Dear Members of the LFS Community,

There was a post on this forum recently, calling for banning of non-wheel devices. I think that has upset many of the keyboarders and mousers that exist within the community. So that got me thinking, instead of banning them, I am now going to do the opposite! I think its time to encourage Keyboard and Mouse drivers, no I’m not saying trash your wheel and use keyboard, what I mean is help out these players without a wheel and teach them how-to play and enjoy LFS with whatever controls they have.

With that in mind, my team, SCCabCo has decide that we, with the help of everybody in the Keyboard/Mouse community will create a comprehensive guide that will help Keyboarders/Mousers drive faster and as a consequence have more fun. Now I am not saying that miracles are going to happen, and Ks/Mouse players will top the hotlap charts, but I DO believe that these of us without a wheel can keep up with the majority of wheel users and have enjoyable close racing. How this will work is there will be a forum where all the keyboarders and mousers can gather and discuss tips, and share sets. Information from the forums will then be compiled into a neat little guide, and be regularly updated as new information comes in.

Now, many of you are probably asking ‘Just get a wheel you loser!’ or ‘Why are you guys doing this?’.

Answering the first question, there are many many reasons why some of us play with Keyboard/Mouse. Some of us simply can’t afford to buy a wheel, others might have a wheel, but still opt to use keyboard because it is much more convenient. For example, I don’t have 1-2 hour LFS sessions, when I have free time, I load up LFS and have a quick race or 2, I just don’t have the time to setup a wheel. Some people might not have the room to set-up a wheel, and for some students who sneaks in a game of LFS between ‘Study’, it is quite hard to make a wheel disappear quickly.

Why are we doing this? To put it simply, we just want to help out. Plus we believe helping Keyboarder’s and Mouser’s alike will ultimately support the growth of LFS. Let me explain, the Demo servers are the first impressions a player gets of the game, and whether he will ever buy S2 might be decided right then and there. Now if you visit some of the demo servers, it is not uncommon to see 30-50% of drivers using keyboard, and then you goto S2 and what do you find? There might be 1 Keyboard player per server sometimes, and usually none. Now where did that 30-50% go? A few might of bought S2 and then a wheel, but more likely than not, they got so frustrated with the game because they simply can’t drive well and gave up ‘it’s just too hard’. But if we can help just 100 of these players, and have them go on to buy S2, that’s 100 more players to the LFS community, and more money that goes into the development of our beloved game. We also believe this COULD help reduce the number of wreckers, I know it’s a stretch, but it’s a longshot, maybe if they learn how-to drive forward well, they’ll stay that way.

The SCCC team behind this is Myself, GianniC (GC), YnoT and Tukko, and we have received the thumbs up from legendary Keyboarders such as Orion, and current mouse superstar PartyBoyU.

I am hoping for a positive response from the community!

This project is still in its very early stages, but feel free to signup to the forums and start chatting it up.

Site: http://kam.sccabco.com
Forums: http://www.sccabco.com/phpBB2/index.php?c=3

And as we say - Keyboard Power! and/or Mouse Power!


[SCCC] Chensta Ex-Keyboarder, Current Mouser

I'm also ex-keyboarder and in demo times you are that guy who help
me about setting my controls. This really help me.

Later you made little guide and as you now, this not help one or 2 driver...
there are many drivers who read that and thats one part of their developing driving skills.

I really hope that project goes well and soon we all can read very good guide book


Best wishes,
MorroW

I completely agree with everything you've said Chensta

Keep up the good work, and good luck :Handshake

Yea! Great work and good luck.
Many players plays with keyboard so that would be good.

I remember old days, then the keyboard drivers could do the same speed as wheel users. I am ex-keyboard driver, but I remember on S1 to get a 1.27.XX lap one time, and I have seen other done it too.

But after the release of S2 everything has changed, keyboard drivers can never be even near to get those laps as wheel drivers, this muhc because the devs simply did the helping more slowly, easier, but slower :\

So I hope they can do something with this, and I will encourage every man with keyboard to use it with a good smile, and ignore people that says, god damn , buy a wheel n00b ^^

Good prosject, wish you all good luck.

Well, I think that keyboard is not the way to go on lfs.. Even on the days of assisted steering on keyboard I quit this kind of controller because I was not satisfied with the reactions sometimes when I went through the curbs. Then I discovered that my setups had very big issues that would make them undriveable on other controller methods.

I don't support bringing back the old system, and it's not related with the fact that I use a wheel today. I think that it was unfair with some mouse drivers, and the old kb system don't make you to use actual driving techniques.

But mouse is a very competitive way. I've played lfs with mouse for a long period on S1 days, and could even fight for some world records using that. My teammate Carlos uses mouse and he is a very fast driver.


The advantage of mouse over keyboard is that mouse lets you to use actual driving techniques, so most part of the problem is to know actual driving techniques. Other part of the problem (imo) is to have a fast computer in order to get a fast visual feedback of the virtual wheel as a feedback of the mouse position.


Imo, the best view for mouse drivers is the cockpit view, because the virtual wheel is much more precise than that curved bar that you get on other views as a feedback of the mouse position. Since the virtual wheel is more precise and is nearer from the viewing point, I think that it should always be used.



As any other controller, mouse takes time to master. My FPS game days helped me a lot on having a precise mouse control, so I took about 1 and 1/2 week to be on par with my keyboard laps (on the assisted steering days). Actually I took much more time to be able to be fast with my wheel than I got to be fast with mouse.


And everyone can afford a good quality mouse, so I don't think that it's an excuse. Also every computer have a mouse, so it can't be used as an excuse too.

Quote from Lola Popeye :

and for some students who sneaks in a game of LFS between ‘Study’, it is quite hard to make a wheel disappear quickly.

Who me??? I've never played LFS during class.... yeah, that's it. I'm a dedicated wheel user at home, but I still love all our KAM friends, I think they're just as entitled to this wonderful sim as anyone else. Of course, I'm very sympathetic, I've had to suffer with a 1.0GHz PIII, 256MB RAM, 32MB videocard, and a non-ffb joystick or mouse for a very long time. I will say that LFS is more fun with a wheel and a nice system, but I don't think we should exclude anyone. Just my $0.02

nice work!!

As a keyboarder and an owner of a logitech wingman, i'm saying again and again: for some people keyboard is much more FUNNIER than a wheel!!! Especially when playing BL1 XFG. They always said that this is a sim-racing game. Yes i know it, and that's why i play LFS. I don't care about the controller of the game, i care about the garage.

People ask all the time why are some racers are so fast with mouse and keyboard, is this a bug or not? The answer of this question is that they play too much (when i say too much, it is more than 3 hours a day) and they are talented. LFS Developers make LFS harder and harder for keyboarders in every new patch but we are still alive and we will survive!

As a full-time mouse player I fully agree with all your suggestions (simply don't have the room for a wheel at the moment). I'd be happy to share suggestions/take suggestion from other kb/mouse players.

Get the thumbs up from me!

Quote from HASTA :

As a keyboarder and an owner of a logitech wingman, i'm saying again and again: for some people keyboard is much more FUNNIER than a wheel!!! Especially when playing BL1 XFG. They always said that this is a sim-racing game. Yes i know it, and that's why i play LFS. I don't care about the controller of the game, i care about the garage.

People ask all the time why are some racers are so fast with mouse and and keyboard, is this a bug or not? The answer of this question is that they play too much (when i say too much, it is more than 3 hours a day) and they are talented. LFS Developers make LFS harder and harder for keyboarders in every new patch but we are still alive and we will survive!

AMEN

Therefor SCCC has decided to start Project KAM ! We hope to see a lot of reaction from you and who knows this is the start of a real KAM community inside LFS.

hey, good luck with project kam, i kno i sneak in between study and lfs, that why i play in window mode lol,

while im not in total disagreement of the idea, i dont think its a good thing to encourage more keyboard and mouse users...

more of a selfish point really, since i found keyb/mouse incredibly dull to use racing. i will stick by saying "What's the point? Get a wheel!"

So are you suggesting, instead of of encouraging Keyboard and Mouse users, we should just tell em to get a wheel, and if they cant (which is probably, hence why their using Ks/Mouse inthe first place) they should just leave LFS?

If you can't afford a wheel like me, and using mouse myself. I want to enjoy this sim as much as possible. It's not my fault that i cannot afford a wheel. While many people think keyboards and/or mousers are slow and lame, i myself think i'm pretty fast and drive pretty clean.

Quote from vpr01 :

while im not in total disagreement of the idea, i dont think its a good thing to encourage more keyboard and mouse users...

more of a selfish point really, since i found keyb/mouse incredibly dull to use racing. i will stick by saying "What's the point? Get a wheel!"

I don't quite follow your logic but you're saying that because you don't like to use a kb/mouse you wouldn't like someone else to? Well okay, I guess that's a valid point of sorts IF, and I stress the IF - let me stress that IF a little more - the project's goal was evangelizing the use of kb/mouse for playing LFS, which it is not. It's just helping out people who already are using different controllers to enjoy the game more.

Good luck on the guides - I already used and appreciated your first kb guide, Chensta.

like i said, quite a selfish point. I just dont see how someone can get any enjoyment from a racing game with keyb/mouse!

I can get just as much as enjoyment from driving with mouse then other people with wheels, im just as addicted to S2 as them

Quote from vpr01 :

like i said, quite a selfish point. I just dont see how someone can get any enjoyment from a racing game with keyb/mouse!

That's very harsh. I get an immense amount of enjoyment out of racing games, it's just that LFS does mouse control very well.

I've introduced two people to LFS and they both find it fantastic and they don't have a wheel.

OK, granted I'm sure that having a wheel immerses you in the experience that much more, but you can't assume that players with kb and mouse don't get any enjoyment out of racing games.

am a ks user and i have a wheel too, to be honest i dont really see any difference in enjoyment, using either one feels the same

that's because you forgot to turn on FF ;p

Quote from jmkz :

that's because you forgot to turn on FF ;p

clearly

nope its on, and am not sayin that keyboard is better than wheel, am jus sayin that u could get enjoyment from ks too,

besides this kam project is not to encourage more keyboard or mouse users, but to help those who have no choice but to use em.

I'm not talking about the enjoyment, I'm replying to this statement

Quote from smack :

using either one feels the same

well Duh!!! wheel has a better feel that ks, its a wheel after all. i was talkin about enjoyment.

please don't get upset, was just joking, sorry if it offended , notice all the smileys in my posts please