Mircea, I didn't think Chronus was referring to you when he posted the metaphor about debris. I thought that was more about the "people with an agenda who don't really want to listen", but yet have some control over the project or work at SMS.
Huh. I stopped reading the comments from the poster you are referring to AFTER he attacked me in another thread. Case closed for me from that point on.
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You are correct, I was referring to a phalanx of "people with an agenda who don't really want to listen" and frequently do nothing but insult & mock those they perceive as being against the direction the "community project" took on.
Fortunately, there are WMD members who we can talk to and have intelligent conversations with.
(and I don't begrudge them this, since ultimately that's how they survive and how inventiveness is fostered, but I don't want to get into a capitalism vs. socialism debate
),
Yes, not knowing for sure where you stand, I can only say I deduce we will probably disagree if you believe "inventiveness" is fostered via capitalism. What we see nowadays with avenues of research (in medicine, technology and even physics) being cut short because they're not profitable (who cares if these "avenues" would usher in good discoveries that might save people and the planet...) is really bad. And when people's careers get smashed by "corporate" decisions, the tragedy is compounded even further.
[And no, lets not go to socialism either...]
I think the fact that the game is being released on consoles makes my presence here more than just an annoyance (although you all certainly are the experts on how this stuff works). So will SMS compromise or will it not? I'm not sure....
I don't see your posts as being an "annoyance", quite the contrary thus far.
CARS has been set to hit a large market, not just PC based simracing, and certainly not hardcore simracing.
So, it's inevitably that those that prefer the ease of use of a console turn out here looking for info on CARS and discussing it.
And by the way, there's no expertise on CARS on my part. I contributed to it with a small amount of money, tried it a few times, couldn't get it to work properly on my rig (not powerful enough for it) and that was it (oh, yes, tried several builds at friends' computers, but felt I shouldn't comment on what I saw/felt). I did try to contribute to discussions at WMD forums, but understood there was
absolutely no point in doing so.
Regarding xbox, [...] Two things became very clear -- they would promise virtually anything to try and appease both the SIM crowd and the arcade crowd, and that their bread is largely buttered by those types of players who I termed "five lap wonders" in a forum once.
That's exactly what I and others believe Greenawalt is doing - reach out for both sides of the fence. Which is, to me, intriguing. Why so much care put into impressing the "SIM crowd" if the sim crow is as irrelevant as the most vocal CARS investors have declared again and again?
Maybe you are right after all. The "SIM crowd" may very well be the "silent majority". I hope you are.
That's what gives me hope. Codemasters, even though it was once headed in the right direction (thanks to British design and ownership...we miss you David Darling), has now gone to pot. Still British based, something has gone wrong. I think
this and
this may have something to do with it. Luckily, Birmingham remains less corrupted by whatever it is that has gotten to them.
Right after Race Driver 2, I expected Codies would finally go after the "SIM crowd" in a serious manner. Meh...Pipe dream.
So we have Slightly Mad who by all accounts had good intentions and remains British based (this is important, as much as Britain and America are Car cultures...and you can't exactly say Turn 10 failed to idolize cars properly, even if they don't know how to race them).
Problem is not "idolizing" cars. Putting Jeremy Clarkson in FM and boasting an impressive number of cars is not doubt IDOLIZING cars.
The great problem is, they're selling that product as if it is a true simulation - and I have read enough threads reporting the most screaming absurdities about it for me to believe in their hype.
I agree, some people will do
whatever is necessary to appeal to a "SIM-aware" crowd. For whatever "mysterious" reason.
So, net of all this is I think with the right company, you can do both SIM and selling on the console. Codemasters silently acknowledged this and GRID2 proved it. And with the new boxes, I think you might have juuuuust enough processing power to make those shiny cars shiny and have good physics. Good enough to satisfy the hardcore PC crowd? Can't answer that one, but your comments even that mention pCARS in the same breath as Assetto really are encouraging.
Well,
I have my own opinion on what it felt to "drive" pCARS with the last builds I tried, but I have reason to trust a few people and their assessment of pCARS is not negative. Just to lift the veil a little bit...one of them posted comments at iRacing forums about what some iR cars felt like when compared to his experiences on track, only to get swamped with angry people disqualifying him from making proper judgements (never mind is RL profession).
On the other hand, AC looks promising (had a look at their physics calibrations files and there's no doubt the potential is there), but for those whose judgement I trust, it's still not THERE and somehow feels to lag behind pCARS. But hey...what do these people know?
One thing that I think is going to get left off my wish list of SIM-ness is the penalization of cars on track, by the game, for collisions. My bet is this is as hard to do as making A.I., but I'm not a computer guy, so I'm really not sure.
It is hard, extremely so. But if Dave Kaemmer found a good, working system (not perfect, but really good and well thought), other developers can too.
The biggest problem (in the industry) I see currently is this: with the exception of Reiza and SMS's AJ, it's the same old faces doing the same old things with newer, more sophisticated dressings.
Fortunately, people like DK (yeah, old timer, probably the real "father of simdom") and those I mention above keep bringing interesting developments to the table.
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One more thing lest I forget: I am not alone in thinking that I very much prefer the "testing feedback" from Andy and feedback from console users than the opinions of those that simply "play back" the results of the latest development leaps.
