Bauer wrote:mine says "Current Account Status: Don't Renew"
this was in the cancel/renew section. You want to make sure it doesnt auto renew somehow. plenty have been caught out by not reading/understanding.
Anyhow, I didnt have you pegged for a long term membership but what did you think from the little bit you got to see?
i have no option for renewing or not, hence why i asked. Maybe that option would come after i went onto a proper subscription.
As for the game it has good an bad. Remember i am only an occasional racer so my opinion is based on my part time experience.
It gives good feedback when driving and is very rewarding. It reminds me a lot of how i felt when driving GPL in the early days. It has that typical taily papy feel, as in most of the control is done with the throttle and you just use minimal steering. It can be fun when your on top of it but when your a part timer like me it can throw you into the weeds quickly too and that gets tiring quickly. I love driving the Legend even if it is incredibly twitchy, but the other 2 standard cars weren't really worth worrying about. I also found some of the features were quite cool. I booked in for a race and then went and did a bit of practice beforehand and i liked the timer counting down reminding me how long until the race.
The bad, i HATE having it run from a browser, having to exit the game just to swap a car or track is a pain. I understand how it all intergrates with the web but LFS seems to make it feel more like a game rather than having it feel like bits of games. LFS is a more intuitive game in my opinion as far as menus etc but lacks what iRacing does as far as physics go, in my opinion of course. iRacing gives a bit better feel but LFS is a much simpler design. iRacing feels slow and clumsy being browser based. The menu's are also very crowded and hard to get used to for a newbie. I've sat there a few times not knowing which bit of the webpage takes me to where i want to go to. A lot of it is click and discover. Probably fine once your used to it but it's quite cluttered. There's bits and pieces of info all over it and it's all seems to have different designs, rather than all being simple and neat and easy to understand.
I also think it's way over priced given what you get as a basic package. 3 cars and 8 tracks is not enough for over $100 a year. Given LFS is about $30-40 and it's yours forever it makes iRacing look very poor as far as value goes. Sure it's got extra stuff being added all the time but that all costs extra. I also don't like that points system, i am too afraid to go online incase i spin off and crash and mess up my rank or whatever it is. It's like having a school teacher watching over you and smacking you every time you do something wrong. Again i understand it's to minimize idiots online but i find it messes with my head.
I'd also like to have the option of racing with AI. I'm not a huge fan of online racing, it can be ok if your with a decent bunch of guys you know but it can also be a huge pain when your with random people and you have no idea what they might do next. The best times i've had online have been racing mates, otherwise racing strangers has no real meaning to me. It's like having a one night stand, you go through the motions but there's no real emotional connection.
It's a good game for full on serious racers, but for the occasional blast it's way over priced. Sadly there's very little out there for people like me. LFS is essentially dead and rFactor is mostly a game for modding. Once upon a time we'd have a few sims coming out every year but now it's almost non existant. There's not much of a market for casual gamers any more.