By Jim Rossignol on December 29th, 2007 at 11:36 am.
I’ve just been having a look at the demo of X Motor Racing, an indie racing game that prides itself on its realistic car physics and damage modeling. As if to prove that the physics are realistic you can even press the ’3′ key to bring up a physics overlay, which explains the stresses and forces on each of the tires, as well as adding big pink arrows to them to illustrate something or other about grip and/or wheel-physics.
Irritatingly the demo doesn’t feature all the physics options or any of the damage modeling – which seems to me to be one of the crucial things you’d want to show off in a demo. Nevertheless it’s an reasonable entertaining car game, and the digital download is DRM free, so you can burn it to disc and install it on your reinstalled PCs and laptops on demand. How refreshing.
realistic? cars? ill try it! thx for the tip.
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Once we get comprehensive physics overlays describing the various forces that apply to Elf boobies, I’ll be interested :3
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the new burnout game has fantastic damage modeling, from a graphical perspective at least. If you are yet to see it, you realy should.
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I can’t download something without knowing how many Peggles it is!
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Strange coincidence, there’s a demo another really neat indie racer out now: Nitro Stunt Racing. I bought it yesterday, sadly it’s a bit light on content, but it’s a lot of fun (very satisfying controls). Reminds me a bit of Stunt Car Racer.
Demo/trial and screenshots here:
http://www.worthplaying.com/article.php?sid=48598&mode=thread&order=0
X Motor Racing seems interesting too, will definitely check it out.
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6.34 peggles, if my calculations are correct. Hmm, what is the standard number of decimal places used when calculating in peggles?
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18
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Ouch, it may have a lot of fancy output from it’s physics engine, but realistic it ain’t. I’ve seen bars of soap understeer less than that Boxter. If you want realism (and indie) have a look at Live for Speed.
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mmmm elf boobies… om nom nom nom. Damn Lineage II. I always shy from driving games because of the early days of mouse/KB were very awkward on them. It doesn’t help that I refuse to buy a wheel. Same with flying games and a flight stick. Games like the GTA series though don’t really require decent driving skills, and in fact, seem to be hampered by them. Do any of these car games really steer decently on a mouse/KB?
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LFS is very drivable with a mouse, but you’ll probably never be as fast as with a wheel. Force feedback combined with the low sensitivity of a proper wheel helps a lot when trying to keep a car under control.
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Maybe I’ll give this one a try. Never have been the biggest fan of racing demos. But then again, gonna try this one all the same.
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