Small change request to opponent position arrows

Hello all, I wanted to get your comments on a small change to the opponent on screen position arrows within AC. This is already in the game, and afaik can't be turned off, but my idea, albeit simple, would benefit all racers.

And YES, (as an Oculus VR user) I know about and always use Helicorsa. I do think every driver in AC should install it, but you and I know this is usually not the case. And consoles aren't able to use this option either.



As seen above, we have those tiny red arrows that rotate on the screen depending on the relative position of opposing cars to ours.

These are somewhat useful, but the problem lies in the limited information they provide. Yes, you know you have a car close to you, but how close? Sim racing with the limited peripheral vision and in more extreme cases with proper FOV, makes it very difficult to gauge the distance to other cars when they are not on screen, and even worse in your blind spot.

Many of us with online racing experience are able to give enough room or move away from the main racing line to avoid contacts, but this only goes so far if the other driver is inexperienced or doesn't understand the information provided by the arrows.



My suggestion would be to turn those arrows into something dynamic what would change color and/or increase their size the closer we are to other vehicles.

This is information already available, because otherwise we wouldn't have Helicorsa. Another more complex option would be to consider Size of the arrow based on distance and color based on risk of contact.

Of course this is not going to magically make AC the perfect simulator where nobody crashes, but if things like Helicorsa and Minorating have done spectacular things to the overall quality of the racing experience in AC, image what could this simple core change do to our enjoyment of online and offline races.

 

I like this, because sometimes I have trouble to know of the car besides or right behind me in a straight or during a corner. Is hard for single monitor and low-medium fov to realize how close I am to the other car.
For me this would help with judging better the turn-ins at corners with cars nearby or when going two or three wide. I've seen corners where opponents turn into each other at a corner because they judged wrongly where everyone was. A constant red arrow only tells you where they are around you, but not how far or how close. Dynamic colors for the arrows would be ideal. Personally I don't like to race with helicorsa because it confuses me more, is simpler to follow the built-in indicators in the game, but with dynamic colors to tell you how safe you are to opponent cars would be highly appreciated for multiplayer and AI racing.

 

Maybe related, but I just discovered yesterday that you can adjust the field of view of the f11 mirror using Content Manager. I put it to around 40 degrees and now I can see better the relative position of a car behind me.

 

Quite nice ideas. But the arrows actually can be turned off on PC. Assettocorsa/system/cfg/proximity_indicator.ini

 

Firstly as above you can turn them off.

Secondly and what I find a bit strange is why would you want to use them in the first place with an HMD? After all if you want to know where opponents are you just turn your head Maybe as you didn't know you can turn them off you then thought up your nice idea, but there really is no need for these arrows in VR at all.

 

Thanks for clarifying the red arrows are actually something you can disable. Not sure if it is an option for console drivers tho.

I was going to write it, but I thought my post was somewhat clear. I DO NOT want the arrows for VR. I know they are not available for HMD. But even with the Oculus, I still use Helicorsa for safer racing due to the lack of a virtual rear view mirror.

Yet, I have several friends who are unable to afford VR for their sim racing, which is why this change helps them directly; And if this makes other drivers around me be more careful it would benefit me indirectly.

 

Yeah that's cool thought you were getting at that
I don't know what helicorsa is but for me any visual aids in VR is not for me at all, I find the experience of being in the car as intended to be all I need