During its GTC 2016 keynote address, Nvidia unveiled a new Formula E event dubbed Roborace. As its name implies, this new racing class will feature fully autonomous cars powered by Drive PX 2 supercomputers. If that's not crazy enough, the first race is expected to kick off this season. Blimey.
On the bright side, at least nobody's taking it seriously.
Formula 1 is a complicated sport. Team radio can tell drivers almost everything they need to know, but the multitude of different gadgets and gizmos on each car have to be controlled by the guy in the cockpit -- and that's where the steering wheel comes in. Three-time world champion Lewis Hamilton has more influence than most drivers in the way his steering wheel looks and feels, and it's an extremely complex piece of technology.
I fell in love with Forza Motorsport 6 the first time I hit a dynamic puddle at high speed and my BMW went apeshit.
Briefly: Thinking about picking up Codemasters' latest racing game, F1 2015? Probably don't -- at least, not yet. The PC version is suffering from numerous issues, from frame rate drops and crashes to busted menus and controller problems. Codemasters acknowledged the issues and released a patch, but there's still more work to be done.
A publicly accessible "Samsung Confidential" presentation Alan Queen, a senior director at the company's Innovation Lab, gave at last October's Samsung Developers Conference offers a bit of insight into the electronic giant's home console plans. Several slides on Queen's presentation indicate Samsung's gaming ambitions are targeting a consumer group called "Console Sceptics", who are current console owners not necessarily interested in upgrading to the next-generation consoles.
Two editions, only one of which will be "Classic". I guess that's one way to sell the premium pack.
I have friends who don't play video games, but they own PS3s. The reason? They're obsessed with cars and pretending to drive them. They love F1, they love Gran Turismo, they love DiRT. They love cars, and they love anything that helps them get closer to the things they love. This incredible 175 degree, circular screen, designed for racing games, is for people like this. It's amazing.
Take F1, for example. While Kotaku was wowed with WipeOut on the PS Vita, Codemaster's racing effort leaves a lot to be desired.
iRacing is an extremely realistic racing simulator. Its top driver won $US10,000, despite never driving over 100 mph in real life. Top Gear put him in an open-wheel racer to see if digital skills translate to real racing prowess.
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On the left is on-board camera footage of the Korean Grand Prix. On the right?
While we've long known Codemasters have been working on a new Formula 1 game - and also that it would be serious - the company have today come out and made some official announcements.
Picture this. You're playing a Formula 1 game on the TV in your bedroom, while in the living room, another TV is set to a real, actual Formula 1 race. And you're racing the same cars, in the same positions, at the same speed, as they're going on the TV. Impossible? Probably, but that's not going to stop iOpener from trying. They claim that through a combination of "Differential GPS and an Inertial Management Unit" attached to a competitor, a car's location on the track and current speed can be relayed back to a game in around five seconds. iOpener are in talks with six developers at the moment, and hope to have the system implemented in a retail game as early as this holiday season.
Real racing in the virtual world
Despite the fact the last few Sony F1 games were fairly forgettable, some people are worried now that Codemasters hold the Formula 1 licence. Worried they'll make a forgettable game. Worried that, being Codemasters - the team behind Grid and Dirt - their F1 game will be some kind of arcade racer. Well it won't! Responding to such fears on the official boards, the official response from Codies is:
GRID and DiRT are aimed at an arcade audience and they do that very well. F1 has different requirements and will get a completely different treatment from our in-house team, including full on sim options, physics, rules and regs etc. We will also have arcade requirements catered for as well. How this will be split we do not know yet, but split it will be.
No word on whether they'll also include team spying and nazi sex dungeons, but we can only hope.
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