Simbin Titles and Simucube/DD

Simucube 1 Games
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I haven’t tested these games. The lack of Realfeel is a big issue - the default rfactor1 FFB is in no way based on anything that is calculated as being steering axis torque, rather than some random effects and forces that would feel good. Those games were developed before there were any high-torque DD FFB systems, so the forces are indeed calibrated to be exaggerated to feel any good on the systems that were sold back in those days.

I would expect, that the next beta release of the firmware would implement most of the missing effect stuff that these old titles use, but the problem of the exaggerated forces would be a good investigation / tutorial subject for someone that has the time!

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I’m pleased to report that the new beta firmware now works very nicely with the old Simbin titles like GTR2 and GT Legends. They are no AMS—but I must say with the Simucube firmware and direct drive goodness, with just a few PLR file tweaks, these old titles feel better than some of the newer titles. THANK YOU for implementing the DirectInput effects which brought these classic sims back to life.

As I fine tune the PLR settings, I’ll share those on here in case others still love these old games.

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Thanks for the report. Please also give the Directinput effect slider settings that you have set, along with the plr file tweaks.

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How did the directinput effects change things?

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I lack the technical knowledge to understand why…but before the latest firmware, GTL ffb didn’t work at all and GTR2 ffb was just a string of overpowering forces that didn’t relate to what the car was doing. It is my understanding that those sims don’t use telemetry based ffb, but instead layered canned directinput effects to mimic steering forces.

With the new firmware, the Simucube relays the same ffb that my T500 did in these titles…just obviously with a lot more power and smoothness. Pretty sure the old firmware only accepted some of the signals from these games, making rather strange ffb.

I’m sure Mika can fix my butchered explanation.

It is heartening that Granite is giving us some backwards compatibility with these effects…there is still some fun to be had with these older sims.

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Yes, rFactor 1 based games (or pre-rFactor ISI engine) without Realfeel plugin uses a heap of effects mixed together.

I think we all got pretty lucky that the effects work as well as they do, as I didn’t really test them with any games.

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Here is what I came up with for PLR settings for GTR2 and GTL (and these settings work in the original GTR, too, for what it’s worth).

A couple of notes:

Sometimes when entering the car, the steering has no feel. Exiting the car and going to settings and turning FFB off and then back to “Full” seems to fix it. No idea what causes this.

Secondly—it is important to have the last line in these PLR settings—Jolt magnitude, at or close to zero. If it is the default “1”–any time you hit a car or wall, the wheel will persistently pull hard to the left. Strangely, at “0”, hitting the wall or a car still provides a solid jolt.

In-game gain seems to have no effect, so the only adjustment to overall strength is through Simucube.

Not sure the DirectInput sliders in Simucube actually have an effect on the game feel. Need to play with those some more, but the attached image shows what is working now on my large Mige.

Like all ISI-based games which are not using RealFeel—the steering response seems to be based on a spring effect. It’s pretty strong relative to the other effects. It can be tweaked in the below settings at the line:

“FFB steer force output max=“1.00000” // Maximum force output of steering force, recommendation 0.8 to 2.0”

I have played with reducing it—which definitely lightens the steering, but going down much seems to affect on-center feel.

Regards.
Alan

(replace the lines below in the .plr file in the GTR2 userdata folder under the main installation directory)

FFB Device Type=“1” // Type of FFB controller: 0=none 1=wheel, 2=stick/custom, 3=rumble pad.
FFB Effects Level=“4” // Number of FFB effects to use: 0=No Effects, 1=Low, 2=Medium, 3=High, 4=Full, 5=Custom.
FFB Gain=“0.52000” // Strength of Force Feedback effects. Range 0.0 to 1.0.
FFB Throttle FX on steer axis=“1” // 0 = Throttle effects on throttle axis, 1 = throttle effects on steering axis.
FFB Brake FX on steer axis=“1” // 0 = Brake effects on brake axis, 1 = brake effects on steering axis.
FFB steer vibe freq mult=“0.50000” // Controls frequency of steering vibration. Recommended: 0.5 to 1.0, 0.0 disables steering vibration.
FFB steer vibe zero magnitude=“0.02000” // Magnitude of steering vibration at 0mph (reference point).
FFB steer vibe slope=“0.00000” // Slope of line defining magnitude as a function of frequency (used with FFB steer vibe zero magnitude).
FFB steer vibe wave type=“0” // Type of wave to use for vibe: 0=Sine, 1=Square, 2=Triangle, 3=Sawtooth up, 4=Sawtooth down.
FFB steer force average weight=“1.00000” // How much weight is given to new steering force calculations each frame (0.01 - 1.0). Lower values will smooth out the steering force, but will also add latency.
FFB steer force exponent=“0.50000” // Steering force output “sensitivity”. Range 0.0 to infinity. 0.0 to 1.0 = higher sensitivity, greater than 1.0 = lower sensitivity.
FFB steer force input max=“11500.00000” // Recommended: 11500 (-11500 if controller pulls in the wrong direction).
FFB steer force output max=“1.00000” // Maximum force output of steering force, recommendation 0.8 to 2.0
FFB steer force grip weight=“1.00000” // Range 0.0 to 1.0, recommended: 0.4 to 0.9. How much weight is given to tire grip when calculating steering force.
FFB steer force grip factor=“0.30000” // Range 0.0 to 1.0, recommended: 0.2 to 0.6. How much of a factor the front wheel grip is on the steering weight.
FFB steer update thresh=“0.0001500000” // Amount of change required to update steer force/vibe (0.0 - 1.0). Lower values = steering force updated more frequently = lower frame rate.
FFB steer friction coefficient=“0.00000” // Coefficient to use for steering friction. Range: -1.0 to 1.0
FFB steer friction saturation=“0.00000” // Saturation value to use for steering friction. Range: 0 - 1.0
FFB steer damper coefficient=“0.00000” // Coefficient to use for steering damper. Range: -1.0 to 1.0
FFB steer damper saturation=“0.00000” // Saturation value to use for steering damper. Range: 0 - 1.0
FFB throttle vibe freq mult=“0.06000” // Scales actual engine frequency to force FFB vibration frequency. Suggested range: 0.10 to 0.50
FFB throttle vibe zero magnitude=“0.02000” // Magnitude of engine vibration at 0rpm (reference point).
FFB throttle vibe slope=“0.00000” // Slope of line defining magnitude as a function of frequency (used with FFB throttle vibe zero magnitude).
FFB throttle vibe wave type=“0” // Type of wave to use for vibe: 0=Sine, 1=Square, 2=Triangle, 3=Sawtooth up, 4=Sawtooth down.
FFB throttle vibe update thresh=“0.02000” // Amount of change required to update throttle vibe (0.0 - 1.0)
FFB brake vibe freq mult=“0.90000” // Scales actual brake rotational frequency to force feedback vibration frequency.
FFB brake vibe zero magnitude=“0.09000” // Magnitude of brake vibration at 0mph (reference point).
FFB brake vibe slope=“0.00000” // Slope of line defining magnitude as a function of frequency (used with FFB brake vibe zero magnitude).
FFB brake vibe wave type=“0” // Type of wave to use for vibe: 0=Sine, 1=Square, 2=Triangle, 3=Sawtooth up, 4=Sawtooth down.
FFB brake vibe update thresh=“0.02000” // Amount of change required to update brake vibe (0.0 to 1.0)
FFB rumble strip magnitude=“0.35000” // How strong the rumble strip rumble is. Range 0.0 to 1.0, 0.0 disables effect.
FFB rumble strip freq mult=“1.00000” // Rumble stip frequency multiplier 1.0 = one rumble per wheel rev.
FFB rumble strip wave type=“0” // Type of wave to use for vibe: 0=Sine, 1=Square, 2=Triangle, 3=Sawtooth up, 4=Sawtooth down.
FFB rumble strip pull factor=“0.70000” // How strongly wheel pulls right/left when running over a rumble strip. Suggested range: -1.5 to 1.5.
FFB rumble strip update thresh=“0.07500” // Amount of change required to update rumble strip effect (0.0 - 1.0)
FFB jolt magnitude=“0.01000” // How strong jolts from other cars (or walls) are. Suggested Range: -2.0 to 2.0.

GTR2 Simucube Settings
GTR2 Simucube Settings695×890 73.7 KB

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I’ve tweaked a bit more in the GTR2 plr file and it now feels really nice to me. Rather than post another long string here, I just edited my original plr post.

Attached is a shot of the “Created FFB Effects” right after leaving the track in GTR2. It appears the only effect being used on track is PeriodicSine. The others on the screenshot were bold only at the beginning and if I stopped off track.

Mika, one strange phenomenon is: When I start the game and enter the track for the first time, the steering has no road feel (rumble strips are felt). I have to go into settings/controls and turn FFB off then on. Then on track all the ffb works. This is also true if I alt-tab out and change an DirectInput effect setting or “Reset FFB device state”. Any ideas? Does this have relevance to the issues some have had with RaceRoom?

Thanks again for making this classic fun again. With your latest firmware, this old sim’s primitive FFB is somewhere below AMS and above AC and PC2 in communicating the subtleties of car behavior on track.

GTR2 FFB Effects
GTR2 FFB Effects698×887 61.5 KB

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Thanks for these settings. Just tried it and feels great. One really strange thing though: GTR2 doesn’t recognize the upshift lever from my steering wheel. Now I already found out that GTR2 has a limit of three usb devices, but haven’t found a way to circumvent this. If anyone has any suggestions, please share. It still is a great sim. UI is stretched on tripples using the 10th Anniversary pack.

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Two tools for solving older titles’ controller count limitations:

  1. JoyToKey is a great tool to translate controller buttons into keyboard keystrokes. Even if the game doesn’t see a controller, it will allow you to assign functions (like shifting) to keystrokes.

  2. DevReorder. https://github.com/briankendall/devreorder/releases

This tool enables you to control the order in which the game sees your controllers, regardless of what order Windows lists them in Game Controllers (which changes randomly with Windows 10 in particular). With this, you can make sure your pedals and steering wheel are seen by the game, whereas it won’t matter whether it sees paddles, shifters, button boxes—if you are using JoyToKey or something similar.

Hope this helps.

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Hi Manashttu. Thanks for your reply. Are you sure this has to do with the order? And if I use devreorder, won’t this mess up existing buttonmappings in other sims? It’s just that it doesn’t seem to register all buttons on one usb device (my wheel). Really frustrating, since I just discovered how great this sim is.

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HardWin…what kind of wheel you have? What controllers you have attached…shifter, pedals,? So some buttons on the wheel work?

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Have a Simucube 1 with SSRG wheel, which works perfectly in all other sims. Besides that I have attached a Logitech keyboard, Heussinkveld Ultimate pedals, Pro sim sequential and H pattern (Pro sim equipment I have detached to reduce the amount of attached usb devices). Some of the buttons on the SSRG wheel are being recognized (for example the left downshift lever).

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These early simulators might have a maximum of 16 or 32 button limit on the controllers, which might be causing issues.

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Mika is right. This is where JoyToKey can be of benefit, as it supports up to 128 buttons, and can translate those to key commands that the game will recognize even if it is confused by the number of controllers or number of buttons.

The DevReorder tool could let you use the h-pattern and sequential, too. You need the Simucube first, then HE pedals, then a shifter—that makes your first three controllers visible to game. Then, the sequential and SSRG 4th/5th, with Joytokey translating these inputs into key commands.

You want the axis controllers first, then button-based controllers can be translated by joytokey.

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Then I should: 1) reorder the usb input
2) do a button-to-button mapping joytokey
3) assign the output button of joytokey in GTR2

Will this reordering of usb inputs mess up with other sims controller settings? Edit: just tried to map the lever to a vjoy key via UCR, but don’t get green lights (indicating that the binding worked). Does seem to work with simple keyboard keys.

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The DevReorder files (a dll file and an ini file) go in the game directory, so the reordering only applies to that specific game. With the DevReorder package are pretty clear instructions on what to put in the ini file to apply to your specific controllers.

In Joytokey—I’d suggest actually mapping a button to a keyboard key which is already used in the game. The game thinks you’re using a keyboard when you press that button on the controller.

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With regard to devreorder: clear. On the joytokey part: 1) map a keyboard button ingame, for example the space button. 2) map the input key (the lever in my case) to the output button, here the space button. I’ll try again but that second part didn’t seem to work.

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In JoyToKey, is there a visual indication when you pull that lever? I’m not at my PC right now, but in the profile tab, there’s an option to re-enumerate or re-list your controllers or something like that. You should have as many input tabs as controllers, and when you press a button, it should light up the tab, then the button you are pressing. Then you assign that one to specebar.

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One thing that might be the core problem, actually…are the levers on your ssrg box acting as axis or buttons? Need to be buttons to do things like shift gears. If it has clutch paddles, those are probably axis. Paddle shifters are usually buttons.