PC2 New slightly experimental FFB file

[bmanic]

.. if anybody wants to give it a go. It's quite simple but seems to be effective. May not be optimal for DD wheels as I removed absolutely all FX, damping etc. It's not completely "raw" though as I have some clever filtering going on with the 'split' command.

Instructions and download at the pC2 forum here:

http://forum.projectcarsgame.com/sh...S2-FFB-File)&p=1576600&viewfull=1#post1576600

.. or alternatively the .txt file from Google Drive link here:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1sPt5fngmXyY-bQPys5DuGq4QICDKeVPe

 

[stormychel]

Hi,
thanks for sharing this. I downloaded it and will give it a try later.
My problem with PC2 is that there's no feel in tyre load and road texture, is this improved with your file or is this something that's just 'missing' in PC2 in general?

 

[bmanic]

It is extremely track dependant.

For instance, I've just been doing the Formula C championship and the first track is Brno GP. It is almost completely silky smooth with very little detail and "road feel". The corners are also a bit strange and not all that natural feeling. Thus this track is a great example of one that has "no details". Unsurprisingly it's not laser scanned.. hand made by somebody who perhaps doesn't have all that much experience with tracks or it got rushed in the end and never got extra bumps and textures implemented.

Then on the flip side, try driving the Formula C with my FFB file around Nordschleife or Nurburgring GP. Those are properly laser scanned (same data set that Kunos and many other companies used) and thus the detail and "road noise" is insane. The corners are also properly banked in all sorts of manner which helps with the feeling of tire load.

Some examples of "textureless/dead" tracks:

Brno
Silverstone
Spa (it's a bit inbetween)
Monza
Ruapuna (has some parts with some vibe.. but quite smooth overall)
Road America

Some examples of properly "textured" feeling circuits:

Algarve (laser scanned)
Oulton Park (laser scanned)
Nurburgring GP (laser scanned)
Nordschleife (laser scanned)
Bannochbrae (one of the better fantasy tracks)
Snetterton (laser scanned)
Cadwell Park (laser scanned)
Knockhill (laser scanned)
Fuji Speedway (laser scanned)
Sportsland Sugo (laser scanned)
Red Bull Ring (laser scanned)
Circuit of the Americas (laser scanned)
Indianapolis Speedway (laser scanned)
Texas Motor Speedway (laser scanned)
Watkins Glen (this is NOT laser scanned but has good road features and sensible cambered corners)

etc..

My point is that what you describe as lacking varies immensely between tracks. It also varies immensely between cars, of course. If you drive a family saloon around Nordschleife it'll feel silky smooth compared to the Formula C which is a very rough ride. This is one thing pCars 2 does much better than any other sim in my opinion. There is TRUE differences in FFB feel depending on suspension/damper settings on the cars. Very few sims manage to convey all of the subtleties of this as well as pC2 does through it's FFB.

.. this is also partly the reason why some cars feel slightly "dead". The suspension + damper + aero setup may not at all be optimal and as soon as you get a truly objectively good setup going (objectively measured through telemetry and consistent laptimes) you suddenly get a lot more detailed FFB and clearly feel tire loads.

Finally temperature and wear of the tires plays a huge role in pC2. If you get the tires too warm or too cold it all will feel a bit "mushy" and non-detailed, just as a real tire does! When the tires fall into that magic optimum temp window you immediately notice it!! On race cars in cold weather it is very important to drastically close the brake cooling ducts so that you get your brakes nice and hot as these help to feed heat into the tires.

TL;DR
It's is super complicated. There is no easy answer or generic objective "opinion" on this. In some cases there is very little "road feel" due to various complex factors and sometimes there is superb road feel due to various complex factors.

 

[Miguel Batista]

I will give this a bash once I am back from Holliday. I am using Christaan's file right now and I like it a lot! Very curious to compare to yours!

Regarding road noise, I keep my FX setting at 30 since it is fairly unobtrusive in laser scanned tracks and non laser scanned tracks it gives you a semblance of road feel (like Brno. That track feels like a track from the first games with ffb as road texture wasn't a thing back then). You might want to consider adding some of that in. If we could use if statements in the ffb files it would be easy.
Something like this:
(Fx (If (lasercan notlaserscanned)))

However, they check for this stuff inside game code which we don't have access. Not even sure if there is a Boolean to define if a track is laser scanned or not.

 

[bmanic]

There is an 'if' function but unfortunately no definition for tracks nor cars selected... so it's a no-go.

Yeah, I can add road noise FX to the file but before doing that I just need some feedback if the idea works at all. At the moment I'm driving as many cars as I can just to see if I'm actually improving my times or not. This has always been my philosophy for FFB. If I can't get "real valuable" information from the FFB, then I don't need it.. thus I've always despised the various FFB attempts by people who add all kinds of weird stuff to it just for fun or "immersion" (which is so weird to me because a real wheel is not "weird".. ever, unless it's a car with really crap or broken steering.. or broken stability control etc).

So yeah, usefulness is key in my opinion. Nr one would be the ability to detect grip and Nr two would be that the wheel correctly and quickly goes opposite lock when the rears come loose.