The best F1 Sim

[slimjim8201]

In my opinion, Live for Speed (LFS) is far and away superior in terms of physics simulation than anything else out there right now. rFactor is nice due to being mod friendly, but the underlying physics engine stinks in comparison to LFS.

Everything about rFactor looks and feels "plasticky" after playing LFS. Hard to describe. I would suggest downloading the demo from rFactor and LFS and giving them a whirl. Tracks and cars, with the exception of four of the cars, are fictional in LFS. That said, I'm glad for this, as the tracks are amazingly well designed and quite diverse. Same goes for the cars. The Formula BMW in is sublime and provides much better races than the full out F1 car.

Are you planning on getting a nice wheel as well? A good sim is worthless without a decent set of wheels and pedals...

[modbaraban]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Am_sDg9NpEI[/youtube]

[Scotracer]

In my opinion, Live for Speed (LFS) is far and away superior in terms of physics simulation than anything else out there right now. rFactor is nice due to being mod friendly, but the underlying physics engine stinks in comparison to LFS.

Everything about rFactor looks and feels "plasticky" after playing LFS. Hard to describe. I would suggest downloading the demo from rFactor and LFS and giving them a whirl. Tracks and cars, with the exception of four of the cars, are fictional in LFS. That said, I'm glad for this, as the tracks are amazingly well designed and quite diverse. Same goes for the cars. The Formula BMW in is sublime and provides much better races than the full out F1 car.

Are you planning on getting a nice wheel as well? A good sim is worthless without a decent set of wheels and pedals...

Sorry but iRacing is currently the most realistic simulator. I have it (although very expensive) it is by far the most realistic in terms of graphics, audio, force feedback and physics. It's friggin' epic.

http://www.iracing.com/home.html

[mep]

I just bought rfactor one week ago and I must say the game starts to suck now.
I have been playing F1 2002 and F1 Challenge.
The best one for me was F2002 because I really liked it to play it online.
I played it almost every evening and met always the same other racers there.
We were a bit like gentleman racers because we were really fair drivers.
If somebody came off the track by a little contact the other waited for him so we could race against each other again.

In F1 Challenge I never found something like this.
Most of the time it wasn't even possible to tough another car.
Moreover it seems like nobody is playing it online.
Maybe because it wasn't sold so often than F2002.


Now I bought rfactor and hopped it would be better in terms of online racing.
But I think it is not.

The problem is you have to download several things first to play online.
If you have the wrong things you can’t play online, and there is a lot of stuff and I don't even know what I need.
I want to play F1 so I downloaded a mod called 08F1RFT.
So then you need the right tracks.
So you have to search for every single F1 track and moreover there are several different versions of one track.
So until now after downloading the mod and a few tracks(obvious the wrong ones but I don’t find others) I still did not managed to play online once.

And furthermore the KI seems always to have one standard setup on all tracks.

Maybe somebody can help me a bit but until now rfactor is really crap.

[Scotracer]

Well rFactor isn't an F1 sim, ultimately. It's just a racing simulation that has well, everything considered.

Sure, it can be a bit annoying that not everyone online uses the same track version and you get miss-matches that way but to be honest, I very rarely play any sim online as they are filled by idiots who just love to take you out at turn 1.

There is no other sim where I can race:

LMP1 (Audi R10, Epsilon Euskadi, Pug 908)
GT1
GT2
F1
Champ Car (1995 and 2006)
IRL
WTCC/BTCC
older F1 series (I have 1955, 1971, 1979, 1985, 1988, 1999, 2005, 2006, 2007)
Various road cars
Rally cars
Racing trucks
Go-karts
A1GP
Formula Nippon
Formula BMW
Formula 3
And many others

All on track at once to compare their relative performance (driving an F1 car on a track that is occupied mainly with BMW Mini Cup cars is bloody hilarious).

Each to their own I suppose...

[kensaundm31]

So, If I buy the game do I have to actually download a mod to play an F1 season?

Is the only f1 car a BMW that is done by the creators of the game. On the site also there were only a few tracks listed.

I know the quality of modding is very good, sometimes better that ISI (F12002)but what do I get as standard in the game in F1 terms?

[kensaundm31]

Oh ... its because of the liscencing issue.

Bernie you are a super-rich PRAT! [-X

[Beemer4]

I've got F1 Challenge 99-02 on PS2 and the graphics are pretty good for a game that it is almost 5 years old. It's got better graphics than TOCA Race Driver 3 or even the past 4 LICENSED F1 games, and yet Bernie won't licence other games that are better than the licensed games.

I also have tried rFactor and Live for Speed and they are the best games that I have played on PC. =D>

[modbaraban]

Codemasters are working on the 2008 or 2009 title now. Thy have the license and the game is planned to be availeble for consoles and PC. The simracing community expect that to be an arcade one though.

[cba_]

100% sure its going to be arcade, like every game they make

[Scotracer]

Don't fret - they have said they will make it a simulation

[mep]

Codemasters are working on the 2008 or 2009 title now.

I have Colin Mcrae Dirt from Codemasters and it is a great disappointment.
Graphics are absolute super but steering of the car sucks so much that you will not get happy with the game.
I really fought me through the game and played the whole championship mode but then I put the game by side.

From steering and car control are all the other games really good.
On Gp4, F2002, F1 Challenge and Rfactor you will get used to the steering of the car quite fast.

So, If I buy the game do I have to actually download a mod to play an F1 season?

Correct.
And this is the biggest problem.
You will need a mod and all the tracks.
The game itself has only Barcelona and Monza and one BMW F1 car.

Finding a F1 mod is also not a big problem but finding the correct tracks is quite hard.
Until now I didn't managed to find a track which is able to join an online session.
Maybe someone here is so kind to give me the links for the needed tracks to play the 08F1RFT mod online.

[Miguel]

Thanks to this thread I decided to download LFS and play the demo, even if it meant rebooting into my dusty hated WinXP partition. What can I say? It's brilliant!

I really recommend everybody who hasn't to download LFS and play the demo. It has three cars: a utility hatchback FWD with 100 HP, a RWD coupe with 140 HP and a Formula BMW (425 kg and 140) HP. You also get to play only on a dirt track and a conventional track which, IMHO, resembles somewhat to Donington Park. The download is only 130 Mb and the game runs very well in my 4yr old laptop (Centrino @ 1.7 GHz, 512 Mb RAM and an ATi Mobility Radeon 9600). Please note that the download contains the full game content, but must be activated by buying the S2 license.

It may not be the most feature-full sim, or the most gorgeous sim, but it really shows what a driving simulator can do these days. I am raving about it and I drive with a joystick. With a bit of luck, I will "trick" a friend of mine to lend me his FFB wheel. I am even considering buying a decent driving wheel, even if force feedback won't work in linux.

[kensaundm31]

rFactor
Wow, I'm very impressed =D>

It looks great and most importantly the handling is close to what I percieve as being realistic based on real on-board footage.

Finally after 10 years a simulation worthy of the name.

[bar555]

mep , is it possible to post a higher-res image of your great avatar please ?

I know that my request has nothing to do with the on-going thread and I apologize for this