In regards to rubberbanding, I think the AI will travel at less than its absolute potential if you're going exceptionally slow, but will ramp up its speed until it reaches peak performance as you cut your way through the pack and then attempt to build a lead. However, I haven't seen anything to indicate the AI can do anything more than 100%. If I'm doing consistent laps I have no problem building a lead, but if I screw up and lose something like 3/10s in a corner, that time is reflected in the position of the AI.
Yep only I feel the rubber banding is a little more pronounced then you just described. Its not the worst ever rubber banding (that award goes to Burnout 3), but the rubber banding is there to reduce the AI routines and feels kind of predictable. As others have said, its easy to catch up and get back into the race, its also harder to pull out a lead. This can obviously happen in real life if drivers feel like they can relax when they are ahead or they need to drive harder when they are behind, but it feels like the 11 AI racers are racing against you only, rather than racing against the other AI racers. When I approach them at a corner, there are many times where they are just following each other in a racing line, and there's no attempt to pass other AI. I've only played half the single player, so it could be different later but I don't think its likely.
Its actually saying something when I enjoy racing against my own ghost more than the AI drivers.
What I want to see in a next gen racer is a racing game that mimics real racing a little more. My guess as to why the AI hasn't gotten any better in the last couple of generations is online. Why spend CPU resources on AI when people can go online and play against human players way better than AI will ever be? Those CPU resources could go into the car physics or the weather system or lighting system? That's why I think the AI here is basically the bare minimum a driving game needs. I mean the single player is still kind of fun, but 5 years from now when the graphics improve further, this game will be surpassed.
Another problem I feel is that the same AI routine is being used for all the other cars, so the cars lack a lot of individualism. It would be great if the drivers actually had some personality, maybe some are aggressive, some are drive at a steady pace, some try to force others into making mistakes. AI that replicates the feeling of an online race would be the next step. I mean the race results have names for all the drivers, but I can't remember any of them to save my life.
I don't know how reliable this is but...
Also, if anyone wants a club to race in, shoot AG SYSTEMS a request. Right now it's just me and AspiringYouth contributing. I asked my GF to join so I could activate the club but she's just there for show. lol
I don't mind to join if I can. I'm only home 3 nights a week though and also not sure when I can race as my internet is pretty shitty, so my progress will be kind of slow.... I'm level 25 now so i feel like I wasted some of my single player progress.
It's the same problem PGR had -- on some tracks, the walls are too close and collisions modeled in a plausible manner (but with no mechanical damage!). So the fastest way around a corner is to ride the wall. Hell, most arcade racers are way more harsh about contact than Driveclub is. They probably could make an adjustment and adjust the leaderboard without wiping everything (which would be annoying). Assuming they have the right data and telemetry (and they do in some capacity, since they have ghosts), they could probably throw out any times in the top 100 (or however many places) that involved any sort of track collision.
Hell, while we're pining for PGR, I would love for them to bring back something like the Kudos Challenges from PGR 1-3. To work in the current system, you could probably make it a series of set face-offs back to back to back, and you have to beat N of them to rank. Leaderboards would then be set by # of face-offs beaten and overall time. Add a couple of additional face-off types (how about one with some virtual cone gates in the road?) and you're probably in there.
Yeah more games should have the challenges in PGR including knockout, cone challenges, overtaking challenges etc
Enzo used to post over there all the time too but I haven't seen him in racing game threads all that much around here recently.
