Need for Speed Racing Games

@smalljaw..,

Exactly! I've been doing a lot of races where I just observe the AI and take mental notes on how they behave. I have completed MANY races where I raced "very clean".., yet the AI seems to go out of its way to put me out of the race. This happens even when many of my prior races were "non contact races".., where the racing was not aggressive.

I know the AI.., is "learning" too. I know that it'll remember when you hit it, and in some cases strike back on the next turn.., or in a future race. What I question is how the AI determines this for the future. It appears that it just sees contact as just that.., regardless of whos fault it was. I've noticed in races that where I had a good clean shot for the line..., would then take it.., and it was the AI that at that very last second would intentionally hit me. This is after MANY good laps without contact. Then the next few laps it's a mad dash to get away from that AI car because it's now taking it out on you because it seems the system isn't coded to determine fault.

Many races off the start line can turn into an outright derby.., and you're lucky if you make it around the first turn. I ran several races this morning.., and a good example is what happened in this race. (I always race against a high number of AI cars to increase points too). After 5 laps of an 8 lap quick race I finally battled my way to 3rd place. Took a few taps from the AI along the way but nothing too heavy. Finally.., a good clean shot for taking second. Just as I'm about to take the position.., the very second the right rear side of my bumper was within reach.., the AI car pitted me. I recoverd and still managed to hold 3rd place. I finally managed to take second place.., but that same AI car beat the living hell out my car while taking the position. This AI vehicle wasn't an issue in MANY of my previous races. It just got downright dirty during this race (as with many others).

The main problem with this AI.., is that it's not coded for circuit racing. Bumps and taps are fine.., as that's just racing. However.., Shift goes too far with it. Way too much break checking.., intentional pitting, hard rear and side slamming, intentional bottle-necking, vehicles that come to a dead stop around a turn for no reason. How many times does a car have to (at the very last second) turn into your vehicle on a clean pass..??? Why is the AI's idea of "blocking" waiting until the absolute dead last second and then BAM they do a hard right.., then break check you making it impossible to avoid contact..?? Much of this nonsense with the AI gets drivers "disqualified" in circuit racing.

Like I said.., the overall game is good. The graphics are great.., the races keep your eyelids peeled, the sound draws you in.., but the AI goes overboard in an attempt to make the race challenging. It wouldn't hurt the developers to take it down a notch.

**just another good example..., I raced for several hours last night, and have so many good races against the AI. I was racking up some serious points too. There was almost NO contact at all. Yet this morning.., every race has the AI kicking my tail all over the track. Constant break checking.., pitting, slamming, ect. It's just way overdone.**

Squeakdog, I'm now really noticing this on the street courses, Tokyo and London are bad for AI taking you out. I just got finished and I am noticing it now that you've brought my attention to it, I actually had a car not brake at all and just rammed me while I was taking a hairpin, didn't think much of it until a lap later another car not only got into the side of me, it kept the gas mashed and ran me across the track into the barrier and didn't even try to steer off or slow down. If you wouldn't have made this post I would have thought it was just something in my game or something I was doing to bring on the assault. Nascar sim racing and GTR don't have as much trading paint as this game but I still like it, I'm just more careful and maybe a little paranoid now...lol!

I haven't really noticed it that much. Sometimes at the beginning of a race, when you hit a bottleneck, the AI cars will refuse to give up their line and slam into you. It's usually pretty understandable because in real life, they'd be concentrating on the bottleneck / crash ahead of them and it's not surprising that they wouldn't see me coming past them. But once the cars get spread out it's pretty minimal. You can normally see where they're going and decide to pass them on the other side instead. There have been a few occasions where cars have intentionally shoved me off the track for no reason, but it happens so rarely it really doesn't bother me. And when it does happen, well...it's a game. If I can't win the race, I'll have some fun taking my revenge on this guy

I can't complain, I hit them far more often than they hit me. As far as realism goes, I'd be ejected from a lot of races. Since I'm not, I really can't hold it against the AI cars that they've got a bit of a grudge against me.

I guess my comment is a little late for this thread but I totally agree with squeakdog. I just did a search for "any mods to fix ai knocking you off track" & found this thread. I might try the mod f0xx suggested.

I can deal with the bumping for the 1st 3 Tiers but what I found really surprising in Tier 4 you're suppose to be up against the "best drivers in the world." Huh?? The best drivers in the world want to blatantly ram thier million dollar car into me? And why am I the one always knocked backwards or off the track but when I hit someone they have a little wiggle & go on their merry way? You have to always be ready with the brakes & try to stay out of a position where you might get knocked off the track. Which obviously is going to kill your lap time. This is how the "elite" drivers behave?

Like squeakdog said, if it hadn't been promoted as a "sim" I wouldn't be so bothered by it but this is obviously arcade gameplay.

I agree with the OP on this subject.

What most here do not realize is that the AI for this game was probably not origionally programed for this game. IMHO The AI type has basically remained unchanged with refinements since NFS7. The Behaviour of the AI in Prostreet and in Shift seem to be nearly identical. Probably the biggest difference between the 2 AI's is that in Prostreet, the AI is both the Immoveable object and the irrestable force. They can bash you mercilously and you cannot retaliate. Shift hseems to have inherited the same basic AI. Its a double standard. When trying to resist or defend oneself against a bashfest, the players car is basically a Pillow with no mass at all. Yet the mass is there when the player tries to take a turn or a corner and this is where the AI has the mass of a pillow. The AI basically Ignores the Physics and rules imposed on the player.

They basically need to FIX the damn AI in a future NFS. I know the Shift AI will never be fixed.

If a Player Cannot do something then the AI should not be able to do it either.

Unfortuneately I doubt this will ever happen at all.

The AI code has absolutely nothing to do with previous NFS games.

cem_ea_id.teeheeaid wrote:The AI code has absolutely nothing to do with previous NFS games.

The Ai has the same behaviour and traits as in the previous NFS titles.

Ai can and does go off the track without loosing speed or control and in many cases, it's off the track speed is greater than the players on the track speed. (Has been seen in previous titles)

The AI does not have to slow down in order to take a turn or corner often taking them at speeds impossable for the player to match. (As seen in more than one previous NFS title)

Ai has a habit of speeding up, passing the player, cutting in front of the player, then hitting the breaks while the pack passes by. There are also other variations on this. (Deja Vu from Pro-Street anybody?)

Then there is the AI car that is always faster than the players car regardless of which cars are used. (Sounds like something from Most Wanted to me)

Then there is the Bashing AI(As seen in previous NFS titles) That can basically spinout, pitt, sideswipe, tapout, and put the helpless players car off the track without the player being able to retaliate. Because the AI Impossabily recovers and leaves the players car behind like a bad habit, or the players car has zero mass against this atttack in order to defend itself with in either case the end result is the same. Players car is off the track and probably wrecked and at a dead stop.(This has been seen in at least one Previous NFS title.)

Also the Catchup is still with us as well.

This title(Shift) was billed as, and was supposed to be a SIM! Riiiiight. It's still fun to play when it is not being frustraiting to the point that you just want to turn it off.

You can unpack the game and see about 90% of the exact same variable names used for the AI in the same locations using the same values as GTR/2/GTL/etc. About 10% is new stuff to do with varying AI behaviour in the race and changing the formatting of this (eg values that would be in the .plr or track or car file go into either a general AI override or a specific AI personality), but again, lots and lots of the same variables using the same values here.

AI code generally isn't something you can take from an entirely different codebase and just drop into another game.

ai

The back marker AI cars crash randomly, into each other as well as the players car. The lead AI cars are less random and drive more cleanly. If you turn off traction control and auto-clutch, you can shift into 1st gear and rev the engine during race countdown and get a very fast launch, which will help get you past the back marker AI's quicker.

Note that you don't need auto-clutch, as the game doesn't require you to use the clutch during shifts, even with auto clutch off. On some cars (like the works Camaro), you will need to lift the throttle on up shifts, but for most cars you can stay at full throttle during an upshift with auto-clutch off.

The AI can be very well behaved. On longer races when you lap them the AI will mostly hold their line or move out of the way.

clean lap

This is only an issue on one lap races or sprints, like Nordschleife. Run the race a second time, don't move at the start, then follow the AI to get the clean lap star (the other 5 stars will light up once the race starts). On multi-lap races, you can get your clean lap while in the lead.

cem_ea_id.teeheeaid wrote:You can unpack the game and see about 90% of the exact same variable names used for the AI in the same locations using the same values as GTR/2/GTL/etc. About 10% is new stuff to do with varying AI behaviour in the race and changing the formatting of this (eg values that would be in the .plr or track or car file go into either a general AI override or a specific AI personality), but again, lots and lots of the same variables using the same values here.

What the hell does that mean? Are you sure you are replying to the right thread?

Anyway, not a terrible game but could have been & should have been much better. I thought you were able to move on to the next Teir too quickly. I had unlocked Teir 3 & I hadn't even finished Teir 1. You can finish the game without playing half of it. I'm glad you could move on without doing the "Drift" races though. I hate that crap. I guess I'm old but I miss Porsche Unleashed. I wish they would make a new version of it.

Yes you are right BChant197. They are done supporting this game.

nfs.RapidRoy wrote:
What the hell does that mean? Are you sure you are replying to the right thread?

I've been over this before and strangely when I went searching for it I found Bchant197 making exactly the same statement in a very similar thread.

So to http://forum.ea.com/eaforum/posts/list/355342.page#3398572:


you could look at the Gmotor2 talent file from GTR2:

Olivier Baron
{
//Driver Info
Abbreviation=O. Baron
Nationality=Belgian
NatAbbrev=BEL

//Driver Stats
StartsDry=1.0 //Average number of drivers passed during start (-4 - 4)
StartsWet=1.0
StartStalls=0.0 //% of starts where driver stalled
QualifyingAbility=15.00 //Average qualifying position NOTE: keep GT between 1 -15
RaceAbility=4.00 //Range 0 - 6.2 (0 is best)
Consistency=2.0
RainAbility=4.00 //Range 0 - 6.2 (0 is best)
Passing=58.0 //% of times driver completed a successfull pass, not including pit stops or lapped traffic
Crash=1.7 //% of times driver crashed
Recovery=80 //% of times driver continued after a crash
CompletedLaps%=99
Script=default.scp
TrackAggression=0.7


// Increase attempted low-speed cornering by adding a minimum onto calculated speed.
// Reduce attempted high-speed cornering by multiplying speed by a number less than 1.0.
// <adjusted speed> = CorneringAdd + (CorneringMult * <original speed>
CorneringAdd=1.5
CorneringMult=.965

//AI Throttle Control - how good they are at their own traction control upon throttle application
TCGripThreshold=0.7 // Range: 0.0-1.0
TCThrottleFract=1.2 // Range: 0.0-???
TCResponse=0.0 // Range: 0.0-???

//AI skill mistake variables
MinRacingSkill = 0.90
Composure = 0.010

//AI ColdBrain variables
RaceColdBrainMin=0.96
RaceColdBrainTime=120
QualColdBrainMin=0.85
QualColdBrainTime=200


---------------


And then look at the driverai settings from Shift:

<data class="DriverIntelligence" id="0x8916450">
<prop name="Name" data="Mr Average" />
<prop name="Reactions" data="1" />
<prop name="Intelligence" data="1" />
<prop name="Race Ability" data="1" />
<prop name="Qualify Ability" data="1" />
<prop name="Passing Ability" data="1" />
<prop name="Stamina" data="1" />
<prop name="Defending" data="0.1" />
<prop name="Risk Taking" data="0.5" />
<prop name="Aggression" data="0.1" />
<prop name="Adrenalin" data="1" />
<prop name="Pressure" data="1" />
<prop name="Concentration" data="1" />
<prop name="Randomness" data="0.1" />
<prop name="Mistakes" data="0.5" />
<prop name="Grudges" data="0.1" />
<prop name="Antagonist" data="-1" />
<prop name="Mass Modifier" data="0" />
<prop name="Front Grip Modifier" data="1" />
<prop name="Rear Grip Modifier" data="1" />
<prop name="Performance Index" data="0.45" />

----------------


Or the AI modifiers in tyre files from GTR2:

AISens=(0.65,11800.0) // Simplified AI load sensitivity (final grip mult, final load)
AIGripMult=1.06 // Grip multiplier for AI vehicles (due to tire model simplification)
AIPeakSlip=0.120 // Simple peak slip angle for AI vehicles
AIWear=0.517e-7 // AI wear rate constant

----------------

And the AI modifiers in the tyre files from Shift:

AISens=(0.80,25650.0) // Simplified AI load sensitivity (final grip mult, final load)
AIGripMult=1.10 // Grip multiplier for AI vehicles (due to tire model simplification)
AIPeakSlip=0.115 // Simple peak slip angle for AI vehicles
AIWear=0.413e-7 // AI wear rate constant

-----------------

Or the AI modifiers in the GTR2 .plr file:

AI Driver Strength="100"
AI Power Calibration="0" // Adjustments with AI strength (0=none, or add the following: 1=power, 2=gearing, 4=fuel)
AI Additional Fuel Mult="0.97000" // Additional fuel multiplier for AIs because of their driving style
AI Brake Power Usage="0.98000" // Fraction of theoretical brake power that AI attempt to use
AI Brake Grip Usage="0.97000" // Fraction of theoretical brake grip that AI attempt to use
AI Corner Grip Usage="0.93000" // Fraction of theoretical cornering grip that AI attempt to use
AI Max Load="40000.00000" // Maximum total load to set up theoretical performance tables
AI Min Radius="20.00000" // Minimum radius turn to set up theoretical performance tables
AI to AI Collision Rate="20" // Detection rate per second (1-40) for AI-to-AI collisions

-----------------

And the AI modifiers in the Shift physicstweaker file:

<prop name="ai physics difficulty mix (grip,torque,gear,fuel)" data="40;80;20;0" />
<prop name="ai driver strength" data="70;85;100" />
<prop name="ai driver aggression" data="45;70;100" />
<prop name="fuel mult" data="1" />
<prop name="tire mult" data="1" />
<prop name="ai min raduis" data="20" />
<prop name="ai max load" data="40000" />
<prop name="ai additional fuel mult" data="0.95" />
<prop name="ai brake power" data="0.98" />
<prop name="ai brake grip" data="0.97" />
<prop name="ai corner grip" data="0.93" />
<prop name="ai power calibration" data="0" />


And conclude that it's pretty much the same old stuff and doesn't really have to do with old NFS games, so much.

I mean you can go on from there. Shift track AIW:

WorstAdjust=(0.7000) // Used for 70% AI strength option
MidAdjust=(1.0300) // Used for 100% AI strength option (note that AIs now use full throttle above 95% AI strength option)
BestAdjust=(1.2700) // Used for 120% AI strength option
QualRatio=(1.0050) // Used to adjust AI speed in qual compared to base values
RaceRatio=(1.0000) // Used to adjust AI speed in race compared to base values

GTR2 track AIW:

WorstAdjust=(0.7500) // Used for 70% AI strength option
MidAdjust=(1.0000) // Used for 100% AI strength option (note that AIs now use full throttle above 95% AI strength option)
BestAdjust=(1.1000) // Used for 120% AI strength option
QualRatio=(1.0200) // Used to adjust AI speed in qual compared to base values
RaceRatio=(1.0500) // Used to adjust AI speed in race compared to base values

I don't know why this guy keeps repeating that its "NFS" AI. It's pretty easy to check...

@teeheeaid

Nice job finding that older topic. Back then I was using a Thrustmaster Top Gun Afterburner Hotas Style Flight Stick(Not FFB). I picked myself up a Wheel. Spacifically a Logitech Driving Force GT. After running this wheel on other racing titles that I have, I thought that it might just make playing shift more enjoyable and somewhat easier.

@All
Boy was I wrong. The AI's Cheating became even more blantently obvious. The AI can clearly do things that are flatout impossable for the player to do. I Mean Come on!!!!! Adaptive AI is something I would have absolutely no problem with. The Problem is having the SAME CHEATING CRAP for 7 Titles in a ROW!!!!!! Now I know that the Vast majority of NFS titles are Arcade racers and that is fine. But having this kind of crap in something that's supposed to be a sim is absolutely unacceptable and has basically caused me to give up.

@EA
My Previous statement stands. If a Player in a racing title is not allowed to do something, then the damn AI should not be able to or allowed to do it either. Because you will eventually get non-professional, casual gamers like me who do not live, breathe, eat, and crap gaming 24/7/365!!!! There are probably other casual gamers that have become just as fed up with this as I have.

@All Again
There are probably those of You that may even say that I just plain S U C K or that Im just not trying hard enough. Well when the harder you try = the more that the AI Cheats, it's either time to take a break from it for a while or stop playing it all together.

Thus ends my Rant for this post!

It's an arcade game, despite the dabbling with racing sim elements - relax. NFS has always done this kind of thing, leastways on the titles I've played, including the challenges.

The AI being difficult is also there for a purpose, not just to annoy, it is there to challenge you good people. The high speed ram at a hairpin bend, or any sudden braking for no apparent reason are there to stop you getting the clean race badges and star. These all happen at pretty much the same places and can be avoided.

Most Wanted was my first experience of NFS and it's where I noticed this kind of behaviour - that last chase is full of impossibilities, but it can be done. The same applies for Shift, I even got the platinum medal with a bit more perseverence.

Okay, I do agree with the original poster's sentiment that fighting the AI all the way through gives other players the excuse to smash their co-racers about online. Perhaps making players pay for their online damage repairs might stop that kind of idiocy. Mind you, those same idiots are out there on Dirt 2 online also, so maybe that's more of an indication about the mentality of the average online racer - difference with Dirt 2 is, they get disqualified.

Wrong thread... sorry.

I've bought the game some while ago, played it for ~30 hours. (Currently in the army, play on leave)
I agree with the OP. They should either make it a pure racing sim or just another of those typical EA "racing" games, but not in under any circumstance mix of those two. I play on "pro" which means that the car drifts a bit more than it should, but the controls are ok. ( Couldn't race with a care like that in RL tho, wouldnt have anything but flatspots in your tires after the first lap) What makes the game so *ucking annoying is the AI which has no other goal but to drive you off the track. I'd really like to know what the developers where after when they programmed the AI this way, but to me it makes no sense at all. If the AI is clearly winning the race, why on earth would it slow down just to ram me off the track? And how is that realistic in any way? All the hype about this game being realistic vanished after I saw how stupid the AI is. In case you think I'm wrong and this is all BS, you could go to your local track and try hitting another car 180mp/h.