Driving is awful, why does everyone praise it?

[Shodan]

No, I'm not here to talk negatively about the game, in fact I think it's a pretty good game, other than some minor issues like optimization, mouse dead zone, constant camera centering on foot, weird camera position when driving and so on, but whatever.

However, driving in this game is simply awful and the reason why I'm posting this is not even driving itself, but the scary amount of pretentious idiots who go around saying "it's just realistic, learn to drive" which is really ironic.

I don't understand the "logic" where awful handling equals realism. No, not everything that is absurdly difficult is necessarily realistic, you know... That's a really stupid way of thinking which confirms that people who make such assumptions have never actually driven a car.

I actually drive outside of games, I have driven plenty of different cars and I have enough technical knowledge about cars, so I'll explain what makes driving in this game objectively awful:

1) Understeer - all cars, even sports cars suffer from this, at minimal speeds. Staying on the throttle or getting off it doesn't make a difference, trail braking doesn't make a difference, the only thing you can do is slow down until you've almost completely stopped. Speaking of which, stopping power is awful too.

2) Cars feel like boats - again, whether it's an old, generic SUV that would be considered a typical "grocery car" or a sports car that resembles a Porsche, it doesn't even matter, because all cars feel like boats, also at really low speeds. No car should do this at such speeds, especially not a sports car.

3) Skidding out of control at low speed and without rain - after I just started moving from a stop at a traffic light and immediately tried to make a turn in a junction before even properly accelerating, the car turned a little and then it just continued to slide forward for ages. Eventually, it crashed into pedestrians and then into a building. In real life, this could only happen if you were driving on (pure) fresh snow / ice and your wheels (summer tires, no 4WD) locked up.

Now, in GTA: SA (which I find to be a hilariously overrated game by the way), every car handles differently. You can instantly tell which car is FWD, which car is RWD, which car is a "grocery car", which car is a sports car and so on.

Trail braking actually works, getting off the throttle ahead of turns in both FWD and RWD cars actually makes a difference (in FWD cars it prevents understeer, in RWD cars it prevents oversteer) and cars generally understeer only at higher speeds which is how it should be. Some cars understeer a lot (old, bulky, front engine, FWD car) while others understeer only in extreme conditions (sporty, rear engine, RWD car).

Don't bring up GTA V because that's a whole different issue. Here, all cars feel like boats, but in GTA V all cars feel like sports cars (but it's still way too arcadey regardless).

[B Dawg]

Originally posted by unturorum:

1) Understeer - all cars, even sports cars suffer from this, at minimal speeds. Staying on the throttle or getting off it doesn't make a difference, trail braking doesn't make a difference, the only thing you can do is slow down until you've almost completely stopped. Speaking of which, stopping power is awful too.

3) Skidding out of control at low speed and without rain - after I just started moving from a stop at a traffic light and immediately tried to make a turn in a junction before even properly accelerating, the car turned a little and then it just continued to slide forward for ages. Eventually, it crashed into pedestrians and then into a building. In real life, this could only happen if you were driving on (pure) fresh snow / ice and your wheels (summer tires, no 4WD) locked up.

That's objectively false. Anyone who complains about cars being like on ice is full of sh!t. If anything, the cars are too damn stable, you have to intentionally want to slide to do so. The only thing you were right about is that differences between cars are more apparent in San Andreas.

So many people in the world who've never played any proper racing/driving games in their life apparently. Or they actually installed the Realistic Driving mod without even playing the game once beforehand, because that mod actually makes you slide all over the place unless you take it easy and take ages to brake.

[GODS_VISION_INITIALIZED]

who cares lmao

[peon]

In my opinion, this is how cars drove before electric power steering was adopted in the late 80's. Mid 90's which is the feel I get from this game, there were still plenty of these old cars with the slower/sluggish Hydraulic power steering systems.

The old cars, literally drove like boats lol. But man they were built sturdy and you could easily stick your hands in and get to what you needed. Cars today are built so dinky and they make it so hard for the average person to do anything. And people call it progress. Meh.

[FourMore]

Originally posted by unturorum:

Originally posted by CRAZED MERC:

it's fun, it's a videogame. That's why I like it

I don't find it fun to have cars that feel like boats and can barely turn at all unless you've almost completely stopped. It's not even realistic or challenging, in fact it's the complete opposite, not only of realistic, but challenging too. There isn't any challenge involved since it's awful no matter what you do.

Have you ever driven a real car? Use the break, if you want a sudden turn use the handbrake. Also play with a controller where you can control the amount of gas/break with the triggers.

[Shodan]

Originally posted by B Dawg:

Originally posted by unturorum:

1) Understeer - all cars, even sports cars suffer from this, at minimal speeds. Staying on the throttle or getting off it doesn't make a difference, trail braking doesn't make a difference, the only thing you can do is slow down until you've almost completely stopped. Speaking of which, stopping power is awful too.

3) Skidding out of control at low speed and without rain - after I just started moving from a stop at a traffic light and immediately tried to make a turn in a junction before even properly accelerating, the car turned a little and then it just continued to slide forward for ages. Eventually, it crashed into pedestrians and then into a building. In real life, this could only happen if you were driving on (pure) fresh snow / ice and your wheels (summer tires, no 4WD) locked up.

That's objectively false. Anyone who complains about cars being like on ice is full of sh!t. If anything, the cars are too damn stable, you have to intentionally want to slide to do so. The only thing you were right about is that differences between cars are more apparent in San Andreas.

So many people in the world who've never played any proper racing/driving games in their life apparently. Or they actually installed the Realistic Driving mod without even playing the game once beforehand, because that mod actually makes you slide all over the place unless you take it easy and take ages to brake.

I experienced that skid in-game just once with a pick up and there was no rain, pretty much just got moving and made a turn. It was just like 0:30 in this video with the same kind of car: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jcLEkjeCy4

I play DiRT Rally with a Logitech steering wheel and pedals and I drive actual cars.

Originally posted by peon:

In my opinion, this is how cars drove before electric power steering was adopted in the late 80's. Mid 90's which is the feel I get from this game, there were still plenty of these old cars with the slower/sluggish Hydraulic power steering systems.

The old cars, literally drove like boats lol. But man they were built sturdy and you could easily stick your hands in and get to what you needed. Cars today are built so dinky and they make it so hard for the average person to do anything. And people call it progress. Meh.

Power steering has no effect on a car's turning capability, it just makes it easier for the driver to turn the steering wheel faster and with less effort.

Originally posted by Fer':

Originally posted by unturorum:

I don't find it fun to have cars that feel like boats and can barely turn at all unless you've almost completely stopped. It's not even realistic or challenging, in fact it's the complete opposite, not only of realistic, but challenging too. There isn't any challenge involved since it's awful no matter what you do.

Have you ever driven a real car? Use the break, if you want a sudden turn use the handbrake. Also play with a controller where you can control the amount of gas/break with the triggers.

Yes, I have driven a real car and that's exactly why I made this. I've been on buses which not only turn better, but also have less body roll than the sports cars in this game. Just trucks have somewhat accurate handling.

[B Dawg]

Originally posted by unturorum:

I experienced that skid in-game just once with a pick up and there was no rain, pretty much just got moving and made a turn. It was just like 0:30 in this video with the same kind of car: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jcLEkjeCy4

Your game is broken then. Normally I'd blame anything weird on high FPS but I don't recall any cases of it completely breaking cars like that so I don't know, a mod?

[Shodan]

Originally posted by B Dawg:

Originally posted by unturorum:

I experienced that skid in-game just once with a pick up and there was no rain, pretty much just got moving and made a turn. It was just like 0:30 in this video with the same kind of car: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jcLEkjeCy4

Your game is broken then. Normally I'd blame anything weird on high FPS but I don't recall any cases of it completely breaking cars like that so I don't know, a mod?

It happened only once and with a pick up, I was just holding D and it happened halfway into the turn. This game doesn't have physics tied to the FPS like 3, VC and SA. Never used any kind of mods for any game. Not sure what exactly went wrong there.

[B Dawg]

Originally posted by unturorum:

This game doesn't have physics tied to the FPS like 3, VC and SA.

Drive Motorcycles above 60 FPS then :)

[naii.neocities.org]

Different cars control differently. The junkers you find in the lower class parts of Liberty City will control badly, while the more modern vehicles in the richer parts of the city control better. It's common sense...

What's REALLY bad is GTA V where most vehicles are homogeneous and there's very little to differentiate a supercar from a SUV aside from speed.