NASCAR Heat Evolution Available, Post Your Impressions Here

[brandon27]

Just to give an idea on the spread of lap times at certain difficulties I just did some quick testing at Vegas. I ran 3 qualifying sessions per difficulty level. I started at 85, then went up to 86, then jumped to 90. At each level, for each run, I recorded the top AI time, and the last place AI time. Here's what I can report: (my apologies if the chart doesn't show up the way it should)

Track	85H	85L		86H	86L		90H	90L
Vegas	33.435	36.492		33.190	35.992		32.181	34.256
	33.430	36.583		33.043	35.902		32.217	34.289
	33.361	36.510		33.085	36.028		32.303	34.313
Average:	33.409	36.528		33.106	35.974		32.234	34.286

There's a bit more spread between 85 and 86 than I anticipated there would be. Quite the jump from 85 to 90. However, it seems that the qualifying times and race lap times differ. Now, the game of course shows you no way to see in-race AI laptimes, so it's hard to compare. So, I ran 10 laps of the race, at AI level 90. I ran laptimes myself as the leader between 31.600 and 31.800. After 10 laps, I had opened a 5.7 second lead. So, if you say I ran my best laptime of 31.6 all 10 laps, and the AI ran it's best 90 OVR laptime of 32.181 each of the 10 laps, I should have gained 0.511 seconds per lap, or 5.1 seconds in total. So, seeing as I had a 5.7 second lead, and that assumes I ran my best time every lap (I did not btw, I was usually about a tenth higher) and it assumes the AI ran their best time. Someone is off, and it's likely to be the AI times since mine were slower than my best lap time, which is the one I used in the calculation.

Now, as for making a sheet of these times at every difficulty level, or even in 5 level increments(85, 90, 95, 100, 105) it's going to be extremely time consuming. I'd suggest doing it as I did here with a 3 run sample of first AI time, and last AI time for each level. The problem is, in order to see the qualifying times, you've actually got to run a qualifying session yourself since you can't sim qualifying, and see the qualifying results. Only way to see them is to load the race, run qualifying, view results, then exit the race... rinse and repeat 3 times to get an average high & low. Three runs is a small sample size of course, but it at least gives you an idea.

For the record... I did this in simulation physics model. Using a controller, and the default Vegas car setup. I doubt any of that matters though.

I do though think it's an interesting venture to put a full list together. For the sake of saving time, I guess you don't NEED a sample size of at least 3, I mean, there is a difference between the 3 highest/lowest times in each qualifying session, but I guess it's not that big of a gap it would have an effect.

That being said, you'd still need to know your own lap times ahead of time in order to know what setting to use. Again, stat tracking is pretty horrible in the game, so there's really no way to know your own historical or average times unless you track them yourself somewhere.

Seems like it could be a long road that would just lead to a ton of work. I'm just not sure it's worth it.

[Turbojugend]

Quote: Originally Posted by brandon27

There's a bit more spread between 85 and 86 than I anticipated there would be. Quite the jump from 85 to 90. However, it seems that the qualifying times and race lap times differ. Now, the game of course shows you no way to see in-race AI laptimes, so it's hard to compare.

What I did for the lower AI benchmarks was race reaaalllly slow so that I wouldn't end up with the fastest lap time. Then the AI's fastest lap shows up at the end of the race

[brandon27]

Quote: Originally Posted by Turbojugend

What I did for the lower AI benchmarks was race reaaalllly slow so that I wouldn't end up with the fastest lap time. Then the AI's fastest lap shows up at the end of the race

That's a good idea, but if were going to try and build some sort of spreadsheet around this, that's even less practical, and more time consuming than doing it through qualifying. Did you happen to notice the difference between the qualifying and race laptimes of the AI?

[Turbojugend]

Quote: Originally Posted by brandon27

That's a good idea, but if were going to try and build some sort of spreadsheet around this, that's even less practical, and more time consuming than doing it through qualifying. Did you happen to notice the difference between the qualifying and race laptimes of the AI?

No, I was actually skipping qualifying. But you're right, if you want to gather data the fastest way, qualifying is the way to do it.

BTW, this is why I love communities like this. Pre-OS I would have labeled this game worthless and gave up on it within a couple of days. But here it is six months later and we're still trying to find out what this game has to offer and how to get the most out of it.

[brandon27]

Quote: Originally Posted by Turbojugend

No, I was actually skipping qualifying. But you're right, if you want to gather data the fastest way, qualifying is the way to do it. BTW, this is why I love communities like this. Pre-OS I would have labeled this game worthless and gave up on it within a couple of days. But here it is six months later and we're still trying to find out what this game has to offer and how to get the most out of it.

I was thinking that too actually last night when I was compiling that Vegas data. First it was... Why am I wasting my time with this? Then I thought to myself, I'm going to see it through and do this whole sheet for every track, in 5 AI level increments in the hope that the devs will see that people actually care, and hope that they'd see some of the other comments here on how they can make the next one better. However, than it took me about a half hour just to gather that Vegas data for 3 AI levels, at one track.. and all hope was lost.

You're right though, that's the cool thing about this community. I remember with other Nascar games here the awesome setup threads we used to have too where people would share their great setups. Unfortunately this game just never gathered enough traction and interest to get that going. Which is sad, because even the NTG series earned itself a setups thread here for a while.

The AI issue for racing games to me is a tough one. Because I think as the player, you want a challenge, but at the same time you want the ability to win. I've almost never found a setting in any racing game that's allowed me to be able to compete for the win and get it, and not get it all on the same AI setting. It's always one or the other. I find this game very much that way too. For example, at AI90 (just pulling numbers out of the air) you might always win by a second or two. At AI 95 though, you may never stand a chance and always finish top 10 only. There never seems to be a setting that just works and gives a good mix. Luckily they gave the option to increase one at a time from 85-105 which helps, but still there is always that breaking point. At 100 you might always be 20th. 95 you're 10th, 90 you're winning by 5 seconds. There's always a threshold in your speed and AI speed that you break or cant break. Sure, varying laptimes and your consistency help and play into it, but that's still usually been my experience.

The other problem I have with the AI in this game though, even if you do get that setting that lets you run around other cars and fight for position, the AI too often wrecks you. They did a good job not having the AI riding on rails, or specific lines. They do shift around their lines. However the problem it does have is if I don't run a line similar to the AI, it's as if they have no awareness that I'm there, and they're going to drive their line. They're always all take, no give, that's just not the case in Nascar.


Too often I've seen a car behind me put their nose on my rear fender and just stay there until I either spin out, or get out of the way and drop 10 spots. Sure, on Sundays you may see Harvick put a fender on Logano and send him spinning. I get that, but that's not what I'm talking about. I expect that if I cut across the AI's line that I might spin out. I'm talking about the times where were in close quarters, not making contact, but the AI just keeps driving up under you, and eventually into you, and they don't let up until you've spun, and on simulation mode your car appears to be driving on an oil slick, but theirs is stuck to the track like glue. That's what bothers me. In those situations you'd expect a driver to take care of their own car too, not just plow through you with no repercussions.

The AI cars for me when it comes to contact with the player are too unaware still, and they drive like tanks that cant be moved, yet the slightest touch, even side to side and the player's car is slippin and slidin all over the place while the AI drives on as if you never touched them. You've got to hit them pretty darn good to get them to spin, as opposed to them feathering you and you're gone.

[Turbojugend]

Y'know, it would be really nice if DMi had some type of presence on this board, much like the NBA 2K and The Show devs. I wonder if we made some attempt to reach out to them via social media if they would be responsive to having someone check this forum every now and then. What we are currently doing is definitely more productive than the usual Twitter "UR GAME SUX FIX IT" drivel.

I usually stay away from social media for just that reason, but I may try to reach out to DMi through their web portal just to see how responsive they are to this idea. I do believe they are passionate about making great NASCAR games, maybe we can help out.

[bravesfan1984]

Quote: Originally Posted by Turbojugend

Y'know, it would be really nice if DMi had some type of presence on this board, much like the NBA 2K and The Show devs. I wonder if we made some attempt to reach out to them via social media if they would be responsive to having someone check this forum every now and then. What we are currently doing is definitely more productive than the usual Twitter "UR GAME SUX FIX IT" drivel. I usually stay away from social media for just that reason, but I may try to reach out to DMi through their web portal just to see how responsive they are to this idea. I do believe they are passionate about making great NASCAR games, maybe we can help out.

I'd also suggest reaching out to Sean Wilson, he seems pretty responsive to everyone from what I can tell. It would be great if they'd become a presence here. Maybe they could find some beta testers here that could help out. I'd consider doing that if they offered.

[longranger]

Only 19 bucks on amazon for ps4 right now......