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TedSGN View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Quote TedSGN Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Topic: ToCA Race Driver 3 impressions
    Posted: 03-08-2006 at 8:22pm
If nothing else it sounds as if that track is flawed, but at least balanced.  If it was entertaining then that's all the better.

I have been reading stories about certain track/car combos that leave the AI looking like student drivers and this must be one of them.  The saving grace is that they are not finding some magical setup or grip that you aren't able to find and leaving you in the dust (as you mentioned).

Your stories are causing me to lean towards asking the lady at my local shop to get a copy in for rental.  I really like ToCA 2, but offline was not much more than practice for me.  If this iteration has more human like drivers it will go a long way with me.

Thanks for the continued impressions!
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Post Options Post Options   Quote GB_Simo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-08-2006 at 7:34pm

Ted, you mentioned level playing fields, and here I'm seeking an opinion - is this the game providing a level playing field or is it the AI being atrocious?

The FW18 series takes you to Silverstone for round two, and having grown frustrated with my inability to find any sort of grip on my favourite circuit I decided to not qualify and start the 6 lap race from P20.  What I didn't know, and hadn't realised in round one at Hockenheim since I was preoccupied with not crashing in the early stages, is that in this series there's a world of difference between the grip levels of hot and cold tyres.

As I steamed into Copse with clear track ahead of me - I wasn't 1st already, I'd just left the line with all the fast reactions and controlled acceleration of a doorframe - I was alerted not only to my failure to take the planned route towards the apex and consequent disappearance stage left, but also to the 6 AI cars ahead of me that had done exactly the same thing.  My attention was particularly drawn to the one just ahead of and about 3 feet below my now airborne car.  Shunt, swear, restart.

Take 2 and I made it through the carnage at Copse and got all the way to the Becketts complex - yes, all the way to turn two - before being speared by a car that had gone off through the Maggots right hander and managed to rejoin the track backwards on the exit of the left at Becketts, right in front of me and just far enough away that I had time to register his presence as I thundered into him.  Shunt, swear, restart.

For two hours.

For some reason, there is absolutely no grip with this particular car/track combination.  It's fine everywhere else, just at Silverstone.  Normally in a racing game, if you've got no grip then you're left sat on your rear wondering what happened as the AI cars disappear into the far distance.  Here, I eventually finished 5th in a mandatory pit stop race and would have done much better if I hadn't rallycrossed my way round the second lap.  Along the way I saw a series of spins ranging from the forgiveable (two cars in consecutive corners having the accidents I'd threatened to have a lap earlier) to the frankly bizarre (at least half the field had a moment at Copse at some stage, including one car that I saw drop it on the exit of the pit lane...) to the Takuma Sato - if I'm braking at the 100 metre board and just about getting slowed down in time for Stowe, braking 10 metres later than me and taking 20 mph more into the corner with you will not work, and a trip into the gravel will surely follow.

That was all in the race I finished.  You should have seen the ones I had to restart.  It's the only time I've ever played a ToCA game and felt the other cars were apparently being driven by the cast of Police Academy, but in the middle of it all I was Steve Guttenberg, in a manner of speaking.  Every single one of the AI cars was all over the show at some point, but in amongst them I was appreciably faster in only a couple of places, both of those braking zones and not corners, and I was in the scenery about as often as they were.  For the rest of the series the AI was fine - is this brilliance on the part of the developer or have they in fact royally screwed it up?

It must be screwy, surely?  The thing is, if the AI is screwy then it still gave me two of the most entertaining hours I've spent with any racer - do I forgive it?

Cheers,
Adam

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Post Options Post Options   Quote GB_Simo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-08-2006 at 7:24pm

Good ToCA time, chaps.

The 1987 Williams Honda FW11B is incredible fun.  Big slicks give bags of grip in the high speed corners, while 1000 brake on tap means you've got licence to slide coming out of the slower corners.  Slide you must, too, because here is a car that practically begs you to drive it on the throttle.  It's a racing car, that's what they're designed for, but here is a particularly fine example of a motor that delivers better results if you're willing to gun it hard and early.

Your enjoyment of them in round one of their World Tour series at Zandvoort, however, is limited by how happy you are about what happens at the end of the back straight.  But Peter, how will we get to Neverland?

Think of Christmas, think of snow
Think of sleigh bells, off you go
Like reindeer in the sky
You can fly, you can fly, you can fly!

You've got to judge the jump just right as well, because a) there's a barrier very close in on the outside of the track and b) there's a very fast corner immediately afterwards.  The good news is that assuming you made it down safely, you'll have so much fun going flat in 5th through the next right hander that you'll forget all about your unscheduled flight.  It does end up being fun once you reconcile yourself with the idea that a Formula One car can do that kind of thing without dissolving.

Curiously, the much faster FW18 of 1996 doesn't fly at the same point.  You can account for some of that with the extra downforce of the car, but it still seems peculiar.

Ignore that, though, and the car isn't capable of being anything less than entertaining.  The AI races you properly, gives you room but isn't scared to have a go, and some of the track selections - in fact, all of them, even Bahrain where the lap is interrupted by no fewer than 3 separate high jump contests - are inspired.  When it's done as well as this, TRD 3 is as good a console racer as you'll find.

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Post Options Post Options   Quote Zeppo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-06-2006 at 1:11pm
Yeah I know, there hasn't been much to miss with F1 games.  But just like FIFA sells massively all over with its fashion show core, so too would any F1 game with proper liveries and tracks find its way into my collection.

Now that I've opened up the BMW Williams F1 Challenge, supposedly last year's car, I am just floored.  My first couple seconds in that thing, I though the game had switched to some double-speed setting or something, it was like watching Benny Hill.  My god that thing is so fast and quick and nimble.

The differences among the open-wheel cars is pretty amazing.  Some of them, like the F BMWs and the F Palmer Audis are almost impossible to spin, so at first I am thinking 'these are too easy to drive, where's the fun?  Where's the room in the driving for the difference among drivers?'  Well, especially with Pro-Sim on, turns out there is plenty of room.  First, it's tough to be quick, as you have to nail you spots and, more critically, maintain momentum through corners.  You can go surprisingly quick through corners if you hit your marks.  And then, when you add in the tire wear, over a longer race (too long for Poker Night stuff, but in a 1/2hr race you would see it) better drivers will have better tires over time.  And then, add in the nice damage model, where going over curbs and bumps and off the tar will damage the suspension, and you can see how a longer race in these cars with other humans really could be fun stuff.

The Forlmula J-1000s and the Formula 3s aren't as nailed down to the road in the read, and take a touch more care to keep on the road.  Right now these are my two favorite cars to race.  Now that I've added the 80s Williams, the 90s Williams, and last year's Williams, all I can say is. . . WOW.  Those cars are not just faster versions of the F3s or something, the are wholly their own beasts, and they are so much fun to drive.  They may be too tough for a longer race, but I am looking forward to some kind of F1 MLR series in one of these Williams cars.  Of course, I'd rather do a series in the J-1000s,, Formula BMWs, Formula Palmer Audis, and F3s first. . . .  Or at least a couple!

And then there are the GT cars and the Touring Cars in the game as well.
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Post Options Post Options   Quote GB_Simo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-05-2006 at 7:33pm

Zep, I've just got to the 80's Williams - seemed a peculiar choice of motor to me until I remembered that the FW11B gave Nelson Piquet the 1987 title and is only really second to the 1988 McLaren in terms of dominating a season in that decade - and I'm slowly starting to soften towards them.  To start with I wasn't happy because the season opens at Zandvoort and you spend rather more time in the air than you should, but once you learn to accept that they're a lot of fun.  Haven't had them on Pro Sim yet, since I'm doing World Tour without it and then running the free race and Pro Career with it switched on, but they're very entertaining cars.

If it's screwy AI behaviour you want - on lap 2 of the 80's Williams race at Zandvoort every car ahead of me began to brake for Tarzan, the first turn, about 300 yards before they'd ever need to.  They'd never done it before, they've never done it since.  Also of note in the They Did Wha'?  category is Dan Wheldon running second and gaining on the last lap at Nashville before jumping on the brakes coming out of the final turn, and the entire driving staff of the IRL meeting at Dover, all of whom appear to be driving a different, much slower racetrack.

I've been elsewhere for the last couple of days, hence the lack of a good ToCA post to balance my bad ToCA one.  Oh, Zep - you've been missing absolutely nothing in the console Formula One stakes, believe me.

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Post Options Post Options   Quote Zeppo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-05-2006 at 3:06pm
Well, the theory is to get some kind of season going with the MLR format and have it on a regular weekly night.  I'm hoping that with a regular night people will keep showing up even after the initial burst of online activity dies away.
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Post Options Post Options   Quote TedSGN Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-05-2006 at 1:04pm
Originally posted by Zeppo


Ted, didn't I see your gamertag online recently or am I imagining things?  You should get this game and come online with us while the crowds are big.  Great times.


Zeppo, you did see me online in Live for like the first time in 5 months!  It was during my rental of Fight Night Round 3.

ToCA 2 was pretty much the last great time I had on Live, especially in your MLR series.  I'll never forget the time I took 3rd in the Formula Fords in the Division 1 race I ran with the big boys.  I would be willing to grab 3 and join you guys in the new season, but I'm just too buys with my PS2 online and real life stuff in general.  This time around I'll have to be content to watch you all from the grandstands since by the time I did pick it up that most of the big crowds would be gone.

Appreciate the thought.

Ted


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Post Options Post Options   Quote Zeppo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-05-2006 at 11:14am
Having played a bit further into the World Tour mode, this game is turning out to be one I have been waiting for for a long, long time.  The reason?  F1.

I miss F1 games.  Now that I've opened up the F3s and most recently the 1980s Williams cars, I am starting to get excited.  There are several Williams cars in the game, this 80s car with a Honda engine (these run at Spa, too, so finally my first race since F1 games on the N64 where I can run Spa in an open-wheeled car), a 90s car I haven't gotten to yet, and supposedly last year's car.  Plus there are the Lotus 49s from the 60s.  No crazy 70s F1 cars though.

But being in the land of no F1 games (thanks Sony!), this game is getting ready to give back what I've been missing.  It's a shame not all the F1 tracks are in the game, but just to be able to run some series in these cars is enough for me.  And then when you add in the online play, the open wheeled component of this game just plain rocks.

In other news, we've noticed some really shoddy AI driving on some tracks with certain cars.  We ran the F1000s at Barhain and the AI could not get past 60mph it seemed.  We also ran them at one of the Aussie tracks, and they went off every tight corner.  Seems like some one dropped the ball a few times here and there!
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Post Options Post Options   Quote Zeppo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-02-2006 at 2:27pm
For online play, this game is the shiznit.  ToCA2 was outstanding online, and adding in Pro-Sim options, putting practice and qualifying, even 'full events' for those that run 2 races a circuit is all good stuff.  The flags are brilliant online as well, even if they are far from perfect in the rulings.  I seem to have gotten better at avoiding the 'what the heck?' flags, though they still do pop up from time to time.  It is weird; sometims I can go right over the curbing, into the runoff, come back on, no worries.  Other times going wide into the grass gets an immediate caution.  But for the most part, the flag system seems to have done a lot for online play in terms of people driving like idiots.  You still get a lot of sloppy drivers in random rooms, but it is so much better now with the flags.  And it's great that the online rules are so series-specific.  Some series have practice and qualigying by lap number, others have timed sessions.  Some series have time penalties for black flags, others have stop and go.  Some series have rolling starts online, like the GT Lights!  All this is an improvement over ToCA2 which had a homogeneous online rules setup; standing starts with Indy cars etc.

Offline I'm pretty much playing World Tour mode without Pro-Sim just to get through and open up all the classes.  Also, something about these 2 and 3 lap races (I am getting more 5-lappers and even 8- or 10-lappers as I get higher in the teen levels) doesn't feel like Pro-Sim settings make sense.  I mean, why run 3 qualifying laps for a 3-lap race?  And so I'm starting in the middle of the grid, with 3 laps to get to the podium?  Thanks but I'll turn off Pro-Sim and use the AI cars as crutches as often as I can.  Something about the way I thrash those poor AI cars around really makes me laugh!!

When I am ready for some full series in Pro Career mode, I will set Pro-Sim to on and run those long races and care a lot less about where I finish than in the World Tour mode.

Online we've been using Pro-Sim options only.  The new variety of cars is flat out awesome.  Great open wheel options, just great.  Some of the GT cars are awesome as well.  The DTMs are the only series that has some of the circuits I want to drive (like Brno, and especially Turkey - Shanghai and Barhain show up in a few series, actually a few iterations of Barhain, but as far as I can tell Istanbul is only in the DTMs - I have yet to unlock the F3s and higher Open Wheel cars, though.  I wonder what tracks may be hidden in the F1 challenge series?).

The one thing that bugs me the most is the sound on some of the cars.  Because of the low-res samples, some of the cars' higher whines are aliasing a ton, and this tends to drive me up a wall much like fingernails on a black board would.  The Palmer Caterhams come to mind.  I've turned the engine noises down now, and that helps a bit but now the impact sound effects are massively loud in the surrounds!  I mean, the graphics do get in the way for me quite a bit.  The jaggy issues can make it really hard to see and the general low power of the Xbox makes things in the great distance hard to make out, like other cars etc.  But the fun of driving outweighs that massively, and in the end it's little more than wishing this game were on 360.  ToCA4 I can hope will come someday.

We ran our frst 'Medium Length Race' event last night in the Formula J-1000s and it was a smashing success.  Full field (poor Jack missed the practice) and some really great racing.  There is tire wear now that has an effect over a race as long as we ran (24 laps at Mondello, took maybe 35'), though I'm sure Terry had much less wear than I did.  I had to struggle with both sets of my tires even though I pitted midway through.  Great stuff, as this, added with the more sensitive damage model which can see your suspension get damaged for going over the grass or jumping curbs, opens up a wide range of areas of difference among cars on longer races like that even without setups (we run exclusively with no setups, which may make some circuits harder to drive than they should be but makes it a perfect 'plug n' play' online hang-out).

Ted, didn't I see your gamertag online recently or am I imagining things?  You should get this game and come online with us while the crowds are big.  Great times.
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Post Options Post Options   Quote GB_Simo Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 03-02-2006 at 9:46am

Ted,

Thought you might like to know that I've had another shot at the IndyCars and I'm getting a bit happier them.  It still doesn't compare to any standalone Indy game you've played recently, and with only 4 tracks to go at I still can't recommend buying TRD 3 for this series alone, but...

There's a bit more meat to the handling model than I'd first realised.  There's no need at all to go playing around with setups, but run what you're given in Pro Sim mode and you'll find you do have understeer, and oversteer, and especially understeer.  That's the qualifier, though - you have to run this series in Pro Sim.  Play it on the standard settings and it's still never more than cars on a flat out bind with the occasional turn.  In Pro Sim you've got to drive them, and while your actions never have as obvious an effect as they do in ICS (especially if you get things wrong - this is ToCA, you can get away with it a few times and the car won't ever do anything nasty to you) you've got to run a proper line and judge your entry speeds - it does require a little thought to get the most out of your lap.

Even knowing that, it's still one of my least favourite series, but there is a bit more to it than I'd originally thought.  The main problem I have is that it's still ToCA, and ToCA on an oval is a fundamentally dull experience because you're always in control.  The car won't ever get loose unless you do something quite silly with the throttle, and if you take that out of the equation there's only one way to put it in the fence.  I'm not suggesting you'd want to put it in the fence, mind, but if there's little danger that you will and the oval AI isn't half as much fun as the road course AI then it may as well be Scalextric slot cars you're racing.

You could quite conceivably write a little review like that on every single category, and the bulk of them would be a bit more glowing than this one.  I singled out the IndyCars because they're of interest to people here, not because I don't rate them highly.  However, since I don't, in the next day or two I'll throw together a post on a class I do like, because some of these posts have an air of gloom around them that the majority of the classes don't deserve.

Cheers,
Adam

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