Robert Hicks - iRacing Review
Any RD members on the beta of iRacing? Im just curious to see what people think of it,
I thought it was going to be fantastic but it seems to be missing lots of features right now as ive read at RSC, Jeez it does not even have yellow flags or pitstops in its current state
I am a beta tester. At least for another day or so till it goes live.
The physics are great and the graphics are amazing. While you do have to pay a monthly fee, you don't have to pay anything for the game.
There are no flags except black at the moment and all races are short enough that pit stops aren't needed unless you crashed. (you get a limited number of resets each race) The rating system seems very solid and should help place drivers in races where they will race against others of equal skill and safety ratings. The reason I say 'should' is when there are few enough people signed up for one race, it lumps you all together since there really isn't an alternative. If there are 100 ppl signed up for a race, it will separated them into about 9 or 10 separate races where the aliens will all run together and the slower people will all run together. If only 12 people have signed up for the race, then you will all be put into a single race and you may have a couple of aliens against a slower field. I think that having very few people signed up for races will be a thing of the past once it goes live.
Currently there are races in each division every 2 hours on alternating times. (road 2pm, oval 3pm, road 4pm, oval 5pm etc) The races take between 15-25mins with a 5 min warm up. Position in the race is determined by a qualify time that you set in a separate qualify event. In the case where several have not qualified, the drivers will be ranked in order of rating.
Rating system - makes you more aware than ever of how you drive. You get free practice and test times that do not effect your rating, but when you race, qualify or run a time trial, anything you do will effect your rating both good and bad. IE:
run a clean race = safety rating goes up
run a race with mistakes = safety rating goes down
finish in the top half of the race = race rating goes up
finish in the bottom half of the race = race rating goes down
The positive effect of this is that it of course will help seed you into the proper group for you, the negative effect is that it can make you drive slower than you are capable because for the first time, you are really worried about driving clean.
Pros
-No initial cost for the software
-Amazing graphics
-Automated race schedule that almost guarantees there will be a race you can attend several times a day
-Great physics
-Rating system - works to ensure you will be racing against people of equal speed and safety ratings
-The game will be a living thing that will have new things added continually
-Seamless organization of race events
Cons
-Monthly fee (while I know that most of you are against this, you have to consider that there is no cost for the software you will get many updates and changes for free throughout the life of the game. To put the cost into perspective; if you go see 2 movies a month, you've spent as much or more than the cost of iRacing. 2 movies = 4hrs of fun while iRacing = almost endless hrs of fun)
-Automated race schedule that means you will have a race schedule to follow and won't just be able to set up a race any old time you feel like it. (though there are plenty set up already) I think they have plans to let you set up a private series, but I don't know how that effects the ability to set race times
-No yellow flags (this isn't really a big deal for me) but they are coming
-No endurance races IE no pits stops. (again not a big deal for me) Right now the races are short enough that pits aren't really needed. They are working on pit stops as well as longer races will be added later in the game.
My overall thoughts:
I really like the game. I am still slow like I am at every other sim, but it's fun. The races are very intense both because I want to finish well because this is the first game that actually fills you with urgency about driving safely. I am going to try it in live and see how it does. After all, the most you have to lose is $20 and you might find your new home in simracing. I think that at $20, the risk is less than most other games you take a chance on.