Racing Sim..Beginners Help Needed

[ExRayTed]

Hi all,

I've been dying to get into racing sims properly for years now.I have a wheel (only an MS FF one) and copies of GTL and GPL.I've also tried LFS and wouldn't mind buying it.The problem I have is I don't want to join a server only to ruin it for other players because I'm new.Are there any noob-friendly games/servers out of the ones I've listed? And apart from the obvious 'don't hit people on purpose' rule,is there anything else I need to know?

I tried LFS a while ago but got roundly criticised because I kept hitting people,mainly because I was massively slower than everyone else.I really want to get into the racing sim scene..just not sure how to go about it.

 

[Insanity]

LFS is ok. Generally, if you're slower than everybody else its because:

A. You suck
or
B. Your setup sucks

A. Can be fixed by just practicing, lots. B. Can be fixed by going over to the live for speed forums and grabbing some decent car setups.

There's not much use driving around alone to get practice, cause racing with 10+ other people is completely different. Just be very careful, if there's a guy behind you that you know is faster, just let him pass, and keep your distance between you and the person in front of you so you dont slam into him when the corner comes up. Gradually you'll need to let people pass less and you'll be able to judge corners better so you can stay as close to the pack as possible.

I dont play the other games you mentioned, so i cant really comment on them.

 

[mc_bob]

S2 has a huge number of servers for beginners. It's easy to get better setups.
Just join a server, explain your new and hopefully someone will send you a couple of setups

 

[mark_t50]

It can be difficult when you first start racing with real people, but some of the things I've found that helps are:

1). Practice in single player mode, even if it's only to learn the tracks. It doesn't matter if your lap times are really slow, it just helps to learn where the corners and chicanes are so that you don't go flying all over the place on the first lap.

2). Memorise your braking points for the first corner. The one way to really annoy others online is to go steaming into the first corner and punt straight into the back of people because you braked to late. Also, if possible, try not to break too early as well, this will usually cause a huge pileup.

3) Be considerate when getting lapped. Try where possible to stay off the racing line to allow the leaders through. This can be difficult sometimes. I get annoyed if someone comes up to lap me but insists on doing it through a chicane which usually results in contact when they could have waited for the straight after the chicane and I would have moved offline to let them through.

4) Accept that people will get mad at you, it's the nature of racing sims that there will be crashes and you will make mistakes. Usually people will be ok if you say sorry and if you aren't doing it on purpose. I often bind a quick chat key for 'Sorry' incase I do punt someone off. If they carry on name calling after saying sorry then I just ignore them.

You've got some good sims there, I'd also recommend RFactor for online racing, it's very good.