What we "DON'T" want Studio 397 to do

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by jerrymcc, Sep 23, 2016.

  1. Tom Satherley

    Tom Satherley Registered

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    an iracing type driver safety score + organised racing on official servers would be nice to improve the numbers of people playing day to day. Face it, without such a system you have dead games/sim online (even AC) except for organised leagues. I'm not sure if this should be a subscription? Because I still don't understand what we paid extra for rf2 online, considering we still rent the servers and organise the racing. All ISI provides is a server browser.
     
  2. Guimengo

    Guimengo Guest

    The idea behind lifetime was to offer a sort of Season Pass, with the high entry fee covering all future content, with regular income coming from standard licenses renewing yearly. I wonder how many standards there are out there, and how often they renew.
     
  3. lordpantsington

    lordpantsington Registered

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    When did ISI state lifetime has anything to do with content? Please provide your source.
     
  4. Guimengo

    Guimengo Guest

    Figured you'd been around long enough to have seen it written. You can look it up.
     
  5. David Wright

    David Wright Registered

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    I must admit I don't understand the link with new content and the lifetime on-line access. Clearly people who haven't bought lifetime are currently entitled to "free new content". If Studio 397 move to paid DLC then all rF2 owners are equally affected.

    I would have thought that the issue would be if Studio 397 decide to give everyone "free" on-line access. Then those with the lifetime option might feel "cheated".
     
  6. Lgel

    Lgel Registered

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    No more than users who bought RF2 full price when the product was very limited in content and quality, against users who bought it at a reduced price later, with more content, less bugs, and better looks.

    Cheers.
     
  7. Marc Collins

    Marc Collins Registered

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    What I don't want Studio 397 to do is wait to start rolling-out the myriad small bug fixes that plague many of the cars and tracks. I know most people are waiting for the big, exciting items, but what would excite me more than anything else is Reiza-style responsiveness to user-identified issues. For example, fixing the reflection issues on some of the historic 60's cars that we have been now been waiting literally years for should have been patched within days. Steam allows this to occur pretty painlessly and all the bad memories of botched upgrades are over, even for rF2. Main grandstand reflection issue at Portugal...and a dozen or so z-fighting issues at the same track--should have been fixed in days, not still waiting with no fix in sight. Why? Because then the track would be/will be perfect. Why do all the work of making it 99% perfect and then not finish the job? The LOD issues and rear bumper cover flashing on the NSX. Etc., etc., etc. Unfortunately there is a very long list.

    That's the part of the old rF2 that I will be happy to forget and it is a sign of good faith to be responsive to these small issues as well as to work on the grand plans of the future.
     
  8. lordpantsington

    lordpantsington Registered

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    I can look for it, yes, but will find nothing because what you state is simply not true. You made the statement, the onus is on you to provide support.

    The yearly fee is for the ability to play on-line, and the ability to auto-update (patch) through the launcher. Can someone manually update or install a mod and play offline with content of their choosing after their online access has expired? Yes.
     
  9. T1specialist

    T1specialist Registered

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    You can check updates from the launcher nowadays even if you don't have online sub.
     
  10. Adrianstealth

    Adrianstealth Registered

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    397 should forget backward compatibility with existing mods (cars/tracks)

    Except for the main official ISI content ,

    modders of 3rd party content can update independently if they wish

    With the exception of a few good quality 3rd party mods the rest are pretty terrible

    I'd be happy with just a handful of cars & tracks on original release of rf2 dx11 version
    Then look forward to official track releases
     
  11. T1specialist

    T1specialist Registered

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    Without backwards compatibility they would need to redo all tracks and cars which can delay the dx11 release a lot. That's a lot of work if they need to redo or add some textures as well. If they need to edit skin files too then it is a ton of work. In the end that probably needs to be done anyways at some point to take the full benefit of the new dx11 shaders but it is maybe better to do it over time instead of trying to do it all at once.

    But if the shaders we have now do kinda work okayish in dx11 (so that similar values provide similar results) then that could work as a stopgap measure for mods too. And it would keep older mods compatible as well which in the end is a good thing. Doesn't make sense to drop years of work just like that. In worst case scenario you have weeks or months without any mods at all when everybody are trying to backwards engineer the new completely undocumented shaders. After all what they will probably do is to first update the game engine to dx11, then update their own tools, work on their own content and finally work on the tools we modders use. So if someone relies on something like gjed to get his 3d models into the game it might take even a year before the updated tools are available... At which point any sane person has lost interest and moved on to other things.

    Backwards compatiblity could also limit how good the dx11 can look. After all there is no point making dx11 if you are not going to take the full benefit from it.
     
  12. Gijs van Elderen

    Gijs van Elderen Registered

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    a Bumb spec map T1 in dx9 is a Bump spec map T1 in dx11. Just the common render pipe line is different. I don't think they need to redo all shaders seperatly. "Just" the rendering.

    Just my thoughts...
     
  13. T1specialist

    T1specialist Registered

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    I think you need/want more values on the rf2 dx11 shaders to make the shaders look better in dx11. I'm not any kind of shader pro at all but for example there is no proper fresnel available in rf2 at all. Glass for example looks pretty poor in rf2 and I think not upgrading the shader settings to give more control would be a big lost opportunity.
     
  14. jpalesi

    jpalesi Registered

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    You don't know what T1 mul T2 is (which can be seen in the car modding section), but you're able to do a full speech about DX11, shader compatibility and everything ? That's quite impressive.
     
  15. stonec

    stonec Registered

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    I assume the game will look nearly identical after first DX11 implementation, at least iRacing did. The only difference was in performance. Then afterwards they can thinker with better shaders and FX etc., once they have the game running in DX11. I think Marcel confirmed in some interview that backwards compatibility will be maintained.
     
  16. T1specialist

    T1specialist Registered

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    I don't know how rf2 shaders are setup in gjed because they are not explained anywhere. Luckily there are people on this forum who have figured them out and are kind enough to answer question.

    I think most of what I wrote is common sense. No need to get snarky. I can create textures and have basic knowledge about how to set up shaders but I would have no idea how to do it in witcher 3, world of warcraft or pcars. I can do it in ac and to some degree in rf2 though. Just because I don't know how exactly one specific game does something doesn't mean I don't have any kind of overall viewpoint worth writing about it in the general sense.
     
  17. TheLeadWolf

    TheLeadWolf Registered

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    My 2cents would be that:
    * I really hope mods won't get broken by migration to DX11. I am not familiar with DX9 vs DX11 differences, (in fact I only coded DX8), but I suspect my hope is unrealistic, some stuff will get broken. Would be nice if we could keep DX9 version of rF2 around somehow, not updated, otherwise there will be nothing comparable to enjoy for a while.
    * Would rather see platform/tools improvements (really like rf1->rf2 converter idea), instead of DLC and content. Though yet again, not necessarily realistic - people need to be paid.
    * I hope they won't prioritize eye candy over plafrom/quality/performance. VR is another story, hopefully it won't get postponed.
    Cheers!
     
  18. Depco

    Depco Registered

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    Well you cant really do VR well without DX11. DX11 will open some performance gains which should help lessen the Computer strain needed for good eye candy... it is a symbiotic relationship I think.
     
  19. WiZPER

    WiZPER Registered

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    Sorry, but this says more about your knowledge - or lack of - about how modding and the graphical platform works. If you think that all current content is going to get an instant complete rewamp, you need to tone down your expectations, even the official content will require backward compatibility.
     
  20. Adrianstealth

    Adrianstealth Registered

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    I have been under the impression that components ( tracks cars ) would require a rework for a dx11 transfer unless it's done in a half measure/semi-conversion way

    I say go whole hog, unrestricted dx11 glory -tad more work for component transfer but better quality
    better optimisation & better performance

    Let the mod world catch-up, most mods are below standard anyhow & just give rf2
    A bad name

    Of course everything current compatible on current dx9 rf2 so could still be used that way not that I'd bother

    My understanding could be incorrect of course it's many based on dev info from Iracings transfer to dx11
     

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