DTR Tips & Tricks
When racing online, you should try to reduce any lag and warp, not only for your enjoyment, but to further enhance others enjoyment as well. Some things you can do to help reduce lag-causing issues, are to download and run the following program before gaming on the internet. End It All - shuts down all programs currently running in the background of your computer. The only things that should be left running are Explorer and System Tray.
To get ready for online racing try the following tips. First, open your internet browser (ex: IE 5.5) and select the tools tab. From that select internet options, then click on delete files tab. This will delete all your temporary internet files and send them to your recycle bin. Next, clear your history folder by clicking on it. Click OK to close the window. Then go to your C:\Windows (show files)\Temp folder, click on the edit tab, then select all. Click on delete, or press delete on your keyboard, then right click on your recycle bin and select empty recycle bin. Also, I recommend defragging your hard drive at least once a week, especially if running a lot of sim racing games. These games and their add-ons have a nasty way of fragmenting the hard drive real fast. You may have to run scandisk before you can defrag. If so, run a standard check in scandisk. Be sure to turn off any virus software or screensavers before defragmenting.
Once you have launched the game, go into the options screen and select video, your resolution to read 640x480x16. This is adequate for most gamers. Next, turn down all shadows, skidmarks, lighting, and particles to mininmal levels. These are fine to use when racing offline by yourself, but they are not to good to use when online racing, where others internet connections will go haywire.
Now go under game and decide if you are going to be racing using manual or automatic transmission. For beginners, it is recommended to race in automatic transmission, although I myself, have recently made the switch to automatic transmission and done quite well with it.
Next, you be aware of what keystrokes to use while in the game itself. F3 = toggles on/off the heads up display F4 = toggles on/off the rear view mirror F5 = toggles on/off names above cars F12 = takes screenshots of the game. They can be viewed in your C:\ folder. They will appear as snap0.tga, snap1.tga, and so on. You must have a program associated with .tga files to view them such as Paint Shop Pro, MGI PhotoSuite, or Microsoft Picture It, just to name a few.
If you need to get back out to the desktop, say to go back to a chat room, but your games takes too long to load, you can use the Tab/Alt keys to escape out of the game from the main menu. This will kick you back to the desktop to do other things you need to do, while your game is still running in the background. When finished, simply close the window you're working in, or click the DTR tab down in the taskbar at the bottom of your screen.
Other things that you can do to speed up your game, is create different folders for your skins inside your data folder (C:\Program Files\Ratbag\data). This allows you to race only with the skins you need on that particular night. Whatever selection of skins you'd like to use, just rename that folder to skins, and rename the other to something else. The same can be done for the different chassis and tracks that need to be loaded.
When racing in any simulation game, you'll hear a lot of guys say "slower is faster", and this is absolutely true. What they mean is, when going through the corners of a race track, don't keep the throttle full bore, but rather lift slightly to hug the inside line more. What this does is keeps the car from sliding, and keeps the wheels straighter, thus lowering lap times. Practice this often, and it's a tip you'll thank me for later.
Also, when racing online remember two people don't see things quite the same way. When you see someone is next to you on your screen, they think they are ahead of you on their screens. Give each other room to race, and give way when a car is up alongside of you. When being lapped by faster cars, the cardinal rule is to just hold your line. Don't try to get up high or low and get out of the way, just maintain the line you are driving and the faster cars will esily find a way around you. One thing you don't want to do is take out the leaders when you're running a lap down.
When racing at different wetnesses, I recommend changing the final drive by .10 - .15 for dry to wet tracks. When running a longer race (over 15 laps) at a lower wetness percentage, I recommend lowering the final drive by.10, and changing the rear tires to medium soft. This will keep your tires from spinning too much, and wearing too quickly.
Well, that's about it for now. Until next time, happy racing! Go fast, turn left...
Paul D. Bayne |