Force feedback is rubbish?

Okay, been out of the auto sim picture for quite a while, although I
used to be really into it - bought one of the first Thrustmaster wheels,
and played Microprose GP and Indycar a lot. I got out of it just as
force feedback wheels started to appear.

Recently I decided to buy a force feedback wheel as I was expecting the
technology to have matured to the point that it would be a great
experience. Checked the reviews and based on these, I got the Logitech
momo force wheel.

I have since tried it in a few games, and it is absolutely rubbish! I
can't believe that people really think that force feedback is good, or
is it just that my wheel is defective? Problems include:

* When turning the wheel, it is notchy rather than smooth. I have never
turned a wheel on a real car that feels like this.

* The amount of force required to turn the wheel is the same or close to
the same irrespective of wheel position, ie, the load to turn it a
degree from dead centre is the same as the load to turn it from 90 to 91
degrees. How stupid is this. Anyone who has driven a race car will tell
you that much more force is required when the wheel is at a high degree
of lock as the tyres are exerting much more sideways force. This feel is
critical to tell you what the car is doing.

* Amazingly, force is required to actually turn the wheel, but very
little force is required to keep it in a given position. This is again
completely unrealistic. When driving a car, the load derives from the
angle of the wheel - not changing the angle of the wheel.

Again, I can't believe that people might think that this type of force
feedback is at all realistic. Do people who are knowledgable about real
car dynamics use the current force feedback wheels, or do they think
they are a joke and just use a non-force feedback wheel?

Mark...

The notchiness is something that should go away once the wheel is broken
in. I've never felt any notchiness with my red Momo, though. Maybe the
black one is different?

As for your less than stellar FF experience, my hunch is that your
settings need tweaking. It took me a lot of hunting around on the
newsgroups and message boards before I found helpful settings from other
racers for the sims I was playing, mainly N2003 at the time. I can tell
you that the right wheel settings can make all the difference as to
whether the FF feels realistic or not, and whether you can sense what
the car is doing well enough to achieve optimum lap times.

Do you have the Logitech Wingman software installed and running? Have
you got the latest version of it from www.wingmanteam.com?

For N2003, I found that the best settings for me were to have the
Overall Effects Strength set to 125% and everything else set to 0%
(Spring Effect, Damper Effect, Centering Spring) and also having the
"Enable Centering Spring..." checked (yes, even though it's value is set
to 0).

Those same settings seem to be working out very nicely in rfactor with
one caveat, and this is really important because most sims built around
the ISI engine will require the same change - you need to REVERSE the
force setting in the game in order for Logitech wheels to properly sense
the forces. In the rfactor demo, this is a change that needs to be made
in an INI file (changing a number to a negative value). In other sims,
like EA NASCAR Sim Racing, there should be a setting somewhere in the
game to reverse the forces. If your wheel is feeling dead on center and
completely wrong when you are steering it, chances are that the force
setting needs to be reversed.

Just that one setting change in rfactor turned the sim into one that I
thought had missed the boat on FF into one of the finest force feedback
experiences I have had.

Hope you get it dialed in to where you like it.

Steve G


Mark wrote:

> Okay, been out of the auto sim picture for quite a while, although I
> used to be really into it - bought one of the first Thrustmaster
> wheels, and played Microprose GP and Indycar a lot. I got out of it
> just as force feedback wheels started to appear.
>
> Recently I decided to buy a force feedback wheel as I was expecting
> the technology to have matured to the point that it would be a great
> experience. Checked the reviews and based on these, I got the Logitech
> momo force wheel.
>
> I have since tried it in a few games, and it is absolutely rubbish! I
> can't believe that people really think that force feedback is good, or
> is it just that my wheel is defective? Problems include:
>
> * When turning the wheel, it is notchy rather than smooth. I have
> never turned a wheel on a real car that feels like this.
>
> * The amount of force required to turn the wheel is the same or close
> to the same irrespective of wheel position, ie, the load to turn it a
> degree from dead centre is the same as the load to turn it from 90 to
> 91 degrees. How stupid is this. Anyone who has driven a race car will
> tell you that much more force is required when the wheel is at a high
> degree of lock as the tyres are exerting much more sideways force.
> This feel is critical to tell you what the car is doing.
>
> * Amazingly, force is required to actually turn the wheel, but very
> little force is required to keep it in a given position. This is again
> completely unrealistic. When driving a car, the load derives from the
> angle of the wheel - not changing the angle of the wheel.
>
> Again, I can't believe that people might think that this type of force
> feedback is at all realistic. Do people who are knowledgable about
> real car dynamics use the current force feedback wheels, or do they
> think they are a joke and just use a non-force feedback wheel?

Steve G > wrote in :

> Mark...
>
> The notchiness is something that should go away once the wheel is broken
> in. I've never felt any notchiness with my red Momo, though. Maybe the
> black one is different?

Your Red Momo has a cable, the Black has gears. But beleive it or not,
often the notchiness is caused by the FF in game and each track.
Especially the Nr2k3 tracks. I generaly put the FF slider in game at
around 45 to 50% for Papy and -negative 90ish for ISI. Each track can be
different. Some are smooth at 49 others need reducing. Is this a 'real'
experience? No. But the various 3rd party tracks and even Papyrus
originals are not all built to the same degree of detail

There are hundreds of threads on setting up wheels for use with ISI
products. Google groups ras.

50% on all ingame axis. Then adjust to suit. Turn off Speed Sensitivity.
Adjust the straight line wandering with your steering lock setting in the
setups. Have fun, good luck. But remember, many old hand have never used
FF and do quite well, some even use gamepads and keyboards. Whatever works

dave henrie
..
>
>

"Mark" > wrote in message
...
> Okay, been out of the auto sim picture for quite a while, although I used
> to be really into it - bought one of the first Thrustmaster wheels, and
> played Microprose GP and Indycar a lot. I got out of it just as force
> feedback wheels started to appear.
>
> Recently I decided to buy a force feedback wheel as I was expecting the
> technology to have matured to the point that it would be a great
> experience. Checked the reviews and based on these, I got the Logitech
> momo force wheel.
>
> I have since tried it in a few games, and it is absolutely rubbish! I
> can't believe that people really think that force feedback is good, or is
> it just that my wheel is defective? Problems include:
>
> * When turning the wheel, it is notchy rather than smooth. I have never
> turned a wheel on a real car that feels like this.
>
> * The amount of force required to turn the wheel is the same or close to
> the same irrespective of wheel position, ie, the load to turn it a degree
> from dead centre is the same as the load to turn it from 90 to 91 degrees.
> How stupid is this. Anyone who has driven a race car will tell you that
> much more force is required when the wheel is at a high degree of lock as
> the tyres are exerting much more sideways force. This feel is critical to
> tell you what the car is doing.
>
> * Amazingly, force is required to actually turn the wheel, but very little
> force is required to keep it in a given position. This is again completely
> unrealistic. When driving a car, the load derives from the angle of the
> wheel - not changing the angle of the wheel.
>
> Again, I can't believe that people might think that this type of force
> feedback is at all realistic. Do people who are knowledgable about real
> car dynamics use the current force feedback wheels, or do they think they
> are a joke and just use a non-force feedback
wheel?


I have the same wheel. its notchy to begin with. as others have said, it
goes away and gets really smooth and feels good after its broken in.

and like the others, google or ask this mob the right settings for each
game. most new people to ff are slower to begin with, and it feels
strange. stick with it. you'll get used to what the wheel is telling you.

cheers

steve

Try GTR with minimal special effects, it's a lot better
at force feedback than most sims. Force feedback increases
with cornering forces until you reach or exceed the limits,
and then the feedback is reduced, letting you know you've
reached the limits and somewhat realistic.

"Dave Henrie" wrote...
>> The notchiness is something that should go away once the wheel
>> is broken in. I've never felt any notchiness with my red Momo,
>> though. Maybe the black one is different?
>
> Your Red Momo has a cable, the Black has gears.

Red Momo has gears too, LWFF (red wheelrim) had a cable driven system.

Notchiness with Papyrus sims and Logitech FF wheels is largely due to the
latency setting (should be about 30ms for smooth operation) and, as Steve
pointed out, one should have the centering spring "on" but at 0% to avoid
drop-outs when turning it from side to side quickly (caveat: will dull the
FF sensation a little in GPL).

Also, 50% strenght in NR2003 is the "standard" setting, what 100% used to be
in N4 and 255 in GPL.

Jan.
=---

"Jan Verschueren" wrote...
> <snip>

Forgot to mention: nearly all fast setups for NR2003 one finds on the web
are for non-FF wheels and feature "evil" caster (full positive left, full
negative on the right), which loads up the steering in all the wrong ways
for a FF user.

Jan.
=---

I agree. FF is rubbish.

The very first wheel/pedal arrangement I ever bought was the Thrustmaster
unit...used it for GP2, ICR2, GPL etc.
No force-feedback on that arrangement.
Then "upgraded" Aussie-built, non-FF unit (Advantage 1) which gave sterling
service for a couple of years.
(At odd times I would still revert to my Gravis Pro joystick....particularly
with GPL as I found it much "quicker" to use.)

Then I tried an MS FF unit and hated it.
No matter how I tweaked it I just could not accept that this was meant to
replicate real life. I saw no advantage in using it.
So I gave it to my son and since then I've gone back to the good old Gravis
joystick, which pretends to be nothing other than a very reliable joystick.

FF leaves me cold, I'm afraid.

BK

"Mark" > wrote in message
...

In Live For Speed S1, just enabling force feedback gave
a player the equivalent of a stability assist, which helped
quite due to the poorly implmented and unstable tire and
differential physics that made cars like the LX6 so unstable.

There wasn't any real feel to the force feedback in LFS S1,
but the stability assist effect kept cars like the LX6
facing forwards more often.

On Tue, 30 Aug 2005 12:34:36 +1000, "Bruce Kennewell"
> wrote:

>I agree. FF is rubbish.
>
>The very first wheel/pedal arrangement I ever bought was the Thrustmaster
>unit...used it for GP2, ICR2, GPL etc.
>No force-feedback on that arrangement.
>Then "upgraded" Aussie-built, non-FF unit (Advantage 1) which gave sterling
>service for a couple of years.
>(At odd times I would still revert to my Gravis Pro joystick....particularly
>with GPL as I found it much "quicker" to use.)
>
>Then I tried an MS FF unit and hated it.
>No matter how I tweaked it I just could not accept that this was meant to
>replicate real life. I saw no advantage in using it.
>So I gave it to my son and since then I've gone back to the good old Gravis
>joystick, which pretends to be nothing other than a very reliable joystick.
>
>FF leaves me cold, I'm afraid.
>
>BK
>

Same planet different worlds. A cable came loose the other night
and I lost FF on my Red Momo. Kept wandering all over the track;
FF kind of "locks" me in (any attempts on a straight to wander left
or right cause the FF to kick in, so much so I can go down something
like the Mulsanne straight on Le Mans 67 (for NR2003) blind and
stay on the track.

And I have found it invaluable for feeling bumps and making small
opposite-lock adjustments to keep the car on course. I can't
imagine driving without it really.