, we're trying to provide some good, varied content, and I would hope some mods can fill in the gaps we either can't license or aren't willing to pay extortionate fees for.
Click to expand...

There is no need for licensed content, just something that is mock up of real thing. Like the NASCAR cars that came with rF1. Same thing with tracks. Modders can then "fix" the rest :D
 
To get real good championship for single player it would need more than just championship, it would need building of atmosphere, lot of text/videos etc to get one into correct state, GTL did attempt to get that done, but I think it still fell bit short, one would really need a story where to get that whole experience to such proper level, some management even very tiny might be needed.

For mod team that might not be possible because additional coding might be required, for ISI it would probably fit to scope of modding platform.

I'm not sure if it would be possible to add those cutscene kind of videos with UI editing? Or maybe that is possibility ISI reserves for those licensing the engine.
 
Golanv said:
Is there going to be a championship that can be build by players them selves, choose tracks, choose cars, choose rules, which can be saved and counts points etc...?
Click to expand...

I like this idea also - create your own series - no need for videos or cutscenes or anything like that ... no need for even having the correct tracks or anything but let me build a championship and keep track of the tracks i've already raced and what is next and also the points (with AI or online whichever :) )
 
Golanv said:
Is there going to be a championship that can be build by players them selves, choose tracks, choose cars, choose rules, which can be saved and counts points etc...?
Click to expand...
I want that, but I have used sims before where there was an external points tool also, do I wouldn't be too upset if it didn't happen.
 
Johannes Rojola said:
There is no need for licensed content, just something that is mock up of real thing. Like the NASCAR cars that came with rF1. Same thing with tracks. Modders can then "fix" the rest :D
Click to expand...
You can't market a product as well without licensing, and you're not going to capture as much viral traffic from Howston as you are from Brabham or Corvette in the name, as an example.
 
The cheaper licences like btcc and stcc are taken by simbin, I dont know do they have the exclusive licence like they have for wtcc, but isnt there any series that can be done?
Obviously alot of them cost ****loads of money and its pointless to have multiple similar series, but to have none, that would be kinda disappointing, and the championship mode itself shouldnt be that hard to manufacture.
Its a feature that is pretty much in every single racing game with an AI in it, without it the AI and the content is nothing but a single race and the pleasure of driving random tracks to the majority of the racing sim audience who play mostly single player racing or do not have time to find online races or community content everytime they want to race.
I believe these kind of features (inclueding the hotseat in GP series) brings in buyers more than the Corvette or Brabham.
 
Golanv said:
I believe these kind of features (inclueding the hotseat in GP series) brings in buyers more than the Corvette or Brabham.
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I think you aren't completely right..... I think those licences brings more buyers. However, those kind of features you are talking about, I think that they will keep people interested for longer.

And I agree that I really like a championship mode. For me it doesn't necesarily have to be a real season, so for instance the F2 that might have a championship at Mills, Malaysia, Estoril, Lime Rock. Not their real tracks, but at least you got the challenge to beat the AI on multiple occasions, on multiple venues, where some might not suit you :p It would also be nice if there will be multiple race formats. Some Classes have 2 or 3 races per weekend, on some of which there are reverse grids, or sprint vs feature races, some races have mandatory pitstops, while other in the same weekend might not. It would at least for me keep the game interesting for longer.
 
Golanv said:
The cheaper licences like btcc and stcc are taken by simbin, I dont know do they have the exclusive licence like they have for wtcc, but isnt there any series that can be done?
Obviously alot of them cost ****loads of money and its pointless to have multiple similar series, but to have none, that would be kinda disappointing, and the championship mode itself shouldnt be that hard to manufacture.
Its a feature that is pretty much in every single racing game with an AI in it, without it the AI and the content is nothing but a single race and the pleasure of driving random tracks to the majority of the racing sim audience who play mostly single player racing or do not have time to find online races or community content everytime they want to race.
I believe these kind of features (inclueding the hotseat in GP series) brings in buyers more than the Corvette or Brabham.
Click to expand...
BTCC cheaper? You are joking. The Brits (and I'm one of them) want way more money than anywhere else in the world. It's really, really, really, not worth what they ask. There's no profit there when you're licensing from the Brits enough to make a full championship of anything. And yes, I am annoyed at them for it. It's irritating the hell out of me that I could license world famous tracks outside the UK 5-10 times over for 1 small UK track that used to host BTCC (doesn't anymore) and is essentially a club circuit. I have to walk away from most UK based deals because of this over-inflated worth.

I agree, I do want to see a championship mode, but like I said, if it doesn't happen, it'll be because something else was considered more important at all times. It's won't be because they didn't want to. I want them to. :)

Actually they don't. Content sells many, many more times over than most features like those. I wish it were different, believe me. :)
 
Tim Wheatley said:
BTCC cheaper? You are joking. The Brits (and I'm one of them) want way more money than anywhere else in the world. It's really, really, really, not worth what they ask. There's no profit there when you're licensing from the Brits enough to make a full championship of anything. And yes, I am annoyed at them for it. It's irritating the hell out of me that I could license world famous tracks outside the UK 5-10 times over for 1 small UK track that used to host BTCC (doesn't anymore) and is essentially a club circuit. I have to walk away from most UK based deals because of this over-inflated worth.

I agree, I do want to see a championship mode, but like I said, if it doesn't happen, it'll be because something else was considered more important at all times. It's won't be because they didn't want to. I want them to. :)

Actually they don't. Content sells many, many more times over than most features like those. I wish it were different, believe me. :)
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I didnt know that btcc is so money hungry. Must be because the UK racing scene is totally weird with the lack of manufacturer support, all the independent teams, and the tracks are some sort of landmarks that god forbid cant be adverticed in anyway. They should be paying you, I wouldnt even know anything about stcc or btcc without race 07, now I try to find ways to follow races anyway I can.

Pull some strings, insert your authoritah, beg, plead, torture, blackmail, use the force Luke... make it happen, you can do it.

Features are content :confused:
Are you in good terms with EA and turn 10, you can try to sneak in couple of Porches and Ferraris if you are? ;)
 
About the championship mode in rF2, why don't you guys (ISI) use the script function (or whatever you name it) built for the good old F1C?

The scripting in F1C is quite good enough to simulate racing event. I used this scripting function to simulate real events in a mod for F1C. Almost any mod I had for F1C, they all exploited this script function, and the end result was very satisfying, close to the real world event we wanted to simulate.

Take this F1C script function as a base functions, then add a user defined (like in .GDB file) rules for scoring, qualifying, race, pit window, etc.

This is an example of what can be scripted and what can be done via scripting, and IMO, will enhance the value of a series/championship mode in a mod, and value of the overall mod itself, and of course the value of rF2 as the premier modding platform.

[RACE RULES]
NumOfLap=31
NumOfPitStop=1

[PIT RULES]
PitMandatory=1 // must do pit stop? 1=yes, 0=no
PitStyle=1 // use pit window style: 0=F1, 1=Nascar, 2=GT, 3=custom
PitWindowOpen=30 // open pit window after 30 minutes of race
PitWindowClose=45 // close pit window after 45 minutes of race

[QUALIFYING RULES]
QualifyingNum=3 // number of qualifying session, xx times, only for F1 style?
QualifyingTime=15 // in minutes, for each qualifying session
QualifyingElimination=5 // number of xx car with slowest time to be eliminated in the next qualifying session

[SCORING RULES]
ValidPos=1-8 // give score to position 1,2,3,...,8
ScorePos=10,8,6,5,4,3,2,1 // the old F1 style scoring, from 1st pos up to 8th pos, descending
ScorePassing=1 // enter the score, use this if score is given for overtaking
ScorePenalty=0 // enter the score, use this if score is taken for crashing

[MOVIE RULES]
PolePositionMovie= // point to a pole position movie (BIK file?)
WinningMovie= // point to a winning movie
LosingMovie= // point to a losing movie
BeforeRaceCutSceneMovie= // point to a before race cut scene
AfterRaceCutSceneMovie= // point to an after race cut scene

[AUDIO RULES]
PlayerWinningAudio= // point to an MP3 file, played when player wins
PlayerPolePositionAudio= // point to an MP3 file, played when player got pole
PitWinningAudio= // point to an MP3 file, from pit crew, played when player wins
PitPolePositionAudio= // point to an MP3 file, from pit crew, played when player got pole

[WEATHER RULES]
RandomWeather=0 // 0=no, 1=yes
First20percent=Sunny // weather for the first 20% of race time/lap, not used if random is used
Second20percent=Cloudy // weather for the second 20% of race time/lap, not used if random is used
Third20percent=Rainy // weather for the third 20% of race time/lap, not used if random is used
Fourth20percent=Storm // weather for the fourth 20% of race time/lap, not used if random is used
Fifth20percent=Cloudy // weather for the final 20% of race time/lap, not used if random is used


Of course the rules can be much longer than what is written here. :)

This scripting system may not be perfect, but this similar and much simpler system exists in F1C (defined in a GDB file if my memory remember this correctly), and it was actually working pretty well for any mod.

I really am hoping that rF2 will include such series/championship scripting function, so we can recreate/simulate real world racing rules/events through user define scripts.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Tim,

sure the community will create mods, some good, some not so much, but maybe ISI could release some too.
I get your Howston point, but if there is an easy way to "correct" it, people wont be turned off.
Just look at Sports Interactive Football manager series. What they cant get license, they deliver in a reasonable fairytale version, and the community provide the fixes.
 
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