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Better times with controller!

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Milton

Joined: 03 Jan 2008
Posts: 6

Posted: Sat Jan 05, 19:53

Hi I just bought Logitech Formula EX wheel and enjoy it a lot. I know it's in the medium quality range. I got some good times with the wheel already but the problem is I am getting like 5 seconds better times with Logitech Gamepad. The driving feels better with wheel but I am not going so fast. Does anyone have any tips how to improve wheel racing and how to setup Logitech Profiler to get the best results with the Formula EX wheel. Thanks.

Giorgio262

Joined: 10 Oct 2006
Posts: 466

Posted: Sun Jan 06, 04:47

I have the same wheel model. Previously I used an old short stick joystick (a 2 buttons Quickshot I bought in 1994 no less ) to steer and the keyboard to control accelerator, brakes and handbrake, with gearbox set in automatic mode. It took quite a lot to find a decent setting for the wheel and to get accustomed with it. At the moment I can't plug in the wheel and write down my settings in the profiler and in RBR so I'll edit the post later. By now I can only tell you that for me it was a metter of understand that I didn't have to try to use the wheel like I used the joystick and keyboard combo. Basically I had to learn to drive again in RBR. At first I get an average of 10 seconds worse timings with the new controller. Then with new settings and practice I started to get some new records. The final step was to try using the manual gearbox which I just could't handle with the joy-keyboard combo, and after some practice I realized it was a whole new experience, a much better one. All in all I found since manual gearbox offers better traction on loose surfaces (the auto being too eager to shift to higher gears ) driving the manual box feels easier and more rewarding. So, while I don't know what kind of gearbox you selected to play with the pad I hope you're using the manula for your wheel. I also suggest you concentrate on getting practice and forget the times for a while. For in my case paying too much attention to the stage times lead to frustration too many times. First edit: I suggest you install the latest profiler software from Logitech since older versions, like the one I found in the box in december 2006, were far from perfect and in some games, RBR included, generated a horrible effect when turning left. Basically it went like this: you're accelerating and then turn left and keep the wheel that side and you feel like the feedback gives some sudden "bumps" just like the clogs in the mechanism missed a tooth. The higher the settings for the force feedback the bigger the "bumps", and believe me, it feels horrible (I also experienced this bug with GP4 and NFS Underground2). Suffice to say that I know of a person in another forum who believed the wheel was damaged so he took it back to the shop and bought something else instead. 2nd edit: as promised my settings for the Formula EX wheel are as follows. Of course I have the tabs and menus in italian so I'll roughly translate them or just refer to their position in each window, you should have the same arrangement so you shouldn't have any problem in understandig what controls I'm referring to. In control panel game peripherals with wheel connected select the settings page: I have combined pedals checkbox unchecked (so that they use different axis. In RBR this implies that there is better control over accelerator and brakes for example when using both pedals at the same time as Richard suggests in the Rally School). I have force feedback sliders set like this: first slider (global effects) at 100% second and third sliders to 0% Wheel centering spring checkbox unchecked. Then In RBR you can set the force feedback intensity to your liking. Personally I don't like too much feedback since it can actually cause accidents sometimes, so I chose to set it at 7 red bars, and autocenter set to on (actually this should be the default setting, isn't it?). Steering filter axis set as follows: curvature: 7 red bars curvature2: 0 bars maximum fade: 7,5 bars saturation: 15,5 bars I have to say that I moved PC_InputFilter.ini away from RBR folder as suggested somewhere in the tweaks section of this forum. Anyway, the wheel works fine with no lag or anything like that.

Milton

Joined: 03 Jan 2008
Posts: 6

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 14:16

Thanx fro the tips Giorgio, but I still think this wheel is a cheap piece of plastic. I should have chipped some more cash and get the Momo. It's really hard to drive Focus with that wheel because it just doesn't turn the car as it is supposed to.

Giorgio262

Joined: 10 Oct 2006
Posts: 466

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 15:41

The first day I had this wheel I just wanted to get rid of it as fast as possible. This is how hard it was for me to switch from my previous controller combination to the supposedly better wheel. It really took me some time, actually months, to appreciate it, and now I really like it very much. Still, as you implied, there are better, though more expensive, wheels on the market. But, if you feel like you'll never appreciate the EX I'd suggest you look for the Logitech DFP instead of the momo (better materials higher turning range and should be even cheaper than the momo!). Anyway, which Focus are you talking about? And perhaps you blame it to the controller but it could be that you're just still not accustomed to the wheel feel and you're not using it properly. That and the pedals, I mean. Which is not surprising given your previous experience is with a gamepad with which a simple swift movement of a thumb could command a very quick reaction of the steering in RBR. Or this is what I had to face. With the short stick of my previous joystick I could command very sharp and very quick steering inputs to balance the car, but I could see from the replays that while very effective the steering looked everything but realistic, infact it looked like a Radio Controlled scale model, rather than a big car. Now I do care about stage times, but I also like to watch my replays very much and an "R\C model" feel simply won't do for me. I want the car to move and feel real on the stages and on replays, even if, sometimes, that mean being slower than what RBR physics seem to allow.

Milton

Joined: 03 Jan 2008
Posts: 6

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 15:58

When talking about Focus I meant Ford Focus car. Yes I feel the same way. With the controller it was very easy to steer the car from left to right. With the wheel it's much slower response. Well it seems I will just have to suffer the slower times for awhile. But the game sure is more enjoyable with wheel and that is really what the game is supposed to be in the end.

Giorgio262

Joined: 10 Oct 2006
Posts: 466

Posted: Thu Jan 10, 18:54

Precisely. Real rally cars don't turn the wheel from lock to lock in 1 second, so a gamepad is actually too good to be realistic. Enjoying the feel of the wheel and the pedals and, hopefully, use the manual gearbox instead of the not so good automatic option and concentrate on the sheer pleasure of driving well. Good stage times will follow, sooner or later. While about the foucs, I meant which focus is the one you're having problems with? As you may have noticed, infact, several modders and teams (Pyros, Eddy3Spain team and Kazhol) produced quite a number of models ranging from the first Focus WRC of 1999 to the second generation focus WRC of 2006. My curiosity: did you use the manual or the automatic gearbox with the gamepad?

Milton

Joined: 03 Jan 2008
Posts: 6

Posted: Fri Jan 11, 00:37

Giorgio262 wrote:

Precisely. Real rally cars don't turn the wheel from lock to lock in 1 second, so a gamepad is actually too good to be realistic. Enjoying the feel of the wheel and the pedals and, hopefully, use the manual gearbox instead of the not so good automatic option and concentrate on the sheer pleasure of driving well. Good stage times will follow, sooner or later.

While about the foucs, I meant which focus is the one you're having problems with? As you may have noticed, infact, several modders and teams (Pyros, Eddy3Spain team and Kazhol) produced quite a number of models ranging from the first Focus WRC of 1999 to the second generation focus WRC of 2006.

My curiosity: did you use the manual or the automatic gearbox with the gamepad?

Yep gamepad just feels to good to be true. But I am slowly getting the feel for it. And the good thing is I can now actually start using oversteer. I am driving Focus 2006 1.2 offcourse. It's a mean machine. I always use manual gearbox with the buttons behind the wheel.

Well for the gamepad I also used the manual gearbox. I was using the buttons on top of the gamepad and changed gears with my 2 index fingers. Right up left down.

dtaker

Joined: 25 Nov 2005
Posts: 244

Posted: Wed Sep 10, 02:32

Giorgio262 wrote:

Precisely. Real rally cars don't turn the wheel from lock to lock in 1 second, so a gamepad is actually too good to be realistic.

Hmm why don't they equip real rally cars with gamepads then Very Happy

There are real life examples that uses game-pad like controls, one of them is the F-16 jet fighter. It works for jet fighters due to relatively small power requirement to move control surfaces as opposed to steering a car, not to mention, jet engines are extremely powerful. If you do that to a rally car, you might rob the engine of significant power when steering.

So there, push-button/joystick controls > wheel for faster stage times, ignoring real life effects(assuming you don't strain the engine). But push button controls will most likely suck for normal, everyday city driving.
_________________
In rallying you can create mistakes and walk out of it. In life, some mistakes will mean losing everything you had...

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