Car Wars ( UI ): nkPro vs rF2 vs CARS
Welcome to the first article in RaceSimCentral’s Car Wars series. Over the coming weeks we’ll be taking a look at netKar Pro, rFactor 2 Beta and Project CARS, investigating how key aspects of these three sim racing games compare.
netKar Pro
While netKar Pro arguably never realized its potential, close to six years on it impressively remains a benchmark for sim racing realism, most notably for its authentic driving experience. Prior to its release community expectations for netKar were brutally high and it went on to demonstrate that success with a commercial sim racing game can be extremely difficult to achieve. With the release of Ferrari Virtual Academy in 2010 it’s clear that Kunos learned much from the nKPro experience and their recently announced mod friendly Assetto Corsa due for release in 2012 promises great things.
rFactor 2 Beta
With its initial release of rFactor, ISI provided the sim racing community with an open platform and years later the community are still running with it, creating a huge number of cars and tracks though of admittedly widely varying quality. rFactor 2 increases support for modding even further, with ISI clearly seeing it as the games’ niche. The question is at what cost? rFactor 2 remains complex and intimidating to all but dedicated enthusiasts. rFactor’s other strengths include a realistic driving experience and proven online racing capabilities. Its graphics have also been updated but arguably are already behind next generation games such as Project CARS.
Project CARS Alpha
WMD’s Project CARS is a curious animal. Members of the PC based sim racing community have seemingly flocked to participate in and contribute financially to the development of the game. However while the game is being developed in a PC environment it’s no secret that the prize Slightly Mad Studios has its eyes on most is in fact the console market, duking it out with the likes of Gran Turismo and Forza to become the iRacing of Xbox, Playstation etc. Whilst Slightly Mad Studios roots lie in modding it’s unclear what support for modding if any will be included in the PC version of CARS. Even at an Alpha stage of development aspects of CARS are seriously impressive, such as the appearance of cars in game along with the level of detail in the models. However just as CARS highlights shortcomings of games such as rFactor 2, so its own shortcomings are highlighted which at the time of writing most significantly include a bland, disconnected driving experience compared to benchmark sims. It’s early days however and CARS is clearly a game to keep a close eye on.
Car Wars ( UI )
The game interface is the first thing a player experiences. A good UI makes a game easy and fun to use. It’s intuitive and responsive, enhancing game play versus getting in the way. How do the UI of netKar Pro, rFactor 2 and Project CARS compare?
netKar Pro UI
netKar Pro was initially released in 2006 and its UI reflected its focus on realism vs game play, functional vs overly slick.
netKar Pro UI
After the creation of a driver profile and setting up controllers in nKPro mini launcher it’s straight into the business of racing.
netKar Pro UI
Kunos have always done a solid job of reducing game UI down to the core components of sim racing – Driver Profile, Offline Racing, Online Racing, Settings and Replays – resulting in an uncluttered UI that is easy to use from the getgo.
netKar Pro UI
Car and track selections in netKar Pro are handled in similar ways, either via a drop down or back and forth arrows. The car selection is nicely done with previews of alternative vehicles to either side of the current selection.
netKar Pro UI
NetKar Pro’s cockpit view is another good example of an elegant and realistic UI solution. Car setup and timing data are simply overlaid when needed in the pit and garage, leaving you ‘in the car’ the whole time versus leaving the car and circuit before visiting numerous separate screens as is typical in other games. It adds to the feeling of realism and if that isn’t enough you can also enable cockpit controls so for example the car must be started by correct real world procedure.
netKar Pro UI
If there is an achilles heel in nKPro’s UI, much like other games it’s in the controller setup. Initial auto detection and configuration of controllers is a dream that won’t be found in netKar Pro. Working out when and where to click in the advanced setup screen can take some time.
netKar Pro UI
Overall the guys at Kunos did a great job wrapping netKar Pro in a UI that doesn’t get in the player’s way, even more so when you consider it was created 5+ years ago. You can go from launching the game to being on track racing in literally less than 1 minute – that’s cool. It simply works and the minimal look and feel of the UI fits in nicely with the games emphasis on realism.
rFactor 2 UI
rFactor 2 was announced in 2009 so it’s fair to say that by early 2012 expectations for the game were running high. rFactor has become as much about mods and modding as it is about online racing. Due to its inherent flexibility/complexity it has never been a pick up and play game but something more akin to a lifestyle! Like the original release of rFactor, rF2’s UI is one you endure vs enjoy. It’s not especially intuitive, responsive or slick. You stick at it, try everything, and figure out how it works largely by yourself with the reward being a flexible sim racing game you can shape to suit yourself.
While community made launchers were created for rFactor, ISI have added their own launcher to rF2 which provides access to many functions, tools etc. Unless you are an experienced rFactor player there is little in the way to guide you as to what to use, how to use and when to use. From the launcher you can: race offline, race online, use the developer build, manage mods, configure display options, launch and configure the dedicated server, manage your account, manage updates, purchase and activate the game, acquire mod ID’s and more. It’s powerful but cluttered and confusing.
rFactor 2 UI
The main offline ‘Single Player’ racing screen helps the user by suggesting the main race tasks that need attending to, and the order they should be done in (left to right) but where and how the secondary options such as Component manager fit in is unclear.
rFactor 2 UI
The now ubiquitous cover flow GUI is used throughout rFactor 2 for selection of series, cars and tracks as well as the new component manager. How responsive and practical this approach will be once the number of mods grows remains to be seen.
rFactor 2 UI
Singe players are also required to go back and forth from numerous dead end screens to complete any given task. It’s not unusual for example to pass through a dozen or more screens between launching the game and being on track in a car. The amount of back and forth is compounded by how slowly the game responds. Granted it is in beta, but there are also relatively few mods installed at this stage.
rFactor 2 UI
Font size, spacing and coloring in the rFactor 2 beta aren’t especially pleasing to the eye at this stage.
rFactor 2 UI
Online racing in rFactor 2 is accessed from the launcher, immediately displaying a list of available servers. This is where the work ISI has done on the handling of mods should pay off big time, with mismatches being a thing of the past.
Unlike the original release of rFactor, players aren’t able to stay in game and alternate between offline and online races. Changing from offline to online or vice versa in rFactor 2 requires exiting the game and returning to the launcher.
rFactor 2 UI
It’s clear that much time and energy has been put into improving the nuts and bolts features in rFactor 2, but at this beta stage rFactor 2′s UI fails to impress. The good news is though that the community can always rebuild the UI as they see fit.
Project CARS UI
As of build 144 the Project CARS UI has a distinct console feel, which isn’t a bad thing especially since it is destined for consoles along with PC! Outside of racing, all options float over a showroom which one would assume will display the current car vs the one car it currently does the entire time.
Project CARS UI
The CARS UI has a slick feel but does take some getting used too, especially at this early stage where options that can be changed by the user aren’t always obvious and/or aren’t previewed (e.g. cars, liveries, tracks) so initially it’s more a matter of clicking and mousing around, seeing where the back and forward arrows appear, and what options you end up with.
Project CARS UI
Overall the Project CARS UI looks fresh and slick, is responsive and doesn’t take long to work out after which it goes unnoticed. There are inconsistencies and obvious things missing but the game is a long way from finished. It will be interesting to watch it grow.
The UI Bottomline
1st: netKar Pro
Give me a minimal, uncluttered, intuitive and responsive UI any day. nKPro by a large margin, even if it is circa 2006.
2nd: Project CARS
Even at this early stage the UI works reasonably well and looks the part too. Some glitches but to be expected.
3rd: rFactor 2
There is a lot of complexity in rFactor 2. Unfortunately the beta UI doesn’t tame the complexity nor does it present the game as an easy to use, responsive and slick 2012 offering.
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