- 10,373
- Manchester
- Ardius_
Argh, how did it record my fastest lap? I thought it didn't record it if the player gets disconnected/leaves. Thats annoying, seeing as it kept my laptime where I spun and got hit
No, its not a problem with the number of people, I get these disconnect problems with any number of people in the lobby, be it 2 or 7 or whatever. This is just an issue with how they've written their networking code, which is a much more major problem.
Anyway, great racing last night, I think I'll explain my night, race by race:
1st race Hockenheimring - finished 5th
I knew this track quite well from previous games and I had practiced a little bit, so I didn't fare to badly in this race, but because it was the first race I decided to take things carefully and this resulted in me losing a few positions (not to mention I had major lag issues around GTP_fairplay_plz, it was near impossible to overtake or avoid him). I felt pleased with that result though because I knew it was the best I could do without more practice.
2nd race Monza - finished 3rd
Now this was more like it, I knew this track from many, many games and I had of course raced it many, many times in FC because it crops up so much in the challenge modes, etc. Had a great battle with Hun near the end of the race and had a bit of a dodgy moment in the Parabolica, where me and Hereward were coming into it side by side, me on the inside. I kept my line on the inside, slowing down to avoid understeering into him, next thing I see is a spinning Hereward smashing into the inside barrier behind me. I don't know what happened there and I wasn't sure it was my fault. Otherwise though, a great race with a few penalties here and there for silly mistakes.
3rd race Redwood/Montreal/whatever you want to call it - finished 6th
Bad race. Very bad race. Straight into the first corner I missed the braking point completely and that pretty much summed up my race. I hadn't practiced this track at all before hand and though I knew it well from other games, I didn't know my braking points in a F430. Still, it wasn't a complete washout, I did manage to gain some fun in trying to catch Hereward up, which I very nearly did if I hadn't made a mistake or two on the last lap.
4th race Mugello (wet) - finished 3rd
Excellent race, this should have been a 2nd place, but I went and did the stupid thing on the last corner, last lap and decided to look behind me to check on RSRacer as I came up to the braking point. Still, I was a bit more in my element here, I love this track and I love the wet weather conditions, it was great racing holding off RSRacer though I will apologise for any small hits or anything I did like that, naturally it wasn't intentional.
5th race Spa - didn't finish
Ok, well technically this was 2 races,
The first race started ok until half way through lap 1 when people started getting disconnected. I had a decent start and before I left I had made a couple of mistakes and dropped to 5th (I think). I had a bad moment though when I gained a penalty going over Raidillon, which slowed me to a snail's pace right in front of jjaisli! I think that penalty right there is very dangerous, not very good games design there.
The second race again started ok, I was up to 4th on lap 2 or 3 and I had Sarrinen69 coming up behind me and then overtaking me at Blanchimont. I started to give him room to go past, because he was clearly faster than me and I was going to try and retake the position at the Bus Stop, but unfortunately as I moved over I got a tyre loose on the grass. Well, its not something I recommend
First, I spun twice into the barriers, then after the second impact I went sliding across sideways onto the track staight into the path of Hun, danjama and jjaisli! Got hit by Hun and spun twice more and was left 14+ seconds behind. I continued to race for another lap but then I got disconnected and that was that.
Overall, this test has proved to me several things about FC online:
- No matter how many players there are, there are problems with the network code which randomly cause people to become disconnected.
- 30 minute races are too long to be worth it because of disconnections. Using our race as an example, if this was a points-race, I would of unfairly got more points than people in Lobby 2 even though I had got disconnected and didn't run the full 30 minutes. This can't be fairly balanced out, because I couldn't not disconnect, it was out of my hands, but its not fair that I should get points for a race I could not complete.
- Despite disconnections, 5 minute or 10 minute races seem to be a bit better because at least the race is over quicker and it damages the race a little less.
- The penalty on Raidillon is very dangerous and I think it should be made a rule that anyone who catches this penalty should pull onto the grass immediately to avoid accidents.
- Lag issues between cars and collisions seems marginally better than F1:CE, so close racing is a bit easier to accomplish without incidents. Its not as good as GT5
, but its good enough. The only problem comes with the really bad lag, because it is impossible to successfully overtake these cars in corners because they're jumping all over the place, perhaps just as bad as F1:CE. Not a major thing though, we'll just have to overtake on straights! - I think the current format of 4 races + final mixed lobbies race works well but the 30 minute race time and the amount of time it takes to get them organised means the last race ends up being way too late for some of us. Perhaps it would be better and easier to make the final race 10 minutes like the rest?
- Overall, I don't think FC is up to having points races and full blown championships, its just not reliable enough, we had disconnections in every race.
, & should lead to some exciting, close racing within an overall competitive framework. It might also serve to provide a basis for future "larger grid" events.
I nailed the brakes as soon as I saw you but I had less than a second to react. And coming through Au Rouge/Radillon at full speed, the car isn't particularly stable to begin with. I actually wasn't sure what to do after I hit you. I felt badly but you were still on the track and were still in front of me. I was waiting for you to take off but it looked like you were moving to side the letting me pass so I started to go. And then I wondered if you were just oversteering onto the grass and hesitated again. ARGH! I also spent a minute fiddling with my view because my windshield cracked and I couldn't see properly so I switched to hood cam. But you're right, a penalty in that spot of the track is deadly because cars coming through there are completely blind. The same thing happened to me at Monza when somebody had a penalty going through the second chicane. There I managed to avoid the car but ended up spinning about 900*, on and off the track, as a result. 
I wasn't sure if the cars behind me managed to avoid you because I was too busy fighting the wheel. 
But then again, Ardius got in our way twice and look what happened to him. 
). Sarrinen showed his "out-of-this-world" class, RSRacer has also clearly shown that, among "just-human" players like myself, he's really very fast and very consistent, and Biggles has again showed his class, with a well deserved 3rd overall.
