- 373
- Canada
I posted this on Reddit, but thought it may be helpful here, if it is helpful at all....
TL : DR I sucked at this game for a long time and blamed myself, turns out my Fanatec brakes were not right. Replaced the super firm rubber stopper with a pool noodle and won my first race after the "fix". I might still suck, but not as much anymore!
I got this game last year at Christmas. On the recommendation of a friend who is a sim racer I bought a Fanatec CSL Elite wheel and pedals (no LC) to go with it. And I sucked. Crashy smashy waaay off tracky. Going into this I thought I'd be good. At least be able to stay on the road. For real life I've karted in a local championship. I even picked up a few wins and podiumed our little championship in my first year in a big field. I've autocrossed and was competitive in my class. Nothing heroic, but I thought it would be enough to play GT even though my real world experience is several years ago now. I thought I'd be good and it'd be fun. I wasn't, it wasn't. So I kinda gave up on it and this new expensive stuff sat unused and my ego took a beating, I ignored the game for months feeling guilty about all the money wasted and good equipment gathering dust.
Several months later (late summer) I was casually showing a friend the wheel and the game, isn't it cool blah blah blah, just fooling around, but it made me want to try again. I tried to give myself a break - the idea I would just log on and crush it was silly. I hadn't played a racing game since Project Gotham for the Xbox (great game!). And because of this I didn't know the tracks - even the ones I "knew" from watching F1. So I started practicing, reading up on here and watching videos of people in GT Sport on YouTube (Thanks to a few of you, but particularly Kie25!! Great helpful content!). Prior to this I had done no research on the wheel or sim racing at all. I had no idea the wheel wasn't officially supported yet or if there was anything wrong with my setup. I have this thing where I blame tools last. It annoys me when someone doesn't take ownership of their performance and blames the instrument(s) of their activity. In this age of entitlement we even seem to believe we're entitled to be awesome. No, it takes hard work and practice. So I practiced and I did get better. A little. I could stay on the road a bit more and move through the campaign stuff without wanting to pull my hair out most of the time. It wasn't awesome and still didn't feel right, but I was getting better. Still ten-ish seconds off of top times, but better. When official support for the CSL landed my friend that recommended the wheel messaged me and asked how the racing was going. Embarrassed, I confided how much I sucked. He was confused, we had karted together, we've driven together. He's seen me turn a wheel decent for reals and claimed it should transfer.... at least a bit.... after an adjustment period maybe - oh after that much time it should have transferred. It hadn't. He came to my place and tried my setup. He couldn't keep the car on the track very well either. He's no alien I don't think, but he's not bad and has some decent times on GT 6. Some hope it wasn't me sucking! There could really be an issue? While at my place he also pointed out some stuff I was doing wrong with my physical setup. Between his help and FINALLY doing some actual research about sim racing I started to find some time.
Oh, I shouldn't sit on the couch six feet back from the TV? I got up close and found a second or so. (I really had trouble seeing from the couch (old eyes)).
I found Moon_Man's settings here for the Fanatec. Found another second or so. Thanks Moon_Man!
Adjusted them a bit to my liking and I found a little bit more time.
I read that most people use ABS set to weak, not off. So I tried that, happy to have the help braking.
I watched Kie25s track guides and found a bit more time. Yet, I also found there was just no way I could hit his brake points or keep his corner exit speeds. Yeah, sure, he's super fast and I'm a nub, but clearly something wasn't right. But what? Not the gear right? This Fanatec stuff is supposed to be pretty good, and it is, I'm not knocking the gear with this post, so it must be me! I didn't bother trying with the controller, I like the immersion of the wheel and I'd rather play with a wheel or not play. I was about to give up again because after all the adjustments and a good setup I should be better than I was. I could mostly follow a decent line, long sweepers were easy, it was the fast hard braking points that just killed me every time. Braking deep meant going deep into the wall. I shared some streams of my driving with friends - "brake later dude!" they'd say. "I can't! I crash!" I'd respond. And I crashed. I was chalking it up to being too old and pathetic to play. I was ok to play the campaign against the apex braking AI, but not race online. I was too unstable to stay on track. I'd spin easily and to avoid going off track I was so slow so I usually avoided Sport. Then I saw a few posts on Reddit that motivated me. One was about someone who sucked at the start, but wanted to be good so he practiced and is now top 10 (I can't remember who's post it was) and the last few posts about the game by u/basetornado taking six months to find a win. Wow. Good for him for sticking to it! I will too. I do want to be good at this. I did some more online racing. After 25 attempts I had a C/S rating, a couple podiums, even got a pole! I came close to a win at Monza in a Fiat until a Brazilian rammed me off the road. Most of the time I spun or would move back through the field. Maybe I do suck? For reals.
Recently Jimmy Broadbent posted a video of him going back to GT Sport. Since he's doing the announcing and wants to be more informed on the air (great job BTW Jimmer!) he was giving the game a go. Other than a different wheel he has the same Fanatec CSL set up I do and what's this?! He had trouble with the brakes! Just as I did. Same spots, same behaviour. Wait. What? Maybe it's not me?! I did some research and found a few people with this problem, but not much help. Most responses to anyone claiming this problem were "user error" or "press the brakes harder weakling!." I lift, have a wilks of over 300 and have literally bruised the bottom of my left foot trying to brake hard so I know it's not that. I did as Jimmy did and took out the rubber stopper - which is a very very hard piece of foam. Wow! All of a sudden I could brake! Apparently Fanatec does not recommend taking it out and leaving nothing there. Plus with nothing it doesn't feel right. So, I took a pool noodle and cut a piece to match the stopper and on my 26th online race, the first with a pool noodle in my brakes, I won. And most importantly, it's now fun.
TL : DR I sucked at this game for a long time and blamed myself, turns out my Fanatec brakes were not right. Replaced the super firm rubber stopper with a pool noodle and won my first race after the "fix". I might still suck, but not as much anymore!
I got this game last year at Christmas. On the recommendation of a friend who is a sim racer I bought a Fanatec CSL Elite wheel and pedals (no LC) to go with it. And I sucked. Crashy smashy waaay off tracky. Going into this I thought I'd be good. At least be able to stay on the road. For real life I've karted in a local championship. I even picked up a few wins and podiumed our little championship in my first year in a big field. I've autocrossed and was competitive in my class. Nothing heroic, but I thought it would be enough to play GT even though my real world experience is several years ago now. I thought I'd be good and it'd be fun. I wasn't, it wasn't. So I kinda gave up on it and this new expensive stuff sat unused and my ego took a beating, I ignored the game for months feeling guilty about all the money wasted and good equipment gathering dust.
Several months later (late summer) I was casually showing a friend the wheel and the game, isn't it cool blah blah blah, just fooling around, but it made me want to try again. I tried to give myself a break - the idea I would just log on and crush it was silly. I hadn't played a racing game since Project Gotham for the Xbox (great game!). And because of this I didn't know the tracks - even the ones I "knew" from watching F1. So I started practicing, reading up on here and watching videos of people in GT Sport on YouTube (Thanks to a few of you, but particularly Kie25!! Great helpful content!). Prior to this I had done no research on the wheel or sim racing at all. I had no idea the wheel wasn't officially supported yet or if there was anything wrong with my setup. I have this thing where I blame tools last. It annoys me when someone doesn't take ownership of their performance and blames the instrument(s) of their activity. In this age of entitlement we even seem to believe we're entitled to be awesome. No, it takes hard work and practice. So I practiced and I did get better. A little. I could stay on the road a bit more and move through the campaign stuff without wanting to pull my hair out most of the time. It wasn't awesome and still didn't feel right, but I was getting better. Still ten-ish seconds off of top times, but better. When official support for the CSL landed my friend that recommended the wheel messaged me and asked how the racing was going. Embarrassed, I confided how much I sucked. He was confused, we had karted together, we've driven together. He's seen me turn a wheel decent for reals and claimed it should transfer.... at least a bit.... after an adjustment period maybe - oh after that much time it should have transferred. It hadn't. He came to my place and tried my setup. He couldn't keep the car on the track very well either. He's no alien I don't think, but he's not bad and has some decent times on GT 6. Some hope it wasn't me sucking! There could really be an issue? While at my place he also pointed out some stuff I was doing wrong with my physical setup. Between his help and FINALLY doing some actual research about sim racing I started to find some time.
Oh, I shouldn't sit on the couch six feet back from the TV? I got up close and found a second or so. (I really had trouble seeing from the couch (old eyes)).
I found Moon_Man's settings here for the Fanatec. Found another second or so. Thanks Moon_Man!
Adjusted them a bit to my liking and I found a little bit more time.
I read that most people use ABS set to weak, not off. So I tried that, happy to have the help braking.
I watched Kie25s track guides and found a bit more time. Yet, I also found there was just no way I could hit his brake points or keep his corner exit speeds. Yeah, sure, he's super fast and I'm a nub, but clearly something wasn't right. But what? Not the gear right? This Fanatec stuff is supposed to be pretty good, and it is, I'm not knocking the gear with this post, so it must be me! I didn't bother trying with the controller, I like the immersion of the wheel and I'd rather play with a wheel or not play. I was about to give up again because after all the adjustments and a good setup I should be better than I was. I could mostly follow a decent line, long sweepers were easy, it was the fast hard braking points that just killed me every time. Braking deep meant going deep into the wall. I shared some streams of my driving with friends - "brake later dude!" they'd say. "I can't! I crash!" I'd respond. And I crashed. I was chalking it up to being too old and pathetic to play. I was ok to play the campaign against the apex braking AI, but not race online. I was too unstable to stay on track. I'd spin easily and to avoid going off track I was so slow so I usually avoided Sport. Then I saw a few posts on Reddit that motivated me. One was about someone who sucked at the start, but wanted to be good so he practiced and is now top 10 (I can't remember who's post it was) and the last few posts about the game by u/basetornado taking six months to find a win. Wow. Good for him for sticking to it! I will too. I do want to be good at this. I did some more online racing. After 25 attempts I had a C/S rating, a couple podiums, even got a pole! I came close to a win at Monza in a Fiat until a Brazilian rammed me off the road. Most of the time I spun or would move back through the field. Maybe I do suck? For reals.
Recently Jimmy Broadbent posted a video of him going back to GT Sport. Since he's doing the announcing and wants to be more informed on the air (great job BTW Jimmer!) he was giving the game a go. Other than a different wheel he has the same Fanatec CSL set up I do and what's this?! He had trouble with the brakes! Just as I did. Same spots, same behaviour. Wait. What? Maybe it's not me?! I did some research and found a few people with this problem, but not much help. Most responses to anyone claiming this problem were "user error" or "press the brakes harder weakling!." I lift, have a wilks of over 300 and have literally bruised the bottom of my left foot trying to brake hard so I know it's not that. I did as Jimmy did and took out the rubber stopper - which is a very very hard piece of foam. Wow! All of a sudden I could brake! Apparently Fanatec does not recommend taking it out and leaving nothing there. Plus with nothing it doesn't feel right. So, I took a pool noodle and cut a piece to match the stopper and on my 26th online race, the first with a pool noodle in my brakes, I won. And most importantly, it's now fun.
