Project Cars vs. Forza 6 - Poll added September 18th

For those that have both (F6 full game, not the demo pls), which do you prefer?

  • Forza 6

    Votes: 22 26.2%

  • Project Cars

    Votes: 42 50.0%

  • On the fence, both are equally good in their own way.

    Votes: 14 16.7%

  • Don't like either one.

    Votes: 6 7.1%
  • Total voters
    84
jimipitbull
The majority of gamers have probably never even driven a manual, with no power steering, no brake booster, leaf springs, drum brakes and needing a wheel alignment. Which I assume the default settings in pcars is trying to replicate.
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My first car was all of those things except it had a brake booster, and the only car in Pcars which handles anything like my first car is the MkI Escort, which, would you believe, has no power steering, leaf springs, drum brakes, and after a couple of aggressive laps, will probably need a wheel alignment :D
 
SlipZtrEm
That sounds like a pretty terrible, major design flaw for a game, if you ask me. Surely that wasn't the case... right?
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The AI in pCARS run simplified physics. Last I checked, they ran an efficient version of the original brush model for their tyres, while only the player has the advanced SETA model. I'm not sure if that stayed the same through to release or whether they changed it, but the AI are definitely not on the same physics as the player and haven't been since very early alpha (if they even were then).

Frankly, the SETA model takes up a buttload of CPU cycles. At one point during testing my CPU was only running under thermal throttle (~1.6 Ghz if I recall) because my fan had broken, and the deformation calculations braking and turning into a corner had significant effects on the frame rate. And that was with it running in 4 core mode, basically a core per corner.

It would require a mega computer to run a handful cars with full SETA, let alone any more than that. Simplified physics was the only way it could ever work. On the plus side, the simplified physics are basically what the player had at the start of the alpha, which wasn't great but wasn't awful either.

This is the price you pay. If the dev wants to put CPU cycles into the player physics, then something else has to give. Computational cycles are not infinite, as any player of Gran Turismo well knows.
 
^ Just adding that when the AI and its physics has been tuned so that they can drive plausible lines and put in the same lap times as the players, it's job done there. Large portions of the advanced tyre model is there to provide feel for the human players - that would obviously be wasted on the AI.

It's certainly not a design flaw. It's a design which allows a sublime tyre feel for the players, where the AI need no such thing.
 
jimipitbull
The majority of gamers have probably never even driven a manual, with no power steering, no brake booster, leaf springs, drum brakes and needing a wheel alignment. Which I assume the default settings in pcars is trying to replicate.
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Wanna bet! Check my profile pic.
 
mister dog
If you want real racing and physics; settle for PCARS. If you'd like a cool and fun car game buy FM6.
Simple as that i suppose.
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I like customising cars and driving them around. In GT4 it was really cool to buy a crappy car that was diving like a swimsuit girl and then fix it up with suspension and tweaks and make it work and look mean. And the very cool special tracks, not just real life tracks. So I imagine today, and especially with Forza and the new NFS coming up, these things are loads better. But I still tend to want the real motorsports racing feeling more and rigging up my wheel in my living room is a pain so even though Project Cars is still buggy as hell, it's such a great game. I have other car-game options but all the time PCars is the game I start up so I guess that's telling.

Maybe I'll get the NFS if it becomes cheap before EA shut the servers down and kill the game.
 
Alltidxx
I like customising cars and driving them around. In GT4 it was really cool to buy a crappy car that was diving like a swimsuit girl and then fix it up with suspension and tweaks and make it work and look mean. And the very cool special tracks, not just real life tracks. So I imagine today, and especially with Forza and the new NFS coming up, these things are loads better. But I still tend to want the real motorsports racing feeling more and rigging up my wheel in my living room is a pain so even though Project Cars is still buggy as hell, it's such a great game. I have other car-game options but all the time PCars is the game I start up so I guess that's telling.

Maybe I'll get the NFS if it becomes cheap before EA shuts the servers down and kill the game.
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That is one thing that has always pulled me to the Forza series(or games that are simliar, really.) I really enjoy customization, and making my car my own. That is one of the funnest things to me. Being able to bring my little crappy looking 86 Civic, and beating people driving more high end cars. It has that certain pull, that PCars failed to bring to me.

I went into PCars knowing full well customization like that was not going to be available, but still decided to give it a chance because I like racing games in general. While it was fun, I gradually fell off and moved back to Forza 5 for the time being. The endless different outcomes you can achieve with one car is something I find amazing, especially with online racing.
 
The guy driving on Forza can't seem to keep the car in check. Driving is not hard, especially considering he's also just using normal steering, compared to Simulation. He's throttling to much it seems like(had to watch the video with no sound, at work :lol:)

What I liked about PCars is the stiffness on race cars actually make it look like race cars when driving around. I've yet to try one on FM6, so I suppose I'll buy one today and give it a shot. At the same time, I feel that they gave that same feel to normal cars as well, in PCars, which I thought felt a bit odd. Another thing that was odd is that the same steering(visually) is through out all cars. It's very quick and odd looking, but looks at home with race vehicles.
 
bleeder
Quick comparison vid round Brands Hatch from VVV. Not sure if I'm biased, but I much prefer the look of pCARS handling-wise and graphically. The road surface looks better IMO and the car looks more drivable.



Haha ninja'd!
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Looks like he's using a controller which might be foreign for him. He doesn't look comfortable in either game, almost as if he took the controller out for the first time and this is his second or third lap in each car.
 
bleeder
The physics are so good it makes you find a car you like and you'll just drive it for days and days until you want to start tuning another then rinse and repeat.
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The "there aren't enough cars" perspective I find is raised by those used to games like GT and Forza. And like I said, I enyoj those games too, but with less advanced physics there is less to explore per car, and the game is somewhat about "progression", and so one needs more cars for the same playtime. Also project cars is about track-racing so there will be much more thinking going on about particular sections of the track, how to cut 10ths of a second and simracers normally have an urge to go tweak this and that (ex. "in that particular turn I need better turn-in, but not so much that...(reasons)") to get slightly faster time, it's half the joy for some, and so really if there was one car, that would be less fun, but would still last quite some time :)
 
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Alltidxx
The "there aren't enough cars" perspective I find is raised by those used to games like GT and Forza. With less advanced physics there is less to explore per car (and the game is somewhat about "progression") and so one needs more cars for the same playtime. Simracers normally have an urge to go tweak this and that, it's half the joy for some, and so really if there was one car, that would be less fun, but would still last quite some time :)
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I can definitely see where you're coming from. In GT6 there were at least 200 cars I owned that I never actually drove. The reason is I'd spend a few mil on cheap but cool old road cars and hot them up, make them look nice, and maybe take some photos, but I never felt much of an urge to drive them. I'd drive some, but others would be just for the collection.

GT6 was a car collecting game, where you would constantly grind crap races you didn't even enjoy just to get enough cash to buy more cars. Then by the time you got some good cars, you were so over the boring driving in the game that you'd just explore the photomode and hot the cars up and all that.
 
Johnnypenso
Looks like he's using a controller which might be foreign for him. He doesn't look comfortable in either game, almost as if he took the controller out for the first time and this is his second or third lap in each car.
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He is a wheel users so not sure why he choose to use pads for this vid, Maybe it was to show Forza handles as badly on a pad as it does a wheel? His wheel comparison vids coming up will be interesting.
 
Alltidxx
The "there aren't enough cars" perspective I find is raised by those used to games like GT and Forza. And like I said, I enyoj those games too, but with less advanced physics there is less to explore per car, and the game is somewhat about "progression", and so one needs more cars for the same playtime.
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I wouldn't necessarily say that's true, all the first sentence I can agree with. The same people that don't like Forza because lack of cars stem from gt, and the same thing trickles down from Forza to Pcars. Seems like a likely scenario.

Although what I would disagree with is the second half. The physics may be less advanced, but by what margin? I feel like the differences are there, but they are not great. The reason I disagree though, is because so far I have not found two similar cars in terms of characteristics, every car has its own feel. While I don't own all 450+, what I have so far are completely different. That alone is enough reason for me to try to explore the cars. There is progression in the story, you are correct, but it can very much be done with a car list the size of Pcars. It's just an added bonus to have the amount it does.

Also project cars is about track-racing so there will be much more thinking going on about particular sections of the track, how to cut 10ths of a second and simracers normally have an urge to go tweak this and that (ex. "in that particular turn I need better turn-in, but not so much that...(reasons)") to get slightly faster time, it's half the joy for some, and so really if there was one car, that would be less fun, but would still last quite some time :)
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I've been doing this since I've been playing Forza 1, so this is not something that is missing from the game, or something that you cant do.
 
pCARS feels much better for me regarding physics and controls comparing to FM6 demo. Looking at videos, FM6 driving physics seem horrible like FM5 but maybe slightly better which puts me off getting game as when cars aren't fun to drive then don't see the point of playing it.

FFB is awesome with wheel on pCARS, never tried a Forza game with a wheel but haven't heard much good about it so I think pCARS will win that comparison by a sizable margin. Hot lapping I think pCARS wins compared to the Rivals system. Does FM6 even let you know the sector times or even any Forza game? Find it strange a "Motorsport" game doesn't seem to have a way to analyse how fast you are going unless I'm missing something. AI on demo seems like FM5 where you have to like overtake most of the cars at the start to have a better chance of winning the race. Otherwise the 1st or 2nd car pull away but you only need to come 3rd IIRC like last game. Soundwise I find, FM6 tyre sound annoying like FM5 and that gets on my nerves but pCARS doesn't. Graphics you can clearly see FM6 is a much higher budget game with more resources spent on it but it also has compromises that makes pCARS do well against it. Sense of speed seems much better in pCARS too.
 
Saidur_Ali
pCARS feels much better for me regarding physics and controls comparing to FM6 demo. Looking at videos, FM6 driving physics seem horrible like FM5 but maybe slightly better which puts me off getting game as when cars aren't fun to drive then don't see the point of playing it.
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Well the problem here is you're comparing real experience with one game, compared to a video of another :P FM6 handles nicely, much better and not so oversteer-prone like it was in FM5. Feels a lot more realistic this way.

FFB is awesome with wheel on pCARS, never tried a Forza game with a wheel but haven't heard much good about it so I think pCARS will win that comparison by a sizable margin. Hot lapping I think pCARS wins compared to the Rivals system. Does FM6 even let you know the sector times or even any Forza game? Find it strange a "Motorsport" game doesn't seem to have a way to analyse how fast you are going unless I'm missing something.
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Yeah, I've heard some bad stories about FM6 FFB as well. Not sure what the case is as some are reporting no problems, also. Every Forza game has always told you if you are running slower, or faster through certain sectors. It's not a set graph like on Pcars, but it pops up on the screen as you pass the sector. This has dated back to FM1.

AI on demo seems like FM5 where you have to like overtake most of the cars at the start to have a better chance of winning the race. Otherwise the 1st or 2nd car pull away but you only need to come 3rd IIRC like last game. Soundwise I find, FM6 tyre sound annoying like FM5 and that gets on my nerves but pCARS doesn't. Graphics you can clearly see FM6 is a much higher budget game with more resources spent on it but it also has compromises that makes pCARS do well against it. Sense of speed seems much better in pCARS too.
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The problem is that the number of laps is low. I would really love to have an adjustable slider like Pcars have, that feature would be so awesome and would alleviate alot of the problems people have with the Career/AI. Still, with the number of laps available, I'm having no problem winning by a large margin by the end of the race, most of the time.

Yeah, they forced podium wins this time. Would be awesome to have a point based system so when you go through one series, it tallies up at the end. Kinda bummed about that.

What I found annoying is the screeching of the tires in the wet. It sounds so bassy and odd! I think PCars audio department, all around, seems better.
 
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ImaRobot
Well the problem here is you're comparing real experience with one game, compared to a video of another :P FM6 handles nicely, much better and not so oversteer-prone like it was in FM5. Feels a lot more realistic this way.
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Do have experience with demo and FM5 and also FM5 demo. My impressions are really similar to what I wrote nearly two years ago: Link

I'm still shocked that they can release a game with such driving physics and controls. Good to see TeamVVV highlighting car behaviour and not giving it a free pass. The handling feels really wrong on all aspects for me. I'm not surprised seeing how difficult it is to drive with 1:1 steering as the game physics make the cars behave very strangely, that it is probably why it is really hard to control car unless there is some steering aid helping. Seems the case since FM3 where T10 forced steering aid so it is drivable but since they they turned it off, it seems particularly in FM5 and FM6 made it really hard to push car to its limit while feeling in control.

Physics feels really fundamentally flawed and it looks like they are continuing to build on this model. They are probably calculating a lot of stuff and have good data but the end product is really shocking. I'm amazed how Assetto Corsa feels so much better and cars handle so much better while having so few people working on it and the same for pCARS.
ImaRobot
Yeah, I've heard some bad stories about FM6 FFB as well. Not sure what the case is as some are reporting no problems, also. Every Forza game has always told you if you are running slower, or faster through certain sectors. It's not a set graph like on Pcars, but it pops up on the screen as you pass the sector. This has dated back to FM1.
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There is no delta and you don't have reference sector times so you don't have something to compare yourself consistently which makes it really hard to understand how quick you are going. They seem to omit a lot of Motorsport relevant stuff out of the game and have been doing so for maybe since the franchise started.
ImaRobot
The problem is that the number of laps is low. I would really love to have an adjustable slider like Pcars have, that feature would be so awesome and would alleviate alot of the problems people have with the Career/AI. Still, with the number of laps available, I'm having no problem winning by a large margin by the end of the race, most of the time.

Yeah, they forced podium wins this time. Would be awesome to have a point based system so when you go through one series, it tallies up at the end. Kinda bummed about that.

What I found annoying is the screeching of the tires in the wet. It sounds so bassy and odd! I think PCars audio department, all around, seems better.
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Against Unbeatable or what it is called AI, I find I only have chance of winning if I overtake most of the field in the first corner or two.
 

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