I've wondered whether any game maker has done this, as it's really not all that hard to do, certainly no harder than modelling a track, for example. It wouldn't be that hard to instrument a real car, drive it around the track to record data, then adjust the game's models to replicate it as closely as possible. But, if any game maker had done that, you'd think they'd be presenting data to showcase their indisputably realistic FFB, and I haven't seen that.
I think it would be quite easy to measure, say, the Nm of force a steering wheel of a race car outputs while going through Turn 3 at Fuji (just to pick a long and constant radius corner). It would be also quite easy to replicate the force felt by the player BUT unless the game physics + car simulation + your steering hardware matches exactly the real life configuration, it would just be the force that is the same, and all the numbers "under the hood" will be fudged to give that end result. Even worse, unless you have a DD wheel it's unlikely your wheel could match the force of a real car's wheel either. This is what I like to call the "top-down" approach in simulation. You try to get the end result as close to reality, and work backwards from there so the physics calculations gives that result at all costs.
It would be a herculean task to do this for every car, on every track, and to calibrate it for every steering wheel that the game supports. People are already complaining we don't get enough cars, can you imagine how much longer it takes for PD to add new cars if they have to do all that testing?
![Sick :ill: :ill:](/wp-content/themes/gtp16/images/smilies/ill.svg?v=3)
And even the same car could produce different values with time and wear/tear in the steering mechanism (flexing of metal rods, loosening of joints, etc). I've driven 2 exact same cars in real life that have completely different steering feel because one has high mileage and not looked after, and the other is driven only sparingly.
So...what GT and other sims try to do is basically the "bottoms-up" approach in simulation. They build the physics engine based on real life physical principles (or as close as technology and maths allows us today). Then they do their best to interpret that signal through the hardware (i.e. steering wheel in your hands). So the numbers in the engine is as close as possible to real, but because of tech limitations and unknown variables (we cannot measure every possible force in real life, from the asphalt, through the steering mechanism, to your hands), the end force is not going to be exactly the same as reality. But in most cases it's good enough. Some sims get it more right than others, but even the best PC sims do not get it totally accurate either. GT does well for a mass market sim, but it's still a step below the best PC sims.
To wrap things up, going back to the title of this thread:
1. During understeer conditions IRL the wheel goes lighter as the wheel goes past the optimum slip angle. This isn't simulated in GTS, the force of FFB just stays constant.
2. If you overturn the wheel in GTS, instead of lightening of force you get this rattling effect, which doesn't happen IRL unless you have wheel hop. And safe to say that not every understeer situation is causing wheel hop.
Does it matter at the end of the day? It won't change the pecking order of FIA races. And personally I think there are bigger problems with GT (both physics, content and feature wise). BUT it is quite concerning how the team a PD can have the attention to detail of modelling the headlamps of a car correctly, but not get these basic simulation things right, even after 20+ years in the business. I'm sure Kaz knows this, because he is a very smart guy to be able to create Gran Turismo and do all the things he does. So that leaves the anomaly as a conscious design decision. And if it's Kaz' decision to have understeer rattle, then nothing we do will ever change that sadly.
When the next round of signup for FIA Star Players come up, I will post a link to that video in the suggestions box. Who knows if it will reach Kaz, but I suggested longer races with more reasonable tyre/fuel multiplier last season and we got it this season, so nothing to lose
![Big Grin :D :D](/wp-content/themes/gtp16/images/smilies/biggrin.svg?v=3)