RIDE videogame

[Mac]

Their latest titles look alot better but everything else has turned into pure arcade for money making.

Remember that hardcore simmers are only a small amount of bike videogames, even if we look like a well grown community, and Milestone have to pay bills and taxes so it's all about marketing.

I'm not complaining Milestone (I loved SBK2001 though), I simply have no interest in this game.

[cdx]

I am working on a few ideas and would love some input for them.

Hi DD,

I hope your meeting with NEA went well. A few thoughts on your post, since you're asking for comments.

On the peripheral:

"real bike controller that all can afford as it is sold in modules" - modularity is not very good in my opinion. If I want to buy a peripheral that's what I want to buy - not a part of a peripheral. For car racing, I wound't buy a wheel, then pedals, then shifter, either all or nothing. So the whole set needs to be priced sensibly. Options only complicate design and add costs. Better have a full unit that costs 300 than a modular that is 2 pieces, 200 a piece. That would only lose customers. The market is small anyway, don't make it smaller by increasing total price.

The size of your controller would be attractive to very few people from what I saw in the other thread. If you make an entry level portable controller that bolts on the desk edge so you can play from your chair (maybe with pedals) you'd reach a lot more people. If you offer both, your range would cover the whole market rather only the "I have a spare room for gaming" market. Having only the large one isn't a bad thing but sales of the small one may keep you afloat if you're moving only a few units a month of the big one.

On my "perfect riding sim" (GP Bikes physics, Project Cars graphics):
Motorcycle games have small audience, so investment has to be small. The only way to get amazing graphics (licences, engine development, world detail, IR scanned tracks, 100+ bikes with individual physics, sounds, etc.) is for a large car sim studio to cash in on bikes a la Tourist Trophy. So I agree about Slightly Mad Studios, it's a great idea to go speak with them. They seem to have the right approach with distributed development and WMD. Other options would be Kunos Simulazioni with their netBike history and open development and Polyphony Digital but PD is PS4 only. Any other big developer can also do that but they would probably make a more casual arcadeish game rather than a sim.

Of course, I'd love to see PiBoSo making that "perfect" game, but it isn't doable by a small team. Maybe one day, if he decides to go all business/marketing ninja and ramps up with a hundred more developers.

As for open world... currently that's a bad idea. Expenses are huge, target audience needs to be as big as possible, so it will be more arcade than sim. Also, bigger world means lower spend per square mile and lower detail/quality for the same investment. Until procedural generation gets good enough to build open worlds cheaply I'd rather go for tracks.

One other thing... if I happen to like Ride as well as GP Bikes, calling me an idiot wouldn't particularly help with convincing me to buy your peripheral Another point to consider - when you start selling the controllers Milestone would be your partner. Arcade their games may be, but some people will have fun playing their games with a good controller, including developers from the studio. Endorsement of your controller from them would go a long way.

[doubledragoncc]

Hi cdx.

Thanx for the post, it went okay so should be starting beginning of next year.

Thought I would answer a few questions with some pics. 

1 Modular System. When I say modular, I mean a basic system but you can add the fancy things too later. OR if you want to build your own system but dont know how to do the mechanical to electrical side of it, you could. You have to understand one point, this is a HANDLEBAR system, not a wheel, there is so much more to the physical side of the design. 300 wont get you much by the way. Wont get into it here as its off topic.

Heres a few pics of what types l build

















So thats the basic idea as you suggested, different strokes for different folks lol.  These are my old designs, the new "HS1 Fullthrottle" systems with make them look like a trabbi next a Lambo l hope lol.

cdx l would never call you an idiot mate just cause you got The Ride lol. I will have to get it myself as I have to test my systems with every game because the coding needs small patch files to make them "SEE" a real control as if it was an XBOX360 or whatever controller. I depend on Milestones products too in many ways. I am working on a system that will work on consoles too, if l want to survive it has to be done.

Back to the post....SORRY......

The TT a dream for us all, but its only one track, to sell a product once is okay but to keep selling you have to have quantity of content too. Imagine GPB without track and bike MODS, its a great sim but the standard content alone would not sell well on its own, Piboso has done it the right way by letting MODS in the sim so he can concentrate on the basics and important writing of the program and let the community make the icing on the cake. Thank you Piboso.

My example about open world is that it is the upcoming norm in racing games and l think its great. Racing is great on a track too but put the two together and oh what fun and mayhem could we have. Its the only way you could reach both sides of the bridge so that you could ride seriously on and off the track or just ride with some mates along the coast of the med or where ever in the world you want to be. Massive yes, but look at GPB, how long has it been going, are any of us really worried about when it will be finished, not really because we actually like waiting for whats around the corner, like is the wrong word but l am sure you know what I mean. And how many GB of space do l need for all the MODS? 20GB, 40GB and more by the time we all get old lol. Its 17GB NOW with only a few bikes!!! If you started off with a map with say a motoGP series amount of tracks, but left it to only certain ways to get from one to the other to start with, but let it be known it had been written to be an open world that could be added to each month or whatever, it would sell and stay interesting as it grew. Use a good graphics engine and Piboso physics and we are all happy campers, who cares if it takes years. Ive been camping with Piboso for years already lol.

I wish l could write programs but l got enough on me plate with this stuff. I hope to meet up with the MAD crew before Christmas but there are not enough hours in the day at the moment. Keep ideas coming in, who know something may become of them.

Keep it sunny side up

DD

[cdx]

DD, Congrats on the successful meeting!

The controller looks great! If I were you I'd probably be wary of showing too many pictures, lest cheap Chinese knock-offs reach market before the original product!

My comments about the modularity and different sizes were based only on the video I saw, which showed the setup on the sixth picture. But you've already covered it all, nice. The wheel/pedals was just a car example, I meant that at least handlebars + leg controls should go together, not separately. 300/(200+200) were meant to show cost ratio, it's not meant to be pounds or dollars. The system looks great and now modularity certainly makes sense.

However, if 300 pounds wouldn't get me much (at least handlebars and leg controls)... you're talking even smaller market than I thought. An ok actual motorcycle can be had for triple that.

By Tourist Trophy I meant the game for PS2 - Polyphony Digital took engine, tracks, etc. from Gran Turismo 4, added bikes and custom physics and cashed in on bikes. Great game, cheaply done compared to starting from scratch. Exactly what Slightly Mad could do if they make a bike sim.

High quality open world... I think it's only doable by a big car sim studio. Millions of players, hundreds to thousands of modders. Build a world for racing cars, fork off a bike sim or just add bikes to the car sim and you're done. Building a world from scratch only for bikes... the market isn't there to support that. A few thousand players and a hundred modders with full-time jobs? The man-hours just wouldn't be enough. It would take years to build something like TDU2 and by the time there's any quantity of roads/tracks the quality would be obsolete. PiBoSo and the community are doing amazing things with GP Bikes but this isn't scalable enough for a high quality open world.

By the way, I read in an Italian article about Ride that they would have the Isle of Man track.  At least if google translate is right. No quote or anything officially confirmed but it makes sense. They will release the game around the time of IOM TT ("spring 2015") to catch the big TT hype and they make a point of a very "special" track.

[doubledragoncc]

Hi cdx

Got your PM by the way.

It will be interesting to see as time goes by and a few tubes and more info on the Ride come out. Its a shame the one video from Italy the guy just rode one bike on the same track all the time, but thats Milestones quality thinking lol. I have most bike games for PC as I have to test them and the OLD SBK was okay as a game but the biggest downfall of most bike games is the fact that they wont even allow you to setup the controller unless its an XBOX360 pad, and we live in a modern world. I hope that they allow all types of controllers for the Ride as they said they would for MotoGP13 and never did. I even have the ISR show where Milestone told Darin Ganji that it would support wheel systems too and it dont!!!

Maybe the Ride will be a surprise, guess we wait and see.

Im a wee bit scared of going to SlightlyMad but it has to be done, you never know until you try. I am pretty good when it comes to putting ideas into peoples heads lol.

I have to agree that it would be best if someone who make car sims added bikes to a good one, THE CREW looks pretty well set up for that, what you think guys, THE CREW ON BIKES??? I just like the chance to not be bound by barriers and walls like in TDU2. Biggest minus for the bikes in TDU was no clutch to use!!! Will The Ride have a working clutch??? Gotta say its one of the best bits about real controls, blipping the throttle, grabbing a handfull and dumping the clutch!!!

Once again Id like to say sorry for hijacking the thread earlier I just wanted to answer a few questions about controllers and why most bike games lack good control over the bike. Thanks to all for being patient with me.

Keep it sunny side up

DD

[BOBR6 84]

If the iom TT Circuit in RIDE videogame turns out to be a good version, is it possible to ''borrow'' the track for GPB's?

[HornetMaX]

High quality open world... I think it's only doable by a big car sim studio. Millions of players, hundreds to thousands of modders. Build a world for racing cars, fork off a bike sim or just add bikes to the car sim and you're done. Building a world from scratch only for bikes... the market isn't there to support that. A few thousand players and a hundred modders with full-time jobs? The man-hours just wouldn't be enough. It would take years to build something like TDU2 and by the time there's any quantity of roads/tracks the quality would be obsolete. PiBoSo and the community are doing amazing things with GP Bikes but this isn't scalable enough for a high quality open world.

Personally, I prefer 20 good tracks than 10,000 average ones. So I don't care a lot about what you call "scalability" of the thing.
Along the same lines, I prefer a limited number of excellent modders than legions of average ones.

IMO, what is missing is not more modders, but more modders cooperation (sharing the work on creating a new bike or track).

MaX.

[doubledragoncc]

Hi Max

Yes modders cooperation (sharing the work on creating a new bike or track) is important. Everyone says "Isle of Man" and some out there are trying to do it, but the quality of the track is bad due to its size, these guys are doing a great job making the track, but it takes so much work to get it right, they have little time for the graphics, so the track looks like a game from a commadore64 (which I use to work on lol) and IMO it means that there is no visual pleasure on the track. In order to feel like your riding a bike down the road your brain wants to see it. I dont use the tracks like this as it makes me feel like lm in a GAME, no fun for me at all. Its not the modders fault, he is working hard but he needs some help from others to do the graphics. This is an example so please to the modders of the TT track, your work is great, but as Max said you could do with help to get it done. I hope I have worded this in a way that makes that point clear.

More cooperative modding is needed to help ease the workloadon modders.

My hat off to each and everyone of you modders. THANK YOU

DD

[Harrytmj66]

That looks an amazing set up Double Dragon. Thanks for sharing your work

[Hawk]

I have to agree with Harry above. Your work there looks amazing DD... Very nice indeed!

Just two questions:

• Are the foot rests on the full setup going to be adjustable for different leg lengths?
• Any rough idea of the sort of price ranges you are maybe thinking about, for the full setup and the separate modules?

Great work mate... Keep it up!

Hawk.

[doubledragoncc]

I dont want to hijack the post guys so I would rather we keep it in topic with davidboda46 if its okay with him as it is to do with all who are interested in real controls. Heres his link.

http://forum.piboso.com/index.php?topic=1544.0

But to quickly answer the questions:

Footrests on their own stand adjust for hieght. The seat on the sit-on systems adjusts for hieght, so it also adjusts for leg length yes.

I am just setting up from being in the USA for 18 years so have to calculete for UK prices of materials and components. I also have to totally re-price because the new systems the "HS1 Fullthrottle" impliments 3D printing and I am looking at using Nylon for strength but its too new to be able to get precise pricing on yet. It will take some testing first.

Sorry to the thread again, dont shoot me lol

Keep it sunny side up

DD

[BOBR6 84]

How far away are these designs from having some sort of hydraulic movement? Is that in your plans anywhere? I like what you made already though!!

Can you get cheap fireblade fairings?

[doubledragoncc]

Hi BOBR

Cant help with the fairings as just got back in UK so dont really know where to look. I got all mine new from Sharkskins but I know Tucker Rocky in USA does cheap new kits check them out.

I have been planning on hydaulics from the begining but its expensive. Now with 3D printing in the works I have a few ideas to play with. The new Nylon printing material allows a lot of new and stronger type of design.

[h106frp]

Love the graphics, but... it looks like it might be suffering from the same 'riding on rails' problem that seems to plaque bike games developed for car sim engines

[doubledragoncc]

The ride looks typical Milestone BS. NO reality to it at all and they concentrate on stupid customizing parts to distract you from the fact its a GAME and no real physics in it. I will only get it to test my systems work with it but otherwise I would not let you buy it for me!!!!

GPBikes RULES!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

DD