Well thats your fault for not having him added.... and you can race in someone elses lounge even if they are not online. Or host a random lobby and boot out randoms.
As long as my racers have me on friends list, they can race. Simple as.
Your answer does not solve the problem. Why should anybody want to add multiple friends on PSN so that they can race with them privately? If my 40 odd GBRC guys want to race with you in your private lounge, should they all add you? If all of your guys want to race with me in my private lounge do they all have to add me also? People also play other games and have other PSN friends where do we all get the room to have enough GT5 friends to race with consitently?
The whole reason why allot of guys no longer race out of private lounges is due to this unnecessary and constant PSN friend request musical chairs. This is how we at GRBC did things before. When a new member would show up they would have to send multiple FR to all of our most regular members to ensure that they would not miss any racing (the guys most likely to host private lounges) Then one day, a not so regular club member would be first to host in his own private lounge, all the regulars would jump in leaving the new guy wondering where all the racing was at as he was not a friend with the dude hosting the lounge.
As a club trying to grow and maintain its members, this was a major pain in butt so I came up with some dedicated PSN Account/lounges. Of course every member could simply add me, and race out of my lounge whether I was online or not but that would mean having every member (183) added to me, which is not possible. We have about 30-40 actives now but in our hey day we had 70-80. a figure I do not want to have on my PSN friends list, so I created some other PSN accounts just for my members to race out of.
We came up with 5 lounges, one for casual racing, 1 for testing prior to events, and 3 divisional lounges where official races would take place out of. All existing and any new members had to do was add/send friend requests to those PSN accounts. At the start, many members were confused and thought it unnecessary. It took a while for it to click but now everyone understands where they need to be to race, whether it be casual racing, testing or for official events etc. You want casual racing, head over to GBRC_Casual. You want Testing prior to race day head to GBRC_TestNtune, and when you race in official events, head over to the lounge representative of your division. GBRC_lobby_1 2 and 3 etc.
We all here run our events to our liking, and we all think that our way is the way to go. This is understandable, we all do things differently, and no one way will suit all.
Regardless of how we differ in how we do things, in my case whether it be our 16 week seasons, or our defined racing car classes with set regulations etc having a distinguishable place to race that is easy for members of any series to understand is very important.
If we have 30 or guys creating series on a regular basis, would it not make sense to have some pre defined places to race rather then having to constantly FR different event hosts?
Anyway, I think the above (in respect of the private lounges) will be a mute point shortly, as I think GT6 will do away with the need to be a PSN friend to access a private lounge. From all that we have heard we should be able to create and manage our own communities within the GT6 World. I suspect clubs/community membership will be managed in game, and possibly without the 100 PSN limit. Access to private race lounges and events will be determined possibly by if you are a member of said community. I imagine and hope that membership of any GT6 Club/Community would be both invite by those that manage the group and request by those who want to join. Even better, would be a searchable club/community data base with filters, so that those looking to join a club/community have the tools to locate and request membership.
GT6 will, make all of our jobs a whole lot easier, but as much as many of you want to stay away from any kind of strict structure and regulation, I think it is necessary to a degree.
- Some kind of set regulations for different car classes would be welcome. But this would have to be opt in, as we can't force any race directors to use them. Again a little mute now as our tools may improve for GT6.
- A set place to race, where any potential participant knows exactly where the racing is going to be at, at all times. Right now with GT5 I would do it my way by creating specific PSN accounts/lounges but this will likely be unnecessary when GT6 arrives so we need to anticipate this as and when we know more about the new GT6 community features.
- Uniform signup and participation rules are very important. We have an official OLR so why not something similar for event participation? The biggest killer of any series are those that sign up for all races in a series but either show up for 1 or none. This is one way to erode and kill series. The whole GT community needs to frown upon this behavior. By nature a series requires a degree of dedication. Sure people have lives to lead, but people need to be honest and up front before one jumps and commits to a series without thought for the time and effort that goes into the organisation.
It is great that we are all talking about this now, but I believe the whole landscape is going to change with Gran Turismo 6. We will be forced (for the good) to do things differently. They say we are all the products of our environment, it is no different with regards to the the state of GT5 online racing. What you see now and before is a direct result of what GT5 had to offer us the online racer, as well as the tools within this forum. We have all made best with what we have, and interpreted our own way of how to do things. We all could have worked more uniformly for the better of the whole community but what we have now is what we have. Some are happy with it, while others want and can see a better way of doing it.
This whole discussion should have taken place before and during the early days of GT5.
GT6 community racing will become a whole lot more private.....
If we do get the tools, robust tools to create and manage our own communities all within GT6, we will all be back to doing things our own way with our own groups. This is not such a bad thing, as there will no doubt be a group for everyone. This time those groups will have a chance to flourish, as meeting with your fellow racers, finding and attracting new members will be down to the merits of your community, all of which will be much more identifiable and out there more than ever before. It sounds silly, but if we get community tools anything like what I have mentioned, a new kind of ecosystem will form. The standard of racing will go up. Being a quality, active and reliable racer will now bare fruits. Those that run a good GT6 communities will attract the quality and well rounded drivers while getting in with the popular communities will mean you will have to be on top of your game.
The way we stand now, I think it is great and admirable that we are discussing ways to improve the online racing, but lets face it, we have wayy too many Leaders here, people that have managed their groups and events their way for a long time. It will take a whole lot of work and effort and for people to swallow their pride and all work together, even if the aim is that of the whole community. Just look at politics as an example lol
Some people like Comfort Hards, while others like Race Softs, a compromise would be sports Mediums but is this really workable for both camps seeing as both would really prefer to run with the tyres of their choice?
As much as I like to run it my way, I accept that it is not to everyone's tastes, so that is why I sale my ship the way I want to, and those that like the way my boat rocks join me, and those that don't, don't.
Furinkazen, I guess to a large degree you are right in saying that GT online is not broken. I say this as GT online is only broken if that is how you perceive it. GT5 the way it works for many is just fine, while others see a better way of doing it.
I think we should all pause for now, and re live this discussion when GT6 ships.
, but I prefer the self important private invite only way j/k lol
. I'm free evening times (BST) on Thursdays, Saturdays, and Tuesdays.
