Worth buying a PC for rFactor/rF2?

[Chadders85]

About a month ago I pretty much made my mind up to buy a PC around September/October time this year for several reasons:

- Need to have the Enduracers Mod (997 RSR pls)

- Need to have the F1 1991 HE Mod

- Need to have all those tracks

- Need to have the sounds

- Need the simulation depth

- rFactor 2


Now though I'm starting to wonder if it's worth leaving it until next Sept/Oct so that I can buy better PC components for my budget and wait for rFactor 2 to develop more.

My questions are how good are the physics for lets say the Enduracers mod and how do they compare to GT5 physics? Is the AI challenging? Does AI skill vary between different mods? How good is the force feedback?

How detailed are the tracks? I know they will vary in detail but I'd like to know if a lot or most of them are good.

Are online rooms still busy and is it quick and easy to get racing online?

I started off with PC's sims so I kinda know what to expect in terms of depth but it was a long time ago and the installation of mods/track packs/sound files etc (and finding where to download them) puts me off a bit from what I have seen people write. If the instructions are clear and it is a simple case of drag & drop etc then I should be ok, but I'd like to know is it is pretty complicated?

After seeing peoples comments about rFactor 2, it seems like there is a LOT of developement left to do, and it seems the Clio is the only thing that is worth trying out at the moment, although i'm only going by other peoples feedback. This is what has made me think twice about getting a PC this year, but if rFactor 1 is really that good then i'll take the plunge this year. As a side note, I'll most likely be trying out iRacing too.

I really don't think I can carry on with GT5 for another year for many reasons. The online has really cut the game short for me. I've spent ages scrolling through rooms trying to find a decent race but everyone seems to want to use tyres with way too much grip and only 3-5 lap races. Not what I want. Add to that the fact that most rooms just won't let me join due to a connection error. So i'm left doing hot laps and one-make races using worse tyres than the crappy AI to equalise the competition. There are many other reasons but it will just turn into a rant.

I know there are a lot of questions here but any replies will be appreciated.

 

[sesselpupser]

It depends, what would your budget be? I would say it may not be worth getting a PC just for rFactor and rFactor 2, but it's definitely worth getting a PC for both of those and:

GTR 2
GT Legends
Richard Burns Rally
GP Legends
Race 07
Live For Speed
NetKar Pro
Simraceway
iRacing, if you're ok with spending that much money on a subscription

And some others I'm no doubt forgetting, and the following upcoming releases:

Project CARS (which you can buy into now and get access to the pre-alpha builds)
GTR3
Assetto Corsa
The Simbin free to play game that I can't remember the name of...
I think that's it.

GT5's physics are only the best there is on a console, pretty much all of the above are improvements. You will, of course, need a wheel. None of these sims except perhaps Simraceway are designed to be played with a controller, much less a keyboard and mouse. Also if your budget does by any chance happen to be pretty high, racing or driving games (read: not sims) like Grid, Shift, Dirt and so on can be enhanced with a triple monitor setup, as far as I know only GT5 and Forza let you do that as far as consoles go. I built my PC back in November, I think I've played GT5 about 3 or 4 times since then.

I could've made this post much shorter by simply saying that if you're looking to move on from GT5, you'll only do significantly better with a PC (I haven't tried Forza 4 mind you).

P.S. check out the DRM Revival 2.0 mod for rFactor.

 

[Chadders85]

It depends, what would your budget be? I would say it may not be worth getting a PC just for rFactor and rFactor 2, but it's definitely worth getting a PC for both of those and:

GTR 2
GT Legends
Richard Burns Rally
GP Legends
Race 07
Live For Speed
NetKar Pro
Simraceway
iRacing, if you're ok with spending that much money on a subscription

And some others I'm no doubt forgetting, and the following upcoming releases:

Project CARS (which you can buy into now and get access to the pre-alpha builds)
GTR3
Assetto Corsa
The Simbin free to play game that I can't remember the name of...
I think that's it.

GT5's physics are only the best there is on a console, pretty much all of the above are improvements. You will, of course, need a wheel. None of these sims except perhaps Simraceway are designed to be played with a controller, much less a keyboard and mouse. Also if your budget does by any chance happen to be pretty high, racing or driving games (read: not sims) like Grid, Shift, Dirt and so on can be enhanced with a triple monitor setup, as far as I know only GT5 and Forza let you do that as far as consoles go. I built my PC back in November, I think I've played GT5 about 3 or 4 times since then.

I could've made this post much shorter by simply saying that if you're looking to move on from GT5, you'll only do significantly better with a PC (I haven't tried Forza 4 mind you).

P.S. check out the DRM Revival 2.0 mod for rFactor.

Thanks for the quick reply.

I'm not quite sure what the budget is at the moment but I'm thinking around £900 ish. I own a G25 and use the clutch and H pattern so that won't be a problem. A triple screen setup is in my future plans too.

The physics are probably the most important thing and I've heard very mixed opinions about the physics of various mods, and watched lots of videos but it's difficult to tell from watching them.

GTR3? I've only heard of GTR2. I'll have to take a look.

 

[sesselpupser]

Unfortunately I don't have the Enduracers mod (couldn't seem to find it when I last remembered to look), otherwise I would've commented... It's popular, though, so it's safe to say it's a good mod. And yeah, the quality varies from 'professional' to 'my dog has produced more convincing-looking textures and also handles better than this even on wood laminate flooring', rFactor Central has a rating system though so it's not hard to find good mods there.

Your budget should be enough to get you an i5 2500K, 8GB RAM and a GTX 680. If you're sure you want a triple monitor setup then the 680 is what I'd recommend, it's not cheap but as it lets you run four monitors (I think?) off of one card it's a very good choice. There is, however, an AMD card (I'm no good with numbers, it might be the 7870?) which is supposedly better for triple monitor, worse for single monitor and possibly cheaper but I prefer Nvidia because AMD drivers seem to have more compatibility issues with some games. I don't doubt that the 680 will struggle to hit 60fps at 3x1080p with the newer sims on max settings, though, but they're not here yet...

If physics are your number one priority above all else, by all accounts iRacing is the best in that regard. I can't comment as I haven't tried it, but it's not cheap; you pay a subscription fee and you have to buy cars and tracks on top. It's online racing only but you mentioned that you play GT5 online so you might be ok with that. However that does mean no mod support so what you see is what you get.

 

[paulpg87]

considering also project cars and assetto corsa, yes.

 

[Chadders85]

Unfortunately I don't have the Enduracers mod (couldn't seem to find it when I last remembered to look), otherwise I would've commented... It's popular, though, so it's safe to say it's a good mod. And yeah, the quality varies from 'professional' to 'my dog has produced more convincing-looking textures and also handles better than this even on wood laminate flooring', rFactor Central has a rating system though so it's not hard to find good mods there.

Your budget should be enough to get you an i5 2500K, 8GB RAM and a GTX 680. If you're sure you want a triple monitor setup then the 680 is what I'd recommend, it's not cheap but as it lets you run four monitors (I think?) off of one card it's a very good choice. There is, however, an AMD card (I'm no good with numbers, it might be the 7870?) which is supposedly better for triple monitor, worse for single monitor and possibly cheaper but I prefer Nvidia because AMD drivers seem to have more compatibility issues with some games. I don't doubt that the 680 will struggle to hit 60fps at 3x1080p with the newer sims on max settings, though, but they're not here yet...

If physics are your number one priority above all else, by all accounts iRacing is the best in that regard. I can't comment as I haven't tried it, but it's not cheap; you pay a subscription fee and you have to buy cars and tracks on top. It's online racing only but you mentioned that you play GT5 online so you might be ok with that. However that does mean no mod support so what you see is what you get.

A GTX 680 might be a bit much from what I remember they are quite expensive but I wouldn't rule it out. I was originally considering a 560ti but I think I'll need something a bit better than that after watching some comparisons. The triple monitor idea probably won't happen for me for quite a while just something that I'd like to do at some point.

I've seen the rating system on rFactor central maybe I should have a good scan through that.
If the physics are at least as good as GT5 for the best mods then I'll be happy. I watched a video of I think it was an Escort mk1 or 2 mod around the ring and it looked a right handful.

As for iRacing, I looked into it a while ago and was quite drawn in. The racing looks great, the sort of thing I'm after, but there are a limited number of cars and fairly small amount of tracks. The sounds don't seem the best either, but I guess I could put up with that if the racing is really good.

considering also project cars and assetto corsa, yes.

Not looked into those yet, but ill be considering any future sim titles that get good reviews.

 

[DG_Silva]

As for iRacing, I looked into it a while ago and was quite drawn in. The racing looks great, the sort of thing I'm after, but there are a limited number of cars and fairly small amount of tracks. The sounds don't seem the best either, but I guess I could put up with that if the racing is really good.

There are quite a large number of tracks and cars available in iRacing, but they are all subsequent purchases at around £10-12 per track, £8-10 per car. It can get very expesive, but if you intend to stick with it, then it will get cheaper per year as you don't have to pay for the tracks again and again.

 

[Chadders85]

There are quite a large number of tracks and cars available in iRacing, but they are all subsequent purchases at around £10-12 per track, £8-10 per car. It can get very expesive, but if you intend to stick with it, then it will get cheaper per year as you don't have to pay for the tracks again and again.

I suppose you can pay for the cars and tracks at your own convenience and that would probably be ok for me. I can see myself being content with just a couple of cars and tracks to start with and continue to buy them in moderation.

For the price though, I'd want to be able to go online and 9 times out of 10 get into a race straight away. Is that how it is? or is it a case of scrolling through room after room to find something that suits you, or sitting around waiting for people to joim your room?

How about the online rooms on rFactor? are they still busy? or is it only people who are in leaugues that are online these days?

Can anyone comment on the difficulty of getting hold of and installing mods on rFactor? I've also heard it is much easier to do on rFactor 2.

 

[sesselpupser]

Can anyone comment on the difficulty of getting hold of and installing mods on rFactor? I've also heard it is much easier to do on rFactor 2.

It couldn't be much easier, some mods have an installation .exe but I prefer those without because you never know what else that .exe might be installing (there was a case where one was being flagged as a virus, actually). Without an installer, you get a few folders depending on what the mod is, usually Locations, Vehicles, Sound, that sort of thing. Just drag and drop the folders into where those same folders are in your rFactor directory and choose to merge them, that's it. Some mods come with duplicate assets because there are some that share certain textures and things (very common if you get two mods from the same modder) but then you just choose to either skip or replace all conflicts. Updating mods is a little trickier because sometimes they require you to hunt down and delete a certain file, but I've never actually updated one before.

One exception to this is the GT/TC mod, there may be others like it but this is the most well-known example; you need to provide it with proof that you own GT Legends because it uses many of its assets and they don't want you to pirate it just to get that mod. You can use either a disc or the Simbin installer from the digital version you can buy on their site, I would say its a shame but it's really not because GT Legends is awesome and the GT/TC mod is well worth the extra effort.

 

[Chadders85]

It couldn't be much easier, some mods have an installation .exe but I prefer those without because you never know what else that .exe might be installing (there was a case where one was being flagged as a virus, actually). Without an installer, you get a few folders depending on what the mod is, usually Locations, Vehicles, Sound, that sort of thing. Just drag and drop the folders into where those same folders are in your rFactor directory and choose to merge them, that's it. Some mods come with duplicate assets because there are some that share certain textures and things (very common if you get two mods from the same modder) but then you just choose to either skip or replace all conflicts. Updating mods is a little trickier because sometimes they require you to hunt down and delete a certain file, but I've never actually updated one before.

One exception to this is the GT/TC mod, there may be others like it but this is the most well-known example; you need to provide it with proof that you own GT Legends because it uses many of its assets and they don't want you to pirate it just to get that mod. You can use either a disc or the Simbin installer from the digital version you can buy on their site, I would say its a shame but it's really not because GT Legends is awesome and the GT/TC mod is well worth the extra effort.

Yeh I understand. Doesnt sound too bad then thanks for clearing that up. I've dabbled with mods before with WW2 flight sims a few years ago and it wasn't too bad, at least not as bad as some people make out. I know i'll have problems and errors from time to time trying to get things to work but I expect that from PC gaming.

What is the full name of the GT/TC mod you mentioned? I'd like to check it out. Also, have you been online with it lately and if so, did it take long to find a race?

I'm guessing iRacing could be the place to be on PC for decent, hassle free online racing and also that rFactor rooms are probably pretty quiet apart from people in leagues/groups. Thats just a guess though.

 

[Voltaic]

Personally, best money I ever spent. I am now on my second gaming PC, I bought both of them primarily to play rFactor 1/2.

 

[sesselpupser]

What is the full name of the GT/TC mod you mentioned? I'd like to check it out. Also, have you been online with it lately and if so, did it take long to find a race?

I couldn't remember the exact name so here's the link:
http://rfactorcentral.com/detail.cfm?ID=Historic GT & Touring Cars
However I think 1.95 was released not long ago so you might like to look around for it. I think it also goes by the name 'Historix', but I'm not sure. It wouldn't be far wrong to say its a conversion of all the GT Legends cars plus a few more, really, there are some excellent cars in there but the only drawback is you have to buy them all, you can't just pick the 917K and go racing, unfortunately. You earn money from races in rFactor but it's never made clear how much you'll earn from a race, so it's not exactly a career mode and it kind of sucks, so most mods set the price of cars to 0 or -1 credits and/or give you 9,999,999 credits to begin with. This is meant to be more professional than most though, I guess!

As for racing online, I've actually never tried it with rFactor. I would imagine it can be tricky to find a server without doing some research first because of the huge number of mods, so finding a server running a mod you've got on a circuit you've got might be tricky, then you have to have the right version of the mod and track as well! It's things like that that stop iRacing, NetKar Pro and Live For Speed from supporting mods, really. But once you find some servers to play on and get the required mods you should be set from then on. That's just a moderately educated guess, though, so don't take my word for it. For online racing I use Simraceway instead.

 

[Dustone]

If you will be racing online the 100% worth it. If its just for offline use then no..

You wont regret it! Find yourself a good community and you will be hooked!

 

[Chadders85]

I couldn't remember the exact name so here's the link:
http://rfactorcentral.com/detail.cfm?ID=Historic GT & Touring Cars
However I think 1.95 was released not long ago so you might like to look around for it. I think it also goes by the name 'Historix', but I'm not sure. It wouldn't be far wrong to say its a conversion of all the GT Legends cars plus a few more, really, there are some excellent cars in there but the only drawback is you have to buy them all, you can't just pick the 917K and go racing, unfortunately. You earn money from races in rFactor but it's never made clear how much you'll earn from a race, so it's not exactly a career mode and it kind of sucks, so most mods set the price of cars to 0 or -1 credits and/or give you 9,999,999 credits to begin with. This is meant to be more professional than most though, I guess!

As for racing online, I've actually never tried it with rFactor. I would imagine it can be tricky to find a server without doing some research first because of the huge number of mods, so finding a server running a mod you've got on a circuit you've got might be tricky, then you have to have the right version of the mod and track as well! It's things like that that stop iRacing, NetKar Pro and Live For Speed from supporting mods, really. But once you find some servers to play on and get the required mods you should be set from then on. That's just a moderately educated guess, though, so don't take my word for it. For online racing I use Simraceway instead.

Interesting I'll have a look at that. I've used the link and seen the community rating is very high. I dont mind paying for content if it is worth it.

What you say about online is pretty much what I expect. A bit difficult finding a race due to versions of mods etc but not impossible. I suppose rFactor 2 will be busy online when it goes gold. I'll check out simraceway too.

I've had a look at Assetto Corsa too and that looks good. They have said advanced physics etc. I just hope it wont be the same case as Need for Speed Shift 2 where the devs raved about how good the physics were, with professional driver input etc yet when it was released it was the same floaty arcade physics as before (I only tried the demo to the first game and read peoples reactions to the second game).

If you will be racing online the 100% worth it. If its just for offline use then no..

You wont regret it! Find yourself a good community and you will be hooked!

I understand what you mean about online. Once you face human opponents, it's hard to get the same challenge from racing the computer. I had a great time online with GT5 Prologue but since GT5 came out i've had problems getting online and struggled to find races that have realistic restrictions. I've tried setting my own room up but I end up sitting there for half an hour waiting for people to join. So I've been left with the offline mode for erm quite a while and I have enjoyed it, but I think its time to move on (for several reasons).

Point is I would probably enjoy trying out the huge content offline that rFactor 1 has to offer for a while, but I know online is always where the best racing is gonna be.

 

[Bigbazz]

Rfactor 2 is a complete resource hogger and a lot of the content isn't well polished at the moment, the Clio and 370Z are certaintly my cup of tea though. Hopefully ISI can optimise it a lot better but at the moment it is very hungry.

 

[Dustone]

I understand what you mean about online. Once you face human opponents, it's hard to get the same challenge from racing the computer. I had a great time online with GT5 Prologue but since GT5 came out i've had problems getting online and struggled to find races that have realistic restrictions. I've tried setting my own room up but I end up sitting there for half an hour waiting for people to join. So I've been left with the offline mode for erm quite a while and I have enjoyed it, but I think its time to move on (for several reasons).

Point is I would probably enjoy trying out the huge content offline that rFactor 1 has to offer for a while, but I know online is always where the best racing is gonna be.

Yeah offline is good, but not great. There are other games I would chose over rfactor for offline though. Regardless, just go for it