Has it ever happened to you when you're so far ahead on the lead and you're performing at your best, but then the AI, out of nowhere, somehow, manages to catch up to you? This makes you lose your confidence and end up losing the race. Please share your experience.
I think the AI on racing games is always a problem, but simply because the game developers don't know how to set it up. Obviously people want to have a bit of competition but if it's set to hard, then people will just stop playing as it's no fun doing your best but losing every race. At the same time though, if it's too easy then again people will just stop.playing because nobody wants to win by 2 clear laps all the time either.
In the older games, AI have been all over the place and nowadays I feel like in some of the games they have been a bit too hard. My most favorite AI game was Need for Speed Underground as they were natural and offered a degree of difficulty but was good enough to win.
When I played racing games on my PSOne I used to finish first on every race, I do not really know why, I personally think that if I ever play them again it would not be the same, it has happened to me a lot when playing some Xbox's racing games, it sucks to lose after being a pro driver from the past.
So you guys haven't experienced it? I see. What I'm referring to is the "Rubberbanding" mechanic of AIs in racing games. This has never been fixed and has always been a problem ever since. Here is what wiki says about rubberbanding AIs: "One example of this effect in a racing game would involve the AI driver's vehicles becoming significantly faster when behind the player's vehicle, and significantly slower while in front, as if the two vehicles were connected by a large rubber band. " However, in certain games, the rubberbanding is so bad, that it stretches so bad, so when the AI pulls too far ahead, it's almost impossible to catch up in time. This is my only complaint against racing games AIs.
I think that they just make me feel like I can never catch up and it isn't fair. I try as hard as I can to beat them, but it's hard to do. I'd rather compete against my friends, but I don't want an AI that will give me the win. There has to be a balance.
Yes, I just hate that crap. There was no way to disable it in most wanted though. kinda got frustrated with the game.
That depends on the game. In realistic games like Grand Turismo, that usually doesn't happen. In arcade type games, that happens all the time. That happens a ton in mario kart. The better weapons among the back of the crowd also doesn't help in that case.
That certainly is an issue in racing games. In grand turismo, I don't really remember that being too much of an issue though. If something like the rubberband effect happened, I think it was mostly due to driving more aggressively when behind and driving more conservatively when ahead.
That's certainly why the effect exists. They just want the game to be as competitive as possible. It may be unrealistic, but it does make the game more fun in that the game isn't either too hard or too easy.
I agree, as far as I know, it's not that bad in Gran Turismo. Although I could be wrong, because it's been a while since I last played it. Yeah, especially in Mario Kart 8. Rubberbanding in Mario Kart 8 150cc is definitely bad to the point that it's sometimes absurd. Even the greatest Mario Kart 8 speedrunners admit that the AI really cheats and goes beyond the games physics and limits. I know it's present since the first Mario Kart but never this bad.
Yeah, rubber banding is awful. The current problem I have is with the AI in Grid Autosport though. They're very aggressive and will just smash into you if they have the chance. I love the game, but that AI makes me want to quit sometimes.
Talk about quitting! Forgot about that. Me too, there are a lot of times when I just rage quit and stopped playing. I have to mention this is not only present in racing games but on other games as well. Specially NBA 2k AI, people just rage when the AI breaks the game's physics and cheats.
I first discovered this when I'm playing Need For Speed: Most Wanted. I had a fully tuned Porsche Carrera GT, and travelling at around 300km/h but the police cars are catching up easily. I mean, I can't believe it before lol. So I looked it up on the Internet and found the rubberbanding mechanics at Wiki. There, I got hold of the truth.
The rubberbanding effect if you want to call it that, is just the games AI trying to make the race more competitive but not being clever enough to do so. If a player is winning, the AI cars will go a little faster, if the player is losing, they'll go a little slower so they have a chance to catch up. I'm not sure there's a lot that game developers can do about that though.
Some of the latest games have some really good AI. Taking Forza 5 & 6 for instance, the AI is pretty challenging and it actually does fight you for position while racing as opposed to just following a single line. It makes for some really intense racing at times.
It's funny you should mention the fighting you for position aspect, as in most other racing games you simply font get that. The AI vehicles stick rigidly to the racing line and after maybe 2 laps you've figured where the best place is to overtake and away you go. It's good that the game developers are now actually making the competition fight back and try to come back at you.
If you guys would notice, there are no "difficulty" settings for AI in racing games. Why are they still not setting the ability level of the AI in raing games? Why settle for rubberbanding? Why haven't they improved that until now? Would setting the difficulty of the AI make them look like bots that will pass through a fixed path everytime? I assume the developers are more creative and intelligent than that, so why?
That is annoying and awesome at the same time. I don't think I've played any game where the opponents smash into you, except for Twisted Metal, which isn't really a racing game. I got to get my hands on Grid Autosport.
