Too complicated

I would just like to voice what I think is already widely accepted with many other people regarding the over complicated process of getting servers up and running online with custom tracks.

In our experience of running public rf1 servers, it was hard enough to get the guys to download a custom track let alone what will be required in rf2. The term shooting ones self in the foot comes to mind... the general racers are just not going to be willing to do all what is required to play online.

The process needs to be incredibly simple regarding installation of mods and tracks. My group of friends who play rf1 have an average age of 50 and consume around 50 beers per night.... Explaining to these guys how to get an additional track working online will be an EPIC FAIL. The release from ISI gives you three tracks (with ISI's Megane mod), nobody is playing those any more because they are bored of the same three tracks, and yet there are many more tracks which we can not play... I really don't understand the logic. I know for a fact that if my group of friends hear of this, then no way would they consider upgrading from rf1.

Its an incredible shame for me because I love driving rf2 vs rf1 and was looking forward to seeing the rest of my mates joining me....
When we open a server at rf1 its full in no time even with our custom tracks... With our rf2 server average at the moment is 2-3 players!

rf2 needs to adopt the simplicity of rf1 or I dont see it working regardless of better physics and graphics.
If anything, I was hoping that the process of getting other players on additional tracks would have been a simplified process from rf1. Such as an auto downloader from the server to get any of the missing files required to play. Some guys dont even know what to do with a rar file as it is when they are trying to add a track.

Each time you add a little more complexity for the user, you loose more and more customers reducing your potential market share.
Where is the sense in that.

 

+1 to all of that.. Really this topic needs to be considered by ISI, Again WHY would you not be able to use ANY track that you have with ANY mod? That decision was a real poor one.

With each update now, I fail to see any major improvements that address a lot of the issues reported here

 

While I don't play online, I have to agree. Being a mod/admin on another game forum, I've had to explain installation to many different people, and it quickly gets tedious. Explaining things to just one person can get very drawn-out... I can't imagine trying to explain and coordinate downloads and installation with a whole server of people. Especially when those people likely just want to race.

Personally, I like the way games like Garry's Mod and Team Fortress handles this situation. When you join a server, it automatically downloads anything you need to play on that server. All the user needs to do is pick a server, wait a few minutes, and then start playing. With such a mod-intensive game, something like this would be very helpful.

Lastly, I'm not sure if online and offline are different, but offline you can use any track with any car series. Just select "All Cars and Tracks" as your series, and then you'll be able to race any car on any track.

 

Yes it is, I agree. This is something we are working on. I realize after six years, many people have become comfortable with the current system. This beta process is intended to help us mature a new system so hopefully it will not only give you the comfort of the past but also a more robust foundation for the future.

TBH we have been spending more time on other issues than I would have liked, but the focus is returning to mods.

 

Surely before any testing begins on your product you would start with the design. So you must have designed it this way, which obviously is not sitting well with the community. It's not a case of sticking with what people know but streamlining the current process, to make it even easier. You didn't do this you have made it more complicated, which could have a serious negative impact.

The community want to see the product succeed, and I especially do as I think you have demonstrated that you have a potentially great product. But it could all be for nothing unless the basic functionality of track implementation is resolved. This should be a priority concern for ISI. I only hope that you will rethink the current design and give the community a solution very soon.

 

As I have stated many times. I do not think the MODID system has to change. There are benifits for all in the system.

BUT other systems need to be in place to make it more workable and practical.

And thank you Gjon, that is all I have been after with my posts over the past months. At least it is being looked at because to be frank, there was a lot of us who where getting the impression of...

"its there, take it or leave it"

And that was making it hard to look forward when we had no idea of the direction it was going to take.

 

I think it speaks volumes that the tracks modders have released took so long to get online to the wider public. Some groups have made custom mods to get these tracks online but most servers are running the original tracks just because those are the only tracks we can figure out HOW to get online with.

Perfect example. The new GT cars just came out. If I want to set up a server with these cars at the excellent Mid-Ohio ttrack that just came out, I have to create a rfmod and everyone who stops by my server has to have the MOD, the TRACK and the RFMOD. With the old system, if you had the mod and the track, you were good to go.

 

Are you serious? So that means if i have the correct mod/car and i have the correct track i still cant join other ppl and race online? I also have to have an rfmod file thing to sort of join that car and track together? What the?........ With hundreds maybe thousands of mods, hundreds maybe thousands of tracks, now having those is still not good enough you also need that rfmod for all the combinations of tracks and cars????? Weird, you woulda thought having the correct car/mod and track is all thats needed.

People are going to start makign their own rfmods for particular cars/mods to work with particular tracks and as new tracks are comming out or people want to use other tracks theres going to be thousands of rfmods all over the place for particular cars/mods mated with certain tracks. At least with cars and tracks theres for the most part just 2 or 3 different ones of each, one gp79 mod, one Historix mod, a few different ppls nordschleife, etc

 

(googletrans)
if we are honest, nevertheless, the new ' Modding system ' is Bull****, a car or a track must be also to be played so without doing for hours files

 

A quote from mysefl from another topic. It's the only comment I will make in this thread, as I really get depressed by reading the overload on topics about this subject. Some decent forum moderation is soemthing that would be a big improvement for the ISI forum.

[quote="Marco Bijl]
Well, lets keep it realistic.

Tracks and car's are something you have to manually install yourself now with rf1, NKP, Race07 and name all the other simulation games. So, to expect ISI to give a sollution to that issue is not a realistic demand

Vmods, the ones I just gave the instruction to create for, are around 7 to 10 Kb. This is surely doable to to have distributed via a hosting server.

So, the sollution is quite simple. Supply 1 button on the client side, which enables to download the mod from the server it is hosting.
Add a function to the dedicated server to push the mod to the client (JUST the vmod).

Then supply a bit more info on the mod in the server selection screen, so people know where to download their tracks and cars.

The result?

A waterproof system against cheating and client/server mismatches. Combine this with the function to have vmods contain complete skin packs and league information, and the system becomes a huge improvement to any other game around.

People simply forget the reason why this BETA is released. It's for Modders, to test the functions and create content. Not to have a perfect, flawless game on the market now. And it's in humans nature to start flaming around then.[/quote]

 

Marco, what is the point of your idea?

ModID is intended to be used for filtering servers and/or allowing connect to a server. Untill you download mod from server you will probably not see it. So, how you want to download a mod?

Another issue is, that you need to have installed all components installed on server (represented by modif) even if you are sure you will be race only one car and one track.

Problem is not with downloading vmods from server. It is just wrong idea to identify content on both sides by pairing cars and tracks.

Because a lof of people don't take a time to understand situation and enumerate all possible issues. Probably including you. No offence.

BTW: overload of similar topic shouldn't surprise anybody. This stage of beta testing is intended to test just this part of software. Why do you want to moderate it in any way?

 

Moderation to 1 topic, is done to keep overview. Spamming all topics with the same content (dislike of the system) does NOT help the forum, does NOT help in finding answers, and does NOT improve reading... Thats why I want moderation. And please do not start telling me i do not know what Moderation is, as I am doing moderating for about 10 to 15 years now, on several succesfull fora.

Please note that its MODERATION I ask for, not CENSURATION! It's a big difference, as I find that everyone should be allowed to say what he wants to get off his chest. There should be a place to ventilate all thoughts about the new system.

In terms of taking time to understand, I dare to say that I have spend a HUGE amount of time understanding it. I KNOW what I am talking about, as I use it on a daily basis, and have spend about every free minute I have had the last months in rF2. But no offence taken offcourse

In terms of your second argument, that is BS in my opinion. Reason for that, with ALL other games you need to have the content installed as well. Like I said before, you can't expect ISI to solve that issue. There is however a way to improve on it, as it's easy to give some more info about the used content in a server via a information button in the server selection screen.

That leaves the vmod as the sole issue. To be honest, I do not see that issue, when the mod can be distributed via the server side. You do not need to see which name it has, as it's distributed by the server. There are no need for details. ModID's are made to prevent people from changing content when not allowed. To make sure all use the same content and versions in 1 server. It's not made just for filtering possibilities.

Lets give 1 example.

rF1:
I set up a server, containing track X and car Y. You want to join.
You go and search for the track X, and car Y, install them, and join my server. That is offcourse, if you guessed the right version of the track, as there is no guarantee in which version is used. You can't see that now.

rF2:
I set up a server, containing track X and car Y. You want to join.
You open the server selection screen, and look into the info to see which track and car (including version numbers) is installed, and look for the track and car. Download and install it.

So far, nothing different, besides the fact that this makes finding the right track and car more easy then in rf1 already, as you have more specific info from the server.
When both are installed, you start the launcher again, look for the server in the selection screen, and click a Download VMod button. The mod is distributed from the server to you, and you can join.

It's actually more easy this way then before as there is more info available.

 

Ok, I was hoping for a constructive conversation, but I hate insinuations. To bad those have to be made.

There is much more that can be included in a vmod, which can make it benefitial to a community. It's not "just" a link between car and track. So there are lots of reason to have your own vmod selection spoken from the community view.

There is actually 1 argument in your post, I can't discuss. The "What if we want to use a different track or car combo" is absolutely true. To me, I could not care less about it, as I never do that. I drive 1 car, 1 track per session. Next day something else again, but thats totally personal offcourse. I can understand the problem you are refering to here, and I agree with that as well. Thats one of the downsides of the system.
There are offcourse the AllCarsOnAllTracks mod's, but as content will grow, they will die out as you need ALL components installed tu use those mods. Thats not desirable, and not doable.

But like said, thats ok FOR ME! I do not mind that. So for ME there are no problems with this system at all.

That said, i am already done with the discussion again. I dislike it when people disagree, and start insinuating cause they feel somebody else is wrong in his views.
Second reason is that I only see people complaining how bad the current system is, and asking for the old one back. Instead, people should concentrate on helping ISI making this system work out.

 

You have been asked once. So again, please let us know about those all pros.
Point is that we cannot see that. On the other hand cons makes rf2 useless online for most of us (doesn't matter that you may live with it)

We did that, reporting that the feature makes problem and cannot be accepted in that form.

What else community should do? Do you mean a person/team which will manage all released tracks and cars updating ATAC vmod any time new version of component will be released? Even so... what about some beta/rc versions released for community just for open testing. Should it be included into ATAC or there should be another mod which will join all cars with all beta tracks, oh.. and what about beta cars? how to join them with all tracks even with beta ones?

And who will download whole bunch of components (tens GB of data) to satisfy dependencies defined in this single huge vmod? Surprised? You deserve for explanation:
- you can see a server with car A and track B installed
- you have installed the same into your rf2.
- you want to join
- bam.. you cannot, car A and track B is joined with other 200 tracks and 200 cars using vmod.. even if not used on this server right now.
- race starts in 30 mins, but for sure you are not able to download 100GB or data in such short time...

I'm not talking about why anybody must be forced to download and install all available stuff if want to race only one track with one car.

It might work under one condition: any one will have installed all cars and all tracks including all existing versions. But it will not happen.

Really, it's not a space shuttle. It is simply logic which has failed in that case.

 

Like said, from a community view, there are benefits. In terms of "club Racing", we are able to have customized rfactor UI's in the vmod. Use icons related to the communities, use custom sounds and/or other tweaks that might be of interest. In terms of League racing, the options are so much better then whatever is around now. Options for whole championships in the vmods, prepared skinpacks and all other stuff people now do with 3rd party software like SimSync. It's not ONLY bad things that come with the system. However, this is said by a Community Race Administrator, so I probably look at it in a different way then a regular racer.

Reporting something sucks and is not acceptable, is not helping out to make it work . At least thats not what I meant. What I mean is making suggestions. Helping out on making this work for all, while keeping the benefits the system has.
In short, there is only 1 problem (simply said). The issue is the "regular online racing". Non-community related driving, with friends or just other unknown people. If you race with a community, there is no problem as the track and car combo are predefined in an announced race evening.

Like said, I have to agree on you there. With the current system, that would be a problem. There are ways around that, but that needs tweaking of the system by ISI.
When I say "help ISI making this work", I mean making suggestions HOW this system CAN work for all. Well, most of us, all is undoable as it's impossible to please the whole world offcourse.

So, the actual question I would like to see addressed and answered, in a positive and constructive way, is what does ISI need to do to make this system work for both the communities, and the regular casual online racer.

F.i. what if the system was tweaked in a way that the vmod can be installed while NOT all components in the mod are installed? That would prevent the issue of downloading the Gb's in data.
Combine that with the option I gave to "push" the mod via the server side to the client, and you are back to the rf1 idea again, with all benefits for the communities included.
If you would like to have a go on a public server, you just see what track and car are used (via the info button/section I suggested f.i.), make sure you have those 2 installed (and ONLY those 2! Nothing else is needed), go to the server selection screen, have the vmod pushed over, and start driving. If you would like to change track or car, the server admin has to restart the server anyway, so a manual action is required anyway. No difference between rf1 and rf2 there. It's just that the admin needs to have his vmods sorted, and prepared.
If not all content is needed to install, and ISI fixes the Dedicated server with the opponent and car selections, the server admin can simply restart the server with the new content activated, whilst still using the same mod. No need to download Gb's of data, or at least download more then before in rF1.

There is 1 big difference here. Thats that I keep saying the system stays, but it is adjusted to fit the needs of most online racers. There is difference in that compared to stating the system is bad, and needs to be removed and go back to the old days. Progress is hard, difficult, and never comes easy. We need to help in a constructive way, instead of just complaining and saying the old days where better.

 

Hahahah When the discussion is done on a normal repsectfull matter like now, I always try to answer LesIU

The benefit, as seen from the community admin part of view, is that the UI, skins etc, are mandatory now, and supplied with 1 file, like in SimSync. I do not need any 3rd party software to distribute the files. When hosting a event for 50+ drivers, you want to make sure all files are ok, and this way, I have full control as administrator (again, just like simsync). Therefore, I like the functions.

In my opinion, the most simple option would be to enable the All Cars and Tracks version of the OFFLINE version in the server as well (The ANY RFM version that is). It is installed by default when you install rfactor, it's just not enabled for online.

That way, you would have the best of 2 worlds in my opinion.

1 - I can have my fun with the mods, and limiting the cars to be choosen from to those I select
2 - You can have a generic event, running any car on any track.

Offcourse, my previous suggestions stay valid, as the Info button, and the Download VMod button would still be a compliment to the game.

To me, this is THE best sollution. I understand the objections people have against the current setup, I just do not agree with them all, and think a lot of the side arguments are BS. Expecting ISI to supply a place to download all possible tracks for instance. People have no CLUE what kind of financial costs this brings...

It's is so easy to solve the cause of all this, and still leave the options open for Race Administrators like me, to make use of the limitations the current system has.

However, I am sure there is a reason why ISI has not enabled that, and I am not aware of that reason. It could be a valid reason, could be it is not a valid one. I can't tell.