rFactor and Other Racing Sims

SouthPawRacer · **on:** October 18, 2009, 03:28:17 AM

Yep, I do simracing. Almost religiously.

If you're not familiar with these games, they're basically PC games that provide quite possibly the most accurate commercially-available simulation of how cars drive. They aren't fully realistic but they're almost too close for comfort.

These games - mainly rFactor - live through their mods. There are huge communities everywhere dedicated to creating addon cars and tracks for these games, and hosting online events using them.

My current sim games that I own are:

Image Space Incoporated's rFactor, loaded to the brim with mods

SimBin's RACE 07 - The Official WTCC Game, the official game of the FIA World Touring Car Championship, and its expansion packs (also loaded with mods

)

...And that's about it.

I race in many leagues (online championships) using these games. Some of the leagues make video recaps of the races, some of which you can see me in. They weren't my best races, but they were the only ones that featured me in any length. These two are from the RaceDepartment Super Touring League, which uses fictional, but no less challenging, cars.
They are located here: Clicky (Look for "Gardiner"... I spin, thus losing a good position

)

And here: Clicky (I appear near the end of the video; again, look for "Gardiner")

Well, that's it for now. I may post some of my reviewing work for simracing sites later on.

JitteryDragon · **Reply #1 on:** October 18, 2009, 04:08:34 AM

I'm impressed.

I can barely handle my own car... let alone a racing sim <_<

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #2 on:** October 19, 2009, 06:18:37 AM

It's quite fun once you get the hang of it JitteryDragon. I can say with confidence that it's going to help my real life driving. Case in point, I hired out a go-kart at the local track back in 2007. To say the least, I suffered the fate of many characters in your vids.

But then in February 2008 I started this, and later on I went back to have another crack. Bam, it was amazing how much I had changed. I was taking corners flat-out that I would have lifted off for before, and I even corrected a slide...

It's a nice relaxation tool as well... well, for me at least. When I'm down, I just take the rFactor F12009 mod around Suzuka and all my troubles melt away...

Anyway, as well as driving in these games, I write about 'em too. I'm on the RaceDepartment media team, writing reviews on new mods and games. I recently did a review on Race On, the newest expansion for RACE 07.
Clicky
And I've also written reviews on mods. Here's one I wrote about the Endurance Series mod for rFactor:
Me too
As it happens, I also write race reports for a league I'm involved in.
And me three
I gotta say, it's kinda weird writing about yourself in the third person.

DarkHououmon · **Reply #3 on:** October 19, 2009, 09:22:29 AM

Sometimes I play racing games, but so far the only racing game I really enjoyed enough to buy the game was Nascar Rumble. Sure it isn't realistic with the ability to use power-ups, but it was the power-ups that made the game fun and exciting for me, not to mention it put in more tension (especially since you never knew when an opponent would get his hands on a dangerous power-up like a tornado or the freeze).

I have tried playing Gran Turismo 2, which is more realistic than Nascar Rumble (and thus no power-ups) but I found I couldn't enjoy it all that much.

Belmont2500 · **Reply #4 on:** October 19, 2009, 04:13:23 PM

I enjoy racing games I think the most memorable was a popular arcade racer I played alot back in the day called Daytona USA, darn that game was good.

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #5 on:** October 23, 2009, 07:38:13 AM

Yeah, arcade racers can be heaps of fun. I can have the time of my life playing Burnout Revenge, but it seems to me that I get more out of setting up a car precisely to suit my driving style and the conditions, and then racing it to get a good result. I enjoy the challenge of tackling the car and track and experimenting with different lines and braking points. I feel this sense of accomplishment when a car I've tailor-fitted to myself gets me to the top of the grid - even more so when I win. But that hasn't happened in months... :unsure: Still, that only drives me to succeed even more.

But when I need to chill out, I just fire up the PS2 and blow up some computer-controlled cars.

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #6 on:** November 09, 2009, 12:45:43 AM

Finished a great event last night - World Touring Car Championship 2007 at Motorsport Arena Oschersleben in Germany. I came SO CLOSE to winning the second race but I was hit down to 3rd in the last lap... <_<

One of my buddies made two videos of the racing...
Click me...
...And me

I'm driving the Alfa Romeo (that lovely-looking red car...

).

2007excalibur2007 · **Reply #7 on:** November 09, 2009, 01:46:06 AM

NEED FOR SPEED FTW. I've played like almost every NFS game that EA made - Porsche Unleashed, Hot Pursuit 2, Most Wanted, etc - you name it. And all them rocked, especially the latest one: SHIFT. Now THAT is the most reallistic-looking sim-racer I've ever seen!

Oh, it seems we have something in common, SouthPawRacer, because I FRIGGIN' LOVE BURNOUT!!! I think Revenge and Paradise are the best. 3 was awesome too though, but Dominator is the one that I didn't enjoy the most, particularly because there's no online mode. Don't know about Legends, because I don't even have a PSP to start with. But overall, it's an awesome franchise. (indeed it is

)

Another series of sim-racers that I like is the Gran Turismo series, but yes, I have to agree with DarkHououmon - it gets pretty boring and repetitive after awhile. Sure there are real circuits and a HUUGEE line-up of cars from a variety of manufacturers, but the fun of it just dissappears after playing for some time, especially when you're doing endurance races. Gawd, I'd hate if I have to waste precious hours of my life going around the track again and again and again and again, so I went B-spec mode (in GT4) and fast-forwarded the race, lol.

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #8 on:** November 09, 2009, 03:07:53 AM

Quote from: 2007excalibur2007,Nov 9 2009 on 12:46 AM

And all them rocked, especially the latest one: SHIFT. Now THAT is the most reallistic-looking sim-racer I've ever seen!

Ah, Shift! We have an absolutely amazing community for that game over at RaceDepartment, and there are heaps of mods available for the PC version. I haven't played the game myself (don't have a PS3 or an X360, and my computer wouldn't be able to handle the PC version <_< ) but evidently it's meant to be heaps of fun.

What version of Shift do you have? PC, PS3 or Xbox 360?

JitteryDragon · **Reply #9 on:** November 09, 2009, 03:08:40 AM

Burnout was quite a nice diversion. If anything, my preference for racing was the World Rally Championship games... with a force feedback wheel

But yeah, as I said before... not much of a racing sim fan. My preference lies with flight simulators (IL2 Sturmovik is my fave) and Mech simulators (Steel Battalion was awesome fun

)

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #10 on:** November 09, 2009, 03:11:45 AM

Quote from: JitteryDragon,Nov 9 2009 on 02:08 AM

My preference lies with flight simulators (IL2 Sturmovik is my fave) and Mech simulators (Steel Battalion was awesome fun )

Flight sims, eh? I've got an old friend who's really into those... and I sometimes saw my late cousin playing MechWarrior 3 when I went over to his house.

2007excalibur2007 · **Reply #11 on:** November 09, 2009, 03:37:47 AM

Quote from: SouthPawRacer,Nov 9 2009 on 02:07 PM

What version of Shift do you have? PC, PS3 or Xbox 360?

I have the PC version, but then again, I couldn't play the game often because I have a s*** PC, so I'd have to play on either my sister's MacBook Pro (Windows XP is already installed on there), or go to my friend's house and play on his PC. That is, my sister has to go to college (bringing the MacBook with her), and she only comes back home on weekends, and my friend that I mentioned has gone to visit Australia for, idk, a week? So yeah, again, I couldn't play often.

I really need to get myself a gaming PC... <_<

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #12 on:** November 09, 2009, 05:59:49 AM

If you're interested Excalibur, racedepartment.com hosts loads of mods for the PC version. There are things like custom car liveries, stuff to eliminate the blur efect (thus increasing performance) and even a mod that alters the cars' physics to make them handle "more realistically".

Just head over here to check things out, and you can register if you want. (Find me on there as Rhys Gardiner - I'm more active in the Race On forums but I occasionally check the NFS: Shift forums to see what's happening

.)

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #13 on:** December 07, 2009, 09:29:21 AM

Well, since my new PC has Photoshop installed on it, I thought I might try my hand at skinning a car for a league I'm participating in. Took me a while to learn the basics... but here's what I've come up with so far.

2007excalibur2007 · **Reply #14 on:** December 07, 2009, 10:14:55 AM

That's actually pretty cool. Me likes.

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #15 on:** January 15, 2010, 04:03:12 AM

Hey, I've just stumbled across some old videos that Tim Hogendoorn made about a GT championship league last year. They're the best I've seen from him (his other simracing vids are awesome too).

The RaceDepartment GT Championship was one of my home site's biggest leagues, with around 70 competitors spread across GTR Evolution's equivalents of the FIA GT1, GT2 and GT3 regulations. I didn't take part myself, but it was quite interesting to follow.

GT Sport @ Istanbul video summary - Tim dedicated this video to the memory of Chris Noble, as you can see at the start. Chris was an awesome guy, I had the privilege of racing against him and he was a great driver. He was due to compete in the race this video summarises, but he died of a burst Aorta on January 3, 2009. When they found out, his teammates changed to all-black cars and drove a lap of honour on the track before the race. That Red Bull-liveried car you can see in the passing shots at the start was the one that he drove.

RDGTC Season Summary video - stunning summary video that condenses the whole season into seven minutes and twenty-one seconds.

SouthPawRacer · **Reply #16 on:** January 28, 2010, 11:10:37 AM

This is me taking a 1993 Williams FW15C F1 car around the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari, in its 1994 layout.

Clicky