How not to lose interest in Simracing?

Here's my tale, I'm a simracer ever since I bought an used G27 and AC at the end of 2014, but instead of playing constantly, I play for a month or two, then lose interest for two or three. Maybe it's because I feel like I'm not improving, maybe because I don't feel like the cars are as nice to drive, I'm not sure. What tips could you guys give that help you mantain your interest in simracing?

 

Multiplayer.

 

Join a league run by an administrator who likes to mix things up and keeps coming up with different ideas to keep it fresh.

Racing against humans, especially those that you come to know, is what sim racing is all about. Hotlapping and AI races don't come close to trying to outsmart and beat a human.

 

Mix up everything: cars you drive, tracks you try to improve on, improve some hardware on your rig, drive fun-race on public, drive league racing, drive MR rated public, get a friend to get into sim, watch pro driving tutorial videos, try to improve on something specific, try heel-toe if you can't, etc.
Keep mixing things up rather than joining the same server again and again with your "favorite"combo, which can really kill motivation, for me at least.

 

join whc

 

Ups and downs, and it comes and it goes, its all in waves. Its natural. Why forcing yourself wantign to enjoy somethign that you have lost interest in, whether it be temporarily, or forever? BTW, we all become older, our personalities chnage, our tastes and preferences. Nothing stays forever the same.

Except Dr. House.

 

I think it depends on what aspects of the hobby / sport you enjoy the most. If it's a social thing, then joining a league or other competitions might keep you involved.

Personally, Sim-Racing used to be a portion of my game-play with FPS, strategy, tactical and flight-sims filling in the gaps. What changed the priority for me, was getting better hardware; once I received my Direct-drive wheel, Sim-Racing became my first gaming priority - by far. Adding tactile, better pedals and VR also help to keep me very involved and interested while studying Race-craft adds incentive to put the knowledge gained into practice.

I think there comes a point where one thing feeds the other, better hardware can equal increased interest / increased interest creates incentive to save and get other hardware which - in turn, creates even more interest in Sim-racing. Sim-Racing for me, now has become a much deeper and intense experience and I realize that it's one that has many aspects to it; learning, practicing, planning upgrades, building & modifying hardware and evolving the entire system are all things that I enjoy along the way. Even the interaction in these very forums is in part, responsible for feeding energy into my continued enthusiasm. One key motivating factor for me is "immersion"; it's somewhat elusive but, also addictive, so I always want more.

Sim-Racing often serves as my personal reward after a long day's work and it also helps me "shift gears" and get my brain out of business mode so I can fall fast asleep as I imagine future racing scenarios or rig upgrades. It's really my way to begin my slumber with "Sweet Dreams".

 

Once everyone has tired and left I'll finally become an Alien

 

I love cars too much to lose interest that long..

 

* 100% join a league
* Take up the challenge of getting all the possible achievements
* Buy VR

If those things don’t do it nothing will And maybe your passions lie elsewhere

 

Its ok to get burnt out of a genre, I generally just switch around, theres months where im coming close to smashing 100 hours into AC and months when I might not race or drive at all. General thing I stick by is just dont force it, if you are in the mood for racing then thats great but if you want to sit back and relax and play some casual games like pacman then thats great. if you are determined to stick with sim racing though 100% join a league, it places a goal in your head, you want to practise for the races, you have a reason to improve and you know your place, after a few races you can find a rival and try to capitalize on their weaknesses and understand their strengths and styles and maybe get some setup advice on the way

 

Stand by the river long enough, and the body of your enemy will float by.

Back on topic.

Some good advice here.

I'll just repeat some of it and say set yourself some new challenges, learn to drift, handbrake turn, heel and toe (as suggested earlier), learn to drive the old vintage cars, learn new tracks, improve what you know by reading or watching tutorial videos etc, learn more about car setups, learn racecraft by driving competitively online, maybe even learn to model in 3D or make liveries for cars.

If you can already do all of that really well, maybe consider a career in real-life motor racing

 

If simracing is not in your blood no matter what you do you will end up loosing interest unless there is a new release of some sort. The need for speed, you can have it or you can just find it fun.

 

What I get into is learning a track inside and out then trying out my favorite (and not so favorite) cars on that track to get a better understanding of the handling differences. I spend some time drifting and sliding the car around, although most of my focus is on car handling, control. I reduce the track grip, swap out the slicks (when possible) for street tyres then challenge myself to drive the fast lap possible with less grip.

 

Why is it so important to you, sell your wheel and move on to something else. Their is more to life, particularly if you are 22, than SIM racing!
My issue with SIM racing is that every once in a while I realize that I spend way to much time SIM driving, promise myself I will not drive the following day, but I drive anyway, would you have an advice for me on how to find it boring?

 

1) Buy new Sim racing gear.
2) Multiplayer.
3) Practice with sim like this



Then use in real life.

 

Thing is, you cannot force any kind of interest in a thing, nor can you control it. If you don't feel like Simracing for some time, do whatever else you feel like in that time.

If you do feel like racing, but are bored with it, you could always switch it up, try a car/track you haven't tried before or you think wouldn't interest you, or try to learn a new skill. If you have the money for it a new sim or new gear could help.

 

I am starting to sound like a broken record, I know.. but if you are not doing this already, try a more realistic FOV. I paste what I wrote in another thread:

"..a lower FOV distorts the road in front of you much less so what you see is closer to what you see in your real car. Basically you can evaluate distances much better, that means less late braking, less understeer, better reaction to elevation changes, less overdriving the car. You can get the same result using VR, as VR uses the optimal FOV. I used this website for the calculation. http://www.projectimmersion.com/fov/index.php I got 23, but set it to 30 to see a bit more on the sides. If the cockpit becomes so big you cannot see it, just adjust the seat position so the cockpit is a bit smaller and you can see the gauges. The important thing is that the road in front of you has the right dimensions. I use an app called Helicorsa for better awareness of cars on the sides and behind. In any case, give it some time and your brain will get used to it. After that for me it was a big improvement, and even more important, driving in AC has become more enjoyable. "

Other than that, AC has lots of variety, and it is a good driving sim other than racing sim. I find myself alternating between racing in multiplayer (have you tried SRS?) and driving on road tracks. When I don't feel like racing I just put on some music (lately the Toto greatest hits ) and enjoy driving some road car on Transfagarasan, Pacific Coast or Lake Louise on some server. Turn off traction control and drive fast staying in your lane like in real life. I recently discovered how much fun is the McLaren MP4-12C with TC turned off, and I am a long time fan of the Shelby Cobra. I can never get tired of these.

 

Three things will make or break any sim racing--or for that matter, any gaming--experience:

1) Friends
2) Hardware
3) Mental creativity

Not necessarily in that order!

It obviously helps to have friends, either personal or casual, who give a **** about racing too...they are no different than a racing team that surrounds the driver, providing a family, support, mechanical assistance, motivation, etc. Without them...Marc Basseng wouldn't be driving, so how will you? Turning to us was the right thing to do

Hardware...makes a BIG difference. Having penned over 5000 messages and posts, created over 200 personal and public mods, and driven more than 2300 hours in Assetto Corsa...I used to think I knew how much I loved and understood the game with my little Thrustmaster F430 wheel...until I started to climb the ladder of superior sim racing components. Though hardware like better wheels, gear, and computers doesn't make sim racing perfect, they do help, especially peripherals. These better transmit the game's coded physical data from the physics engine to your hands (always a good thing!), and increase the forces to levels similar to what real drivers experience. Now with the proliferation of DirectDrive wheels on the market (the latest due from Fanatec the end of this year), game wheels are at 100% of the forces real performance cars put out...and believe me, coming from a cheap Thrustmaster wheel to a Fanatec ClubSport 2.0, I thought I knew everything about Assetto Corsa...wrong! I was missing so much of the experience simply because my peripherals weren't delivering all the game could do/was doing. If I'm honest...nothing short of a Fanatec ClubSport base will get you anywhere close to experiencing what the real drivers feel. Watching Marc Basseng drive around Nords, I can see little things...all kinds of little reactions and inputs he makes based off what the car is going--reactions the better wheels will demand of you. In short, this is part of the fun you miss when you don't have superior hardware, so I suggest saving for a better wheel long-term. Trust me, it took me 3 years to save for one...a LOT of dreaming in that time...but it was worth it!

Mental creativity is HUGE (lets see who gets my pun ). If you're not feeling it, then no computer, wheel, or friend is going to entice you to drive. Basically...you have to want to race, you have to enjoy pushing a car around a track lap after lap of boring scenery passing you by. Don't get enjoyment out of that? Then the first step is finding out what's so fun about that in the first place. Reignite the passion. Watch real drivers. I race mainly to emulate the times and reactions of drivers I know or have seen in action. I want their skills to be mine. I want to react to things the way they do. This interest pushes me to sim race. I can hardly watch a Race-media.tv video without wanting to quit work and go drive, even with a broken pedal set like I have now...the passion, find it!

Oh, you cruel man you

And I never get tired of seeing it!

 

Build a motion sim and of course multiplayer. That's what I did, to me AC is more than turning a wheel in front of a display.