10 things I wish I knew when I first started Sim Racing

get out guys will here welcome back to the channel so today's video we're talking about 10 things that I wish I'd known before I spent a cent on any of the sim racing gear that you see in front of me now so it's important to acknowledge before we get into this video that quite a lot of the gear that I do have was provided either at a discounted rate or for free by various different companies so next level racing provided the cockpit that I had originally when I first started doing sim racing videos as well as the GT tractor that I have now they also gave me a discounted rate on the motion platform that I'm sitting on and thank you very kindly supplied the 335 inch ex35 0 1 R monitors that I'm using as well so that has had a little bit of a bearing on the order in which I've done things and the upgrade path that I've taken but having said that it hasn't sort of influenced the actual products that I've ended up with and it definitely has taught me a thing or two about you know the right order to buy things what kind of gear you should be getting and you know the kind of direction that you want to take if you're wanting to get into sim racing for the first time so whether you're completely new to the world of sim racing or maybe you already have a little bit of gear and you're just wondering how you can get the absolute most full of the money that you've already spent or maybe you're wanting to invest in some upgrades into the future you'll definitely be learning something in this video so stick around [Music] okay so we've got a list of ten things that we're going to be working our way through here but I'm going to split it into two main sections the first section revolving more around the hardware side of things and then the second section revolving more around the overall experience of racing competing online and stuff like that so let's start off with number one field of view so field of view makes a absolutely massive difference much bigger difference than you think and if you've seen some of my earlier racing videos particularly where I was doing f1 20:18 you would have seen I had a crazy wide field of view on the 55 inch Samsung screen that I was using at the time now the reason I was doing and actually I was kind of a little bit of you mendick about this a lot of people were saying to me if field of view is completely wrong and you need to fix it and I was kind of being resistive and saying I didn't want to fix the field of view I wanted to have a nice wide field of view because I wanted to be able to see what was going on around me because I was doing league racing primarily I didn't want to narrow down my field of view and lose the perspective of being able to see cars alongside me and see my mirrors and things like that what I didn't realize is just how much that actually affects how you drive the car having the view sets really far back actually means that you lose that sensation of the car sort of moving around underneath you the car pivots around the center and when you're when your field of view is too far back you actually don't feel the car sliding or the car feels like it's sliding when it isn't and I found that when I corrected my field of view I was actually able to control the car a lot better not only hitting apex is more accurately but also catching slides and things like that being able to compensate in turns for little tiny twitches and movements in the car made a massive difference so definitely would recommend taking the time to make sure that your field of view is set correctly regardless of the thing that you're driving in the type of car that you're driving as well now there's a bunch of field-of-view calculators that are available online and I'll link a few of my favorites for you in the description below but definitely put the time into making sure that your field of view is set correctly and regardless of whether you're running a four by three aspect ratio sixteen by nine or even an ultra-wide 21 by nine or something like that it is absolutely vital that you set your field of view correctly and don't be worried about losing the peripheral vision because it is less important to overall speed then then having a wide wide field of view so you can see what's going on around you so point number one field of view [Music] [Applause] three screens are much better than one big screen now this obviously will depend on the amount of space that you have available that this is something that I think this is probably the most costly mistake that I made from the onset I went out when I first bought my steering wheel and I went and bought a big 55 inch widescreen TV that I had mounted up really close I thought this is gonna be perfect because it's nice and close to me I've got a massive field of view and indeed when I first installed it and I first got everything set up I actually did think that it was really awesome because you know I was happy to look around what I was doing I was having to actually turn my head to see the mirrors and things like that and I thought you know this is incredible this is amazing and I felt like I've made the right decision and it wasn't until I actually upgraded to triple screens that I really realized the mistake that I've made now the only reason I actually upgraded to triple screens was because Benki reached out to me and offered me very kindly the 335 inch monitors to to test out if I hadn't done that I probably would have stuck with the 55 inch screen at least until I went along the VR pathway which is still gonna happen but um yeah as soon as I had the triple screen setup I realized the mistake that I'd made and this is something that I think is really important to understand having a big field of view and having to look around you inside the rig or inside the setting is very different from actually having the perspective of something wrapping around you so when you're when you're seeing things whizzing past you in real life you're you're looking to the side and your peripheral vision is based on things moving past you so when you set up the perspective and field of view inside your sim racing titles you're actually wanting to set it so that you've got that sort of 45 to 50 to 60 degree angle on your side monitors and if you don't do that you find that instead of looking at a mirror that's sort of beside you you're looking at a mirror that is sort of in front of you and it's not really very realistic at all so it's kind of like a distorted perspective that you get and what I found is that having a triple screen setup actually gives you a lot more immersion when you're driving because you actually you know you're placed inside a cockpit and you're actually seeing things wrapping around you and I was a little bit concerned about having relatively shallow screens as well these 35 inch screens aren't particularly tall but what I'm finding is that because the field of view is set correctly and it's actually wrapping around me it's a lot more immersive and I'm able to drive a lot more accurately obviously different titles support triple screens in different ways the Codemasters titles unfortunately at this point in time at least don't allow you to adjust for the angles so you still kind of get that little sort of stretch that's happening on the sides titles like iRacing I said of course race room things like that will allow you to actually adjust and compensate for the angles on the sides and that allows you to really sort of have that perspective of a mirror kind of being where it would be in real life and jumping in a real car versus jumping in this now you actually really do have a very realistic field of view and it makes you a lot faster with your turning and things like that you can really spot your ape X's and aim for them a lot more accurately as well as it giving you a better perspective of what's going on around you with the single screen kind of stretched out perspective you really just don't have that same level of immersion so that is probably the single biggest mistake that I've made in terms of money that I've spent on things that I probably would have done differently if I'd had my time again so I would definitely recommend if you do have the space for it obviously having a single big screen works perfectly fine if that's all you have the room for and I'm not trying to discourage you from buying a large screen TV to to use for your sim rig but if you do have the space for a triple screen setup and you can't afford it I definitely would recommend that because it definitely makes a massive difference over having a single larger screen so that is point number two [Music] monitor refresh rate input lag and response time make a much bigger difference than you think they do now this is something that I kind of didn't realize for about four months of driving around in 4k resolution at 60 Hertz on my 55 inch TV and it wasn't until I actually had the triple screens running at 100 Hertz that I really noticed the difference that having a higher refresh rate in particular makes there's just your breaking points your turning points your apexis and everything become a lot more accurate when you have a high refresh rate around the Sun of hundred Hertz to 120 Hertz mark seems to be about the sweet spot for simracing at least in my opinion I've tried out monitors that run up to 144 hubs and there wasn't really a discernable difference above about a hundred Hertz for me at least but definitely the difference between 60 Hertz and a hundred Hertz is absolutely massive and as I mentioned it wasn't really something that I noticed until I had it but I found that I was a lot more consistent in terms of my turn in my breaking points and hitting those ape axes once I was running at 100 Hertz now this is an interesting point when it comes to TVs in particular because a lot of TVs are marketed as being 120 Hertz or 240 Hertz or even up to crazy numbers like 680 Hertz I think I've not even seen up to a thousand Hertz now it's important to understand that TVs use a combination of backlight blinking and you know frame interpolation and things like that to actually generate those refresh rates so even though the the monitor itself or the panel that is installed in that TV has a native refresh rate that might be very high and the actual input rate or frame rate that's coming into the TV via the PC is still limited to 60 Hertz with today's technology regardless of the native refresh rate of the panel so your your TV can't actually display more than 60 Hertz in terms of what the signal that's actually coming in at 4k resolution and what I actually ended up doing was was lowering my resolution so that I was able to run 120 Hertz so I actually ended up going down to 1440 resolutions so I think it was 2560 by 1440 that I was running to get that sound to get that hundred and two Hertz refresh rate on the 55-inch TV and I found that that made an absolutely massive difference I was almost in f1 2018 at least which was the game that I was playing back then I was almost a full half a second faster per lap just by making that change so it really was a significant change and there you know I didn't really notice that until I was starting to sort of push my own limits and find you know the limits of my own skill and you know the limits of the hardware actually limiting my my speed moving forward so something really important to understand there is that regardless of the refresh rate or the Hertz that might be marketed on the TV that you're buying you're still limited to 60 Hertz in terms of the actual signal coming from the PC into the screen when you're running over HDMI at 4k resolution so just keep that in mind and yeah you might want to look at actually getting a smaller screen that you're able to run at a higher resolution that actually looked comfortable for your eyes rather than getting a massive screen and having to have a pixelated view that is you know all grainy and fuzzy because you're running a low resolution on a larger screen so just make sure you consider that now it's also important to understand the difference between input lag and response time as well and I'm only going to touch on this very briefly in this video I'm going to do another video where I explain this in a lot more detail but basically response time is just measuring the time that it takes for the pixels on the actual panel itself to respond to a signal whereas input lag actually accounts for the time it takes for the PC to process the input from your steering wheel or your pedals the signals are actually be processed the frames to be drawn and then the picture engine inside the monitor to actually draw those frames and then the actual pixels to change on the screen as well so just because a TV or a monitor has a quoted low response time doesn't necessarily mean that the input lag is going to be low so you do need to read your reviews you do need to check a lot of monitors particularly cheaper ones like Kogan screens and things like that they can advertise a really fast response time but that doesn't necessarily mean that the input lag is going to be low so do make sure you check your reviews make sure that you're getting a screen that has the lowest possible input lag because it really does make a massive difference [Music] okay number four button layout is absolutely vitally important particularly if you are playing some racing titles that require you to do things like activate ers DRS change fuel trims and things like that while you're driving anything that makes you have to take your eyes off the road to make an adjustment or take your hands off the steering wheel is going to make you slower now I was originally playing f1 2018 with a button box which you can actually see up behind me just behind my head just there it's hard to point while I'm looking at a camera but just there and then I also was moving over to I also moved over to my stream deck which you can see just beside me just here and I was using a control surface there you can see the video that I did where I set all that up and originally I was using that to change my ers my fuel trims and stuff like that and what that meant was that every time I wanted to make a change to my fuel trim or something like that I had to take my hand off the wheel and find the button and press it now when I was using the button box because that was a tactile adjustment I could kind of feel what I was doing so I didn't really have to take my eyes off the road so much but what you'll find is that as you get faster you're making more and more adjustments to your trims and things like that while you're driving so it becomes absolutely vital to be able to do that without taking your eyes off the road and without taking your hands off the wheel so often you'll be adjusting particularly your fuel trim or your your ers as you're actually breaking into a turn so you'll see in a lot of my simracing streams and things like that I'm actually flicking my thumbs on the little paddles on my phonetic v2 formula wheel while I'm braking while I'm spotting my X's and turning in now if I wasn't able to do that with my thumbs then I would be a lot slower and we're talking again probably point three point four even point five over seconds slower that I found when I was actually using a button box as opposed to the wheel so you want to make sure that you're choosing a steering wheel where possible and obviously you know it comes down to a budget but I would definitely recommend getting a wheel that has all the buttons that you're going to need as accessible as possible for things that you need to change while you're actually driving and if you don't have a wheel that has thumb encoders or something like that you can still use the buttons along the top but you're definitely going to want to be able to set up buttons for things that you're going to be changing regularly while you're driving so obviously that's gonna depend on the software that you're using for something like erasing it might be your brake bias or your fuel trim and things like that f1 obviously you're going to be doing things like your ers management things like that but yeah make sure that you do consider when you're buying a wheel that you want to be able to have as many buttons as possible in a position where you don't have to take your hands off the wheel so even just having to use buttons in the center the rotary encoders that are in the center that we're still having to take your eyes off kind of feel what's going on so you want to have things as close to where your hands sit naturally while you're driving as possible [Music] rig rigidity makes a absolutely massive difference particularly in braking so the most important thing when you're braking in a sim is muscle memory you find that over time you do start to learn exactly how much force you need to exert on the pedal and it becomes more about the muscle memory than it does about you know really thinking about what you're doing so if you've got a rig that's flopping around and flexing and moving around a lot it makes it really really difficult to be consistent with your braking now this is something that obviously it's going to come down to budget but if you're buying a platform or a rig or cockpit or whatever you want to call it you definitely want to be considering where you're going to be going into the future so if if simracing is something that you're going to be getting into more and more and you're going to want to wanting to be upgrading your gear then you definitely want to consider the rigidity of your platform it's probably the single most important thing when it comes to spending money if you have a tight budget you want to be spending more money on your cockpit and probably less money on your wheel and other things then than the other way around you definitely need to have as much rigidity as possible particularly in your pedal plate and your wheel platform if things are moving around it does make things difficult when it comes to setting muscle memory now as well as there's a little bit of there's a little bit of a slippery slope here when it comes to upgrading your gear because you'll find as you upgrade your pedals in particular the pedals become stiffer particularly if you have a performance kit or a load cell braking system you need that additional rigidity otherwise every time you press the pedal either the pedals are going to slide or if you're using an office chair or something like that rather than a cockpit the seat is going to move back or swivel a little bit and it becomes really really difficult and this is one of the things that I see all the time with beginners that have just bought expensive pedals and then they find they can't use them properly because their chairs moving all over the place or their wheels moving all over the place and it makes it really difficult and really disappointing and I've seen a few people that have actually bought pedals and then ended up having to go back to their old cheap pedals because they simply can't use the load cell braking system while the pedals are sliding across the carpet or sliding across the floor or whatever so you really do need to consider that you know it is an investment in the future you you are going to need to upgrade other to compensate for that additional quality and pedals and steering wheels and stuff like that as well with you know if you're getting a direct drive wheel you need to make sure that you have a cockpit that can actually support that and it's not going to be flapping around and vibrating and working its right loose during that during the course of a race the last thing you want to have is you know things getting loose or things breaking and falling off while you're driving so definitely make sure that you consider the rigidity of your cockpit when you're choosing it even if you think that you're you know you're only starting off now you know I might just buy a you know a $500 cockpit instead of a $700 cockpit or something like that because I'm only sort of getting used to it now maybe look at the second-hand market or something like that it's better to spend a little bit more or you know go secondhand if you need to but get the best quality cockpit that you can afford for the money that you have because it really is gonna make a massive difference a much bigger difference than you think particularly if you're using load cell brakes okay so now we're moving more into making the most of the gear that you already have so I'm not going to be encouraging you to spend more money from this point onwards I promise so the next point is regarding force feedback motion and things like that if you have motion this is obviously a thing that you need to spend a lot of time fine-tuning but force feedback in particularly regardless of the wheel that you have it doesn't matter if you've got a old G 25 or G 27 or you know a direct-drive wheelbase a Thrustmaster whatever it is that you have you need to take the time to fine tune your force feedback settings to get the most realistic experience possible and a lot of this does come down to personal preference as well I see a lot of people jump into Facebook groups and forums and say hey what settings should I use for my wheel and then they never touch it again they just use somebody else's settings and they think that that's the best it can be and they never really dive into fine tuning things now obviously it's great to start out with somebody else to suggestion but everybody's driving style is a little bit different everybody's wheel is a little bit different and you know if you if you're if you're not fine-tuning it to your own personal preference you're often missing out people different people have different amounts of strengths as well I mean I'm not the most muscley guy in the world so I tend to have my force feedback crank down just a little bit just so I'm able to really feel what's going on with the car the detail is more important than the strength and I think that's something that people miss a lot when it comes to the discussion between direct drive versus versus belt-driven and things like that as well that's a topic for another discussion altogether but yeah definitely take the time to really fine-tune your so they start off with somebody else's profile by all means or jump on a forum and ask but really take the time to make adjustments trial and error and you will find that there's a lot of frustration in doing this often you know you'll make some changes and the temptation is always there especially if you've gotten used to the settings that you've been running for ages you'll make some adjustments and you'll instantly be slower because you're having to relearn you're having to you know reset that muscle memory just because you're slower originally doesn't mean that the settings are worse you really do want to find a point where you're really comfortable you really feel like you're feeling what's going on with the car those little tiny details in movement the twitches in the car feeling the ripple strips feeling the breaking feeling you know feeling understeer and oversteer all those little details you want to have those as accurate as you possibly can and even if it makes you slow to begin with once you get used to it you will become faster so that is a great way that you can get more out of the gear that you already have and you don't necessarily need to spend a massive amount of money to become fast I mean I give you I can give you an example of a a guy that some had a problem with his will last season in the in the competition that I was doing and I actually ended up sending him my old Logitech g27 which isn't exactly regarded as a high quality wheel and he actually ended up winning the championship against guys that were using you know ten thousand fifteen thousand dollar cockpits you know he's just using a tiny little monitor with a g27 and yet he was still able to win the championship with that set up so you know taking the time to really set things up and get things as accurate as possible really is worth the time investment even if you feel like you're sly and you're getting frustrated to begin with [Music] okay so this one's probably going to get a few people triggered but guys don't pay too much attention to people's opinion in facebook groups discord channels you know forums all those places at the end of the day what you enjoy and what brings you fun and entertainment is what's important so I mean I've copped a lot of flack in the comments online as well as in Facebook groups because of the amount of time that I've spent playing f1 2018 and yes I understand that it's not the most accurate sim out there but I enjoy it and that's what matters so guys if you have a particular title that you enjoy you know don't don't be afraid to you know just enjoy that and share it and you know experience it don't don't feel like all if you've got an expensive rig or a lot of gear you have to be playing a certain title just because that's what people say you need to do I've found that I've gotten so much enjoyment out of you know f1 2018 to use that as an example just by having this year and even though maybe that software doesn't take full advantage of all the gear that I have I've still found it more immersive and more enjoyable and you know different people enjoy different different aspects of simracing and different things like I like the fact that F 1 2018 has all the genuine livery from the real cars I like the aspect of the career mode having things like you know needing to answer the right questions in the right way I kind of enjoy that management side of things and you know it really doesn't matter what other people think so you know by all means follow people's suggestions and try things out but you know don't get caught up in the drama don't think that you know certain piece of software sucks just because a few people said it did at the end of the day if you're enjoying it that is what matters [Music] okay guys so if you don't listen to any of the other points in the video please pay attention this one for the love of God join a online racing league find yourself a good league where you can get involved in the community find a good bunch of guys and girls that you can race with you will have so much more fun than you do in open lobbies and single-player mode you'll improve your racing skills but above all you'll just do away with a lot of the frustration that comes from you know people just cannonballing into turn one people taking you out and not having any regard for the welfare of other drivers there's also the community aspect of it as well just being a part of a community enjoying chatting to your mates building reputation and building relationships with other races is so it brings such a lot to the overall experience of simracing and on the whole the majority of people in the sim racing community are awesome people that are willing to help you willing to help you improve your skills improve your race craft all that kind of thing and it really is so much more fun than just jumping in and open lobbying and getting taken out in every single race and I actually find that for the large part I actually enjoy the community aspect of it more than the actual racing itself I've made some really awesome friends in the sim racing community so if you are playing in open lobbies that's fine too get used to the physics of the game and things like that but get in get into a league you'll also find that it improves your driving as well because you're jumping in with people that are varying in their skill levels rather than going into open lobbies where the people are generally around the same sort of circular level as you are or slower you find that by challenging yourself and racing against a few people that are a little bit faster a few people a little bit slower so you're having to sort of deal in traffic and things like that overall that's going to make you a much better racing so I'll link to a couple of leagues that I recommend in the description below but do some shopping around asking Facebook groups try some things out and look don't get caught up in the drama that is often present in online leagues as well just enjoy the racing become a part of the community share your passion for sim racing and have a good time [Music] so this one is one that I honestly wish I'd paid more attention to you guys in the comments on YouTube originally I resisted turning off assists and racing line for so long simply because I guess I was scared of being slow I didn't want to you know absolutely suck when I was live-streaming I didn't want to embarrass myself in front of you guys by being slow and so I left the racing line on in particular for ages I did turn off most of the other assists pretty quickly like abs and traction control and stuff like that but the racing line really does limit your improvement you'll find that what you're doing is you're paying attention to the line rather than actually learning proper braking points and what that means is that when you jump in other titles so I was playing f1 20:18 primarily and then as soon as I jumped into another title I just couldn't drive it because the racing line worked differently and I wasn't looking for the correct braking markers you know I was trying to do things like use shadows to spot my braking markers and then obviously throughout the course of a race those shadows would change and I'd end up just sucking so you really do need to develop good habits from the onset if you're using the racing line all the time in particular you're never going to develop those good habits and you start to set muscle memory that is incorrect it's a lot like learning an instrument when you when you just learn off you know off making your own mistakes and reading a book you pick up bad habits that you then don't break it's much better to have those professional lessons right from the start when you're learning an instrument because it makes you you know develop good habits from the onset that's very much similar here if you're using assistance you really start to develop these bad habits that become a lot more difficult to break later on so you know even though you might be a little bit embarrassed and you might feel like you suck to begin with you will get used to it very quickly and I found it I only took me you know maybe five or six hours of driving without the racing line to really sort of get back to the same point where I was and I'm finding now that's I'm actually you know I'm breaking a little bit earlier I'm getting better exit speed and I'm sure that over the course of the next couple of weeks I'm gonna end up being a lot faster but it also adds a lot to the level of immersion as well it makes it a lot more enjoyable and you really do feel a much greater sense of accomplishment and achievement and exhilaration when you get a good lap with Noah it really is a lot more fun in particularly you've got a rig that's got you know force feedback and emotion platformer triple screens and you know really immersive you know setup you want to have it as realistic as possible and using assists really doesn't help with that so guys you know the temptations always there to leave them switched on but switch them off give it a go I've promise you you'll have a lot more fun and you ultimately will be a lot faster with no assists [Music] all right so that brings us to our final point which is don't be afraid to compete with people that are faster than you if you're always at the front of the pack you're always winning or coming first second or third you're not challenging yourself and you're not going to improve your skills as fast the temptation is always there to limit yourself turning down the AI if you're playing in single-player mode so that you always win and that was something that I always found I was tempted to do I always enjoyed the thrill of you know competing near the front challenging for first place and it wasn't until I actually started to turn up the AI and racing classes against you know online players that were faster than me that I really started to improve my skills and even you guys that have been watching my streams would have seen that I'm competing in tier 1 which is some of the fastest guys in Australia and f1 2018 at the moment and you know I suck compared to those guys I'm in last night's race I was you know I got lapped almost twice by the leader in Monaco and I ended up pulling over and letting most of the field pass but you know what I was following people around I was enjoying it and it's it's setting a benchmark I'm seeing those lap times that are 2 or 3 seconds faster than me and it's you know it's motivating me to push harder whereas if I'm winning I'm thinking oh yeah I'm fast I'm good and I'm not really pushing myself and challenging myself so it's so much more fun to challenge yourself and really battle in that midfield to route to the back of the field even if you're even if you're dead last you're challenging yourself to go faster and it's so much more enjoyable when you do make up those couple of places and you start to get faster and faster and people start to recognize that you're improving your skills as well and if you're always at the front of the pack in a you know in a group of people that are slower than you you're never really going to enjoy it because you know that there are people out there that are faster than you and you know that you're not really challenging yourself so if you're racing offline don't be afraid to crank that AI up and if you're online don't be afraid to race against people that are faster than you ultimately you will have more fun you will improve your driving and you will have a better time so guys that is my list of top 10 things that I wish that I'd known before I got into and spent any money on sim racing hopefully you guys have found some interesting tidbits of information in there regardless of where you're at in your journey so whether you're completely new to sim racing just wondering you know what sort of gear should be looking at getting how much money you're going to need to spend whether you've already got some gear you just want to get the most out of it ultimately it's all about having fun and enjoying what you have so you don't need to spend an absolute fortune to have a good times in racing and you don't need to spend a fortune to be competitive either I think that's probably the main takeaway from this is that yeah you can't have a lot of fun you can be fast you can be competitive with a small investment you don't need to have a setup like this obviously but you don't need to go all out and spend tens of thousands of dollars like I have to get a good experience so guys I hope you found this video interesting and useful if you have hit the thumbs up button hit the subscribe button and the notification belt as well so you don't miss the next video and I will see you guys on the track bye

Channel: Boosted Media

Views: 1,104,035

Keywords: Next Level Racing, Fanatec, 10 things, Top 10, Boosted MEdia, Sim Racing setup, Sim Racing guide, League racing, how to join a league

Id: o__0iy_H8Lk

Length: 31min 21sec (1881 seconds)

Published: Tue May 28 2019