Black Helmet Visors X Painted Pilot Faces or a Hardcore X Arcade discussion

[Speed Soro]

One thing, between many others that afixes me to LFS is the impressive immersion of multiplayer experience.


When a pilot by your side turn the head to you, the mp experience is carried to its limit, but one the most important thing there, is that the other pilot has no face, no traces, it is just a helmet and it can be anyone your mind figures, like read a book without pictures.


This thing works in the same way when you watch a replay, so you see yourself in that car, not a toy, not a doll, not a stupid frozen mannequin.


That is a lesson that should be learned by the others developers, a lesson of simplicity and economy, immersion and solution.


That brings a better simulation, against the arcade-like sensation of those ridiculous faces present in other simulators like GTR, RF, RBR, NKP and others.


A piece of inteligence, a good thing that should be followed

[Tweaker]

I am sorry... but the point about this topic is that other games should have turning heads?

I am very confused here. Lost actually.... :zombie:

[Gunn]

hmm, perhaps I misunderstand the post. So Speed Soro, you think that a black visor is good? Or do you want to see a pilot's face?

[Tweaker]

I am not sure if he was suggesting something, but pointing out the reasons why LFS's Helmets are better? I'll just wait and see what he meant, because I cannot seem to understand this. :tilt:

[Gunn]

For the record, I'd prefer to see a clear visor with a skinnable face.

[Speed Soro]

Well, I'm surprised I did not make understand me.

My post is not a sugestion, I guess, it is a sugestion, but for other games.

It is about how good is the way the LFS does the immersion with black visor solution.

I think other games should follow the same format.

A black visor permits you to see the other pilot as you want.

When a game uses to paint a mask on a ball, you got a doll, not a human pilot. Doing the thing like LFS does, you have better immersion, and better replays too.

It does not matter if you are black, white, or have a big nose, whatever, you see you there, cause there are no face in that model.

I think this is the best solution and hope scavier does never change this feature.

[XCNuse]

..right

i say the opposite; yes there will still be a fair amount of tint, but you have to have enough tint on a helmet; but i think it would be most realistic to see some face or something; not all games do this well, but my idea is somewhat similar to toca race drivers'

once again, this is a graphics thing, LFS has a way to go graphically into todays' world of games if it wants to make some income

[Gunn]

Skinning the driver would be no harder than skinning the car. I'd like to see the face become editable. You could be whoever you wanted to be that way, even yourself! :)

[wheel4hummer]

For the record, I'd prefer to see a clear visor with a skinnable face.

Me too! I would make a skull texture for the face!

[Vagner]

My avatar is from GP4.:)

[Tweaker]

Real drivers have a choice between a tinted visor or a clear visor. If people want to show their face, I think the driver's suit and face should be a skin for LFSW, and you can control the tint + color with sliders in the game.

If you just want the black tinted visors all the time, well that is too bad, because LFS could look really nice with clear visors and an improved helmet. Other games don't do it too well, and I would be 100% sure that the LFS devs could make something that is very cool looking.

This is kind of a suggestion thread (now it is), but also a suggestion for other games. Whatever it is, I think it leaves us to debate on what we like. I for one would like an improved looking driver, it ADDs to the multiplayer experience, and doesn't ruin it.

[Julppu]

I'm with Soro here. Imagination is much more powerful than vision. Helmets bring equality: no-one is judged by their looks but instead of their driving.

Colors and textures of helmets and cars (=skins) don't actually show anything about the driver her/himself. Faces - even if virtual, but still visual - are in much more personal level than the color of helmet.

Black visor brings equality in sense that we're only judged by the edge of our skills or the sharpness of our tongue.

[Gunn]

I'm with Soro here. Imagination is much more powerful than vision. Helmets bring equality: no-one is judged by their looks but instead of their driving.

Colors and textures of helmets and cars (=skins) don't actually show anything about the driver her/himself. Faces - even if virtual, but still visual - are in much more personal level than the color of helmet.

Black visor brings equality in sense that we're only judged by the edge of our skills or the sharpness of our tongue.You would judge a person by the texture on they used the front of their virtual helmet in a race sim?

[Julppu]

You would judge a person by the texture on they used the front of their virtual helmet in a race sim?

Nah, I'm just bored at work :D But sorry, I can't rephrase my train of though ts into words right now :)

Like someone in some other thread said: if I have time to look at graphical gimmicks, then I don't drive fast enough.

[richo]

I love this sim as much as the next man but fmd we seem to go off on the most bizarre tangents , who gives a tinkers what the driver looks like?

But for sheer amusement a skinable face would be fun..

[Captain Slow]

+1 for skinnable face. i remember my freind having a formula 1 game for the playstation2 where you could map your own head onto the driver using an eyetoy. it was fun. especially mapping gollums ehad onto it. :D

[Speed Soro]

So I rather prefer black visors.

It will never be realistic to see any painted face... BTW there are some players that modify their helmets in LFS, giving to them a head format, and sure, that look disgusting.

Games like GTR and rFactor have this ridiculous feature.


And I do not prefer personalized faces too, cause we use to play against kids, and sure I don't want to see their faces when driving... I prefer do not distract myself laughing about them when drive in competition mode.

Well, this is a preference question. I vote for the current format :)

[ajp71]

Skinning the driver would be no harder than skinning the car. I'd like to see the face become editable. You could be whoever you wanted to be that way, even yourself! :)

I hope not, nice idea but we'll end up with too many bad quality/unrealisitic
faces.

[sil3ntwar]

It will never be realistic to see any painted face...i disagree. McLaren used to have a camera from just behind the steering wheel looking at the driver and with a clear visor you could easily see the drivers face. Faces would be awesome as would setting the colour/tint of your visor.

[Captain Slow]

would setting the colour/tint of your visor.

you can change the colour of the tint. just you have to do it on the skin.

[Kostek]

You can't. Even if you paint it white, it will remain black in the game.


Personally, I don't think skinnable face is necessary. You hardly see a helmet skin, so face (in fact, only eyes) would be even less visible.

[Becky Rose]

+1 for a modifyable face like the nVidia demo, but -1 for fully skinnable faces because of...
Me too! I would make a skull texture for the face!
...this sort of thing would just spoil the game.

[Gunn]

I hope not, nice idea but we'll end up with too many bad quality/unrealisitic
faces.I won't. I'll end up with a realistic looking face and driver. But if people wanted to drive as Harry Potter or Senna or whatever, it doesn't bother me. At the moment we all look like a cross between Boba Fett and the Stig.

[RAYfighter]

i disagree. McLaren used to have a camera from just behind the steering wheel looking at the driver and with a clear visor you could easily see the drivers face. Faces would be awesome as would setting the colour/tint of your visor.

-1
I absolutely support Speed Soro here. Black visors is a typical Scavier's elegant approach. I love it.
Clear visor and visible player's face only as a webcam live footage. :razz:

[Darkone55]

I wouldn't like transparent visors. However, I would like fully paintable visors. So you can really let the visors shine, instead of black with a tint. (see attachment).

But to be honest, I think a better shape is more important.

[StanleyCarter]

+1 for the modifiable/skinnable driver face!
I like drawing faces...hehehe

[Rob76]

.... it is just a helmet and it can be anyone your mind figures, like read a book without pictures.This thing works in the same way when you watch a replay, so you see yourself in that car, not a toy, not a doll, not a stupid frozen mannequin......


I agree with you totally. The helmets look good and allow the imagination to do the rest.

Me too! I would make a skull texture for the face!

And this is the main reason I would hate to see skins for the face implemented.

[Tweaker]

If faces aren't done, I'd much rather have a better choice of tint for the helmet visors. Even more so, a helmet of greater quality, as well as the driver's suit. That would be satisfying. I am not very thrilled by having a skinnable face, as that will only be messed around with -- example above.

[Resound]

+1 for the skinnable face for all the same reasons that see-though windows on the cars was a good idea. Plus, it's one thing to customise, which is an aspect of the game I've always found fun.

[Bob Smith]

You say people will go silly but I rarely see silly car skins.

Why should this be any different? And, when are you actually going to see their face anyway?

[Tweaker]

And, when are you actually going to see their face anyway?
Then why make the face skinnable? :)

[XCNuse]

because you'll see it in screenshots, and thats what counts to the gaming world

making generalizations about people happens all the time, so there is absolutely no point in worrying about it

its like.. if someone made their face the face of Mr T :mr-t: everyone would go up in flames and be like OMG A BLACK DUDE! ahhh no we cant have faces thats racist... 'you fool'

i mean honestly.. how many people that you pass during the day you quickly make generalizations about them and how they look; its .. normal, everyone does it, we may not say it aloud, but everyone can think freely, and we do

so .. i mean, theres nothing bad about it in any way

[Tweaker]

I don't know why people say you should "leave it up to your imagination" to who the driver is and what he or she looks like (well tinyk is an exception). But seriously, you drive up next to an opponent, you look at him, he looks at you... are you really wondering what color his skin is, how bushy his eyebrows are, or just what he looks like in general? I am only looking to see how close them damn car is so I can race safely!! How a driver looks is the LAST thing that would cross my mind when racing. If you look at a drivers helmet and imagine who really is there, then you've got a different kind of racing concentration I take it :really:

Having a skinnable face or no face with dark visor colors, it doesn't matter to me, I just care about the racing. If people want to take screenshots, surely faces will do just fine. But I can't understand why some people would say the faces wouldn't be abused. If you knew how many people tried to skin some pretty awful stuff on their driver's suits in S1, you would realize. BUT nobody really worried about the suits because they aren't something you can skin like with the cars. But if the suits and and faces became available to skin, I am 100% that people will make whatever they please, and the game will look absolutely shitty if people fool around with it. LFS should just have a wider assortment of their own suits to choose from (and nicer ones), and maybe preset faces. :shrug:

[Hyperactive]

Why not just make a driver skin? It could include the suit, boots, gloves and helmet (+ to be able to adjust "visor transparency") and seatbelts even. And one suit per player would be enough ;)

[XCNuse]

But if the suits and and faces became available to skin, I am 100% that people will make whatever they please, and the game will look absolutely shitty if people fool around with it. LFS should just have a wider assortment of their own suits to choose from (and nicer ones), and maybe preset faces. :shrug:
no; then we would get moderation into place and then there wouldn't be freaky messed up head in gutters junk going around, it wouldn't be tollerated; like it is right now at LFSW, if you put something on your skin in LFSW and its reported.. you lose your priveledge of uploading skins in LFSW, simple as that :nod:

obviously there should be a limit or something as to how moderation would work; first you'd get a warning, and it would be removed, you'd be watched, and if it happens a second time then you'd loose your priveledge for that particular car/face/suit or whatever it is

[Nick_ll]

What I'd personally like to see on that matter is:
- a skinnable face (or preset textured faces, see Tweak's point above (would also save some bandwidth))
- a choice of helmets: 1 rally-style, 1 full-face, then if full face is chosen, in closed cockpit cars have the visor open and in open cockpits cars the visor closed, both helmets using the same skin to save bandwidth.
- a choice of visors for the full-face helmet: tinted semi transparent (with a way to choose transparency level), flat reflective, iridium reflective; all with color sliders.

[bbman]

... and I want a million dollars.

Seriously, many people are turned down because they think LfS is too arcadey (for whatever reason, I don't know)... Just imagine all those grim reapers and the other joke faces in the game: Now THAT'll give LfS a truely arcadey image!

Paintable visors: Fully agree. Faces (and all that nonsense Nick_II suggested): Hell no!

[Nick_ll]

Nonsense???
You don't want a better helmet model? Your choice really, but last I checked, devs wanted to improve it too. I just suggest that when this will happen the visor be open in tin tops.
Then I do agree that everyone painting their faces would be stupid, but I also think that having untextured faces as it is now (or any untextured polys that can be seen) in a game that aims to be a quality product like LFS, is nonsense. Hence the reason why the faces should be textured. I don't care if all the marshalls and drivers have the same face, as long as it's not left untextured.
What I suggest with visors is basically paintable visors, without the need to paint more than the sunstrip (because in case you don't know, we can already paint the sunstrip on the helmets).
Why is that? Well...because if you put the visor texture on the same bitmap as the helmet itself, you loose real estate, and therefore resolution for the helmet, which is already low res enough if you ask me (unless you want to make it 1024x1024, but that's pointless). Then if you map the visor on a new skin for itself, you waste bandwidth.
What I suggest is to have 2 types of visors selectable in the player driver suit/helmet selection screen. 1 is iridium (which is just eye candy to look cool because it exists in reality and many race drivers have such visors), the other one is a normal/black visor of which you can select the transparency/tint.

So you just end up with a new helmet model and the possibility to choose from 2 types of visors. Is that nonsense?
No. Should Eric concentrate on more important things like updating the GTR cars and their dashboards? Yes of course.

[jtr99]

At the moment we all look like a cross between Boba Fett and the Stig.

I feel much cooler now; thanks, Gunn.

[bbman]

Nonsense???
You don't want a better helmet model? Your choice really, but last I checked, devs wanted to improve it too. I just suggest that when this will happen the visor be open in tin tops.
Then I do agree that everyone painting their faces would be stupid, but I also think that having untextured faces as it is now (or any untextured polys that can be seen) in a game that aims to be a quality product like LFS, is nonsense. Hence the reason why the faces should be textured. I don't care if all the marshalls and drivers have the same face, as long as it's not left untextured.
What I suggest with visors is basically paintable visors, without the need to paint more than the sunstrip (because in case you don't know, we can already paint the sunstrip on the helmets).
Why is that? Well...because if you put the visor texture on the same bitmap as the helmet itself, you loose real estate, and therefore resolution for the helmet, which is already low res enough if you ask me (unless you want to make it 1024x1024, but that's pointless). Then if you map the visor on a new skin for itself, you waste bandwidth.
What I suggest is to have 2 types of visors selectable in the player driver suit/helmet selection screen. 1 is iridium (which is just eye candy to look cool because it exists in reality and many race drivers have such visors), the other one is a normal/black visor of which you can select the transparency/tint.

So you just end up with a new helmet model and the possibility to choose from 2 types of visors. Is that nonsense?
No. Should Eric concentrate on more important things like updating the GTR cars and their dashboards? Yes of course.

I'm not against a better helmet model, but I am against dozens of different helmet models for no good reason (why would I need a rally helmet besides a full face one?) or different "modes" (open/closed)... It has no real use, and just make things complicated... And guess why those faces aren't textured: Because they weren't to be shown...

As I said before: Textured visors (pre-textured or self-painted) are fine, making things unnecessary complicated isn't...

[Gunn]

I'm not against a better helmet model, but I am against dozens of different helmet models for no good reason (why would I need a rally helmet besides a full face one?) or different "modes" (open/closed)... It has no real use, and just make things complicated... And guess why those faces aren't textured: Because they weren't to be shown...

As I said before: Textured visors (pre-textured or self-painted) are fine, making things unnecessary complicated isn't...If you find choosing between three options complicated then how on earth do you get past the current menus? Why do the current helmets look like they do? Because they haven't been developed further yet. Before S2 we had black windows but the reason wasn't because "they weren't to be shown". A transparent visor and textured or skinnable face is a natural progression towards a realistic representation of the driver model. Judging by how many people are against the possibility of silly faces being displayed it seems like most people would use a sensible texture anyway.

[MR_B]

+1 on the skinning for the face.... I want to give people a royal beating with the face of the queen :D.... Even worse, imagine rolf harris in your rear view mirror! :|

[ScHiZ]

+1 on the skinning for the face.... I want to give people a royal beating with the face of the queen :D.... Even worse, imagine rolf harris in your rear view mirror! :|

Hey, I resemble that remark!:smileypul

[bbman]

If you find choosing between three options complicated then how on earth do you get past the current menus? Why do the current helmets look like they do? Because they haven't been developed further yet. Before S2 we had black windows but the reason wasn't because "they weren't to be shown". A transparent visor and textured or skinnable face is a natural progression towards a realistic representation of the driver model. Judging by how many people are against the possibility of silly faces being displayed it seems like most people would use a sensible texture anyway.

Can you stop turning my words around as you like? UNNECESSARILY complicated... How much time do you think would it need to create all that options and other coding for the things Nick_II suggested? If everything else is done and the devs feel bored, then we can discuss about implementing that... For the textures: I never ever saw a good face texture in any racing game, even if they were predefined, especially when the dark visor-method is way more elegant to solve this problem... Many people here (which are not that many anyway) would use a sensible texture (as you say), but how about the other ones? And guess which part do people not involved in LfS see more often?

[Gunn]

Can you stop turning my words around as you like? UNNECESSARILY complicated... How much time do you think would it need to create all that options and other coding for the things Nick_II suggested? If everything else is done and the devs feel bored, then we can discuss about implementing that... For the textures: I never ever saw a good face texture in any racing game, even if they were predefined, especially when the dark visor-method is way more elegant to solve this problem... Many people here (which are not that many anyway) would use a sensible texture (as you say), but how about the other ones? And guess which part do people not involved in LfS see more often?Not turning your words around, I don't see it as complicated to implement or use. It's just mapping textures to models. You may never have seen a good face texture before, but I'm sure you would if some of our talented community members get the chance to create face textures. They're an impressive bunch generally when it comes to graphics. :superman2

[Greboth]

To me being able to see the face would be a good idea, also chosing between a clear, black or iridium reflective visor is also good. Saying this though i wouldnt want to be able to see tha face unless it was a reasonable model of a face, not just a texture.

[Slartibartfast]

I'm on board with the original post. I kinda noticed it before, but the idea really didn't come forward until Soro mentioned it. LFS does seem more real because it's not the same face or 3 faces in every car. Each driver has their own personality. It has more depth for me. I don't see programmer face one, I see Tweak, or Nick, or DWF. It's very immersive.

[duke_toaster]

I don't want any changes to the LFSW system other than suits being added. What's the point of faces when LFS has full face helmets?