Video: Does B Spec Attack Level Matter?

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amp88

amp88

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I've often wondered exactly the difference changing the B Spec attack level matters. What I've suspected is that level 4 is the best if you don't want to watch the race (and aren't prepared to change levels throughout the race), since level 5 generally causes the driver to fall off the track. I've had a look at lap times before, but they seem really variable. So...I wanted to see the difference changing the attack level really makes. I made the B Spec driver do a single lap around Trial Mountain in a standard Lotus Carlton in each of the attack levels. I picked the Carlton since it's fairly heavy, so the attack level should make more of a difference than a light car. I also did a lap in A Spec for comparison (not a stunningly fast lap, it has to be said, but a lot quicker than the fastest B Spec lap). The results basically confirm what I thought beforehand: Attack level 4 is the fastest if you're not prepared to baby sit the driver. The lap times were as follows:

Level 1: 1'43.003
Level 2: 1'39.434
Level 3: 1'37.112
Level 4: 1'36.583
Level 5: 1'38.978
A Spec: 1'34.027

Below is a link to the video. The quality isn't great, but I think for the filesize it's not too bad.

http://s60.yousendit.com/d.php?id=2EEFCSNIG5HC41TQS24LV2IF44

edit: Video re-uploaded, working link added
 
The attack level depends on the car and the track. In his LM cars comparison, Zardoz found that nearly all of the cars went off the road on 4, never mind 5. 3 was the best setting for them.
 
daan
The attack level depends on the car and the track. In his LM cars comparison, Zardoz found that nearly all of the cars went off the road on 4, never mind 5. 3 was the best setting for them.
Click to expand...

Yeah. I've been testing a few more tracks with a different car this morning. I didn't want to do any testing at Le Mans or the Nurburgring (too long a lap, leads to longer editing times and longer upload times), so I chose a couple of different tracks which have similar charecteristics. I chose Fuji to be a close substitute for Le Mans fast, sweeping nature and Infineon and Tsukuba for their tight, twisty sections. The car I chose was an Audi R8, equipped with the Stage 4 turbo (giving 1009bhp) and RSH tyres all round. The times at the different tracks are interesting, but the laptimes don't tell the whole story.

Fuji

Level 3 was steady and consistant throughout the lap, as you'd expect, but was pretty slow in most places. Top speed was 214mph.
Level 4 was quick and safe. No mistakes on the lap, carrying decent speed through the corners. Top speed was 210mph.
Level 5 was very quick on most of the track, carrying a lot more speed through the corners than 3. Only one mistake on the lap, running slightly wide at the first corner. Top speed was 214mph.

Laptimes:

Stage 3: 1'20.180
Stage 4: 1'18.443
Stage 5: 1'17.243

Fuji Comparison Video

Infineon

Level 3 was the only one to stay on the track all the way around here. It was pretty slow, but safe.
Level 4 went off the track once, but was quick around the rest of the lap.
Level 5 was terrible here, leaving the track 3 times and running very wide a few more times on the lap. Interestingly though, it wasn't that much slower than level 4.

Laptimes:

Stage 3: 1'25.726
Stage 4: 1'23.411
Stage 5: 1'24.421

Infineon Comparison Video

Tsukuba

Level 3 was pretty decent here. Quite quick and no errors.
Level 4 was very good. If you squinted whilst looking at the lap it could almost be a human driver.
Level 5 was good on most of the lap, but tended to be running wide on most of the corners. Came off the track on the last corner but still managed a good time.

Laptimes:

Stage 3: 50.958
Stage 4: 49.658
Stage 5: 49.571

Tsukuba Comparison Video
 
daan
This is great stuff 👍
Click to expand...

Thanks. I've been toying with the idea of doing something like this before, but I didn't know how to make a good quality split screen video easily and quickly. I only found out yesterday with the help of a friend.

I originally intended to make up a video of a lap with several different camera angles (e.g. front view, rear view, left rear view and right rear view (something like this)), but I had the thought about B Spec in the back of my mind.

If anyone's interested in the technique, it's not too difficult. All you need to do is to create an AviSynth file, which is a scripting system for post production. You can do many things, but the only one you need to do splitscreen is the Stack command.

Here's an example avs file you might use to make up a split screen video:

Code: 
a = AviSource("L:\1.avi")
b = AviSource("L:\2.avi")
c = AviSource("L:\3.avi")
d = AviSource("L:\4.avi")

StackVertical(StackHorizontal(a, b), StackHorizontal(c,d))

So what this code does is to set up the four video files (the paths for the files are obviously going to differ for different files/systems) as video sources and give them names. Then you stack the four video sources how you want.

Then all you need to do is to open that avs file into a video editor which is compatible with AVS files (I use VirtualDub) and compress the video
 

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