Let's discuss iRacing

Just my opinion of course, but iRacing has the best sounds after Race Room. As far as engine sounds at least. I don't care for the tire 'scrubbing' sound but in real life in a race car you can't hear that anyways.

 

i think you probably know as much about physics as a former friend of mine who's been dead for 25 years

 

In general, the AC driving experience feels more authentic than Iracing to me, but one physics area where Iracing feels much better is kerbs. In AC if you touch a kerb you have to gingerly coast across it for fear of the oversteer spin, whereas in IR you can really attack the kerbs which looks much more like real life.

 

I believe F5 enables free cam that allows you to position the camera wherever you want around the car.

 

Yes, but you can't - correct me if I'm wrong - control the replay from any view other than the cockpit.

 

You mean as far as pausing, skipping ahead/back, etc.? Pretty sure you can do that from whatever view you want.

 

edit.. was probably wrong. thought ac would be the only sim without night/day but neither r3e or ams has it afaik.

 

i swear, the sound of tires scrubbing has to be the most beautiful sound my ears ever heard!!

 

For those who have been driving iRacing since a very long time, has the general handling on the limit improve much lately? Last time I drove was around 2014 I think and its what drove me away, and what AC did to suck me in. At that time the tyre model was obviously flawed (they were faster on the out lap and from that point the only got slower) and I got bored asking myself, 'what just happened?' or 'why did the back end stepped out in an uncontrollable manner there while it was perfectly fine the other 80 laps I drove?'.

I'm asking because the driving feel in AC is just so good that I dont want to drive anything else, but at the same time I really miss the competition aspect of iRacing.

 

@Mathieu Labbé

I'm an Iracing member since late 2013 and since then the tire model has improved much imo. The timeframe in which you can avoid snap oversteer respectively catch a slide has become bigger. I still prefer ACs car feeling but Iracing is on a good way.

 

If I want to start with iRacing.
How much will it cost me to be able to race with the Mazda to get me up to being able to race GT3s, and how much will it cost me if I want to race every week in GT3 with the different tracks? Lets say ~6 months racing. Im happy enough with 1 GT3. Maybe the Porsche Cup aswell.

 

I would say about 200€ to get from Mazda to GT3 racing in all tracks of IMSA or Blancpain Sprint / Endurance.

 

I was member for 5 years, i can tell just an approximate cost, guessing some things:

1- you just run Mazda cup and then gt3 without nothing other in the middle.
2- you just run 8/12 races (it's the amount to obtain 10$ iracing credist at the end of the campionship) but obviously in this case you can't compete for the champ.
3- you must stay focus on what you want buy, because there are several discounts if you buy 3 or more contents all together, or something similar.

This is the way to pay the less you can but only if you are able to gain the license for gt3 in just 1 season...

Mazda mx5 and some champ's track are included on the basic subscription, so for example you should buy 4 or more tracks for that champ (it's not always the same. On every season ther's some small change on track rotation).
If you are extreme lucky, all the mazda champ's tracks are used also on the gt3 champ, so, for this champ you need buy a gt3 car and some other track (let's say, at least 3 other tracks).

So, if i remember correctly, at the time 1 car's cost was 12$ and 1 track's cost was 12 or 15$ (it depends from the track):

+ 2 x "3 months" subscription = 66$
+ 1 x "any gt3 car" content = 12$
+ 8 x "track" content = 120$

- 1 x "championship partecipation request" = 10$
- some random discount = 10 / 20$ (?????)

So it's about almost 180$ to run an incomplete official gt3 championship, but believe to me that this scenario is very very optimistic, imho the total cost will arrive easily over 250$, even near 300$.
iRacing is a software to use for long long time. If you do this all the costs will be amortized by the time and you just will need to add 1 or 2 track season after season.
But if you think to enter on iR to run a complete championship (mx5 basic excluded) prepare youself to pay hard for the first weeks/months.

Now, take all this like an simple example, i'm no more active into iR so i don't know the actual prices and discounts.

 

Pretty sure that they don't pay participation credits anymore.

 

I'm pretty sure AMS has it. I don't think it has rain though.

 

Unlike other titles though, once you stop paying the "sub", you lose all access to the content, forums and your investment. Don't get me wrong, it's awesome for online racing provided you can spend the time to get the most out of it but, for me - iRacing is more like a vacation; I enjoy it and have great memories but, I can't afford to do that very often - neither in time nor monetary terms. For the most part, I'd rather have a nice car (AC) at home where I can drive it on any given day.

 

Completely agree, I'm trying to justify getting back to iRacing but I dont know if I'll be able to make the most out of my investment. Back when I had loads of time to spend in simracing, I would take 4-5 hours a week on one car/track combo to prepare for the big weekend races. Now I struggle ot find time to race 4-5 hours a week. It can quickly become a really expensive forum subscription

@fbiehne thanks for the heads up. Until the driving feel is up to par with AC I'll consider getting back but until then...

 

Yeah, that's another point.
It's sad to know that over 800€ in contents and many gb are right here in my hard disk, and i can't use neither offline just for some single lap.

But this is iracing.

 

That the thing I regretted the most after losing my membership. Forum Hardware and Classified sections were the best you can find. I don't think there is anything of similar scale and number of knowledgeable members. ISRTV was my other go to forum, but it's a ghost town for over a year now.