A few LFS questions...

[Dave_George]

Hi to all,

Ive been seriously thinking about downloading and trying LFS, looks great.

I see there are a few people here who obviously take part and may be able to help me out with a couple of questions?

My main concern is over graphics, I only currently have on board graphics with my Dell machine, will i need a new card for the PC to do the game justice? If so any reccomendations as im not up much on PC specs etc....

Also will I need to buy a wheel or can i use a controller similar to a DS2 item? Im sure i read about them on this forum somewhere for PCs? I have never used a wheel so far and dont really have space for a wheel and chair, but keyboard or mouse control doesnt really appeal to me!

Lastly can you race against AI to practice with before jumping in at the deep end and doing the "Online" competitions?

many thanks guys your help would be appreciated.

best regards

David

 

[Carl.]

I would be surprised if it would be playable with an onboard graphic chip, unless it's from NVidia (It used to be fine for me on an old GeForce 2) but it doesn't cost anything to try it. For me, it currently runs fine in 1024x768 on an AthlonXP 2600 and a cheap Radeon 9550.

I'm not sure about playing with a joystick, but I've seen pretty fast drivers using mouse for steering. To me It doesn't compare, though. The experience is lightyears ahead with a wheel, and most importantly force feedback. The Logitech Driving Force is quite cheap now, and will do the job fine.

You can practice against AI cars or license tests before going online, once you're used to control the car, you can start with less crowded servers. There shouldn't be any issue If you use common sense. Bear in mind that since demo servers are free, not everyone does, though.

 

[mad matty12]

live for speed is a new but yet fantasic game for me

 

[Lino]

My main concern is over graphics, I only currently have on board graphics with my Dell machine, will i need a new card for the PC to do the game justice? If so any reccomendations as im not up much on PC specs etc....

I dont think a onboard graphics will cut it. but you can always try. I use a Radeon X800 GTO.

Also will I need to buy a wheel or can i use a controller similar to a DS2 item? Im sure i read about them on this forum somewhere for PCs? I have never used a wheel so far and dont really have space for a wheel and chair, but keyboard or mouse control doesnt really appeal to me!

No you dont have to have a wheel. I used the mouse/keyboard combo for months before I got a Logitech Driving Force Pro for christmas. But I do recommend a wheel. Any wheel.

Lastly can you race against AI to practice with before jumping in at the deep end and doing the "Online" competitions?

Yes there is a single player. You can race up the 11 AI players, or you could watch 12 AI's race, but they dont pit for gas.

 

[Wolfe]

An onboard graphics chip might do the job....barely. I once managed to get LFS running at 15-20fps on my parents' 800MHz onboard-chip-equipped laptop (I can't remember the amount of RAM)...by setting the resolution to 512x384 and turning all of the graphics options all the way to the lowest level...

A controller will work with the game, but I can't guarantee that you'll have an easy time with it...you'll have to manually adjust the controller options until the game "feels right" to you. A wheel of any kind is highly, highly recommended. It doesn't even have to have force feedback, if your budget is that low...

You can race the A.I. and practice before going online, but it gets even better than that -- there's a training mode where you can do GT-license-style tests. I'm not entirely sure whether that's available in the demo mode, though....

 

[F1GTR]

Yes, it's available in the demo. I know 'cause I don't have the full version and it's all I play (apart from GTR).

 

[Tenacious D]

I seem to have a few issues with LFS.

First, it misrecognized my DF Pro and won't work right. I'm still intending to see if I can get it working properly soon.

Second, the darn thing seems to have frooked with my graphics settings! I have a GeForce 6800GT with 256megs onboard and the drivers current as of last December. After running it, not only did the game look kind of unpolished and unfinished, looking nothing like the pics at the LFS site, but videos were messed up and Anarchy Online wouldn't display ANY images at all till I reset some 6800 settings. Have any GeForce 6000 series users had any issues?

I'll download the latest version tomorrow from the LFS site but at this rate, I may only be playing console racers. I'm having too much fun training my drivatar B-Spec Bob in Forza anyway.

 

[Wolfe]

I seem to have a few issues with LFS.

First, it misrecognized my DF Pro and won't work right. I'm still intending to see if I can get it working properly soon.

Second, the darn thing seems to have frooked with my graphics settings! I have a GeForce 6800GT with 256megs onboard and the drivers current as of last December. After running it, not only did the game look kind of unpolished and unfinished, looking nothing like the pics at the LFS site, but videos were messed up and Anarchy Online wouldn't display ANY images at all till I reset some 6800 settings. Have any GeForce 6000 series users had any issues?

I'll download the latest version tomorrow from the LFS site but at this rate, I may only be playing console racers. I'm having too much fun training my drivatar B-Spec Bob in Forza anyway.

Can you tell us what exactly LFS is doing with the wheel? What version of Windows do you have (98, XP, etc.), and did you download the Logitech drivers/software?

Did you check the "Screen" and "Graphics" options in LFS to see if something was turned on or off that shouldn't have been on/off? LFS offers "advanced" graphics options at the bottom of the "graphics" menu -- I would check there first.

 

[CDailey]

And to add with your card...you could run 4xAA (or more) and 16xAF and LFS will not only run just as smooth, it'll look a whole lot better.

 

[G.T]

The menus confused me in LFS at first (demo). There are lots of options to turn things on/off, and I didn't know that I had turned everything off.

I have a 9600 Pro 128mb here and the game runs fine on 1600x1200, pretty much everything turned on. Only when there are more than 6 cars in my view does it slow down.

 

[Gabkicks]

^ thats not good lol. i can have 20 cars in front of me and still get decent framerates. Of course i am rarely in the back of the pack unless i've just joined a server.

 

[Tenacious D]

In reply,

I have WinXP SP1

I downloaded the Logitech Wingman drivers which Gabs provided a link to, but have yet to install them. Having too much fun with Forza right now to bother with it.

I think I'll delete this version of LFS and get the latest demo version. I'll give it one more shot, but I'm still having video playback issues till I reset a couple of features in the NVidia control panel. If this version is as frooky, I might try Richard Burns or Colin McRae Rally, or just stick to console racers. I honestly can't see the serious racers on the 360 and PS3 being outclassed noticeably by any PC sims, and Forza 2 and GT5 will undoubtedly be a lot more fun and full featured.

 

[Gabkicks]

have you got it up running?

 

[Wolfe]

Believe me, Live for Speed is worth any trouble it takes to get it working properly...

Which options do you keep on having to reset in the nVidia control panel? Have you looked for those same options in Live for Speed's options?

What problems are you having with the wheel and/or pedals?

I personally am not expecting any PS3 or 360 driving sim to be more realistic than Live for Speed...not even if Konami made Enthusia 2, since you think I'm such an EPR fanboy.

 

[Tenacious D]

Oh, the pedals are on the same controller assignment. Gas and brake, gas is 50% and down, brake is 50% and up. Hrm...

On the NVidia control panel, I forget which are my chosen parameters. Maybe color correction, but there's no correlation that I'm aware of to setting parameters in LFS.

And I'm not expecting any game to be noticeably better than LFS (not more realistic, that's another category entirely and not really what I said). But if Konami does make an Enthusia 2, I hope that the game resembles the demo that time around, and they remember to include tires.

 

[Gabkicks]

have you tried recallibrating?

 

[Wolfe]

Oh, the pedals are on the same controller assignment. Gas and brake, gas is 50% and down, brake is 50% and up. Hrm...

Sounds like you've currently got combined pedals (both pedals on one axis, where if you applied full throttle and full brakes, they'd cancel each other out). If you look in the lower-right-hand corner of the LFS control options screen and fiddle with the pedals, it should show you what they do and which axes they use.

Check the DFP's settings in the "game controllers" control panel and see if you can switch it to seperate pedals. If not, you'll have to install the Logitech drivers to be able to change it.

You can play LFS with combined pedals (set the "Throttle / brake axes" option to combined and set up the appropriate pedal inputs for throttle and brake)...but if you do that, you can't do left-foot braking, heel-toe, burnouts, or other fun stuff like that.

On the NVidia control panel, I forget which are my chosen parameters. Maybe color correction, but there's no correlation that I'm aware of to setting parameters in LFS.

Is there some setting in the control panel that would override LFS's ability to change stuff?

And I'm not expecting any game to be noticeably better than LFS (not more realistic, that's another category entirely and not really what I said). But if Konami does make an Enthusia 2, I hope that the game resembles the demo that time around, and they remember to include tires.

I understand what you said -- it's just that if I said "I'm not expecting any driving sim on the PS3 or 360 to be a better driving game than Live for Speed," I would be lying, simply because of the lack of cars, tracks, and single-player content in LFS.

 

[KurtG85]

You have to goto the logitech controller options for the dfp (or whatever wheel your using) that are not within the live for speed program and click the box that puts brake and accel on two axis. Then change it in lfs to 2 axis.
Also, make sure your number of degrees of full lock is the same in the controller options as it is within live for speed as it will make the force feedback a helluva lot more accurate and realistic.
Ive been kicked out of my house for like 2 months and havnt even been able to play the new updated physics version! :'( Hope you all are enjoying it!
Also, I run Lfs on my crappy laptop at 60 fps. About 15-30 when ive got a mass of cars in front of me. All my graphic settings are turned to lowest and im running at the resolution one above the lowest, but it doesnt bother me one bit. I cant believe the best driving simulator out there (what i was craving for years) happens to run decently on crap hardware. I got lucky as hell.

 

[Tenacious D]

I'm not sure what the deal is with the pedal assignments. I've tried all three settings for the pedals and they're just stuck. In the game they don't respond at all. I'll try to rip the old version out this weekend when I have time to sit around and fuss with it, but if the new version does the same thing with my video playback, I'm not going to be too enthused about LFS either. You don't have these frooky issues with console games. Oh well, we'll see saturday or sunday, but I must say that I'm having a blast with Forza, and Sega GT is in the wings, so I'm not in a hurry.

 

[G.T]

^ thats not good lol. i can have 20 cars in front of me and still get decent framerates. Of course i am rarely in the back of the pack unless i've just joined a server.

Yeah, it isn't that good really.

I only play online with a few friends here at GTP, so I never really get the slowdown.

 

[Jondot]

It looks pretty good on my useless card, so it doesn't need that much

Like carl said, give it a go and see what happens

 

[amp88]

The reason you can get more cars on track without slowdown online is that there (usually) aren't any AI cars on the track online, so the AI calculations don't have to be done.

 

[Wolfe]

Is anyone else having issues connecting to LiveforSpeed.net and LFSWorld?

 

[Gabkicks]

yeah... lfsforums and lfsworld are down !!!! i havent ever seen this in years of playing lfs... its been down since yesterday.

 

[gt4005]

Hey,

is it necessary to buy S1 and S2 license? I mean I dunno if anyone is still driving S1.

But I think I wouldnt be able to race on S1 tracks or am I wrong? Would like to buy game too!

 

[Gabkicks]

i dont think s1 is for sale anymore germany's got a HUGE lfs community.

 

[CDailey]

S2 includes everything from S1 plus the extra tracks and cars, if that's what you're asking, gt4005.

 

[gt4005]

S2 includes everything from S1 plus the extra tracks and cars, if that's what you're asking, gt4005.

Yeah I was. Was confused cos some people say u have to buy both. Hmm thats confusing. Yeah there's some action going on in Germany. I think I'll buy it and then race. Hopefully there're no idiots on the servers like in F1Challenge.

 

[Lino]

Yeah I was. Was confused cos some people say u have to buy both. Hmm thats confusing. Yeah there's some action going on in Germany. I think I'll buy it and then race. Hopefully there're no idiots on the servers like in F1Challenge.

LOTS of idiots on demo servers, but hardly any on full s2 servers.

 

[amp88]

LOTS of idiots on demo servers, but hardly any on full s2 servers.

We must be playing on different servers then...

edit: Yesterday when I was playing on South City, someone was racing the wrong way down the pitlane, then later on at Blackwood someone ran into the first corner without braking at all, taking out half the field, called us all a very bad word then left.