AFAIK, LFS will be getting a graphics update once S2 final is out - ie, in the first official S2 Final patches. Right now the focus is probably AI, sound, physics and improvements to netcode to support larger grids.

Quote from scoobyrbac :

Yeah well...There is some things that need to be better....Like tyre smoke without use the smokemod would be nice like in S2 they can view everyones skins..be nice if they can do that in the demo...and change the cars up some..becaus those 3 cars get boring and there slow....and a couple more track selections...

You're kidding, right? Firstly smoke is something that has a huge hit on FPS on lower-end graphics cards so while the devs are aware that there isn't enough smoke in most circumstances, they are doing this for the sake of performance.

Secondly, if you pay money - £24 is all you need - you'll get the rest of your requests.

Scooby,
If you want to experiment with higher res textures I offer a pretty full texture mod for Blackwood- just follow the link in my signiture below. At present I do think that the default textures are a bit too low res, but I believe that will all be taken care of come S3. Don and Kidcodea have great high res skies available which are a must download- Kid/Don? has just collected all of this stuff into one file which you can find here. Also I recommend Yamakawa's reflection mod, which provides a more intense reflection effect on cars.
You won't see incredible new graphics with any of this stuff, but IMO it's better than nothing. See how you go

Quote from Vain :

LFS's performance is already pretty bad, considering the quality of the graphics we have. I'd hate to see how much the fps will drop when more detail is included.

Vain

Don't know how you can say LFS performance is pretty bad. Like I said earlier, I'm also on an onboard ATI chip. I'm running LFS at maximum settings other than dynamic LOD for race starts, and run AA/AF in my onboard graphics options. My only limiting factor is the resolution where I stick with 1024x768. That gives me 35-50 FPS, like I said.

In comparison, GTL, with all it's over done eyecandy I tried setting it at directX 7, all options minumum, resolution at 800x600 and still hit 10 FPS.

...until you join a full grid of cars.
The fps are very jumpy. On some sections you get fewer than 50% of the fps you get in other places. Put in 20 cars at such spots and suddenly LFS doesn't run that smooth anymore at all.

Vain

This Thread reminds me on a situation i had a couple of months ago:

There was a buddy visiting me while i was just in a long run race, so i went to the pits (he had great timing ), opened the door and finished the race while he was watching. He has never seen this game before and said, "damn thats kind of bad graphics". In this moment i thought, damn he is kind of right. What i mean is, i never gave a sh.. on the gfx (which isnt that bad at all anyway) more then that i was to much impressed by the simulation part also there are games out there with great gfx but without any simulation, <place name here> . I gave him some facts about the game and the Devs and told him that: its not a screen shot generator but a competitionless online racing simulator. (so far)

"Well" i said, "go on and do some laps"... He did, and i wasnt able to unplug him from my system for at least 2 hours. illepall

Basically, I agree with what Scawen said about it being a sim and not a pretty picture making utility.
Personally, I would much rather see a wider range of systems run a fantastically detailed piece of simulated genius like this, than a half dozen top-end users running full DX10 graphics settings and a program that's as realistic as the laughter in 80s sit coms.

Let's use me as an example.
I run a fairly old system with a fairly old card and I get a very playable 50ish to 80ish FPS in LFS, with about 25-30 on a full grid. Lovely. I'd panic if it was dropping below 20 because then reaction times are affected, but 25 is fine.
Now let's upgrade to DX9 and stick in a bunch of realtime reflections, doubling poly count and knocking maybe 25-40% off my frame rate. Suddenly the game is ticking along at an unplayable 5-10FPS on a full grid. Then we add in the upcoming weather effects which you won't be able to turn off (unless you're an admin) and we knock off another half dozen frames. Uh oh, 0FPS. So everything gets turned off because it's not needed.

And if half of your audience has to switch the effects off to play, why did you bother adding them in the first place? Total waste of time and effort.

If you ask me. Which you didn't, but I don't care

Quote from Vain :

...until you join a full grid of cars.
The fps are very jumpy. On some sections you get fewer than 50% of the fps you get in other places. Put in 20 cars at such spots and suddenly LFS doesn't run that smooth anymore at all.

Vain

I don't think you can do much about that at all TBH. This will happen in any sim. Apart from having "mip-map" style thing of the mesh rendering it with a different number of polys depending on distance, I can't think of many ways to improve it.

Quote from scoobyrbac :

Hey im not tryin to be mean but could you atleast give or video cards a run for the money? We buy almost $200 video cards and here they say its a racing sim...but in other sim's they are 300 times better than this...like Flight Simulator X couldnt you get grafix like that?

My motherboard was 80-100 euros, so why LFS doesnt have good sounds?:O

Quote from p1u :

My motherboard was 80-100 euros, so why LFS doesnt have good sounds?:O

Because you should've bought the $200 X-fi and the $450 Logitech Z-5400 to go with it before you can complain about the sounds???

Although I agree LFS should not be a screenshot generator (I wonder why we can take screenshots then?), most of the nifty effects can be turned off in the options. But all in good time... Once the racing simulator part is done, Scawen can always start working on the screenshot generating bit, while Eric does the gazillion tracks and cars he has in the pipeline.

dont know if its been reported... there's a section on kyoto long, where i notice a considerable drop in framerate. its only noticable if i am running 4xAA and 6xAF with adaptive anti-aliasing. it goes from 40 to around 18 and then back up after a second or two...\


the game does look much better with a bit of AA and AF i wonder how many people play lfs without a bit of either.

Quote from Vain :

...until you join a full grid of cars.
The fps are very jumpy. On some sections you get fewer than 50% of the fps you get in other places. Put in 20 cars at such spots and suddenly LFS doesn't run that smooth anymore at all.

Go play netKar Pro online and let's talk about performance after that...

Quote from Gabkicks :

the game does look much better with a bit of AA and AF i wonder how many people play lfs without a bit of either.

I agree, LFS is those games that needs FSAA to look good. Maybe it is because of LFS's simplistic vertex (?) rendering or something and not-so-advanced lightning.

Quote from Taavi(EST) :

Please tell me that this looks bad for todays standards

what track remake is this?

Quote from deggis :

Go play netKar Pro online and let's talk about performance after that...

If it s full game...is it better than LFS? Is it online? I might switch to that insted of LFS.....


Edit: I just looked it up...haha its a WAY better version of LFS with just F1 cars....haha nice

nK Poo. Better than LFS?

*faints*

EDIT - I typed nK Pro. SamH the mod was a noob and changed it!

Quote from scoobyrbac :

If it s full game...is it better than LFS? Is it online? I might switch to that insted of LFS.....


Edit: I just looked it up...haha its a WAY better version of LFS with just F1 cars....haha nice

First of all it's not an LFS version and second there's not a single F1 car in it. But I'm probably nitpicking.
nKPro may look quite nice, it's got alot of problems and you'll hardly find anyone online besides in the one league or so.
It's all about the complete package as far as I'm concerned, and LFS definitely has the better package. If all you're looking for in a game is fancy graphics then I guess LFS isn't the right game for you.

My only experience so far...

I play on an AMD X2 4600+ with 2GB PC3200 RAM and an ATI X1900XT 256MB Edition.

1600x1200 32bit 4xAA 8xAF 85Hz. Single player race. 10 cars. 3 laps. From inside and out of the car. Everything in game VIDEO and GRAPHICS settings maxed completely out.

The fps counter never left 85 once.

Can't wait to test out a full track of cars.

Comming from GTL where 1280x960 4xAA 8xAF with HIGH settings in game and getting parts of the race get jumpy on me and dipping into the low 40's, this was a VERY welcome change.

I want to race. And I need EVERY split second of smoothness in the corners when I am pushing it. Framerate drops tend to cause me to mis-judge my speed and apex.

So far I am impressed with LFS. But nothing is ever perfect.

C.

Quote from scoobyrbac :

If it s full game...is it better than LFS? Is it online? I might switch to that insted of LFS.....


Edit: I just looked it up...haha its a WAY better version of LFS with just F1 cars....haha nice

lol:dunce: