Dipping my toes in this Sim stuff, any Forza 7 folk on here?

So Walmart had a Black Friday Xbox One sale and I couldn't resist.

I've thought about some Sim racing before, but added up the cost and decided I'd rather buy car parts. My buddy talked me into getting a FFB wheel, and after a lot of consideration landed on the Thrustmaster TMX Pro kit. So far I'm pleased, but was already looking into a load cell upgrade for the T3Pa pedals. Brake and throttle modulation is a little too vague for me, or I just suck. Anyway that same buddy had a spare set of Clubsport V3s with dampers on throttle/brake, plus all of the brake performance kit poly stuff. He said I could have them. Can't argue with that, so I looked up a way to make it work with the TM wheel. I ordered up a DriveHub adapter that allows me to put it all together and talk nice. Should have that all functional by next Wednesday I think, and best of all the box allows me to use this gear on ANY platform.

One of the biggest things I wanted to get was a seat/rig setup. I'm camped out in the living room, so couldn't get something real rigid and it needs to pack up into a closet. I stumbled on the Playseat Challenge. It frickin rocks! Super comfortable, packs up in a minute, and has improved my driving a ton already. I bought a Ricmotech adapter to bolt the TMX wheel to the seat. It's simple and could have been made with my own hands, but the lazy side has taken over lately.

So I've started out with Forza 7 Motorsport for now. I'm probably going to dive into Project Cars 2 as that's on Xbox as well and was recommended by another friend.  Any of yoos guys on Forza 7? Trying to put some fruit in one basket while I work on basic skills, but I'm thinking about trying some other games to venture in to.

Untitled by hatchethairy, on Flickr

Forza is awesome I cut my online sim racing teeth on the first and 2nd Forzas.   Unfortunately I now do all my gaming and sim racing on PC so I can't join ya there.   We do have a Dirt Rally 2 thing that we just started.   The nice thing about that is that all systems work together since your not actually connecting and racing at the same time.   We setup an event and you can complete the event at your convenience over the course of a week.   Then it compares the times of all the drivers regardless of platform.  Check out this thread:

https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/simulation-central/dirt-rally-20-grm-club/161876/page1/

Maniac0301 said:

Forza is awesome I cut my online sim racing teeth on the first and 2nd Forzas.   Unfortunately I now do all my gaming and sim racing on PC so I can't join ya there.   We do have a Dirt Rally 2 thing that we just started.   The nice thing about that is that all systems work together since your not actually connecting and racing at the same time.   We setup an event and you can complete the event at your convenience over the course of a week.   Then it compares the times of all the drivers regardless of platform.  Check out this thread:

https://grassrootsmotorsports.com/forum/simulation-central/dirt-rally-20-grm-club/161876/page1/

I might need to get in on this. 

In reply to captainawesome :

I've played quite a bit of Forza 7. Haven't picked it up in a while. Played project cars 2 and found it to be less forgiving than Forza. I could see project cars 2 being more fun with a sim setup.

I play forza 7 occasionally. I'm just using a controller but I still like to get on and either just do some laps or pop into a d class hopper lobby.

I'm finding there's a mixed bag of nuts when doing the hopper lobby stuff. Since I'm new, I'm back at the rear of the grid, and dive bombing is apparently just the norm. Last night me and a couple buddies spent some time doing an open track at the Nurburgring turning hot laps and that was a lot of fun. The hopper lobby we are usually in is the one where each race is a different track AND car. I struggle to acclimate that quickly so it's often a disaster. I think I'm going to try some lower class hopper lobbies and move my way up as needed. I'll look into the Dirt Rally one a bit as well. This stuff is addictive.

I used to run FM7 a LOT.  Don’t run it that much anymore, but I was on for an hour and a half this morning running a D class lobby.

In reply to racerfink :

I was running in the D class open lobby this morning. Was yours private? What's your name on there? I'm DonkeyLips31. I ended up getting a tuned version of the 90 Miata that was pretty fun and somewhat competitive. Ran quite a bit this afternoon getting acclimated.

A few years ago, we had a pretty good 'spec miata' group on Forza 4, mostly guys from Miata.net.  Ran in a private lobby restricted in such a way that the cars were exactly matched, and we could punt any strangers that were being asshats.  It kind of faded 'cause it's just difficult for everyone to get online at once.

I recently got back into it and picked up Forza 7 so I could simulate our ZL1.  

Forza 7 looks fantastic, but there's something goofy in the physics that I haven't quite figured out, and I still haven't really got braking dialed in.  I have older Fanatec pedals and a newer wheel... I need to upgrade to the newer pedals to see if I can get more braking feel.

Also, the 'career' play in F7 sucks compared to F4... in F4 you had a lot more freedom to build and race the car you wanted to, where F7 locks you into just a few cars for each race series.  And the AI drivers are awful.

I haven't done any online racing with F7 yet.

In reply to Rodan :

Physics are a bit hard to grasp. Some cars manage to just go loose and start whipping back and forth uncontrollably. Braking, lifting off throttle ever so slightly, etc. but it's usually too late to catch in time. There are some cars that don't seem to care what you do, they stick pretty good. I'm hoping the Clubsport pedals will help in that department, but honestly after a couple days of using the Playseat Challenge I have been able to modulate pedals so much better. My next step is to get a TH8A shifter since I'm just using paddles for the time being. I think it would help learn what gears are best for each turn better? I'm also thinking about turning off the brake zone so I can just use what's already there for markers.

The online lobby I was in was just the open D class. Since I'm pretty new to it, I'm still surprised at how quickly the group goes from being completely reasonable to an all out brawl. Most of the time it was civil though, and still good practice rubbing paint.

captainawesome said:

In reply to Rodan :

Physics are a bit hard to grasp. Some cars manage to just go loose and start whipping back and forth uncontrollably.

This is exactly what I was referring to, and it's different in F7 from previous versions.  For example, the Lotus 2 Eleven was fantastic in F4, and the same car is almost undriveable in F7.  I've tried some tuning, but can't seem to get it dialed in...

Rain races are also a little weird at times.  And it always seems like at least one of the AI cars has dry traction while everyone else is sliding around.  Even in the dry, AI drivers have very unrealistic acceleration off corners.

For the most part, it does provide a pretty good simulator, once you get the cars dialed.  I was recently able to model a swap from 5 speed to 6 speed in my real world NA, and try it at various tracks in F7.  The improved gearing an acceleration off slow corners showed a 1-1.5sec/ lap improvement on the sim, which is exactly what I expect to see with the real car this spring.

Same as here

The campaign in F4 is far superior to F7. Physics has their pluses and minuses in both games. One thing that bugs me is I cannot set the steering to simulation in F7. Everything becomes a twitchy weird mess. I must say it's easier to catch a slide or a loose handling car in F7 over the previous games.

clutchsmoke said:

 I must say it's easier to catch a slide or a loose handling car in F7 over the previous games.

Curious which wheel you're using, as I found it to be the exact opposite with a Fanatec 

I play Forza 7 on PC. One cool thing with buying some of the Xbox games digitally is it gives you the game for Xbox and PC, this is the case with Forza. Your progress is saved and sync'd between platforms too. 
The only issue I have is getting the steering feel better on PC. The Forza games are just so pretty that I enjoy playing them even if they aren't the most realistic. 

I played Forza 7 a lot when it came out, but the progression in career mode frustrates me.  I'll get on and race around VIR and Road Atlanta every now and then.  Several years ago we had pretty good Forza 4 tournaments, I skipped 5 and 6.  My son has been hogging the Xbox with Horizon 4 and Madden. 

I have a Forza 7 account.  Like some of the others here it has been a bit since my last run on there.  
I believe my screen is mkirby924.  I will keep an eye out for ya.

Rodan said:

clutchsmoke said:

 I must say it's easier to catch a slide or a loose handling car in F7 over the previous games.

Curious which wheel you're using, as I found it to be the exact opposite with a Fanatec 

No wheel setup sadly. Just Xbox controller. Perhaps because I am using the steering setting that's just under simulation?

There are a good number of affordable wheels out there these days.  If you wait there are always sales on at Amazon to get the G29 or 920 for half price.  It is where I got mine.  I have been running online races with Forza Motorsports 7 the last couple of days.  Using it to tune my 944 to be competitive in the Class B group.  

I think if there is enough interest we could setup a Forza run one night.  Wednesdays are out for me due to my rFactor commitment.  But any other day could be fun.

I've got F7 an play with some guys from work some. It's been a little bit though, I've been really getting into the GRM Dirt Rally 2.0 league. 

I need to try out the Dirt Rally. Forza 7 lobbies are getting old with all of the terrible drivers. I tried to do the race regulations a couple times and regardless of the points system there are people on there that just have no other way to drive than to smash into you. I've mainly been in private lobbies with a few buddies but even that has began to lose it's charm.

In reply to captainawesome :

It's a blast but it's really tough. I can generally just hop into a car in forza and do some fast laps no sweat. Dirt rally takes 100% focus and is still hard. It's way more of a sim than forza is. I'm already addicted to trying to catch nonack. 

shagles said:

In reply to captainawesome :

It's a blast but it's really tough. I can generally just hop into a car in forza and do some fast laps no sweat. Dirt rally takes 100% focus and is still hard. It's way more of a sim than forza is. I'm already addicted to trying to catch nonack. 

That settles it. Gotta get this one and check it out.