[DiRT 4] Constructive feedback on the subject of car-feel and physics: The Ultimate Thread

[Porkhammer 78]

Onylra said:

:/

Is this the standard of discourse then? I post a damn novel, and I get sarcasm, innuendo, and baseless accusations of sock-puppeting because apparently more than one frickin person counter-jerks to the 'accepted wisdom' of a few vocal people? Just STFU and report it to the mods - let them compare IPs and mind your own business.

@ Porkhammer: WHATEVER. Thanks for your thoughtful input. Now I must retire, as my eyeballs are injured from all the rolling they just did. Others can watch you 'drive' and see what I'm saying is true. Being good at games doesn't make you an expert at anything other than video games. Just be happy with your world records, you da champ - and for the love of God: give your cars at least one shakedown after you alter the setup to see if you hate it first.

I even included an apology for my sarcasm, but sure. Roll your eyes all you want. I never claimed to be an expert on real life driving, or virtual driving for that matter.

But thanks for your thoughtful "input".

[KevM 44]

1976 RAC Rally
https://youtu.be/0wfSZLfcvvY


Dirt 4 cars are too fast, have too much final drive and have no resistance.

Gear them down, introduce drag and up the power.  The current physics will do the rest

[LittleApple 47]

https://youtu.be/VFqfSmp0YQU
https://youtu.be/q1bkdHwNSD8
No dramas driving the escort. I dont think the car has anything wrong with it from a personal POV i think they're as close to the real thing as any sim has come. Most corners had an entry speed in this video of around 140kmh. Would drop about 20-40km's off the top speed mid corner simply from the drifting angle. Recorded a video on Australia and the UK aswell but those stages were way to bumpy to actually give clean long drifts/slides thats what people seemed to want.

Able to do much longer slides in Dirt Fish if requested.

The hand of God comment seems to me to be a combination of poor setup and driving combination. It takes some practice and clear thought to learn how to drive and setup a car. This is a very hard thing for many wrap thier heads around. Well we see professionals getting setups wrong all the time. (Hamilton, Verstappen, Mcrea). Schumacher was probably one of the few who always seemed to nail perfection on his setups.

[KevM 44]

More messing around - with promising outcomes!

Again, I have tied the brake pedal on.  
This provides a constant 10% braking to very crudely replicate wind resistance and car weight.  For the experiment, Iv shifted the brake bias forward to keep the driven wheels less restricted 
This has some nice effects in that: it slows the pace of the car down (the std game speed is silly-fast) and gives the rear wheels something to push against (creating grip-loss & wheel spin off the line & powering through corners).  It also creates understeer on the front axle, but the expected type, which is actually nice to 'deal' with.  Last of all, Codies wanted to add weight to the fly-away DR cars.  They aren't as jumpy in D4, but the brake restriction makes them feel heavier to drive.  Changing direction & braking isn't as flicky now and you can actually Scandinavian flick more effectively  

Because of this, you have to work more with your power and manage grip on both axles.  It's a nicer, more challenging drive.  But unfortunately restricting the car like this makes it feel grossly underpowered. 

The Manta feels how you would imagine a 1.6 Mk2 Escort to be.  You have to keep it wound up or it bogs down.  The movement is nice but the power is lacking.

If I had more power, I would actually try & turn the resistance up more, just to see how things react!


I'm not saying we should all break out the cable ties for our brake pedals, but it's a suggestion to Codies to add another dimension to further refine their physics model.

More resistance, more power, less speed (& the front axle is a bit too hard as standard - & gearing is a bit long - lol)

Try it & see team!

[dgeesi0 305]

LittleApple said:

No dramas driving the escort. I dont think the car has anything wrong with it from a personal POV i think they're as close to the real thing as any sim has come. Most corners had an entry speed in this video of around 140kmh. Would drop about 20-40km's off the top speed mid corner simply from the drifting angle. Recorded a video on Australia and the UK aswell but those stages were way to bumpy to actually give clean long drifts/slides thats what people seemed to want.

Able to do much longer slides in Dirt Fish if requested.

The hand of God comment seems to me to be a combination of poor setup and driving combination. It takes some practice and clear thought to learn how to drive and setup a car. This is a very hard thing for many wrap thier heads around. Well we see professionals getting setups wrong all the time. (Hamilton, Verstappen, Mcrea). Schumacher was probably one of the few who always seemed to nail perfection on his setups.

so by this logic codemasters has no idea what they doing ? if all the default set ups are wrong.i just went and done some mk2 escort driving set quite a few wr back to back it doesnt handle right.i dont claim to be the tech wizard at set ups but with logic you would think if it was logic all the default set ups would make the cars handle well and perform well.with just a few extra tweaks for personal set ups.this is not the case.

people arent moaning or discussing this because its not happening.

we want the best of the game but if we honest not one of us really knows what is off.we just guessing.some say its perfect.some say its wrong or broke.some post magical theories but many are basing it on reality when its a game.

[Fizzlenog 6]

KevM said:

More messing around - with promising outcomes!

Again, I have tied the brake pedal on.  
This provides a constant 10% braking to very crudely replicate wind resistance and car weight.  For the experiment, Iv shifted the brake bias forward to keep the driven wheels less restricted 
This has some nice effects in that: it slows the pace of the car down (the std game speed is silly-fast) and gives the rear wheels something to push against (creating grip-loss & wheel spin off the line & powering through corners).  It also creates understeer on the front axle, but the expected type, which is actually nice to 'deal' with.  Last of all, Codies wanted to add weight to the fly-away DR cars.  They aren't as jumpy in D4, but the brake restriction makes them feel heavier to drive.  Changing direction & braking isn't as flicky now and you can actually Scandinavian flick more effectively  

Because of this, you have to work more with your power and manage grip on both axles.  It's a nicer, more challenging drive.  But unfortunately restricting the car like this makes it feel grossly underpowered. 

The Manta feels how you would imagine a 1.6 Mk2 Escort to be.  You have to keep it wound up or it bogs down.  The movement is nice but the power is lacking.

If I had more power, I would actually try & turn the resistance up more, just to see how things react!


I'm not saying we should all break out the cable ties for our brake pedals, but it's a suggestion to Codies to add another dimension to further refine their physics model.

More resistance, more power, less speed (& the front axle is a bit too hard as standard - & gearing is a bit long - lol)

Try it & see team!

Can't you calibrate your brake pedal for a minimum force at 10% so when your pedal is at 0 the game thinks it is at 10%?

[LittleApple 47]

dgeesi0 said:

LittleApple said:

-snip-

so by this logic codemasters has no idea what they doing ? -snip-

They seemed to have some idea. They said in dev streams that cars base setup is around being "safe". Not being fastest, or oversteer nature. Just setups that will work for people who drive within the track limits.

To me thats how most base setups are. Fine aslong as you dont drive them beyond that limit. Other than camber/toe and roll bar i barely ever touch ther the base setup for the 4WD's on tarmac.

[PaloSamo 0]

LittleApple said:

https://youtu.be/VFqfSmp0YQU
https://youtu.be/q1bkdHwNSD8
No dramas driving the escort. I dont think the car has anything wrong with it from a personal POV i think they're as close to the real thing as any sim has come. Most corners had an entry speed in this video of around 140kmh. Would drop about 20-40km's off the top speed mid corner simply from the drifting angle. Recorded a video on Australia and the UK aswell but those stages were way to bumpy to actually give clean long drifts/slides thats what people seemed to want.

Able to do much longer slides in Dirt Fish if requested.

The hand of God comment seems to me to be a combination of poor setup and driving combination. It takes some practice and clear thought to learn how to drive and setup a car. This is a very hard thing for many wrap thier heads around. Well we see professionals getting setups wrong all the time. (Hamilton, Verstappen, Mcrea). Schumacher was probably one of the few who always seemed to nail perfection on his setups.

I didn't see much sliding in your videos, mate. Actually, on a couple of occasions I could see the issue that is bothering me in DiRT4 - when the rear end starts to come out you only need to press accelerator to straighten it out. There's not much countersteering going on. On a side note, who's Mcrea?

[dgeesi0 305]

Fizzlenog said:

KevM said:

More messing around - with promising outcomes!

Again, I have tied the brake pedal on.  
This provides a constant 10% braking to very crudely replicate wind resistance and car weight.  For the experiment, Iv shifted the brake bias forward to keep the driven wheels less restricted 
This has some nice effects in that: it slows the pace of the car down (the std game speed is silly-fast) and gives the rear wheels something to push against (creating grip-loss & wheel spin off the line & powering through corners).  It also creates understeer on the front axle, but the expected type, which is actually nice to 'deal' with.  Last of all, Codies wanted to add weight to the fly-away DR cars.  They aren't as jumpy in D4, but the brake restriction makes them feel heavier to drive.  Changing direction & braking isn't as flicky now and you can actually Scandinavian flick more effectively  

Because of this, you have to work more with your power and manage grip on both axles.  It's a nicer, more challenging drive.  But unfortunately restricting the car like this makes it feel grossly underpowered. 

The Manta feels how you would imagine a 1.6 Mk2 Escort to be.  You have to keep it wound up or it bogs down.  The movement is nice but the power is lacking.

If I had more power, I would actually try & turn the resistance up more, just to see how things react!


I'm not saying we should all break out the cable ties for our brake pedals, but it's a suggestion to Codies to add another dimension to further refine their physics model.

More resistance, more power, less speed (& the front axle is a bit too hard as standard - & gearing is a bit long - lol)

Try it & see team!

Can't you calibrate your brake pedal for a minimum force at 10% so when your pedal is at 0 the game thinks it is at 10%?

depends what pedals / set up you have but yes with most decent set ups you can set brakes as you want to whatever percentage.

[dgeesi0 305]

LittleApple said:

dgeesi0 said:

LittleApple said:

-snip-

so by this logic codemasters has no idea what they doing ? -snip-

They seemed to have some idea. They said in dev streams that cars base setup is around being "safe". Not being fastest, or oversteer nature. Just setups that will work for people who drive within the track limits.

To me thats how most base setups are. Fine aslong as you dont drive them beyond that limit. Other than camber/toe and roll bar i barely ever touch ther the base setup for the 4WD's on tarmac.

i know they do thats why it makes no sense to suggest its down to set ups.why would you make literally everyones experience poor with bad set ups ? that makes no sense.especially as most people buying dirt 4 will be on ps4 or eggbox 1.they mainly just want to go fast with no messing about.tbh im pretty much the same.thats what you have a team of mechanics for.if they set up the mk2 they need firing :D

[Madhun1967 51]

Ok so I went in last night and can setup the M3 perfect in Dirtfish.Havw to go pretty extreme to be able to do power oversteer and pendulum effect .
But it does feel pretty good with the extreme values in the tuning to dial in tail happiness.
The Evo is another story though ........ it's pretty much FWD only and in testing in Dirtfish I cannot even do a donut with it .Ridiculous.
The GC Impreza reacts to tuning pretty good ,although I cannot replicate McRae with the rear diff fully locked ,like he liked it on tarmac.
more tuning tonight :)

[SamRWD 2]

So we have to tweak setups to make it slide? Because it would make more sense to leave them default and enjoy faster times set while car is glued to the surface.

[Madhun1967 51]

Also the weirdest thing in the FWD 206 while tuning .The tire feedback from its front wheels is really good and audible when throwing it around ,unlike any AWD cars in game .
Like Codie's need to do to all the cars what they did to the front of the 206 .
It pushes under power and steps out off throttle like it's supposed to .
BTW that same 206 feels like shit to me in Spain.

[Madhun1967 51]

To semi enjoy the game in its current form ,yeah you have to tune .
Nowhere perfect though even after .

[KevM 44]

Fizzlenog said:

KevM said:

More messing around - with promising outcomes!

Again, I have tied the brake pedal on.  
This provides a constant 10% braking to very crudely replicate wind resistance and car weight.  For the experiment, Iv shifted the brake bias forward to keep the driven wheels less restricted 
This has some nice effects in that: it slows the pace of the car down (the std game speed is silly-fast) and gives the rear wheels something to push against (creating grip-loss & wheel spin off the line & powering through corners).  It also creates understeer on the front axle, but the expected type, which is actually nice to 'deal' with.  Last of all, Codies wanted to add weight to the fly-away DR cars.  They aren't as jumpy in D4, but the brake restriction makes them feel heavier to drive.  Changing direction & braking isn't as flicky now and you can actually Scandinavian flick more effectively  

Because of this, you have to work more with your power and manage grip on both axles.  It's a nicer, more challenging drive.  But unfortunately restricting the car like this makes it feel grossly underpowered. 

The Manta feels how you would imagine a 1.6 Mk2 Escort to be.  You have to keep it wound up or it bogs down.  The movement is nice but the power is lacking.

If I had more power, I would actually try & turn the resistance up more, just to see how things react!


I'm not saying we should all break out the cable ties for our brake pedals, but it's a suggestion to Codies to add another dimension to further refine their physics model.

More resistance, more power, less speed (& the front axle is a bit too hard as standard - & gearing is a bit long - lol)

Try it & see team!

Can't you calibrate your brake pedal for a minimum force at 10% so when your pedal is at 0 the game thinks it is at 10%?

Not on a crappy Xbox lol

But yeah, anyone on PC can give it a try

[Slowish 0]

dgeesi0 said:

i know they do thats why it makes no sense to suggest its down to set ups.why would you make literally everyones experience poor with bad set ups ? that makes no sense.especially as most people buying dirt 4 will be on ps4 or eggbox 1.they mainly just want to go fast with no messing about.tbh im pretty much the same.thats what you have a team of mechanics for.if they set up the mk2 they need firing :D

SMS took the same approach with PCars1 and it was a recipe for disaster; the cars handled poorly, didn't drive like "Sim" cars at all and the FFB out of the box was terrible with massive clipping - all in favor of making the cars easy to handle. They lost most of the Sim market within the first few hours of release and have a steep uphill climb to overcome those mistakes with PC2.

[KevM 44]

SamRWD said:

So we have to tweak setups to make it slide? Because it would make more sense to leave them default and enjoy faster times set while car is glued to the surface.

& that's why it has to be patched.  Be slower, setting the car to feel more authentic, or break records with stacks of fake grip just like a Dirt Rally man with a 3Euro hack-pack :p

[Gordouxk 0]

PaloSamo said:

LittleApple said:

https://youtu.be/VFqfSmp0YQU
https://youtu.be/q1bkdHwNSD8
No dramas driving the escort. I dont think the car has anything wrong with it from a personal POV i think they're as close to the real thing as any sim has come. Most corners had an entry speed in this video of around 140kmh. Would drop about 20-40km's off the top speed mid corner simply from the drifting angle. Recorded a video on Australia and the UK aswell but those stages were way to bumpy to actually give clean long drifts/slides thats what people seemed to want.

Able to do much longer slides in Dirt Fish if requested.

The hand of God comment seems to me to be a combination of poor setup and driving combination. It takes some practice and clear thought to learn how to drive and setup a car. This is a very hard thing for many wrap thier heads around. Well we see professionals getting setups wrong all the time. (Hamilton, Verstappen, Mcrea). Schumacher was probably one of the few who always seemed to nail perfection on his setups.

I didn't see much sliding in your videos, mate. 

I see too much sliding goin on. In real life going through such fast corners you would not want the car to get too sideways at all because it would take off too much speed. Especially on a very soft and heavy gravel like at Michigan. In real life you would want to drive that particular car very straight like Latvalla in that Audi Quattro Finland video I posted earlier. 

[griev0r 15]

I applaud you guys to trying to make extreme setups to make the game feel decent on sim mode, but I don't think you can tune out physics problems in the game.  It's truly a shame CM has still not addressed this well over a month.  I had no faith in Codies the way the Dirt series was going, and thought there would never be a rally sim ever again years and years after RBR, then DR hit out of nowhere.  Sure it had/has its problems, but they got my trust how they handled that EA, and made it a great f'n rally sim.  They got my pre-order on the hype of Dirt Rally but better with millions of stages, and I can't help but feel let down.

They are really dropping the ball here and losing us rally sim fans.  D4 has mixed reviews on Steam, and more people are playing DR.  My Dirt Rally league I'm in hasn't had a post on the boards for a week, the gossip thread here is barely being posted to.  That's bad a little over a month after the new game comes out.  Dirt 4 is underwhelming to say the least, the lack of communication or anything from CM is making it worse.  I have 300 hours in Dirt Rally, but can't make it past 16 hours trying my hardest to like it in Dirt 4.  No tuning will help, and My Stage needs serious work. 

[Gordouxk 0]

griev0r said:

I applaud you guys to trying to make extreme setups to make the game feel decent on sim mode, but I don't think you can tune out physics problems in the game.  It's truly a shame CM has still not addressed this well over a month.  I had no faith in Codies the way the Dirt series was going, and thought there would never be a rally sim ever again years and years after RBR, then DR hit out of nowhere.  Sure it had/has its problems, but they got my trust how they handled that EA, and made it a great f'n rally sim.  They got my pre-order on the hype of Dirt Rally but better with millions of stages, and I can't help but feel let down.

They are really dropping the ball here and losing us rally sim fans.  D4 has mixed reviews on Steam, and more people are playing DR.  My Dirt Rally league I'm in hasn't had a post on the boards for a week, the gossip thread here is barely being posted to.  That's bad a little over a month after the new game comes out.  Dirt 4 is underwhelming to say the least, the lack of communication or anything from CM is making it worse.  I have 300 hours in Dirt Rally, but can't make it past 16 hours trying my hardest to like it in Dirt 4.  No tuning will help, and My Stage needs serious work. 

Funny that you say that since Dirt 4 is about 1000 times more sim than Dirt Rally ever was. My guess is that years of playing games like Dirt Rally and even RBR tricked people's brians into believing that that's how rally cars drive in real life. But the reality is much different and some people are struggling to readjust. 

[ShodanCat 231]

The fact that we are now up to almost 100 pages in this thread without a single developer comment is unacceptable IMHO. I went into D4 (which I pre-ordered on the first day it was available to do so)  with high confidence based on DR's development and dev interaction based on feedback. The way D4 is being handled (the key developers going on vacation for a month *immediately* following release? Really???) and absolutely no communication other than a launch day Facebook stream that hinted at known problems and extremely vague response in the last Road Book just flabbergasts me that they could go from a shining example with DR to D4 which ensures I'll never be preordering - and maybe buying - a Codies title again.

I know this is basically OT to what this thread is about, but the thing is we can't just hash this over for 100+ pages without any feedback. It's just wasting breath at this point.

/rant off

[Gordouxk 0]

ShodanCat said:

The fact that we are now up to almost 100 pages in this thread without a single developer comment is unacceptable IMHO. I went into D4 (which I pre-ordered on the first day it was available to do so)  with high confidence based on DR's development and dev interaction based on feedback. The way D4 is being handled (the key developers going on vacation for a month *immediately* following release? Really???) and absolutely no communication other than a launch day Facebook stream that hinted at known problems and extremely vague response in the last Road Book just flabbergasts me that they could go from a shining example with DR to D4 which ensures I'll never be preordering - and maybe buying - a Codies title again.

I know this is basically OT to what this thread is about, but the thing is we can't just hash this over for 100+ pages without any feedback. It's just wasting breath at this point.

/rant off

We have nearly 100 pages of about 5 people repeating the same thing over and over again and being rude and disrespectful to the other 5 people who diagree with them. 

[griev0r 15]

Gordouxk said:

Funny that you say that since Dirt 4 is about 1000 times more sim than Dirt Rally ever was. My guess is that years of playing games like Dirt Rally and even RBR tricked people's brians into believing that that's how rally cars drive in real life. But the reality is much different and some people are struggling to readjust. 

Ok Headlong V2, it's pretty simple.  There is a reason for mixed reviews on Steam, outcry from the rally sim community after the hype of a better Dirt Rally with limitless stages.  It didn't deliver on either front.  The sim physics are dumbed down, you can't slide the cars AT ALL, and the stages are extremely repetitive.

Dirt 4 takes 1 step forward and 2 steps back in regards to physics.  I can feel the weight of the cars better than DR, especially under braking.  But you cannot keep a slide through a hairpin going, you can't drift through a fast right 5 on gravel without steering into the corner and the car pin-pointing itself straight instantly.  Watch the replays, the cars act like pendulums that just bob back and forth till the instantly right themselves straight as soon as you pin the throttle like every car in the game is FWD.  And I'm not just using almost 20 years of sim racing experience when I say shit like this, the replays look horrible!! The way the cars move, if you've watched any WRC or rally stuff on YouTube it just doesn't look right.  Dirt 4 is broken at the moment with rally physics, and I feel like I wasted 60$ because that's all I bought it for after the way it was marketed. 

[ShodanCat 231]

Gordouxk said:

ShodanCat said:

The fact that we are now up to almost 100 pages in this thread without a single developer comment is unacceptable IMHO. I went into D4 (which I pre-ordered on the first day it was available to do so)  with high confidence based on DR's development and dev interaction based on feedback. The way D4 is being handled (the key developers going on vacation for a month *immediately* following release? Really???) and absolutely no communication other than a launch day Facebook stream that hinted at known problems and extremely vague response in the last Road Book just flabbergasts me that they could go from a shining example with DR to D4 which ensures I'll never be preordering - and maybe buying - a Codies title again.

I know this is basically OT to what this thread is about, but the thing is we can't just hash this over for 100+ pages without any feedback. It's just wasting breath at this point.

/rant off

We have nearly 100 pages of about 5 people repeating the same thing over and over again and being rude and disrespectful to the other 5 people who diagree with them. 

I agree, because we've already established the physics are off. We have made our case pretty clear and it's up to Codies to do something, if anything, about it. 

[Gordouxk 0]

griev0r said:

Gordouxk said:

Funny that you say that since Dirt 4 is about 1000 times more sim than Dirt Rally ever was. My guess is that years of playing games like Dirt Rally and even RBR tricked people's brians into believing that that's how rally cars drive in real life. But the reality is much different and some people are struggling to readjust. 

Ok Headlong V2, it's pretty simple.  There is a reason for mixed reviews on Steam, outcry from the rally sim community after the hype of a better Dirt Rally with limitless stages.  It didn't deliver on either front.  The sim physics are dumbed down, you can't slide the cars AT ALL, and the stages are extremely repetitive.

Dirt 4 takes 1 step forward and 2 steps back in regards to physics.  I can feel the weight of the cars better than DR, especially under braking.  But you cannot keep a slide through a hairpin going, you can't drift through a fast right 5 on gravel without steering into the corner and the car pin-pointing itself straight instantly.  Watch the replays, the cars act like pendulums that just bob back and forth till the instantly right themselves straight as soon as you pin the throttle like every car in the game is FWD.  And I'm not just using almost 20 years of sim racing experience when I say **** like this, the replays look horrible!! The way the cars move, if you've watched any WRC or rally stuff on YouTube it just doesn't look right.  Dirt 4 is broken at the moment with rally physics, and I feel like I wasted 60$ because that's all I bought it for after the way it was marketed. 

Do you know what the argumentum ad populum logical fallacy is? Look it up if you don't? And I agree that YOU can't slide through a hairpin and drift through corners in fifth gear. You can't do  it in real life and you can't do it in the game. You wanted a sim and you got it.