I can't wait for the update. I've had some very good and competitive racing, but there has been a ton of frustration too. Here's my short list of features off the top of my head. I probably forgot some, but this is a good start.
1. Voice Chat
2. Public and Private rooms with a host that can kick.
3. Rooms with host selected laps, aids, ghosts/no ghosts etc.
4. Eliminate the magical ghost/no ghost crap. Too much indecision about who is/isn't a ghost and when they'll go solid.
5. Add damage and ditch the penalties for crashing. It's often given to the wrong driver anyway.
6. Fix the lag issues. There is way too much lag compared to other online racing games.
7. Count online lap times on leaderboards.
8. List more than the top 100 on leaderboards. How about the top 400,000? Or better yet, have a friends filter, so you can find their times.
9. Show the names of the trailing cars, so you know who the maniac is behind you.
10. Allow for a toggle to see on your hud the differential in time/distance for the cars in front and behind, so you know if you are closing the gap etc.
11. Can the rolling starts. It's ridiculous. Standing starts are proven to work fine. It takes way too long to catch up from the positions in the back.
12. If you don't have host options at least allow for online races longer than 3 laps.
13. Give some different options for the starting grid. Performance points is currently the only sorting option.
14. Show us who the host is at the beginning of the race, so he/she knows they shouldn't quit.
15. Don't change the physic's for online. My G25 has a different feel online. Much less force. Overall, the physics just seem different online.
16. Kill the online boost. Rubberbanding online is embarassing. We're not all kids. At least not all of us.
17. Allow for some form of "respect" or "Don't matchmake me with that lunatic again" option or something.
18. Don't disband the lobby after the race. Allow us to race again together or even *gasp* select a new track and stay together.
19. Show us our top lap time for our online race, not just total time.
20. Show penalty points for each driver after the race and leave the screen up for longer. It disappears immediately after the last driver finishes.
21. Keep track of wins/losses etc.
22. Better tire sounds and/or separate volume controls for tires, engine, crowd/wind etc. I can't hear tire spin on acceleration only on lateral drift and braking. And basically more variety in the tone/volume of tire sounds.
23. Wheel vibration for loss of grip and/or ABS to give more clues about reaching the edge of tire grip beyond sound and wheel tension.
24. Replays from online races, so we have "evidence" and/or the ability to watch replays of your better races.
25. Some type of messaging system in lieu of voice chat, so we can say "thanks, great race" or "thanks for nothing". It should be an XMB feature, but Sony doesn't have it, so it's PD's job.
They better not just extend it again.
They left in the popular events, which is a shame.
