Just to pin my own comment: I'm talking about the last 10% or 20% of 'wiggle room', of course data and telemetry DOES point you in the right direction. It can get you extremely close when matching telemetry, probably within 5%, but the 'feel' of the car has more wiggle room than 5%.
Hi Neils! Does any tyre model you know of take into account thread spread on wet tyres/conditions? Is there any advantage in increasing wet tyre pressures to better deal with water/puddles in any sim you know of? Thanks!
The biggest difference in my opinion is the brake pedal feel. Sims need brake pedal force feedback!!! Sometimes more then a steering wheel FFB, its by far the most important feel in real car on a real track. They overheat, they fade, they come back, you can tell what is overheating by how is the pedal feeling, you can feel what the wheels are doing thru it in a way too. Brake pedal FFB Neil! Mr Pedals maker! Thank me later :)
@untitled. I put a replacement much stiffer spring into my g27 pedals and it made a big difference (it's still not great but much better than it was) so much so that I still use those pedals to this day with my thrustmaster wheel (IMO the logitech pedals with spring mod are better than even the t3pa pedals I also have) I put in the stiffer spring on brake and used the original brake spring in the clutch and used the original clutch spring on the accelerator so all springs are stiffer than default and it makes a huge difference. search ebay for g29 brake mod
No spring can do it justice, every time i come back from a trackday its the same, i cant feel my brakes, no matter how stiff my pedals are. Its about feedback from your wheels, not about how stiff the pedal is. Lets make a simracing revolution!! VIVA LA Brake pedal FFB! The Steering FFB and the car feel tends to be close enough to be able to quickly relate, but not even close on the brake pedal!
This is in fact imo quite doable as a DIY with todays tech. You get so much telemetry for motion you can use. Ive built G seats 2 dof/3dof rigs and so on. Sticking a motor on the brake pedal really isnt an issue. Just need someone to program specifically for brakes or use some compromise. You can stick G force and grip levels and change its feel via a motor with some springs for a quick example.
I just love how you can all the time find people arguing about how this car or that has 2 mm difference for something in the sim compared to real life and the realism is therefore completely ruined and the car is not worth the money, whereas here Niels is basically saying there's still a fair amount of unreliable data or guesswork, no matter how accurate you try to be. And the part about expectations in particular, and overstating your own abilites, I think is something people should keep in mind a lot more than they do, because our expectations influence everything to a very large degree, again more than many people think.' Basically I think this video should be linked at the start of every simracing discussion about handling and even about other stuff (like FFB, for example).
Racing on a monitor was always a weird abstraction for me, I think that made sim racing seem harder than it was. VR has made sim racing a lot more... I won't say easier but maybe approachable. The geometry of the track, its the camber and turning points make more sense. The sense of speed and consequence is heightened as well.
Thanks for your insight. Racing IRL is very difficult and most people don't realize the actual brutality of it. I believe the pursuit of realism in sim racing is somewhat misguided because, as you've stated, you can't recreate all of the tactile feedback you get from real racing. I also don't believe that the calmness (lack of G forces, vibration, etc) of a sim rig can make up for this loss of feedback you get from a real car on a real track. I think this fact makes sim racing even harder, at least in some aspects.
@@davegelink I have found from real drivers I know that are new to simracing the biggest issue is not the lack of Gforces per say , but more so the lack of the visuals lining up and sense of speed ( which is part G forces as well) but in the sense of just driving normally. As a result I have noticed and almost magical instant improvement when you put a VR headset on them which typically gives a much more natural in the car visual experience. But yah I think any real driver thats good that spends a bit of time getting used to the abstract aspects of simracing should be fine in sims as well , and that seems to be the case when you see real drivers that have spent 30+ hours with sims.
@@GamerMuscleVideos Totally agree GM. I am much quicker in VR than in a rig. A rig is much more convenient than VR, so I do race more in a rig, but as soon as I put on that VR headset - vroooom! Having the wrong FOV in a triple screen rig can really mess me up too i think for similar reasons. For the longest time I sim-raced on a TV screen that was very far away from the wheel, and that was very difficult as the FOV was all wrong. (VR provides the FOV for you as the screens are very close to your eyes).
@@davegelink driver61 made a video on this with James Baldwin relatively recently and the biggest consideration is that it's harder to adapt to losing information/feel, that you normally rely on, than it is to gaining it. So for drivers that have never really used a sim it's a lot harder to adapt to sim racing than you would expect because of all the information they lose.
I can‘t recall, who said this „ the cars are not real, but the racing is“. This is as I look at it. It‘s just another car, and yes, a different one. Go racing online, It‘s as real as the people racing with you. The more real race drivers are online, the more realistic the sim is :-)
I’d take it a step further and say we don’t need “real” race drivers. Just look at what Gran Turismo has done with GT Academy and Nissan. A game that’s not even considered a sim. A lot of those guys only played Gran Turismo before becoming real pro/semi-pro drivers
The way you presented this video just makes it so authentic and believable! Thanks for your insight. It's useful for new entrants into the sim racing world.
Nice video. One other discussion point I would add deals with a comment I used to see more often in the past, the lap time comparison between sim and real life: the assertion that if the sim is faster than real life, then it can't possibly have been realistic. My stance on this has always been that on first analysis, there is an almost limitless number of variables swaying the sim's accuracy one way or another, many points of which you go over in this video. I believe that in the limit case, however, a hypothetically perfect sim would produce faster lap times than real life 100% of the time, provided it's not an edge case like a single car at a super speedway. This result would be merely a factor of the fear and caution you describe together with a level of iteration/practice simply not feasible at a real track. When a car/track combination gets driven by the sim community at large, the number of full-risk attempts is orders of magnitude higher than what is sustainable at a real track, and so the level of perfection achieved ends up being closer to the physical limit. We have all seen the heroic onboard footage of record lap times, but these would all be faster yet if the driver had 50 or 100 times the number of attempts with no cost nor danger. Something else worth considering is the talent pool with respect to the activity: I believe that the g-forces and physicality of real driving sufficiently differentiate it from sim driving so as to reward a somewhat different skill set at the extreme. One might argue for example that the factors constituting the successful real driver and sim driver are similar in composition, but the weighting of those factors in either scenario is quite different. The likely consequence to this, though by no means guaranteed, is that the best sim driver in a given circumstance is necessarily a different person than the best real driver, in much the same way that two disparate sports are rarely dominated by the same person. A further factor here is the barrier to entry for real racing vs. sim racing, leading to a numbers game favoring the top percentile of sim racers.
I think I would agree you should be a bit faster in the sim because of track time, and possibly more things being 'consistent'. However, you can also achieve the right laptime in a bad way. So lap time of the sim versus real is a terrible way to judge the realism. Its just one of the parts where you expect to be close. I think you can be 2 seconds too slow or 2 seconds too fast and still have a better sim than one where they 'badly' reach the correct times.
I think the best takeway you can take from simracing is the amount of focus required.. I'm pretty confident I wouldn't be able to be much better focused for extended periods of time like I can't in a sim either. Maybe for a lap or two I could be better focused with all the extra stimuli.
Thanks for the insightful video :). I have a comment regarding the lack of G-Force. Personally I feel like the lack of G-Forces hurts most under breaking. For the most part you can't really "feel" that you're close to locking a wheel, but you can indeed remember how it feels to break close to the limit. When accelerating the lack of G-Force is almost irrelevant. When cornering the FFB does a good job at giving you information. But under breaking you're flying "blind" without G-Forces.
Kind of a good point, but then again when I locked the tires on my few track days, I could really only feel it by my face going red in shame when I looked in the mirror and saw a bunch of smoke.. :-)
On the real life part, I cannot get past the fact that I don’t have confidence in a sim and I also cannot tell myself is I crash in a sim there will be no problems if I crash so I tend to be much slower in a sim even though I know I can go quicker. In a real vehicle I tent to get to the limit within a couple of laps
Yep, this debate has been going on forever, I remember lots of talk about low speed grip unrealism in GPL :-) I guess I look at a ‘good’ driving model as one that gives me cues and feedback about what the car is doing that I can to learn. I’ve only ever raced karts and have no idea what any other racing car feels like but sometimes there is a car in a game / sim that makes you think ‘if this behaves like this in real life it should be scrapped’ :-)
Real racing is violent, scary and exhilarating! It will never be replaced with sim racing but sim racing will also never be replaced as it allows the greater public to experience the thrill safely, something they may never ever get close to experience otherwise. Love your work Niels. 😊 currently saving my pennies for a set of your push babies.
I once tried to make the step from RC helicopter simulators to real RC helicopters. I couldn't do it. In the sim I could do all kinds of stunts with pretty good control, but simply flying around in real life was a big struggle. Simply the difference between being in a game and being in real life where if you crash things can get expensive or you could even get hurt was just too much. This to me is the one thing no sim can ever simulate.
I think the biggest difference is the fear factor. on a sim there is no fear involved because if you crash in the sim you don't die. I fly RC helicopters which also have simulators (that allow you to plug your radio into the pc to practice your moves) to all intents the "feel" of controlling both the real heli and the virtual one is identical (no feedback from either and you are using the same radio for both situations) but taking a trick you learned on the sim and can do 100% of the time virtually takes on a whole new level of fear when you do it for real. (because one mistake and your model is in the ground shaking itself to pieces and you have a big repair bill) I think this applies to ALL simulators not just driving, they are useful and fun but at the end of the day are no substitute for actually being in the situation for real. they can lay the groundwork and give you the muscle memory required for the task at hand it's then up to you to get over the fear factor when you take it to the real world.
If I ran a racing team, I'm pretty sure I'd be inviting some hardware devs, sim devs and/or influencers to do a test drive in some of these real racing cars. It's a missed marketing opportunity. The last one I saw was Ginetta inviting Yorkie the RUclipsr for a test drive about 5 years ago.
So basically I pretend to be a race car driver and the sim pretends to be a race car. Which leaves two main question: Do I enjoy what I‘m doing? Does it feel great doing it? Yeah, it really does. And this feeling is very realistic. qed Thx for the video! And for them great pedals, too......😃
Very good video. However, I have something to say. The whole "it's a game" thing is really tiring. Yes, in simracing you won't break the car and you won't get injured, however, in most sports, real life sports, you are not risking much, very little (yes, you can get injured, I have playing basketball several times, but hey, if you're not careful, a DD wheel can injure you too). And most sports are also GAMES. So much that they are called that: "did you watch the game between the Lakers and the Celtics?". It's just a game.
You have a very basic view of reality. Athletes risk a lot.... sometimes, everything. It’s not only about getting hurt or risking injury. Simulators will never perfectly replicate the feeling of real life sports.
Enlighten me please. What includes "a lot" and "everything"? Cause some real drivers (Larsson, Abt, and at least another one) lost their jobs because of simracing incidents. That seems pretty real to me.
Juanfra Valero You’re trying really hard to make point....But you’re failing bro Larson lost his job for saying “nigg*r” on stream, which was interpreted as racist. He would have suffered the same consequences if he did that on Twitter/Facebook or even if overheard on the streets. He represents a brand and there is a code of conduct.
The hardest part about being a simulation car physics modder is that there's no good way to convince other people, or even yourself, that your car is better than another. You can just dump some data or video or something and say "Look, it's similar!" and hope it's really like that.
It should be obvious that personal opinion is what matters. Even if we accept, for example, Niels' opinion; it remains OUR OPINION that this information is relevant to our personal experience. We can't escape; it always boils down to personal opinion. None of which actually matters, of course: If you're having fun, stop asking stupid confusing questions 🤪
In my opinion simracing is easier because you don't have bumps and g-forces moving you around. But it's also harder because you never truly feel connected to the car like in real life.
I will say for me the g forces do something to me, something primal kicks in and I can drive better. Also the level of adrinaline and my natural ability to keep myself alive. While ignoring I could die, ultimate trust in myself and a heightened sense of reality, somewhere in all that I’m better in real life.
good vid apart from all the other things mentioned for realism you would need someone with a sledgehammer stood by the side of you ready to break youre leg when you crashed,i suspect it would slow quite a lot of us down a fair bit.btw youre middle hinge pin is working itself out
Setup is a huuuuuge thing that you didn't touch upon. A former flatmate pointed out that the springs in the rallycross Audi A1 in both pCARS2 and Dirt Rally were massively too soft. And even the hardest settings were softer than the softest springs he could choose from when working for the team. With this I want to add another layer to the -feel- discussion, because the driving feel nowadays is more dependent on the setup you're using than the exact sim.
The simple answer I have to the whole thing, is if I drive a certain car at a certain speed and turn the wheel a certain way with that brake input. Whatever the real car does, I want the sim one to replicate in the same manner. But I am the weird guy that dislikes driving racing cars and I live in the realm of road cars, that is where my passion is.
Simracing should be as hard as real life because you are aiming to simulate as true to life as possible. So lacking areas of simulation (hardware or software) might even make the game more demanding than driving in real life but with the aim of sticking true to life we should be getting as close as possible to that realistic level of difficulty albeit not by artificial means but just through continues improvement of the both hardware and software and of course as a consumer by improving our rigs with ever more realistic hardware add-ons.
Yeah, aiming at the best realistic result, only considering the best hardware around is the way to go about it during the developpement. But it doesn't excuse the lack of compatibility on a second time... just by adding tweak... how is it to add a 'brake pressure' option to help those with logitech wheels, etc...
Real life racing means, you don't have infinite tyres/cars and your actions have real consequences, financially and physically. Also mechanical failures often ruins a race and when pCars 2 was introducing those random failures, people were complaining and thought these were bugs. SMS disabled that 'feature' very soon after release and made the tyres less heat-sensitive to please the crowd. And than you have people like Daniel Abt, who was driving the FE car in rF2 with stability control and ABS before the prank probably because the real car is more like that to drive. Sim-Racing is just another discipline at the end.
@@kahel... You don't need a brake pressure option but you just need to adapt your driving skills to the hardware you are driving. Just like you shouldn't brake a truck like you should brake a Ferrari 458, you shouldn't brake with a Logitech brake pedal like you would with Heusinkveld Ultimate pedals. Driver adaptation is also a key part of race craft, because in reality unlike in a sim a change to the setup costs A LOT of time to do. So in order to be competitive as a driver you will first need to adapt to the car given on the track and you would only go for changes if you are 100% sure it's the car's limitation and not yours as a driver. So number one for a racer is definitely learning how to adapt to your environment. I myself work with professional racers, really good sim racers and so on just like Niels does. Yet I only develop a force feedback file for Project CARS 2, you might have heard of "Christiaan's Pure FFB" on a forum somewhere. I know that this is for a fact true. In fact I've been on sim racing on national television as well for a Formula 1 broadcast. Which meant that I had to adapt to completely different set of equipment as well in the studio as I do at home. At home I at the time had the Fanatec Clubsport line of equipment but in the studio they were working with Thrustmaster gear with a brake with potentiometer instead of the loadcell I was used to. Yet I managed to take P2 for a while albeit that due to damage from a first corner punt up the rear end I would fall back eventually to P7. Or the fact that I hopped into a rental kart in an active session (2 laps in) on a track I was unfamiliar with and managed to win the heat with a 2 second leap over number 2. Adaptation for a racer is absolutely fundamental to becoming fast and not everyone is equally skilled in making due with what you get. Heck, even Pierre Gasly last year in F1 fell into that pitfall and couldn't for the life of him adapt to that Red Bull even if he wanted to. The same happened with Jos Verstappen back when he got into F1 next to Michael Schumacher in F1. All cars were setup for Michael and were extremely oversteer sensitive and Jos had a hard time dealing with that setup. So it isn't bad if you can't adapt but it is a realistic expectation that you find it hard to adapt and for some cars you might find it impossible to adapt, but does that impossibility make it any less real? I don't think so but you tell me.
@@Leynad778 Nope that isn't what it means at all. First of all financial and physical consequences have nothing to do with replicating driving a real car. Even fear is just a manifestation of your brain and the amount of people who put on VR goggles for the first time that fear crashing are uncountable. Also you can restrict the aids a driver uses in online races, just like a rulebook dictates the limitations in any other form of motorsport. Lastly about the people who were complaining about failures have never driven a real car before. Shit happens and it sucks. So I hate SMS for having removed that actually and maybe it should've just been toned down or at least make it an option just like allowing to drive with driving aids is an option. Core of the matter is that im a simulation you should approach reality as good as is technically possible in that moment of time that you are developing your simulation game. Doesn't matter if it's Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, DCS World, iRacing, rFactor 2, Assetto Corsa Competizione, Automobilista 2, Project CARS 2 or even F1 2020 and Dirt Rally 2.0. If you claim your software to be a simulator or simulation experience than a customer will expect you as a company to put forth an as true to real life simulation as you possibly can within the limitations that you have to work in present day. From my experience Codemasters their claims to their games is just a prime example of calling something a simulator and their products not even trying hard enough within the available means these days to approach what could be called a simulation. Maybe 10 or 15 years ago they would still be a simulator but not today, and hopefully with acquiring Slight Mad Studios they will be able to put forth something again that can be considered a simulator by the modern standards upon the point of release. Simulation is a term that is forever evolving as the quest to ever improving realism is nearly never ending. So what could be called a simulator 10 or 20 years ago is a joke compared to modern simulators, whilst back in the day they maybe were the best there was. So yeah... the evolution of simulation!
From a sim racer perspective (12yrs now) I have found I'm really shooting in the dark when it comes to authenticity from car to car mainly as I have no reference point to the original car as I have not driven it in real life. This creates a conundrum of problems as their is no base point to reference all the myriad of options within a simulation. Hence we really do rely on the devs of both the software and the hardware to fine create default settings close to the real life counterpart. But then you have wheel strength, wheel ffb options and they are never consistent from driver to driver. I guess what I'm saying is 7nless you have driven the real car it is impossible to set up your gear to achieve a 'realistic' simulation. I always end up spending more time tweaking (to what end) than I do driving even though in the back of my head a muffled voice is crying out just frackin play the game and enjoy it! That said the devs do a brilliant job of implementing such a complicated concept. Kudos to you all! Whether the individual cars are realistic or not you can't say it's not hella fun. I love love love AMS now vr is implemented. Real feel on the fly control is amazing.
writing this before watching the video to not be biased. To me Sim racing is harder because it does not give any room for error. ( talking about iracing ) the edge is too thin and the grip too vague . Plus braking deceleration is hard to judge on sim so you rely more on muscle memory and eyes than on your ASS. I always felt that for example in Iracing when competitive, the way you trail brake and use the brake as to be perfect almost like computer wise meaning almost linear release of brake at the perfect speed and amount i guess because the developer said this the way you should brake so people that will be able to be the closest to the theoretical braking will be in general faster than others ( same for throttle. The problem is that in real live you have way more room to modulate the brake,.. In iracing if you differ a bit too much from the "theoretical braking" then you probably loose the car. What i want to say by this is that the physics of the game is "pre define "with almost 0 room for error. In the others hand it is a really good tool to learn because it force you to understand how the car , the braking technique, tires , weight transfer,... works to be competitive on the game, which ultimately will make you faster in real life du to your better understanding of how everything works. My 2 cent ;)
Gravity. I feel inertia is not properly translated into the sims. when drivers turn sharply at high speeds the weight shift is very violent, particularly f1, on sims it feels like you can't overcome the grip that you have or the inertia that is carrying you, as if your grip overwhelms the drag from the tyres.
This is probably some of the more straightforward stuff that I would assume all simulators get right. You highlight another big issue with simracing: describing the 'feel'. I'm sure people feel something and want to explain it but feel versus physics equations are different languages sometimes. :-)
Yes, that is why I mentioned it, it should be a given but it is not. Gravity, drag etc, can easily be translated in a few parametres, but It is impossible in practice to simulate all physics just for a simracing game. the sim is the sum of all parts. You can't recreate the universe for a game. I wonder if you (generalization) don't end up fixating on a complex and computationally intensive part such as tyres and end up missing other areas. For instances your shed car, your model does not correlate with its physics, structurally that thing would not hold itself, secondly it would easily topple, and that is just physics simp!e gravity, the engineering I'm sure someone could make a 450 bhp shed but that can actually jump ramps but that is beside the point, you surely know this far better than I do.
The problem is literally where the rubber meets the road, or more specifically the amount of vectors and different types of calculus required to correctly model tire breakaway, it's too complicated to be calculated accurately in real time, this system is feedback, ergo there is a round trip for the signal which implies an inherent latency. Even a latency of 4ms could ruin the feel of breakaway for anyone who does not have "alien" reflexes. To put this in perspective, even the top F1 teams with spec simulators and wind tunnels cannot garner enough data for it to completely work on track.
Thanks for the videos you have done so far. I'm really interested in how close it's possible to get to having a real driving experience in a sim. Over the years I have got a lot better on driving games but it isn't me it's the fact that the games are getting closer to whats realistic. I currently favour one particular game as an overall best but this might change if I manage to get he wheel setup similar on a few. Is there any easy way to go about changing all the setting to get a similar feel from different games ?
GPS and satellites are difficult enough ;-) Actually the cars GPS-unit is a satellite signal receiver. It connects to several satellites to use the signal the satellites send to calculate its position on the globe. And meanwhile it is also able to calculate its speed as well (difference in location and time). It is even more accurate at higher speeds.
I think a good real-life driver can filter out the violence and feel the g-forces through it. I think the goal of force feedback should be to let normal people feel the *end result* of what a real pro driver feels. E.g. a pro driver can feel the onset of oversteer using X Y and Z forces, whereas sim hardware should convey the same things using A and B forces.
People talk physics like this is what realism means. Instead of pay thousands on a wheel setting, we should spent it with models to role play pitgirl to us... with champagne... and leave some at the golf course. This is full-simulation gentlemans
Interesting how you talk about different data for same car with different drivers. I did a driver swap race in ACC and my team mate had 1 PSI less pressure in the rear tires compared to me.
I like how people want to simulate real cars but moan about low detailed ffb (for example in ams2 and acc) now go to your car and see how much detail you can feel on the road. I get that you need more feel because you don't feel g forces etc but still.
@@cademckee7276 by "your car" I mean some old sporty cars like mx5 etc. I know you literally don't feel anything in modern street cars like Yaris or other Renault captur
I personally don’t have to much of an opinion, I just like driving cars I that if I owned one I would basically have a heart attack if it so much as got scratched in a parking lot
I can't work out if you've just completely ruined the entire genre for me, or made me gape in awe at the whole concept of it. I guess I'll find out tomorrow when i fire up iRacing. Fingers crossed!
Question. If all these variables exist and it's so hard to pin the accuracy down, then why do big teams spend so much resources on simulation? I mean I can answer myself but would be interesting to hear you give some insight. I hope there will be more questions arising from the answer!
You can get close as far as matching telemetry goes. And F1 teams have the best wind tunnels and make 5x sure they put the right values in the sim, unlike buying a car from a 3rd party and getting their numbers. A simulator is extremly useful, even if it doesn't QUITE handle perfectly, if the ride heights, speeds and G forces are identical to the real thing. Plus you can learn the complex systems and steering wheel buttons. But I think even in F1, they do the same 'shrug' and have some freedom of adjusting extreme tire and aero behavior. All this is just my thoughts, I don't know exactly how they go about their business.. They also employ the best real drivers, great sim drivers and great engineers. I think that is the best situation to find the way towards better realism.
@@NielsHeusinkveld I suppose they just limit the range of variable factors as much as possible by using the best people and the most accurate numbers, thus the mark gets easier to hit more often. Still I imagine trying to accurately define that mark is like trying to fry a snowball! That's what makes it so interesting. Like you say you have to feel it and it's a bit of a black art so we need individuals like yourself who shine a light onto the inner workings of something which is impossible to pin down!
I'm not sure that you ever really addressed the question. There is a lot of philosophical thinking that has to go into the decisions that make a successful game. Should it be that only F1 caliber talents are able to perform well on the game and everyone else should be shown that they don't measure up or is there value in allowing the below average punter the ability to feel the exhilaration of winning, as if they were a top tier talent? Is enjoyability and playability more important than accuracy and realism if the sim isn't a trainer or test bed for the car and driver that is heading out on track that weekend? And can making a sim enjoyable and playable give a greater illusion of realism than a sim that is more accurate and "real?"
i just wanted to try AMS2 now but i cant, no street cars. iv driven a ferrari but neva will b able to drive a fuckin racecar lmao (as 95% of people in d sims), so.. AC my only option, n i love so much s2
Hey, thanks for another video with great topic and great talk. My 2.5 cents to the topic, if there wasn't enough variables mentioned. 1. I find that perception is greatly affected by mood, attitude and how well person feels physically. This is quite a solid cent right there. I have personally experienced this once: feeling cars terrible one evening (tired, sleepy and unhappy about the day, not the most enthusiastic about simulation at the time either). Did few tweaks for parameters, like aero "something"(don't remember), caster, tires transition in/out slip... (it was 1967 911S), and decided to test out in the morning. And car felt great to my expectations just to find out that I actually failed to update rFactor package and really drove completely same physics... So car was not different, but I must have been different, and that was just the next day. In other cases I have noticed other people too finding some things better by trying it some next time, or if by some chance there are good reviews, and knowing if someone else feels good probably can alter the attitude. Being tired should always be expected to make cars to feel worse and to seem more difficult, in my opinion. Bad mood perhaps could relate with having thoughts that spoils concentration, plus negative mindset might not help either, although hobby you like is expected to make mood better, well... usually. Speaking of concentration, i think it is one of the most important factor besides talent, people should be fair about their talent and concentration when expressing their opinion about difficulty of handling. 1.5 In the days of majority of simracing being run by replicating most modern and most recent real life racing vehicles that runs with high downforce on best modern racing slicks it is not unusual that most simracers spend most time (if not almost all) in cars like those. And in case they aren't quick to readjust themselves to very different car type, they try something like 60s race car, or 90s street car, then they just can't understand and can't feel it as they different. But they just need more time to get used to, or perhaps teach themselves something new and slightly different. In my personal opinion modern racecars are no way easier than older race cars, because they requires and rewards much more precision and greater reactions to reach full performance, while older cars were some more playful and requires and rewards more technique. On the flipside, driving pretty much same car all the time probably alters perception of difficulty a lot too, spending hundreds of hours with car that should be considered as undrivable, could probably make it feel alright, but driving a car that is way too easy and severely lacks certain dynamics might also lead to hollow perception and false sense of skill and talent, especially in context of simulation. 2. I think not enough is being used, noted or talked about of simple things that can be just observed through videos, or even pictures. Besides handling and appearance of its subtle details from exterior and onboard views. It can also be seen how often the drivers get into a spin, or has rough moments, also should be visible how playful and twitchy the car can possibly get. Of course without direct feel of how it actually is it is slightly different (not to mention variables that mentioned in this RUclips video), but it can be seen, thats all I say. These things should help to obtain less inaccurate easy/hard expectations. For example if real racing car got into some severe tankslapper during some race driven by pro and it wasn't because some extra variables, then I'd suppose that to go at absolute peak of performance with that car for whole race can be very punishing with slight loss of concentration or little delayed reaction or small mistake. And that obviously should be increasingly expected with lesser skills, more distraction, worse concentration, slower reactions (also talked about in the video)... While at the same time not every bit of slide should be a killer, which would mean that handling of a car is just simply poor and doesn't fit tires, or vice versa. But there was a time in Assetto Corsa when I raced for months without ever getting a single tankslapper, till I accidentally got some game vs desk steering wheel rotation angle mismatch. However, drove iRacing, and couldn't really not to have a slide without at least tiny bit of tankslapper. To me thats one on too easy, and one on too hard, and perhaps both equally off from what perhaps would be right. And thats AMS and rFactor (depending on content) :D
G-forces are so important, one of the Rally champions used to say he drove his car with his bum. I can only attest, that the feedback from the forces on your body is so important to me.
Disappointing to hear you might not have had reliable shed data...not even aero and telemetry? Might have to reconsider AMS as having best physics. Shocking...
Just to pin my own comment: I'm talking about the last 10% or 20% of 'wiggle room', of course data and telemetry DOES point you in the right direction. It can get you extremely close when matching telemetry, probably within 5%, but the 'feel' of the car has more wiggle room than 5%.
Speaking of pins...hows the repair of the centre hinge of your door coming along?😜
Hi Neils! Does any tyre model you know of take into account thread spread on wet tyres/conditions? Is there any advantage in increasing wet tyre pressures to better deal with water/puddles in any sim you know of? Thanks!
@@BMD8 I haven't got a clue how sims do rain, I'm sorry! :-)
The biggest difference in my opinion is the brake pedal feel. Sims need brake pedal force feedback!!! Sometimes more then a steering wheel FFB, its by far the most important feel in real car on a real track. They overheat, they fade, they come back, you can tell what is overheating by how is the pedal feeling, you can feel what the wheels are doing thru it in a way too. Brake pedal FFB Neil! Mr Pedals maker! Thank me later :)
@untitled. I put a replacement much stiffer spring into my g27 pedals and it made a big difference (it's still not great but much better than it was)
so much so that I still use those pedals to this day with my thrustmaster wheel (IMO the logitech pedals with spring mod are better than even the t3pa pedals I also have)
I put in the stiffer spring on brake and used the original brake spring in the clutch and used the original clutch spring on the accelerator so all springs are stiffer than default and it makes a huge difference.
search ebay for g29 brake mod
@untitled. Checkout GTEYE. They make a spring with progressive load for the G29.
No spring can do it justice, every time i come back from a trackday its the same, i cant feel my brakes, no matter how stiff my pedals are. Its about feedback from your wheels, not about how stiff the pedal is. Lets make a simracing revolution!! VIVA LA Brake pedal FFB! The Steering FFB and the car feel tends to be close enough to be able to quickly relate, but not even close on the brake pedal!
And clutch ffb
This is in fact imo quite doable as a DIY with todays tech. You get so much telemetry for motion you can use. Ive built G seats 2 dof/3dof rigs and so on. Sticking a motor on the brake pedal really isnt an issue. Just need someone to program specifically for brakes or use some compromise. You can stick G force and grip levels and change its feel via a motor with some springs for a quick example.
and the award for most accurate video description of the year goes to....
I just love how you can all the time find people arguing about how this car or that has 2 mm difference for something in the sim compared to real life and the realism is therefore completely ruined and the car is not worth the money, whereas here Niels is basically saying there's still a fair amount of unreliable data or guesswork, no matter how accurate you try to be. And the part about expectations in particular, and overstating your own abilites, I think is something people should keep in mind a lot more than they do, because our expectations influence everything to a very large degree, again more than many people think.'
Basically I think this video should be linked at the start of every simracing discussion about handling and even about other stuff (like FFB, for example).
5:05 keep in mind this guy makes the best simpedals...
Racing on a monitor was always a weird abstraction for me, I think that made sim racing seem harder than it was. VR has made sim racing a lot more... I won't say easier but maybe approachable. The geometry of the track, its the camber and turning points make more sense. The sense of speed and consequence is heightened as well.
Thanks for your insight. Racing IRL is very difficult and most people don't realize the actual brutality of it. I believe the pursuit of realism in sim racing is somewhat misguided because, as you've stated, you can't recreate all of the tactile feedback you get from real racing. I also don't believe that the calmness (lack of G forces, vibration, etc) of a sim rig can make up for this loss of feedback you get from a real car on a real track. I think this fact makes sim racing even harder, at least in some aspects.
This has to be the no 1 excuse of a racecar driver doing simracing. It really shouldn't take a good driver long to adapt to a static rig.
@@davegelink I have found from real drivers I know that are new to simracing the biggest issue is not the lack of Gforces per say , but more so the lack of the visuals lining up and sense of speed ( which is part G forces as well) but in the sense of just driving normally. As a result I have noticed and almost magical instant improvement when you put a VR headset on them which typically gives a much more natural in the car visual experience.
But yah I think any real driver thats good that spends a bit of time getting used to the abstract aspects of simracing should be fine in sims as well , and that seems to be the case when you see real drivers that have spent 30+ hours with sims.
@@GamerMuscleVideos Totally agree GM. I am much quicker in VR than in a rig. A rig is much more convenient than VR, so I do race more in a rig, but as soon as I put on that VR headset - vroooom! Having the wrong FOV in a triple screen rig can really mess me up too i think for similar reasons.
For the longest time I sim-raced on a TV screen that was very far away from the wheel, and that was very difficult as the FOV was all wrong.
(VR provides the FOV for you as the screens are very close to your eyes).
@@davegelink driver61 made a video on this with James Baldwin relatively recently and the biggest consideration is that it's harder to adapt to losing information/feel, that you normally rely on, than it is to gaining it. So for drivers that have never really used a sim it's a lot harder to adapt to sim racing than you would expect because of all the information they lose.
I can‘t recall, who said this „ the cars are not real, but the racing is“.
This is as I look at it. It‘s just another car, and yes, a different one. Go racing online, It‘s as real as the people racing with you. The more real race drivers are online, the more realistic the sim is :-)
Jimmy broadbent said it
kurt7902 yes indeed, it was him
Thanks a lot for the reminder Kurt
I’d take it a step further and say we don’t need “real” race drivers.
Just look at what Gran Turismo has done with GT Academy and Nissan. A game that’s not even considered a sim.
A lot of those guys only played Gran Turismo before becoming real pro/semi-pro drivers
The way you presented this video just makes it so authentic and believable! Thanks for your insight. It's useful for new entrants into the sim racing world.
I was thinking to do video about this topic but you said it all! I cannot agree more Neils ! so well said !
This was like a Richard Feynman video where he was asked simple questions but answers by tearing down bit by bit the way the whole universe works.
Nice video. One other discussion point I would add deals with a comment I used to see more often in the past, the lap time comparison between sim and real life: the assertion that if the sim is faster than real life, then it can't possibly have been realistic.
My stance on this has always been that on first analysis, there is an almost limitless number of variables swaying the sim's accuracy one way or another, many points of which you go over in this video. I believe that in the limit case, however, a hypothetically perfect sim would produce faster lap times than real life 100% of the time, provided it's not an edge case like a single car at a super speedway.
This result would be merely a factor of the fear and caution you describe together with a level of iteration/practice simply not feasible at a real track. When a car/track combination gets driven by the sim community at large, the number of full-risk attempts is orders of magnitude higher than what is sustainable at a real track, and so the level of perfection achieved ends up being closer to the physical limit. We have all seen the heroic onboard footage of record lap times, but these would all be faster yet if the driver had 50 or 100 times the number of attempts with no cost nor danger.
Something else worth considering is the talent pool with respect to the activity: I believe that the g-forces and physicality of real driving sufficiently differentiate it from sim driving so as to reward a somewhat different skill set at the extreme. One might argue for example that the factors constituting the successful real driver and sim driver are similar in composition, but the weighting of those factors in either scenario is quite different.
The likely consequence to this, though by no means guaranteed, is that the best sim driver in a given circumstance is necessarily a different person than the best real driver, in much the same way that two disparate sports are rarely dominated by the same person. A further factor here is the barrier to entry for real racing vs. sim racing, leading to a numbers game favoring the top percentile of sim racers.
I think I would agree you should be a bit faster in the sim because of track time, and possibly more things being 'consistent'. However, you can also achieve the right laptime in a bad way. So lap time of the sim versus real is a terrible way to judge the realism. Its just one of the parts where you expect to be close. I think you can be 2 seconds too slow or 2 seconds too fast and still have a better sim than one where they 'badly' reach the correct times.
I think the best takeway you can take from simracing is the amount of focus required.. I'm pretty confident I wouldn't be able to be much better focused for extended periods of time like I can't in a sim either. Maybe for a lap or two I could be better focused with all the extra stimuli.
Thanks for the insightful video :).
I have a comment regarding the lack of G-Force.
Personally I feel like the lack of G-Forces hurts most under breaking. For the most part you can't really "feel" that you're close to locking a wheel, but you can indeed remember how it feels to break close to the limit.
When accelerating the lack of G-Force is almost irrelevant. When cornering the FFB does a good job at giving you information. But under breaking you're flying "blind" without G-Forces.
Kind of a good point, but then again when I locked the tires on my few track days, I could really only feel it by my face going red in shame when I looked in the mirror and saw a bunch of smoke.. :-)
On the real life part, I cannot get past the fact that I don’t have confidence in a sim and I also cannot tell myself is I crash in a sim there will be no problems if I crash so I tend to be much slower in a sim even though I know I can go quicker. In a real vehicle I tent to get to the limit within a couple of laps
" I am basically a living question mark" LMAO
Yep, this debate has been going on forever, I remember lots of talk about low speed grip unrealism in GPL :-) I guess I look at a ‘good’ driving model as one that gives me cues and feedback about what the car is doing that I can to learn. I’ve only ever raced karts and have no idea what any other racing car feels like but sometimes there is a car in a game / sim that makes you think ‘if this behaves like this in real life it should be scrapped’ :-)
Real racing is violent, scary and exhilarating! It will never be replaced with sim racing but sim racing will also never be replaced as it allows the greater public to experience the thrill safely, something they may never ever get close to experience otherwise.
Love your work Niels. 😊 currently saving my pennies for a set of your push babies.
i appreciate u being real with all thi knowledge man, cheers
man.. you are such a great guy!
I once tried to make the step from RC helicopter simulators to real RC helicopters. I couldn't do it. In the sim I could do all kinds of stunts with pretty good control, but simply flying around in real life was a big struggle. Simply the difference between being in a game and being in real life where if you crash things can get expensive or you could even get hurt was just too much. This to me is the one thing no sim can ever simulate.
I think the biggest difference is the fear factor.
on a sim there is no fear involved because if you crash in the sim you don't die.
I fly RC helicopters which also have simulators (that allow you to plug your radio into the pc to practice your moves)
to all intents the "feel" of controlling both the real heli and the virtual one is identical (no feedback from either and you are using the same radio for both situations)
but taking a trick you learned on the sim and can do 100% of the time virtually takes on a whole new level of fear when you do it for real. (because one mistake and your model is in the ground shaking itself to pieces and you have a big repair bill)
I think this applies to ALL simulators not just driving, they are useful and fun but at the end of the day are no substitute for actually being in the situation for real.
they can lay the groundwork and give you the muscle memory required for the task at hand it's then up to you to get over the fear factor when you take it to the real world.
If I ran a racing team, I'm pretty sure I'd be inviting some hardware devs, sim devs and/or influencers to do a test drive in some of these real racing cars. It's a missed marketing opportunity. The last one I saw was Ginetta inviting Yorkie the RUclipsr for a test drive about 5 years ago.
Listening to your words i think you can help the world having even better simulators!
The correct answer is 42.
So basically I pretend to be a race car driver and the sim pretends to be a race car.
Which leaves two main question: Do I enjoy what I‘m doing? Does it feel great doing it?
Yeah, it really does.
And this feeling is very realistic. qed
Thx for the video!
And for them great pedals, too......😃
Very good video. However, I have something to say. The whole "it's a game" thing is really tiring. Yes, in simracing you won't break the car and you won't get injured, however, in most sports, real life sports, you are not risking much, very little (yes, you can get injured, I have playing basketball several times, but hey, if you're not careful, a DD wheel can injure you too). And most sports are also GAMES. So much that they are called that: "did you watch the game between the Lakers and the Celtics?". It's just a game.
You have a very basic view of reality.
Athletes risk a lot.... sometimes, everything. It’s not only about getting hurt or risking injury.
Simulators will never perfectly replicate the feeling of real life sports.
Enlighten me please. What includes "a lot" and "everything"? Cause some real drivers (Larsson, Abt, and at least another one) lost their jobs because of simracing incidents. That seems pretty real to me.
Juanfra Valero
You’re trying really hard to make point....But you’re failing bro
Larson lost his job for saying “nigg*r” on stream, which was interpreted as racist. He would have suffered the same consequences if he did that on Twitter/Facebook or even if overheard on the streets. He represents a brand and there is a code of conduct.
The hardest part about being a simulation car physics modder is that there's no good way to convince other people, or even yourself, that your car is better than another. You can just dump some data or video or something and say "Look, it's similar!" and hope it's really like that.
Respect for stating you won't answer the question in the title
Interesting video, enjoyed listening to your experiences. You know a lot about sim racing, but even more about sim racers :)
thanks for video, good to throw in personal thoughts for discussion etc
It should be obvious that personal opinion is what matters. Even if we accept, for example, Niels' opinion; it remains OUR OPINION that this information is relevant to our personal experience. We can't escape; it always boils down to personal opinion.
None of which actually matters, of course: If you're having fun, stop asking stupid confusing questions 🤪
In my opinion simracing is easier because you don't have bumps and g-forces moving you around.
But it's also harder because you never truly feel connected to the car like in real life.
I will say for me the g forces do something to me, something primal kicks in and I can drive better. Also the level of adrinaline and my natural ability to keep myself alive. While ignoring I could die, ultimate trust in myself and a heightened sense of reality, somewhere in all that I’m better in real life.
good vid apart from all the other things mentioned for realism you would need someone with a sledgehammer stood by the side of you ready to break youre leg when you crashed,i suspect it would slow quite a lot of us down a fair bit.btw youre middle hinge pin is working itself out
You're not the first to notice (the hinge), its actually quite stuck there so I'm gonna leave it as is for now.. ;-)
Setup is a huuuuuge thing that you didn't touch upon.
A former flatmate pointed out that the springs in the rallycross Audi A1 in both pCARS2 and Dirt Rally were massively too soft. And even the hardest settings were softer than the softest springs he could choose from when working for the team.
With this I want to add another layer to the -feel- discussion, because the driving feel nowadays is more dependent on the setup you're using than the exact sim.
amazin man, thanks.. so many facts! i love it
Neil I really enjoy these videos and the deep explanations. How accurate would you say the movie Cars is?
Good question but I haven't reached the PEGI age yet where I am allowed to watch this masterpiece.
The simple answer I have to the whole thing, is if I drive a certain car at a certain speed and turn the wheel a certain way with that brake input.
Whatever the real car does, I want the sim one to replicate in the same manner.
But I am the weird guy that dislikes driving racing cars and I live in the realm of road cars, that is where my passion is.
Simracing should be as hard as real life because you are aiming to simulate as true to life as possible. So lacking areas of simulation (hardware or software) might even make the game more demanding than driving in real life but with the aim of sticking true to life we should be getting as close as possible to that realistic level of difficulty albeit not by artificial means but just through continues improvement of the both hardware and software and of course as a consumer by improving our rigs with ever more realistic hardware add-ons.
Yeah, aiming at the best realistic result, only considering the best hardware around is the way to go about it during the developpement. But it doesn't excuse the lack of compatibility on a second time... just by adding tweak... how is it to add a 'brake pressure' option to help those with logitech wheels, etc...
Real life racing means, you don't have infinite tyres/cars and your actions have real consequences, financially and physically. Also mechanical failures often ruins a race and when pCars 2 was introducing those random failures, people were complaining and thought these were bugs. SMS disabled that 'feature' very soon after release and made the tyres less heat-sensitive to please the crowd. And than you have people like Daniel Abt, who was driving the FE car in rF2 with stability control and ABS before the prank probably because the real car is more like that to drive. Sim-Racing is just another discipline at the end.
@@kahel... You don't need a brake pressure option but you just need to adapt your driving skills to the hardware you are driving. Just like you shouldn't brake a truck like you should brake a Ferrari 458, you shouldn't brake with a Logitech brake pedal like you would with Heusinkveld Ultimate pedals.
Driver adaptation is also a key part of race craft, because in reality unlike in a sim a change to the setup costs A LOT of time to do. So in order to be competitive as a driver you will first need to adapt to the car given on the track and you would only go for changes if you are 100% sure it's the car's limitation and not yours as a driver.
So number one for a racer is definitely learning how to adapt to your environment.
I myself work with professional racers, really good sim racers and so on just like Niels does. Yet I only develop a force feedback file for Project CARS 2, you might have heard of "Christiaan's Pure FFB" on a forum somewhere. I know that this is for a fact true.
In fact I've been on sim racing on national television as well for a Formula 1 broadcast. Which meant that I had to adapt to completely different set of equipment as well in the studio as I do at home. At home I at the time had the Fanatec Clubsport line of equipment but in the studio they were working with Thrustmaster gear with a brake with potentiometer instead of the loadcell I was used to. Yet I managed to take P2 for a while albeit that due to damage from a first corner punt up the rear end I would fall back eventually to P7.
Or the fact that I hopped into a rental kart in an active session (2 laps in) on a track I was unfamiliar with and managed to win the heat with a 2 second leap over number 2.
Adaptation for a racer is absolutely fundamental to becoming fast and not everyone is equally skilled in making due with what you get. Heck, even Pierre Gasly last year in F1 fell into that pitfall and couldn't for the life of him adapt to that Red Bull even if he wanted to. The same happened with Jos Verstappen back when he got into F1 next to Michael Schumacher in F1. All cars were setup for Michael and were extremely oversteer sensitive and Jos had a hard time dealing with that setup.
So it isn't bad if you can't adapt but it is a realistic expectation that you find it hard to adapt and for some cars you might find it impossible to adapt, but does that impossibility make it any less real? I don't think so but you tell me.
@@Leynad778 Nope that isn't what it means at all. First of all financial and physical consequences have nothing to do with replicating driving a real car. Even fear is just a manifestation of your brain and the amount of people who put on VR goggles for the first time that fear crashing are uncountable.
Also you can restrict the aids a driver uses in online races, just like a rulebook dictates the limitations in any other form of motorsport.
Lastly about the people who were complaining about failures have never driven a real car before. Shit happens and it sucks. So I hate SMS for having removed that actually and maybe it should've just been toned down or at least make it an option just like allowing to drive with driving aids is an option.
Core of the matter is that im a simulation you should approach reality as good as is technically possible in that moment of time that you are developing your simulation game. Doesn't matter if it's Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020, DCS World, iRacing, rFactor 2, Assetto Corsa Competizione, Automobilista 2, Project CARS 2 or even F1 2020 and Dirt Rally 2.0. If you claim your software to be a simulator or simulation experience than a customer will expect you as a company to put forth an as true to real life simulation as you possibly can within the limitations that you have to work in present day.
From my experience Codemasters their claims to their games is just a prime example of calling something a simulator and their products not even trying hard enough within the available means these days to approach what could be called a simulation. Maybe 10 or 15 years ago they would still be a simulator but not today, and hopefully with acquiring Slight Mad Studios they will be able to put forth something again that can be considered a simulator by the modern standards upon the point of release.
Simulation is a term that is forever evolving as the quest to ever improving realism is nearly never ending. So what could be called a simulator 10 or 20 years ago is a joke compared to modern simulators, whilst back in the day they maybe were the best there was. So yeah... the evolution of simulation!
From a sim racer perspective (12yrs now) I have found I'm really shooting in the dark when it comes to authenticity from car to car mainly as I have no reference point to the original car as I have not driven it in real life. This creates a conundrum of problems as their is no base point to reference all the myriad of options within a simulation. Hence we really do rely on the devs of both the software and the hardware to fine create default settings close to the real life counterpart. But then you have wheel strength, wheel ffb options and they are never consistent from driver to driver.
I guess what I'm saying is 7nless you have driven the real car it is impossible to set up your gear to achieve a 'realistic' simulation.
I always end up spending more time tweaking (to what end) than I do driving even though in the back of my head a muffled voice is crying out just frackin play the game and enjoy it!
That said the devs do a brilliant job of implementing such a complicated concept. Kudos to you all! Whether the individual cars are realistic or not you can't say it's not hella fun. I love love love AMS now vr is implemented. Real feel on the fly control is amazing.
writing this before watching the video to not be biased. To me Sim racing is harder because it does not give any room for error. ( talking about iracing ) the edge is too thin and the grip too vague . Plus braking deceleration is hard to judge on sim so you rely more on muscle memory and eyes than on your ASS. I always felt that for example in Iracing when competitive, the way you trail brake and use the brake as to be perfect almost like computer wise meaning almost linear release of brake at the perfect speed and amount i guess because the developer said this the way you should brake so people that will be able to be the closest to the theoretical braking will be in general faster than others ( same for throttle. The problem is that in real live you have way more room to modulate the brake,.. In iracing if you differ a bit too much from the "theoretical braking" then you probably loose the car. What i want to say by this is that the physics of the game is "pre define "with almost 0 room for error. In the others hand it is a really good tool to learn because it force you to understand how the car , the braking technique, tires , weight transfer,... works to be competitive on the game, which ultimately will make you faster in real life du to your better understanding of how everything works. My 2 cent ;)
I want simulator that tries to pull my eyeballs out of the sockets
Or interms of simulating drifting, with yaw angles are beyond 90 degrees in some cases
Gravity. I feel inertia is not properly translated into the sims. when drivers turn sharply at high speeds the weight shift is very violent, particularly f1, on sims it feels like you can't overcome the grip that you have or the inertia that is carrying you, as if your grip overwhelms the drag from the tyres.
This is probably some of the more straightforward stuff that I would assume all simulators get right. You highlight another big issue with simracing: describing the 'feel'. I'm sure people feel something and want to explain it but feel versus physics equations are different languages sometimes. :-)
Yes, that is why I mentioned it, it should be a given but it is not. Gravity, drag etc, can easily be translated in a few parametres, but It is impossible in practice to simulate all physics just for a simracing game. the sim is the sum of all parts. You can't recreate the universe for a game. I wonder if you (generalization) don't end up fixating on a complex and computationally intensive part such as tyres and end up missing other areas. For instances your shed car, your model does not correlate with its physics, structurally that thing would not hold itself, secondly it would easily topple, and that is just physics simp!e gravity, the engineering I'm sure someone could make a 450 bhp shed but that can actually jump ramps but that is beside the point, you surely know this far better than I do.
The problem is literally where the rubber meets the road, or more specifically the amount of vectors and different types of calculus required to correctly model tire breakaway, it's too complicated to be calculated accurately in real time, this system is feedback, ergo there is a round trip for the signal which implies an inherent latency. Even a latency of 4ms could ruin the feel of breakaway for anyone who does not have "alien" reflexes.
To put this in perspective, even the top F1 teams with spec simulators and wind tunnels cannot garner enough data for it to completely work on track.
Thanks for the videos you have done so far. I'm really interested in how close it's possible to get to having a real driving experience in a sim. Over the years I have got a lot better on driving games but it isn't me it's the fact that the games are getting closer to whats realistic. I currently favour one particular game as an overall best but this might change if I manage to get he wheel setup similar on a few. Is there any easy way to go about changing all the setting to get a similar feel from different games ?
Sharing telemetry is integral! Everyone enable open telemetry on their hw. Soz last post I promise. 🤞
GPS and satellites are difficult enough ;-) Actually the cars GPS-unit is a satellite signal receiver. It connects to several satellites to use the signal the satellites send to calculate its position on the globe. And meanwhile it is also able to calculate its speed as well (difference in location and time). It is even more accurate at higher speeds.
My mistakes usually involve a slip angle of >90 degrees
Since AMS - what will be your next project you are working on? Your magic on AMS is currently god teir.
I think a good real-life driver can filter out the violence and feel the g-forces through it. I think the goal of force feedback should be to let normal people feel the *end result* of what a real pro driver feels. E.g. a pro driver can feel the onset of oversteer using X Y and Z forces, whereas sim hardware should convey the same things using A and B forces.
Such as Skippy and MX5 are slidable and easier to handle limit especially with OSW.
Automobilista 2 is much slicable and I like it!
Niels, if you find yourself in Northern California any time soon, let's have a beer. Would love to chat about this stuff over a pint! Cheers! :D
Same headphones, same Modmic 😍
screamin tire happy tire s2
thank you for this video , very informative
Agreed 100%.
Have a look at your middle door hinge...looks like the bolt is coming off there ;)
People talk physics like this is what realism means. Instead of pay thousands on a wheel setting, we should spent it with models to role play pitgirl to us... with champagne... and leave some at the golf course. This is full-simulation gentlemans
thanks for the shed
Interesting how you talk about different data for same car with different drivers. I did a driver swap race in ACC and my team mate had 1 PSI less pressure in the rear tires compared to me.
Great Video! Have you considered streaming anything?
I like how people want to simulate real cars but moan about low detailed ffb (for example in ams2 and acc) now go to your car and see how much detail you can feel on the road. I get that you need more feel because you don't feel g forces etc but still.
Race cars have better feel than road cars by a long way
@@cademckee7276 by "your car" I mean some old sporty cars like mx5 etc. I know you literally don't feel anything in modern street cars like Yaris or other Renault captur
I personally don’t have to much of an opinion, I just like driving cars I that if I owned one I would basically have a heart attack if it so much as got scratched in a parking lot
It should be ALMOST like driving a real car.
We are discussing how real a simulator should be while living inside a real universe simulator.
meaning?
@@robben896 nothing is real :P
I can't work out if you've just completely ruined the entire genre for me, or made me gape in awe at the whole concept of it. I guess I'll find out tomorrow when i fire up iRacing. Fingers crossed!
Question. If all these variables exist and it's so hard to pin the accuracy down, then why do big teams spend so much resources on simulation?
I mean I can answer myself but would be interesting to hear you give some insight. I hope there will be more questions arising from the answer!
You can get close as far as matching telemetry goes. And F1 teams have the best wind tunnels and make 5x sure they put the right values in the sim, unlike buying a car from a 3rd party and getting their numbers. A simulator is extremly useful, even if it doesn't QUITE handle perfectly, if the ride heights, speeds and G forces are identical to the real thing. Plus you can learn the complex systems and steering wheel buttons. But I think even in F1, they do the same 'shrug' and have some freedom of adjusting extreme tire and aero behavior. All this is just my thoughts, I don't know exactly how they go about their business.. They also employ the best real drivers, great sim drivers and great engineers. I think that is the best situation to find the way towards better realism.
@@NielsHeusinkveld I suppose they just limit the range of variable factors as much as possible by using the best people and the most accurate numbers, thus the mark gets easier to hit more often. Still I imagine trying to accurately define that mark is like trying to fry a snowball!
That's what makes it so interesting. Like you say you have to feel it and it's a bit of a black art so we need individuals like yourself who shine a light onto the inner workings of something which is impossible to pin down!
Niels, did you record all of these on the same day, or do you only own red shirts? :D
I'm replacing Vettel, haven't you heard?!
Like Nicki Thiim once said, “go hard or go home”
Currently he is at home. Lol (corona)
I'm not sure that you ever really addressed the question. There is a lot of philosophical thinking that has to go into the decisions that make a successful game. Should it be that only F1 caliber talents are able to perform well on the game and everyone else should be shown that they don't measure up or is there value in allowing the below average punter the ability to feel the exhilaration of winning, as if they were a top tier talent? Is enjoyability and playability more important than accuracy and realism if the sim isn't a trainer or test bed for the car and driver that is heading out on track that weekend? And can making a sim enjoyable and playable give a greater illusion of realism than a sim that is more accurate and "real?"
Hey Niels ✌️simracing should be fun for each and everyone exactly how he or she likes it. Just my 2 cents
You mean like reality ?
make broadbents house please
hey, 18:30 are you talking about me? 😂
GPS speed measurement can be VERY accurate, because it is the doppler shift that is being measured ;)
Sims will never be perfect, drive those you think is realistic for you, and burn those you dont think is.
Does a human have to put all those data together? Why not use AI for it?
i just wanted to try AMS2 now but i cant, no street cars. iv driven a ferrari but neva will b able to drive a fuckin racecar lmao (as 95% of people in d sims), so.. AC my only option, n i love so much s2
Hard would it be to make a sim game in Unity 3
d with multiplayer support and an AC style physics?
Whatever you say Niels. Now get back in your stadium super shed.
each simulated car should be as "difficult" as the physical car it models.
Of course, but how difficult is that? Its not an easy answer!
To summarize this video in a TL;DW i.imgur.com/d1hBWiS.jpg
Edit: i.imgur.com/2WeT5Jr.jpg
Hey, thanks for another video with great topic and great talk.
My 2.5 cents to the topic, if there wasn't enough variables mentioned.
1. I find that perception is greatly affected by mood, attitude and how well person feels physically. This is quite a solid cent right there. I have personally experienced this once: feeling cars terrible one evening (tired, sleepy and unhappy about the day, not the most enthusiastic about simulation at the time either). Did few tweaks for parameters, like aero "something"(don't remember), caster, tires transition in/out slip... (it was 1967 911S), and decided to test out in the morning. And car felt great to my expectations just to find out that I actually failed to update rFactor package and really drove completely same physics... So car was not different, but I must have been different, and that was just the next day. In other cases I have noticed other people too finding some things better by trying it some next time, or if by some chance there are good reviews, and knowing if someone else feels good probably can alter the attitude. Being tired should always be expected to make cars to feel worse and to seem more difficult, in my opinion. Bad mood perhaps could relate with having thoughts that spoils concentration, plus negative mindset might not help either, although hobby you like is expected to make mood better, well... usually. Speaking of concentration, i think it is one of the most important factor besides talent, people should be fair about their talent and concentration when expressing their opinion about difficulty of handling.
1.5 In the days of majority of simracing being run by replicating most modern and most recent real life racing vehicles that runs with high downforce on best modern racing slicks it is not unusual that most simracers spend most time (if not almost all) in cars like those. And in case they aren't quick to readjust themselves to very different car type, they try something like 60s race car, or 90s street car, then they just can't understand and can't feel it as they different. But they just need more time to get used to, or perhaps teach themselves something new and slightly different. In my personal opinion modern racecars are no way easier than older race cars, because they requires and rewards much more precision and greater reactions to reach full performance, while older cars were some more playful and requires and rewards more technique. On the flipside, driving pretty much same car all the time probably alters perception of difficulty a lot too, spending hundreds of hours with car that should be considered as undrivable, could probably make it feel alright, but driving a car that is way too easy and severely lacks certain dynamics might also lead to hollow perception and false sense of skill and talent, especially in context of simulation.
2. I think not enough is being used, noted or talked about of simple things that can be just observed through videos, or even pictures. Besides handling and appearance of its subtle details from exterior and onboard views. It can also be seen how often the drivers get into a spin, or has rough moments, also should be visible how playful and twitchy the car can possibly get. Of course without direct feel of how it actually is it is slightly different (not to mention variables that mentioned in this RUclips video), but it can be seen, thats all I say. These things should help to obtain less inaccurate easy/hard expectations. For example if real racing car got into some severe tankslapper during some race driven by pro and it wasn't because some extra variables, then I'd suppose that to go at absolute peak of performance with that car for whole race can be very punishing with slight loss of concentration or little delayed reaction or small mistake. And that obviously should be increasingly expected with lesser skills, more distraction, worse concentration, slower reactions (also talked about in the video)... While at the same time not every bit of slide should be a killer, which would mean that handling of a car is just simply poor and doesn't fit tires, or vice versa. But there was a time in Assetto Corsa when I raced for months without ever getting a single tankslapper, till I accidentally got some game vs desk steering wheel rotation angle mismatch. However, drove iRacing, and couldn't really not to have a slide without at least tiny bit of tankslapper. To me thats one on too easy, and one on too hard, and perhaps both equally off from what perhaps would be right. And thats AMS and rFactor (depending on content) :D
One thing i know it shouldn't be like Project Cars. homicidal AIs.
input lag n low fps is d worst thang
G-forces are so important, one of the Rally champions used to say he drove his car with his bum. I can only attest, that the feedback from the forces on your body is so important to me.
!!! VERY HARD !!!
Disappointing to hear you might not have had reliable shed data...not even aero and telemetry? Might have to reconsider AMS as having best physics. Shocking...
There is one shed Passat you could consult... :P Maybe Car Throttle could help getting in contact
You need a better title. This video has little to nothing to do with your current one.