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Good EA Sports Quote.

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Mike Beauchamp

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May 9, 2002, 11:03:27 PM5/9/02
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All this talk about F1 2002 reminded me of a great quote that the EA Sports
Representative that came to my school said. It went something like this:

"We tried to use real physics models, but they just don't look right. Even
though the formulas may be proper, when you see it on the computer screen
most people tend to think there is something wrong with it. That's why we
just use our own formulas for physics and stuff.

With our game F1 2002 for example, we set our gravity to be like 100 times
the actual force of gravity. If we set it to the proper value, the car would
just fly off the track, and it would be impossible to drive."


Maybe the guy was just fudging a more complicated thing to get a point
across easier.. afterall my university isn't the smartest around :)

Either way, it's a funny quote. He also mentioned lots of things of doing
games with real physics wouldn't sell..

Mike
http://mikebeauchamp.com

John Pancoast

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May 9, 2002, 11:31:04 PM5/9/02
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On a related note, I've seen where actual fighter pilots, have said, that
if X flight sim actually modelled X plane's flight, etc., flight simmers
would think it was an arcade game.

-John


"Mike Beauchamp" <ne...@mikebeauchamp.com> wrote in message
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Douglas Ellison

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May 10, 2002, 5:14:02 AM5/10/02
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"Mike Beauchamp" <ne...@mikebeauchamp.com> wrote in message
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> With our game F1 2002 for example, we set our gravity to be like 100 times
> the actual force of gravity. If we set it to the proper value, the car
would
> just fly off the track, and it would be impossible to drive."

Clearly their phsyics engine is still as shafted as it was with 2001 then

Doug


Carol Bekker

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May 10, 2002, 8:22:46 AM5/10/02
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That is an amazing statement.

Ashley McConnell

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May 10, 2002, 9:00:10 AM5/10/02
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... Well it scared me :)

Seems ridiculous - Perhaps 2 wrongs making a right.

Ash

"Carol Bekker" <scarol....@lineone.net> wrote in message
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Stefano Casillo

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May 10, 2002, 10:17:19 AM5/10/02
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Are you serious? This is crazy... can you post a link to the page
where you took this quote from?

thanks...

"Mike Beauchamp" <ne...@mikebeauchamp.com> wrote in message news:<sTGC8.33864$Yt.19...@read1.cgocable.net>...

Ian Bell

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May 10, 2002, 10:42:30 AM5/10/02
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That is just about the greatest load of bumph I've read. From every
conceivable angle, ISI put real world figures into the sim engine. Maybe he
was talking about the console versions.

Ian Bell
www.simbin.com

"Mike Beauchamp" <ne...@mikebeauchamp.com> wrote in message
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Andreas Nystrom

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May 10, 2002, 12:19:08 PM5/10/02
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Yepp Agree!. You just have to look at the physics-files for the cars in F1
2002 to see that the numbers they put into the
game is the real ones.

"Ian Bell" <nospamw.b...@ntlworld.com> wrote in message
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Jonny Hodgson

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May 10, 2002, 12:22:57 PM5/10/02
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Mike Beauchamp <ne...@mikebeauchamp.com> wrote in message news:sTGC8.33864$Yt.19...@read1.cgocable.net...

> "We tried to use real physics models, but they just don't look right. Even


> though the formulas may be proper, when you see it on the computer screen
> most people tend to think there is something wrong with it. That's why we
> just use our own formulas for physics and stuff.
>
> With our game F1 2002 for example, we set our gravity to be like 100 times
> the actual force of gravity. If we set it to the proper value, the car would
> just fly off the track, and it would be impossible to drive."

Heard a similar story from the guys at my uni who helped with
Vanishing Point. They ended up, IIRC, with tyres around mu = 2
to avoid the cars feeling like they were on ice.

Jonny


Carol Bekker

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May 10, 2002, 1:35:03 PM5/10/02
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Perfectly possible to have real values in the ini files, especially coefs.
Can all be scaled and fudged about in the code if needed.


ymenard

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May 10, 2002, 2:23:18 PM5/10/02
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>"Mike Beauchamp" <ne...@mikebeauchamp.com> wrote

> With our game F1 2002 for example, we set our gravity to be like 100 times
> the actual force of gravity. If we set it to the proper value, the car
would
> just fly off the track, and it would be impossible to drive."


Ah so now the confirmation that F1 2002 is basically just F1 2001 patched
6months later sold in a box ;)

--
-- François Ménard <ymenard>
-- http://www.ymenard.8m.com/
-- This announcement is brought to you by the Shimato Dominguez
Corporation - helping America into the New World...

ymenard

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May 10, 2002, 2:24:36 PM5/10/02
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>"Carol Bekker" <scarol....@lineone.net> wrote

> Perfectly possible to have real values in the ini files, especially coefs.
> Can all be scaled and fudged about in the code if needed.

Coefs are still coefs, just values. Even if it's "there" to be tweaked, it
might not be the reality of what the ini files tell you.

GTX_SlotCar

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May 10, 2002, 2:46:28 PM5/10/02
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It's modeled physics, so it's also scale dependant. I don't know about his
explanation, but to a degree I can concede that certain things might have to
change. The same physics model doesn't always work when you change scales,
for example. A bee the size of a person would not be able to fly, so I
would have to model his wing (tinsel) strength and muscle mass to about 100
times that which the actual scale allows. Then you have to consider which
physics profile you're going to follow from there. Stop at fudging the
muscle mass or continue along that line? If you continue, you've got to
change his eating habits to supply enough energy for the increased muscle
mass, which means he'd spend his entire life eating, and nothing else. That
doesn't even account for heart rate and size needed for the delivery of the
nutrients, which also don't work when kept to scale. It can get complicated,
but in the end that bee just doesn't scale well and if you want to make it
work, what you end up with doesn't resemble a bee very much.
Appearance is another thing that changes with scale. When I was doing a lot
of train modeling in HO scale, there were places that called for, let's say,
1/2 inch stone covering. In scale, each stone is then .0625 inches. On the
layout, you couldn't even see the texture and it looked wrong, so you cheat
a little by making the stone larger. It looks perfect unless you have a
scale person standing near it and some picky friend points out that the
pea-stone is the size of the person's hand. To model a train line that was
supposed to be a few miles away on a mountain, I'd change everything to N
scale to give the impression of depth (otherwise it's hard to make 20 feet
of layout look like a few miles). Is it proper scale? No, but it sure looks
better and more realistic.

I know that computer race cars aren't bees or model trains, but modeling
physics is still modeling. A road surface at 150° affects the handling of a
car. That can be modeled, but what about the shadows cast by grandstands and
other things that cool the temperature on certain parts of the track? The
track temperature should gradually cool until the center of the shadow, and
each shadow, being a different size, would have different temperatures. Take
this and a hundred other nuances, one thing affecting another, and I doubt
that we have enough processing power to model all these changes. Does that
mean that the physics model is flawed? Certainly.
There are limitations on modeling physics; many due to technology, and some
just because things don't scale well. I think we shouldn't look for, or
expect, or even want a pure physics model. Maybe the best thing a game
developer can deliver is something that makes us FEEL like the experience is
real. If fudging the physics makes something seem more realistic than a
proper model would, I'm all for it. I like realism, but I don't want to
feel the pain when I crash in GPL.


--
Slot

Tweaks & Reviews
www.slottweak.com


"Mike Beauchamp" <ne...@mikebeauchamp.com> wrote in message
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Mike Beauchamp

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May 10, 2002, 3:47:53 PM5/10/02
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Stefano,
the quote isnt' from a webpage. It was from a lecture that someone from EA
Sports Canada gave at my school (university of windsor)

Mike
http://mikebeauchamp.com

"Stefano Casillo" <ku...@inwind.it> wrote in message
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Mike Beauchamp

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May 10, 2002, 3:48:52 PM5/10/02
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LIke I said, he could have just said it to prove a point.. I doubt he had
anything to do with the programming of F12002 at all or anything

Mike
http://mikebeauchamp.com

"Andreas Nystrom" <andr...@home.se> wrote in message
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Jan Verschueren

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May 10, 2002, 4:58:51 PM5/10/02
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"Mike Beauchamp" wrote...

> Stefano,
> the quote isnt' from a webpage. It was from a lecture that
> someone from EA Sports Canada gave at my school (university
> of windsor)

First off, EA Sports Canada did some of the Need for Speed games and are
AFAIK not involved with ISI and F1 200x. Secondly, NFS games, though fun in
their own right, are not exactly sims. Thirdly, how long ago was this?

Jan.
=---


HeadHunter

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May 10, 2002, 8:15:11 PM5/10/02
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Is it possible that while they can input all the real numbers for the
physics to make it as real as possible on paper, CPUs still don't have the
power to model all the things that influence it? Things such as in depth
enviromental conditions (wind, atmospheric pressure, et al), in depth tire
grip, and all those other things we overlook in the real world. Maybe
current CPUs just don't have the power to model all that for all the cars. I
find that statement a bit odd myself and I am sure that there is much more
of an answer than what was given.

HH


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Wayne Hutchison

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May 10, 2002, 7:53:28 PM5/10/02
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Last Chance "U"! It takes some guts to admit you go to Windsor <G>

Wayne Hutchison
University of Western Ontario grad '88


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Mike Beauchamp

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May 11, 2002, 2:19:06 AM5/11/02
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Hahaha..
yeah, I'll admit it.. the school is pretty cruddy. :)

Mike
http://mikebeauchamp.com

"Wayne Hutchison" <whutc...@sprint.ca> wrote in message
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Mike Beauchamp

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May 11, 2002, 2:19:52 AM5/11/02
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Yeah, I agree.. he was probably dumbing things down a lot for the audience.
:)

Mike
http://mikebeauchamp.com

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Gerry Aitken

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May 11, 2002, 4:40:50 AM5/11/02
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Mike Beauchamp wrote:

> Mike
> http://mikebeauchamp.com

Mike -- I really enjoyed your 'Windsor night out' gallery! The cat fight
was great!! :)

Cheers

Gerry

Mike Beauchamp

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May 11, 2002, 7:43:10 AM5/11/02
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Why thanks alot for lookin' Gerry! :)

Mike
http://mikebeauchamp.com

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