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INTRODUCTION
Every now and then something really exciting happens, like a new graphics card or a new CPU that promises to make wonders. Things we know will enhance our experience playing simulators. Still, is there something else around the corner that will make that experience better using other kinds of hardware? Virtual reality is something most of us have not been able to afford but that may change, and drastically so. A few companies have popped up with some very promising hardware at a cost that makes graphics card and CPU manufacturers blush. In this article we will look at a few chosen, affordable virtual reality gadgets that might enhance your gaming experience. In fact, I would say it will, and maybe give you even more for your money than the newest graphic card.
Virtual reality; what does that mean? There are different approaches to interpret what virtual reality is. I imagine it is anything that lets you believe you are experiencing something real even though you are not. Most of us using simulators are participating in Virtual Reality to some extent by racing or flying, while not actually doing it for real. The main aim is to come as close as possible to reality, whether it be the best physics, graphics, or both. What I would like to do in this article is to make an unbiased representation on why or if these devices can make your sim-racing experience better. Not that this equipment will necessarily make you faster from the word go, but simply more involved and immersed. None of these items has to do with being totally immersed in a virtual reality environment. Total immersion would require a full 360-degree, 3-Dimensional field of view. Without saying too much at this time, being �totally immersed� or just �really immersed� is the difference between being seated in a NASA developed simulator or laying out a few hundred bucks.
Even though flight simulator development seems to have more support dedicated toward visual immersion, this doesn't mean that racing simulations can't gain from those developments. There seems to be a strong willingness however, to support the racing community from the developer�s perspective understandably. I have had the good fortune to have been provided a small mouse look feature added as a patch for NASCAR Heat. The Live for Speed crew found time to implement a quick mouse look feature in their beta demo. Another talented and dedicated third party developer for Grand Prix Legends has allowed me to test an upcoming release of the popular GPLShift software. I'm going to focus mainly on these titles since today, the three above, are the only ones fully supporting the hardware I am going to take a look at, namely the TrackIR device.
TrackIR
The TrackIR system is simply a camera that tracks a reflective dot placed at an appropriate place on the user, which translates the users� head movements on to screen movements. This reflective dot can be placed at the tip of a microphone, on a cap, on the forehead or wherever it is most convenient. This system emulates the movement of the users� mouse. The TrackIR updates at 60 Hz per second, meaning it tracks the dot 60 times per second. The device is small enough to fit in the palm of a hand. If placing it on the top of the monitor, it looks like a little alien looking down at you. That alien soon becomes a very close friend. The closer you can get to your �friend� the better off you are. Meaning the closer the dot is to the camera, the greater the reaction of the device.
The newly released software TrackIR V2.0 features some user requested items regarding speed and dead zone that can be customized to your application. These settings are crucial to making the tracking software work properly so you need to spend some time adjusting to get the best set-up for a particular game. These set-ups can then be saved as profiles that can be loaded prior to using it with the game intended.
The first title I tried this device with was MS Flight Simulator 2002, granted not a racing sim but it had dedicated support for it and seemed to be the best application to test this device. It appears that the flight-sim developers have adopted this device faster than any other. The most surprising thing I found was that if I just turned my head a few inches to the left thus making the view turn left, really fooled me into thinking I was really looking left. I was amazed at how my brain actually adapted to this strange situation. I would never have thought that I could actually use this device as a believable tool. How on earth could I look at the screen, at the same time as turning left and believing I was really turning left? That was one of the questions that I got an answer for big-time using it. It works! If supported in the code by developers, it �remembers� where it was centered and you can actually step away from the screen and when you return you will have the exact center you set. Without dedicated support, it works exactly like a mouse. Therefore the software doesn�t remember your last position. If you turn too hard and the cursor comes off the screen, it is off until it is back in view, often totally in the wrong position. That can lead to some not so accurate centering. To get the most out of it, you really need dedicated support, but more on that in awhile. Now let's move onto the real stuff; Racing Simulators.
I will begin with Live for Speed. It will be a hard game to have missed if following the development of racing simulators lately. LFS aims to be a simulation providing a realistic experience for the PC. At the time of this writing, there is only a �pre-beta demo� available for me to test. The developers are very aware of this hardware though. Although their very quick implementation of mouse look is far from being perfect, it�s impressive that they were able to implement it at all. Live for Speed had another issue that can interfere with the chosen view. Mainly that the animation of the characters head driving dictates the direction of the view. Hence, if you steer violently in one direction the view changes even if you don�t want it to. That was a big issue in the earlier demo releases. Thankfully there is now an option to disable it by setting the feature, �move view with animation� to off, and then you are allowed total control of the view. That single improvement made the TrackIR experience much better.
The TrackIR development team is providing a development kit but then allowing the developers to make the most use of it. In the case of Live for Speed, they haven't found time to do a proper implementation using those tools at this time. It now supports mouse-look, but not dedicated TrackIR support. My understanding however is that they intend to fully support this device in the future and that will mean a lot of improvements to the current implementation. For instance, whenever you move your head totally away from the TrackIR camera, when returned to center, it will be centered in the game. That is not the case with pure mouse support as in LFS as explained before. Instead you would have a totally wrong centering of the view, needing to center it with a button. This is how the mouse-look feature works in LFS at the moment. Although the current operation is better than nothing the constant fear of not regaining the proper center makes you a little too careful using the look feature. It is best to set the device so it is very sensitive, but only moves the view a very small amount. The result is a subtle change of cockpit view. It lets you see the turn in to a corner properly and you can counter steer a slide by looking in the direction of travel. It all comes very naturally. In the tests I have done, I decided to concentrate on the driving instead of over-using the ability to look left and right.
"Mouse-look" is essentially the only thing the TrackIR hardware can provide you if not supported natively. That means it can be used in all titles supporting the mouse as a look device. In all honesty, if liking flight simulators as I do, this is nothing short of a real bargain being that Mouse-look is widely supported in most flight simulators. TrackIR supports IL2 Sturmovik: Forgotten Battles natively, and it�s nothing short of stunning. The turning view is smooth as you can imagine and has the best support for this device that I have found. Any self-respecting racing-sim developer owes it to their customers to at least look into this. I happen to know Racing Legends is doing just that, thankfully.
One other game that has adopted the mouse look feature for use with the TrackIR device is NASCAR Heat. That seemed unlikely, since the game was released years ago. In fact, NASCAR Heat took the crown of being the first released racing game/simulator that supported mouse look. Live for Speed coming in at a close second. As it is now NASCAR Heat has the best native support for TrackIR of any racing-sim that I�ve tried. This is due mainly to superior X, Y-axis support using the mouse. Feeling less restricted using the mouse look feature in the cockpit with the TrackIR device adds to the immersion factor even though not totally necessary. However, if you position the �alien� too far from the dot, you will notice a jerky motion using the mouse emulation mode. This is more apparent in NASCAR Heat where X and Y-axis are used. NASCAR Heat gives you good freedom of movement, and can use the TrackIR device in the manner intended. This allows the user to look into the corners without feeling restricted and also provides a natural view movement that corresponds with what you might expect when looking around in the cockpit. With this hardware, I must say NH is very much the top of the line in that perspective.
Grand Prix Legends. The game has become a legend in its own right. GPL has a very strong following, and deservedly so. Not only because it's a great simulation, but also because it has a great feeling to it. Capturing the heart of the era and making it a great challenge - a huge challenge depending on how you look at it. Either way, using the third party add-on called GPLShift, you get TrackIR support via mouse-look. The first version was not that great because of too much view angle and non-linear view movement but it was a good start. The developer of GPLShift has seen the limitations though and through some e-mail correspondences, I was able to obtain a beta version of the next release. It has all the features the TrackIR user will need. In all fairness having a game released so long ago, it�s amazing to see it works as well as it does with newer gadgets. The latest revolutions of Papyrus NASCAR games and others are challenging the popularity of GPL. I still contend that nothing comes close to the experience of the TrackIR hardware coupled with the latest GPLShift features. It genuinely seems open wheel simulators benefit more from using this device. You can accurately place the car into corners and clearly determine where the wheels are in relationship to the track. Some corners I had grown to hate, like the hairpin at Zandvoort, are now something I look forward to at each run.
The benefit of this is that you can put the view of the cockpit much closer to the actual track. Having the freedom of movement, you can look into the corners and judge the position of the car better. You use the mirrors by simply turning your head slightly. It all feels very natural after just a few minutes of play although it can take longer to feel totally comfortable. As with all software only supporting mouse look, you are always leery of not having the view centered. However, if a button can be mapped on the wheel that can center the view, you can live with that. I assume the next release of GPLShift will be able to do this. This labor of love from �*JSJ*� has provided something for free that breathes new life into GPL.
 
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