Hey, guys!
I've been taking a look at car articles in the Wiki, especially those that are custom-made. I found that some custom-made cars that are very used (and some that are not used so much) don't have an article or have a very minimal article. I am willing to create and edit articles to have that completed, but it turns out I don't know a lot about cars so I'm not the best car reviewer. I could start by making the articles and then other people could contribute a thorough analysis or you guys could help me make those analysis in the depth these cars deserve.
So far, what I have done is create an article about the DTM pack, which mentions the three cars, but this article is very basic and I think each of the cars should have its own individual article as well with much more detail.
Then... which aspects should I measure and how? Everybody who would be interesting in adding to this, I guess the more we are, the better, but as I said, I'm willing to do the whole thing myself if necessary... I would just want some directions to do it well. Thanks!
Sounds great :) There indeed are some car articles that have been pending since forever.
Quote from: Cas on December 15, 2020, 09:51:46 PM
Then... which aspects should I measure and how?
As far as stats go, I think the infoboxes cover the basics (see e.g. the GT3 article (http://wiki.stunts.hu/index.php?title=LWT-ZR1_GT3_Mark_II) for an example of a fully filled one), though ideas for extra data are of course welcome. A couple notes on the numbers:
- In the existing articles, torque peak and maximum power are both obtained from Car Blaster data, using the conversion factors from the Car Model Physics article (http://wiki.stunts.hu/index.php?title=Car_model_physics).
- Using the Car Model Physics factors, a half mile is about 12.9 tiles. Back in the day, IIRC I measured the half mile times by the using centre line markers and other visual cues to eyeball that distance from the starting position in a test track, likely the one attached below. Alternatively, these days there is the option of analysing repldump output in order to get fully accurate results.
By the way, I'll be happy to carry out the measurements for any article you write.
I can definitely help with real world information and terminology. If you need me to proof read anything, just let me know.
That's a great test track! Thanks, guys. I think I'll make a good list of cars and start "testing my testing" to get used to the procedure, but yes, any help is very welcome. Two things I have pending in the community are: learning more about cars (Stunts cars, but also some about real cars) and becoming a reasonable pipsqueak ::)
Alright... I've added articles for the three DTM cars. The text is very brief, but I've been able to fill the car information by copying from the forum post. I'm going to take pictures of the cars. What I'm not good at is reviewing the cars, so when I write the text in the articles, what I will need is a review of my review because my comments will probably be pretty childish. For example, I envy the car article for the Speedgate XSD. I would like to write something like that. By the way, that same article says "no bugs", ha, ha... Looks like the Speedgate trick had not been discovered at that time. That should be added, but I don't remember very well what that trick consisted in. It was something like lowering all gears quickly at certain moments and the car would turn into a bullet.
Quote from: Cas on December 16, 2020, 05:12:38 AM
That's a great test track!
Thanks for reminding me of it; now I feel like playing around a bit there :) Those blender renders are pretty nice. I'll try to chime in with something tomorrow.
Quote from: Cas on December 16, 2020, 05:12:38 AM
For example, I envy the car article for the Speedgate XSD. I would like to write something like that. By the way, that same article says "no bugs", ha, ha... Looks like the Speedgate trick had not been discovered at that time. That should be added, but I don't remember very well what that trick consisted in. It was something like lowering all gears quickly at certain moments and the car would turn into a bullet.
IIRC beyond the first couple of paragraphs the text in that article was taken directly from Mark's readme. And yes, it was written well before we properly learned about the downshift bug/trick. I don't think any other car ever went through such a sudden change in public perception...
Yes, I felt like using Blender renders. I've been thinking they do look good, but it'd make sense to also have a picture of what the car looks like in Stunts, so maybe I'll put that in the information tables and then put the renders below, maybe with some context, like a track in the background, I don't know. But so far, I like it this way.
About the downshifting bug, I'd like to document it in the Speedgate Wiki article... although maybe the less people know about it, the more they'll enjoy the car XD. I don't know. I don't even remember very well how to do the trick. And to be honest, I still like the Speedgate. If one doesn't like the bug, it can be forbidden for a race. It's very easy to see when the bug was used and when not. And otherwise, it makes the car interesting because, as far as I know, it's the only Stunts car that has that bug. If we've become used to seeing PG as a feature, then maybe this one is too.... Anyway, Stunts philosophy :P
Quote from: Cas on December 17, 2020, 09:04:23 AM
Yes, I felt like using Blender renders. I've been thinking they do look good, but it'd make sense to also have a picture of what the car looks like in Stunts, so maybe I'll put that in the information tables and then put the renders below, maybe with some context, like a track in the background, I don't know.
Maybe this, yes. They are nice, but look like they are from a different game. The SpeedGate image is a good mid-point: more details than a Stunts screenshot, but the same palette and lighting.
Yes. That is exactly what I feel. I want to make it look good with the details easy to appreciate, but I don't want to remove it too much from Stunts
Quote from: Duplode on December 17, 2020, 04:37:41 AM
I'll try to chime in with something tomorrow.
Here is an article for the 911 Turbo (http://wiki.stunts.hu/index.php?title=Porsche_911_Turbo). You'll note I have used a showroom screenshot, mostly to see how it would look like (I was originally inclined to be as lazy as possible by borrowing the ZakStunts scoreboard pic (http://wiki.stunts.hu/index.php?title=File:ZPTR.gif) and possibly replacing it later. For some ungodly reason, though, MediaWiki is not rendering the car windows in that GIF correctly when the picture is resized). Doing the performance tests stirred a few thoughts on the stats; I will share them once they settle down a bit.
(Speaking of stats, credit where its due: looking at the Wiki history logs, I remembered the half mile results that already were in the Wiki had actually been obtained by CTG, as documented in this thread (http://forum.stunts.hu/index.php?topic=2813).)
Nice article! The image looks good to me... A problem I had when I went to filling the DTM individual cars' articles is that I had already said all I knew in the main DTM-pack article. Not sure if I should just rewrite that same thing more or less for each of the cars. The thing is that the DTM cars have always been together in Race For Kicks whenever they were used and in ZakStunts, while separated, they've played similar roles, so it's little what can be said about them separately except comparing the individual features, which is what I think I'm going to do, although the information table says it all in that regard.
About the DTM cars. Maybe a individual article (like all others) with only reference to the pack and a main pack article with the story behind and the comparison between the three.???
There are a lot of cars now. But on the main car page i kind of miss segmentation,.
Like what are the original cars, which are considered cheat cars and which cars have new models.
Also, some cars are not really made for racing like the ikarus 260 or the starting line truck (thats still wip)
(some cars can be in more than one category, but i think it will make it cleaner)
maybe a download option? or link to a download page?
Quote from: Daniel3D on December 18, 2020, 10:59:24 PM
There are a lot of cars now. But on the main car page i kind of miss segmentation,.
That's a good point. Instead of just the Cars category as the entry point, we might set up a few subcategories or create a fancier landing page.
Quote from: Cas on December 18, 2020, 06:18:44 AM
A problem I had when I went to filling the DTM individual cars' articles is that I had already said all I knew in the main DTM-pack article. Not sure if I should just rewrite that same thing more or less for each of the cars. The thing is that the DTM cars have always been together in Race For Kicks whenever they were used and in ZakStunts, while separated, they've played similar roles, so it's little what can be said about them separately except comparing the individual features, which is what I think I'm going to do, although the information table says it all in that regard.
I think of the DTM cars as being very similar in straight line performance but differing in handling feel. Quoting myself from the DTM pack thread:
Quote from: Duplode on November 30, 2018, 05:02:26 AM
After racing with the three cars, I can confirm each of them has its own distinctive temperament. The Audi is smooth as butter, IMSA like as you say, and definitely the easiest of the three. The BMW is very nimble, and I'm fairly sure it beats the other two on a twisty track. All the responsiveness, however, means you end up being very close to the limit at all times. Another complication is the occasional curveball thrown by the bug-susceptible nature of the car. To me, the BMW is the most challenging of the set. Lastly, the Mercedes feels more like a typical "slow car", and is probably the one for which the conventional driving techniques translate more easily.
Since this is a rather subjective picture, I wonder whether you all think of them along similar lines.
Quote from: Duplode on December 18, 2020, 11:30:17 PM
Since this is a rather subjective picture, I wonder whether you all think of them along similar lines.
I prefer the BMW out of the three, but that is mostly because I prefer it in real life. I find it is the hardest to control, but the fastest when everything comes together. The Audi is the most civilised and the easiest to get a competitive time with. The Mercedes feels like it is slower, but has more lateral grip. They all obviously have similar straight line performance so the difference I perceive might just be based on my opinion of the real cars.
I just gave them a try on the same track one after the other. It really is difficult to tell the difference as the time it takes to start over is enough to blend the memories. They are very similar. My feeling, probably very subjective, was that the Audi was more "powerful", not necessarily faster. I found the other two more similar between them and I felt more comfortable with the BMW. Odds are it was just the experience I had with each at that moment. They really are very close to one another.
I'm thinking I could quote both of you guys in the article just as that: as a quote of personal experiences
I'll give my two cents on the differences between the DTM cars, but honestly not even I know at this point.
Speed and acceleration wise I did my testing before release. Okay, I tested lots of things lots of times before release, I have a 41 page document of what can be loosely called design notes. I have data for top speed, average speed and time taken on acceleration over 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 10 and 20 tiles of straight road and even tests with titles like "10 tunnels into curve left into halfpipe" where I note whether I had to release the gas or not (that was a no only on the Mercedes, which also had the highest top speed and the fastest time shared with the Audi). But the following are some of the useful numbers. I introduced differences in the weight, the power curve, the air drag (the Mercedes is slightly higher than the other two, that's an eye on detail for you) and the gear ratios, which makes the differences kind of organic and probably a little harder to fully nail down. I'll publish the numbers here ordered a little different than in the release topic:
0-60mph: BMW 3.15s Merc 3.15s Audi 3.15s
0-100mph: BMW 7.30s Merc 7.40s Audi 7.40s
Half mile: BMW 17.50s Merc 17.45s Audi 17.60s
Flat track top speed: BMW 186mph Merc 188mph Audi 190mph
Real top speed: BMW 199mph Merc 196mph Audi 197mph
So the BMW has a bit of an edge in the roughly 60-100mhp section, tracks with repeated small corners. The Merc should have the edge at the most typical speeds for a race to take place at while the Audi, as indicated by its flat track top speed, has the most acceleration to work with on the really fast bits. But that's really fast. You can do a straight line from the start on one side of the track into a slalom block on the other side and you're still waiting for the Audi's advantage to kick in. The BMW than has the most to gain with high speed stunts. All in all it's pretty close. But just going by the numbers the Merc feels like the slight favorite here. You know, if none of those tiny differences were measurement errors or unlucky shift times or something.
For those people using automatic gears you'll also notice differences in mostly the downshift RPM. The BMW has the tightest settings, shifting back earlier for optimal power, but sometimes this results in that annoying situation where the car shifts back, forth and back again or somesuch because it keeps meeting its shifting criteria. The Merc has the loosest settings to prevent too much shifting, which should give you more time with power on your wheels, even if that power doesn't always come from the optimal gear.
Car length wise the Audi is the longest and also the most of an outlier, the BMW is the shortest. One of the effects this has is jump length. When you want a long jump to make a certain stunt the Audi is best, when you want to land before the next corner while keeping as high a speed as possible the BMW is best.
Cornering is where things get tricky. Really tricky. This is where most of the difference in the feel comes from, and I don't have a proper complete explanation for it. First of all I looked back at the files quite some time after release and I think I found that I didn't actually finetune the steering like I thought I had. I had been looking to the wrong side of the "big" handling number and fiddling with a completely different variable as if it was the "small" handling number. At least, that's what I thought at that point I had been doing. So all cars have the same handling stat. I think. This should mean that the BMW as the shortest car has the best steering, and the Audi the worst. However, it's not just the length of the cars that's different. The bigger cars are also wider. The difference between the Mercedes and the BMW is tiny, the difference with the Audi, also the longest car by a fair margin, is decisively less so. I have no idea what that does to the handling of a car to be honest. If a longer car needs to be wider to have the same ease of steering the Mercedes is at a disadvantage here. There's also the weird issue that during testing I thought I found a "sour spot", a place where you can increase the handling stat and things actually get a little worse rather than better for a while. Now keep in mind I might have actually been messing with the wrong bar that entire time and those results get really questionable. I'm also just in general not good enough at cornering to get very reliable results at these things. I did test laps and such, but how much of my times on those is just variation between runs, or lack of skill because I'm still getting used to new settings?Basically at this point I've decided that these cars are what they are and there's no sense in trying to figure them out.
Now, which do I prefer? You can't ask me that, that's like asking a parent which child they It's the BMW. It always has been. Most of the testing during development was done on the BMW. That idea of the sour spot? All BMW based. But that just raises more questions than it answered. Did I make it the better car? Or is it the car that I think feels best and did I overcompensate for that actually making it the worse car? The favoritism was actually sort of by design. I figured that as the author of the Superkart I probably was a bit more extreme than most in my love for fast and nimble cars. The BMW was meant to end up around my sweet spot, with the other two more towards the "normal" side. Whatever the cause, given the exact same bonus and no track based reason to prefer one or the other (like wanting longer or shorter jumps) I will usually default to the BMW. That said I don't feel like I have an "unfavorite". The Audi may feel a little sluggish, but it's like a good, reliable kind of sluggish. The Mercedes really seemed like probably the best handling one during testing, if there was even a difference at all, plus it has the acceleration advantage at the most useful speeds. It even has the best brakes, and it has the strongest top of the power curve to reduce the losses from overshifting. It should honestly be the favorite. Yet on the track, I don't know, it doesn't feel off, but maybe not quite as spot on as the others. At least to me. Maybe it is just the mental associations I have with these cars/projects.
They're pretty close one way or another. The numbers say if anything the Audi should be the slowest one, but it's also the most like the IMSA cars and such, which could make it the easiest one to pick up. The Mercedes should be the favorite but somehow isn't quite that, and the BMW is my pet car and I can't objectively analyse it in enough detail.
Quote from: KyLiE on December 19, 2020, 01:20:28 AMI prefer the BMW out of the three, but that is mostly because I prefer it in real life.
That is either the biggest compliment a Stunts car designer can get, or a good indication of how hard it is to get a fair feel for these things by driving them. 8)