rec.autos.simulators

anyone tried it?  what did you think?  I snarfed a demo from
gamesdomain.com a cople of days ago, and really liked it.  seems like
a perfect lan party beer-racer, imho. :)

would be cool if someone with a bit of 1/5 scale racing experience
could comment on it, as the physics seemed pretty believable to me.

--
Gunnar
    #31 SUCKS#015 Tupperware MC#002 DoD#0x1B DoDRT#003 DoD:CT#4,8 Kibo: 2
                               myk, trygg og god.

The track was an old kids midget track on the grounds of the San Diego
Raceway.

It drew so many spectators, the Race Track owners had to deny us racing on
Saturday's because we were stealing spectators from the full-size track
races!

These were cars that ran with weed-whacker motors.  Tires were around 5"
tall, if I remember right.  All had complete, adjustable suspensions.

The cars were about 30-35" bumpber to bumper, and if I remember had a
minimum weight of 30 or 35 pounds.

We had to use these HUGE 1/4 scale retract servo's for steering, and a lot
of us ran TWO of these (especially in the RACO cars, which were designed for
this).

Back then RACO and WCM were the two big manufacturers, and that's what
everyone raced.  I believe RACO is out of business now, and I'm not sure
about WCM.

WCM used true tube-frame contstruction while RACO used more sturdy aluminum
frame/composite material contstruction.  The WCM cars were a bit more
realistic looking, but man they were EXPENSIVE to have fixed after a wall
hit.  If the frame was bent, you either had to replace it or send it out for
repair/re-powdercoating.

The RACO's used a pretty complex gear-transmission system while the WCM's
used a simple belt-pully system.  The RACO had changeable final gears, and
was FAR more reliable than the WCM cars.

Tires started off as Foam, but as time went on we progressed to air-filled
*** compound tires.  This allowed us to change stagger as needed.

I remember many days of setting the car up on 4 weight stands and adjusting
the weights around and getting the readings.  It all really mattered and
made a big difference in performance.

It was a blast, and I'm really sad that it never caught on more than it did.
It required large plots of land in commercial area's (due to the noise and
safety issues), so it wasn't something you could just set up anywhere.

I think it's still reasonably big in the west, but I've seen nothing of it
in the east :(

I really miss this...

I never really got into 1/10 scale, especially electric.  4 minute races
didn't thrill me, and the 1/10 scale gas cars were so damned finicky to keep
running it detracted from the enjoyment.  Plus races sounded like a huge
swarm of pissed-off hornets.

-Larry

The graphics are nice, but the driver's stand camera angle is a joke
(you don't get to zoom in your eyes to the back straight in real life).

The AI cars are total squids in the demo.  I have them all passed
(starting in 8th) before the back straight away.  The physics of the
cars aren't really that accurate either.

I race 1/8 scale gas offroad, and have raced 1/8 scale gas onroad.

The speed of the action is about 10% of the pace of actual R/C onroad
racing.

This one might be fun for the kiddies for a couple of days, or it could
be fun to race online w/ multiplayer (if that option is available,
looked like split screen only in the game).

Jon

8 player TCP/IP, according to the website.

thanks for the comments.
--
Gunnar
    #31 SUCKS#015 Tupperware MC#002 DoD#0x1B DoDRT#003 DoD:CT#4,8 Kibo: 2
                 "Det er nok ingen ovn, men fartsm?leren v?r."

I did my best lap times using the chase camera though, but then the game
felt like a rehash of ReVolt or Micromachines.

8 player TCP/IP might make it work picking up though, as long as you can
force the pit cam :-)

Yeah, but your eyes have /slightly/ higher resolution than your
PC monitor.  If it didn't zoom in you'd complain that you couldn't
see your car properly - which I'm sure isn't a major problem in
1/5th scale ;-)

True, the AI are slow, but remember the demo is designed to get
everyone's interest not just experienced RC drivers.  I race
1/10th electric, both on- and off-road, and the handling feels
pretty much spot on when you remember how much bigger these cars
are.

I agree they feel underpowered (or maybe the clutch model or
low-end torque curve is wrong - they go okay on the straight)
but the rest feels fairly convincing.

The AI are rather Gran Turismo-like in their disregard for your
presence, though...

If it came with full setup options and the ability to sort out
the pick-up, I'd be interested.

Now, when's the next beta of - oops, no, musn't talk about
that one... :-)

Jonny

*yeah im from holland*

Jonny

Beers and cheers
(uncle) Goy

http://www.theuspits.com

"A man is only as old as the woman he feels........"
--Groucho Marx--

what R/C game are you talking about and where do you download it from?

cheers

--
Gunnar
    #31 SUCKS#015 Tupperware MC#002 DoD#0x1B DoDRT#003 DoD:CT#4,8 Kibo: 2
               "a language is a dialect with an army and a navy"

http://www.racer.nl/

Jonny

Jonny