Dirt Rally
Single Player, PC (Windows/ Linux), 2015
No matter how much “realism” (what is realism? Is it same as making the game difficult?) exists in a driving simulator, it is still a video game where mistakes are pardoned and accidents forgotten with a restart. It is important to have the distinction between a video game and real life.
In reality, there is no second chance. If I am allowed to restart a race after I have crashed, then irrespective of how realistic the handling and physics are, it “is” unreal.
It is naive for such games to try to outsmart other similar games by synthetically reducing AI stage times to the point of being not achievable and not including a difficulty setting. Case in point – Dirt Rally. I can complete a stage carefully without crashing even once and maintaining fairly decent speed wherever I can, but still at the end I find myself 30-40 seconds behind. And it is not that all AI have that timing – only 1 or 2 at the top. There is a significant delta after that. The timings are inconsistent even without my participation. The randomness that they have put only varies the timings within a tolerance, but the lead split times remain nonetheless*.
On the internet, fanboys of the game feel proud of this feature. Their justification is that the more hours you put, the better your skills would be, and it is ok to win the first competition after 100 or so hours if you are really not that “great”. They somehow have an issue with providing the customer with choice when it is possible to do so without added cost. If you ask for this choice, you are labeled a console peasant, arcade noob, etc.
What their limited maturity prevents them from comprehending is that even after putting 100+ hours and winning perhaps all competitions in the career mode, I would still not drive a car in real life using a gamepad or a gaming wheel in the comfort of my home. I will only be good at a “video game”. No matter how many hours you put in the game and how many stages you win, it will not qualify you for any real life rally stage.
Many games have a “points” system, where you are awarded more for playing at highest difficulty. Even Dirt Rally offers more “credits” at higher difficulty, and the self-righteous “experts” can feel proud of it. But the “I-put-100-hours-to-learn-so-you-should-too-else-this-is-not-for-you” arguments are BS.
*Let us dive a bit deeper into the AI mechanics of Dirt Rally. Here is an excerpt on Dirt Rally AI from Steam Community:
“In short – the fastest time the AI can achieve was set according to a time set by a real human driver from Codemasters. The AI can never be any faster than he was.
“So the simple truth is – if you can’t keep up with the AI, you’re just not on the level of the top guys. You either need to get better or accept the fact that you’re not fast enough.
“BTW, if you want to see a rally game that literally just “spits out a time” for the AI drivers, try WRC 5 or 6. The times of the AI drivers are completely made up in those games based on just how many mistakes you’ve made during the stage. “
https://steamcommunity.com/app/310560/discussions/0/133258092242139442/
If this is true, then Codemasters got AI all backwards. They do not know what AI means.
Artificial Intelligence is NOT random sampling from data. It is about “learning” from data.
And in a single player game where challenge should be specific to that player, the “data” is how the player is doing, not how others have done.
Why would a single player care about how good a Codemasters employee is in the game? He could go online for such challenges, right? WRC actually got it correct when it comes to the definition of AI. They implemented actual AI, because they consider how “you” are playing. In WRC then it would be possible for each player to have a different experience, tailor-made for him – this is true “single-player”.
Also observe that though WRC is made to look like the only one who “spits out the data”, Codemasters also does so. Selecting one timing from a predefined set is also “spitting out the data”, isn’t it?
In a custom championship event I was playing, the topper had the exact same timing (to the millisecond) on a stage in Finland at night and at day (day was a reverse of the same stage). How is this possible if timings were “simulated”?
In the same championship, that topper guy (name was P. Serrano, though obviously it does not matter) came first in each stage at every location. This game truly honors that legendary line from Fallout: New Vegas –
The truth is, the game was rigged from the start
So,
- Do not code the AI
- Spit out data nonetheless (select randomly from a list of values around a top human time),
- Brag “difficulty == more realism” in a blog for the fanboys.
This does not cover up for poor (or non-existent) AI implementation. If WRC has actually “coded” AI to “learn” about the player, then hats off to them.
AI is actually always for single player; if timings are based on random sampling other humans, then it is multiplayer.
Which is why most games are going the multiplayer way, where they can “crowdsource” the AI thereby reducing actual coding costs.
No, this game does not have a steep learning curve.
It just has professional timings (for 1-2 at the top) in a singleplayer race of “entry-level” difficulty. Let that sink in, before inferring anything from the high ratings the game has received. If you are struggling and only the high ratings keep you going (like yes-I-can-also-ace-it-someday), save yourself precious hours and do something more productive.
“Learning” about the player is what a single player game should do in order to provide a custom challenge to the player. Each player is different, so it does not make sense to expose all of them to the same challenge even when they are not playing online. If I want to compete against a leaderboard, I could go online or use “Community delta” where Codemasters crowdsource the challenge. If all they wanted was to brag about how good their employees are, they could have just created another “Codemasters delta” as a difficulty option. But they had to cover up for the poor design.
Why restrict the player from having a choice? If you are good, play it at a harder difficulty level; dominate the leaderboard with your achievements. If someone else wants to play at a lower difficulty, then why would it reduce the game’s appeal? It is not about coming first always. It is about making that individual player believe that the fastest time is at all possible for him. It is about customer satisfaction. And competitive strategy – how I can keep my customer from moving to my competition.
To sum up, there is no motivation to keep trying to “improve” your timings. No matter how hard you try, with all sorts of controller settings, not a single crash, correct corners, even Scandinavian flicks, end of the race you are still a 2nd or 3rd at best. There is always a P. Serrano at the top, who will win each stage at every location of your championship. Others will commit mistakes, their cars will fault, but one dude is rigged to win, and it is not you.
No wonder Dirt Rally is almost always on Sale in Steam. If the game was that good, it would have sold without the “80% discount”.
</rant>
Pros:
- Excellent game engine, controls, and feedback
- Runs smooth on Linux even on old hardware
- Choice of classic Rally Cars
- 80% discount almost always on Steam
Cons:
- Terrible (actually non-existent) AI
- Cars do not have any notion of weight, so no “sense” of grip while driving
- Stages not as exhaustive as WRC
Hello, new world! 