Now THIS is a great summary of OUR user experience

Quite a lot of people yes. The reason you hear a lot of negativity around this, is because there are quite a few people gatekeeping ICEs, and since they are very loud about it, people tend to think nobody likes things like Fe (as you do for example).

 

Oh wow, so iRacing just hired the guy who basically created rF2's tire model. Hm, okay. I guess he wasn't needed here then.

 

I can't get myself to press like on this, although I guess it is good to know. And the timing with recently publicly announced S397 hiring... Well....

I guess he does not like talking about pizza as much. As expected to be from highly respectable professional while working at a sphere he loves and should be greatly valued.

Seriously, can see many reasons why he wouldn't want to come back here himself. No reason to name them loudly and add up to negativity, plus it would be just hollow assumptions. It is very disappointing, as I actually had some dreaming about rF2, that some of its original devs would come back to save it...

(and in before someone gets triggered by the word "pizza", I should explain that to me, in terms of simracing, it literally has become a symbol of ignorance and sabotage of rF2 and bullying of people)

 

Tbf, I think I haven't seen a single post from Terence Groening connected to rF2 since a very long time so I am really not that sure how much he was involved the last couple of years. Besides that, iRacing is US based and ISI has allways been aswell wich propably contributes to how some people choose their jobs. I know, we are living in a connected digitalized world, but it still factors in.

Nevertheless, certainly knowledge that would have been very usefull for rF2.

 

@hitm4k3r You did not see a single post, really ? The last couple of years ? The last couple of years, again ? How is that even relevant to the situation, did you seriously just judge his competence right there ?

I suggest you to read this: https://racesimcentral.net/an-interview-with-terence-groening-master-of-physics/

 

There are a few points to consider:

• ISI is USA based so does iR. 397 is not!!!
• iR poses a new challenge that i guess after 20 years someone might be looking for
• Potentially iR salary could be higher for many reasons
• ISI is a company actually working on physics, 397 is barely maintaining it (the updates history clearly confirm this). They changed their instance about it just recently with motorsport acquisition and new positions wanted
• 397 is seeking for their own physics dev hints that they want to proceed with their own path, which he might not agree with or be confident that there will be the freedom he desires
  
• 397 physics updates history indicates that improving physics is not they priority at all (so far, again it seems to be changing), contrary to iR which recently had a lot of updates that touched the physics/tire

Put all that together i believe it is no brainer jumping from ISI to iR over 397, specially for an american.

Statements like "i guess he wasn't needed here then" is extremely naive and actually pathetic. 397 could have used ISI as third party to work only on the physics but they didn't, so if today the physics is the same with the same old bugs/unfinished stuff is not due to ISI but to 397.

 

I would consider the new tyre in the Formula Pro and BMW M4 to be, at least, a try at improving physics. Whether that is with better knowledge on how the tyre operates in different condutions or how to better model it in the current engine.

 

I think you misunderstood my post a littlebit. I know who the guy is as we are using the infamous tires with the Greoning branding since ages and it would have been great to have him onboard for rF2. But people usualy don't take a job based on what other people wish, that's how it is. I would just make a guess that the local factors and money play a much more important role.

That said, you don't sell sims on the consumer market with tire models like in rF2 anymore, if the rest of the product is below genre standards or garbage. As much as I still love rF2 for it's handling and FFb, wich is down to the great tire model and car dynamics, you could argue that it was a fail for ISI. We wouldn't be having this conversation if S397 wouldn't have picked up the pieces. And objectively speaking, I am still not sure if the tire model of rF2 is it's biggest drawback right now. There are other areas of this sim that need much more work to make this product not just a tech demo and I am not sure if Terence would have made a difference in that regard. He is propably not a UI specialist or backend engineer.

 

He's the G in TGM, but I don't think he was involved in much rF2 development for 2-3 (?) years before S397 took over.

 

Exactly. Btw, I would also like to point out that there seems to be a bit of a misconception, that ISI only cared for physics and nothing else while S397 never seemed to care for physics development according to some users. That's not entirely true and besides a few small adjustments shortly before the take over there weren't that many physics updates for rF2 either during the ISI days. It also wakes the question if there is a bit more to producing a consumer software than a few "nerdy" techheads going all in, when we consider that rF2 development and community activity was allmost nonexistent before S397 took over. Everyone will have his or her own priorities and points that they deem important in a racing sim, but I would argue that you need to develop a sim in a much broader scale than it was done under ISI in the early days.

 

As far as I am aware rF2 wasn't progressing that much in last 2-3 years before S397 took over. And after S397 took over game did evolve indeed, but in such areas like AI, vehicle dynamics, tires there were nearly no progressing. IIRIC AI even become worse. So specialist like T.G. would be extremely valuable, and probably nobody else could bring more hope than that man for obvious reasons.

I fully agree with the first part, personally I did not assume T.G. wasn't wanted. Way more likely just didn't want himself. Who knows really, for us it is not necessary to know. Personally I wouldn't come back to project which I have sold, just to become ordinary employee there. It just makes little sense. Let alone now being a sub-project that is supposed to feed other games, primarily with stuff that it was created by you, for Motorsport Games. It would just be weird. Besides that it makes little sense to look back to something that you already decided to leave. I guess person like that would come back only purely driven by heroism and if many people wanted him back very much.

Also IMO it is true what you have said about consumer market sims being way bellow standard of rF2. It is really a shame, consumer simracing really is becoming whole different niche from what simracing would be ideally. Consumer simracing actually has been blending and mixing in with dying arcade driving games genre and lesser prestigious simcades, which no one wants to be. Pursue of realism in consumer simracing niche is indeed over, perhaps new features are still wanted for immersion, but the depth of these features and delicate details that really makes stuff real is just not appreciated by most, mostly perhaps because most people can't comprehend these things, and I hate to see this virus being taken over in rF2 as well. And back to iRacing, it might very likely to become the only sim soon that developers sincerely will remain pursuing finesse at realism of physics.

Also you are right that physics definitely isn't weakest link in rF2 right now, it is strongest. But physics professional, especially one that made it in the first place could still make good physics better, probably would easily implement proper clutch simulation, would fix the broken AI finally which it seems S397 will never be able to, there are probably problems with solid axle simulation, there is a lot to want from wet surfaces simulation, changing conditions, temperatures.... So even if weakest stuff about rF2 is related to still rough graphics, now even worse UI than before which is absolutely ridiculous to be so after so much development, sounds, several general game bugs and issues, it does not make improvements for AI and physics needed less, especially if you'd have dedicated pro working on it, basically god who created it in the first place.

Last but not least Motorsports Games bought rF2 mainly for the things he did, if I understand the situation correctly. It makes him extremely important. But it is almost clear that MG does not plan to master or improve his work a lot. I doubt they would find other person if they would try. What they will do, will be what most of the other devs did using gMotor, they'll take extremely advanced physics and downgrade and simplify them a lot, but in a way for 80% of consumer market to still get illusion of hardcore simulation, because most people just doesn't know reality that well. Although subconsciously everyone understand, but very few people can tell what is happening, let alone being able to put those things down mathematically and then tailor that stuff in into a big complex code in a way that everything works smoothly and as intended. Just imagine what it means to be three experts in one: vehicle dynamics expert, mathematics expert and coding expert, and on top of that you also become an expert of the software you are creating. Now take physics expert away and use much less of mathematics expertise, and it would probably be difficulty level of reworking UI, which took many years for S397, and is worse than previous. I'd never use bad UI integration of not improving physics, but I understand I am minority who is still not satiated by level of realism currently achieved, half of sirmacers now will probably continue playing Assetto Corsa, thinking that it is as far as realism goes.

People just don't need good stuff anymore. And perhaps only people in iRacing who pays into submission still somehow appreciates good stuff, but I guess it also depends on sanity and attitude of their king and iR keeping its grace.

 

I fully agree with your post. Definitely he could bring a lot, but i guess both him and 397 are going in the opposite direction. I truly believe that he has more freedom and potential in iR rather than rF2, not because rF2 sucks or something like this but because, just like you said, there is a high probability that MG will seek to a mainstream simulation.

Unfortunately i fear that the way that MG subgames will improve their physics and stability will be by notching down the simulation but at the same time maximize the behavior in that degree of simulation, things already saw in the past and honestly not always the worst choice, actually a smart one if you struggle to maximize a higher tier of simulation.

 

That makes him even more valuable. I'm wandering if there was any chancees he could have signed for S397. @88mphTim ?

 

https://www.studio-397.com/2021/10/roadmap-update-october-2021/

So S397 actively confirmed its not worth working on a new ingame HUD, although it's trash, but completely remade the driver labels, which the majority of users have disabled? I will never understand why those decisions are so out of this world...

 

I've never used the labels. I don't like those things flying on the cars. But it's fair to say that many people, a lot of times have asked for the labels.

 

I'm curious to know, how do you do to know the driver count, to know that most of them deactivate the labels? ... How do you know that most users disable it?

 

They've re-enabled driver labels? Hell yeah! They weren't gone in devmode, which is where I spent most of my time, but I'm really happy they're back in normal version.

 

Well, I don't know the number I just don't know anyone who have it enabled within the communities I'm in. I guess people in Sim racing communities just don't use it. And as rF2 is not quite the game for non sim enthusiast, this was just an educated guess. But here is a big BUT, S397 wouldn't know either so it was more to intensify the fact that soo many users are shaking their heads about this.
And I'm not talking about that it's bad reenabling and refreshing it, which is cool for the people interested in it. I'm mainly talking about their decision NOT to touch the HUD, but the labels, which might fall under the same category and now quality within parts of the Sim differ even more. Which would be fine if they said they would redo the HUD but they said its not planned.