OT: How to Improve Single Player Career Modes?

Compared to years ago, AI in sim racing has progressed in leaps and bounds in terms of realism. However, I feel that single player (particularly career modes) are lacking. I decided to take a look at what it could take to make sim racing's single player experience a more realistic and enjoyable one:

http://simracingpaddock.com/opinion/sim-racing-how-to-improve-single-player/

What are your thoughts?

 

it does seem a shame when RF2 has the best AI in the business.

Is there a season generator, like someone did for Raceroom? Is there any custom championship generator out there?

 

My thoughts are that in an ideal world ISI (I'll use them as we're here afterall!) would need a seperate coder to be specified the job of Career/Championship Creator. I think it's too much to ask of the current team to work extra (alongside everything else) in creating what essentially would be a massive part of the Offline experience.

So hypothetically if Dave got the job then I'd like to see something like this in two parts:

Part 1) Essentially an in-game Championship Season editor, where the User selects the cars/tracks and points system and has at it. More advanced than what we had in rf1 of course with the ability to add Penalty Points, Proper Race Weekends, Damage occured in Race 1 would be evident in Race 2 etc stuff like that.

Part 2) This would be the Career, where the player starts off in Karting or "Other" low level form with a small bank balance (maybe some form of Sponsorship backing), from that point onwards there are "branches" of which the career path could take; i.e. the Left Branch is all Open Wheeler so from Karts to Skip Barber -> F3.5 -> F1 (insert otheres where needed), the Right Branch would be for tin tops so Clio Cup -> Carrera Cup -> DTM (insert others where needed) but have the ability to "swap" Branches at the end of each season. Maybe have a seperate Right Branch specifically for Endurance Careers so from Clio Cup -> GT3 -> GT2 -> LMP etc. Or even make a Region Based Branch, so USA would be Dirt Oval -> Nationwide -> Sprint Cup.
This would give the user a Target to aim for, all the while earning more £££ to be able to afford to either buy the next Car or "buy into" a Team in the next stage of his/her career branch path. Think of it as Levelling Up in an MMORPG but without the Skills Buttons and all that guff!

Of course the major problem with Part 2 is what Cars/Tracks to use, ideally it would be Official ISI Content Only as with 3rd party mods there's always the problem of unfinished work/issues/bugs etc, but a way to pre-choose and add in your own mods to create your own Career Branch would be cool if the mods & tracks are upto scratch.

To go with the above though there would need to be more advanced AI, although in its current state RF2s is certainly good enough there is still room for improvement:
- AI Jump Starts resulting in Drive Through Penalties
- AI Pit Errors
- AI Memory, just as in NASCAR the drivers remember who took them out early on, the AI do too, maybe move to an advanced "Career" memory where AI drivers remember racing against you in the Karts.
- AI Personalities, as above and even though we have them now to some extent they could be more advanced; Consistently better in one Section of Track than the other two over the race weekend, better on certain types of tracks, better on different tires, Consistently has issues in a certain corner of a track. Basically make them even more Human like than they already are and not so predictable.
- AI Advance alongside the Human, some of the AI could "learn" as they progress up the branches as well so we get a similar effect to what Hamilton & Rosberg have, where they raced each other in Karts and now for the F1 title.

 

i think idea 1 will be the most possible, idea 2 looks to be very advanced of what we have in any sim/game. Not sure ISI will be interested in this route. Good post though..

I hope someone mods in a custom season mode...

off topic....: is there a carrera cup mod around?

 

http://isiforums.net/f/showthread.p...alpha-testing-offline-championship-discussion

 

It's really a shame that the best AI in the business don't have a championship generator, ideally a career mode would be ideal, I remember my days with forza, even if the game was lacking in the sim aspect the single player mode was a blast, working your way up the ladder, I also miss a school mode like gtr 2, it's like you expected to know all the stuff, a simple school explaining green track, tyre wear and a way to learn tracks would help a lot to the newcomers. I remember my first experience, I took the the formula isi in silverstone in a green track, lets say I left unsastisfied, if the sim started me with the clio and a track wih some rubber, my first impression would have been different.

 

eltidi's school idea is a good add-on.

There are definitely two different expectations for a career mode. First is to have seasons and the second is the ladder to the top. A top-quality career mode will have both and not box you into one form or the other.

Also, different ladders exist. Someone who considers NASCAR to be top level is less likely to start in karts than someone who wants to go F1. This also means a good sim is going to need content in areas that they weren't necessarily planning for.

 

I realise were talking in game here, but that's exactly what I'm trying to create via simmunity.


Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

 

Nope Paul. You run a preconfigured race or series against AI, then upload your results. These results are the compared to others doing the same.

You can also just have an AI only championship of your design if you like.

Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk

 

There is a small application you can download and it captures or applies race settings, then there is the website which holds the data.

That depends on how you see things I guess.

My perspective is this: I do not have time in the right places to race in a league, so I can race in pickup groups or against the AI.
Often when I would like to race, there is little activity online and those that are there are driving something, I have no interest in.
So I race against the AI.

Now when I race against the AI, there is added importance... a higher purpose.

The website will calculate the results in a series and it is position dependant, so if I can consistently finish high in the order, I can expect to be competitive with others racing the same scenario.
If for example, after 5 races 3 people have won every race, then the positions are sorted by total race finishing time for that person.

So no, I don't have a direct relationship with my competition. However, I am well aware of who my competition is and what they are capable of and every race I'm doing, foremost in my mind is beating them, not the AI i'm actually racing.

*I'll add that my designs will all have custom AI specifically tuned.

I guess the bottom line is, we work with the tools we have.

 

If you sincerely want to know what I think then go here and here

 

The simplicity on create a Championship Mode for who are able to create a complex software as rF2 plus the consistent refusing on implement it on the simulator make me really resigned.

 

I probably know the answer but need to understand the question. What is a "season generator"?

 

Simmunity supports custom seasons and points calculation

 

With regard to humans, the answer is yes. You will share history with other drivers and will have (real) career statistics such as number of races, podiums, wins, championships, head-to-head records against human rivals, number/% races finished, personal best results/times, lap records, etc. etc. etc.

The number one goal of Simmunity is connect sim racers...

 

Understood Paul.

One thing you may not be comprehending is that the site can assist with that exact scenario.
Tools have been or are in development. The first being the ability to save and share race configurations.

I'm also developing a very easy guide to follow for AI tuning ( in addition to the wonderful thread Marc created) and in my early testing the results have been quite incredible.
While this can be a lot of work, it has been done privately for years and now there is a way to share those.

So you can create and tune a championship and use the website to collate the results(so you and AI only, no outsiders), track stats, then share the package if you think it is good enough.
The site is still young and if there is enough interest to be able to gauge whether more investment would be beneficial, the feature list will grow.
Things like Career mode, driver contracts, salaries...

In the short term, in a basic track config for AI tuning I'll be adjusting:
AIW, RCD, HDV and VEH files in addition to creating custom content and configurations driver profiles so that a championship feels like a real thing.
When I'm done you can download and apply it so at the very least you'll have a good AI race to attend, at best a complete championship.

 

Plugin is a definite possibility, it's really a matter of is it worth the investment if general interest is low?

With a plugin, you'd just have to signup and install it but an external suite would be required for the management of data.

Yep and to date, no one has come up with any method to do that.
Much like some people create tracks and most drive them, I suspect the same can be true here. I've mucked about with AI editing before but now I haven't had the chance to share that work, it's inspiring me to dig deeper and create a full package. I'd like to think at least a few others would enjoy this 'intro to modding'

So you can be most people if you like and not worry about any settings, simply download and apply my files then race.
I think the only core thing that is missing for you is the automatic ability. I just wish I had something ready for you to sample, hopefully not too far away now!

 

I was talking about in game not a 3rd party program, I already have something else that works just fine for that.

 

Can I ask what your using?