Do You Think That Racing Games Affect Driving??

I think they have a positive effect. I have been in several situations were I handled the car in way which I could have only learned in a racing sim.
One instance I can remember is where I came round a semi blind corner at about 60, normal for that section of road, not speeding. What was before me on the road? A van sitting there right in the middle of the lane. They were resurfacing a few hundred meters down the road and a queue had formed from the traffic lights. There were no signs at all and the queue finished just after the corner. I was driving a little fiesta and had never had to brake like that, in any car. But the braking wasn't enough.. the front left locked and I actual had to steer around the van, while skidding. It's all a blur now but I came to rest exactly along side the van on the wrong side of the road. The driver just looked with his mouth open. Had I not been playing Driver and Gran Turismo on the Playstation 24/7 around that time I don't think the 'instinct basics' of how to control an under steering car would be there. In the panic I would have slammed into the back of the van and probably lost my legs or something..... mostly due to the crapness of the Fiesta.
I think that computer games give you a very slight insight of how a car will react when pushed. There is no other way to learn without skidpan training.

Forgetting car games specifically. How can vastly improved hand eye coordination not have a positive effect on car control. You already have the skill to displace you mind in that way... if that makes sense. Not controlling your body but something else.
In a car accident rasing your arms to protect your face does no good. That's a fairly heavy instinct you need to over come when something is about to hit you. If you play games the brain rewiring required to maintain the cars protection... thus ultimately yourself.... has already been learned from many many hours of "inhabiting" avatars and virtual machines.

 

Engine is pretty much standard, uprated springs and shocks, 17" rubber, with a nice set of 4 pot brembo calipers on 305mm disks...

Makes a fantastic V6 growl when winding on.. and offers great entertainment when little wide boys in their corsas with dustbin exhausts but 1L engines fancy dragging it..

and if memory serves, Wild drives a nicely sorted punto...

 

Nicely put, i have to say i agree with you. Not only the other day i was out Karting for a laugh with my mates, and id been on the racing sims the previous day and on that morning so i was all geared up ( as you do lol) but anyway, i went out and i pritty much wiped the floor with my mates, there not exceptional drivers but i felt that i new the track, were to break, i had knowledge that my tires were cold on the first lap or so and to take it easy, while everyone else spun off. I could feel what the kart was doing, and i dont know if thats to do with sims but i remember agesss ago when i went karting i didnt have a clue, i spun off alot and well.....was crap, but playing sims does help you get a perception of distance and were and when not to break, how wheather effect driving, and so on.
And im glad to hear you are ok that incident with the van sounds all too farmilar, same sort of thing happend to me and my dad a while back, and my dad used to street rally, so he knew exactly what to do, but if i were driving im sure i would have crashed.
Driving sims give you experience and.....wel fun

 

HaHa, im like that with my sunbeam 2.2L Twin Cam, they dont really stand much chance . I dont see the point in spending the cash on a Corsa, why not save ya pennies and buy something nice in a couple years time....plus they just look silly with the bodykits on Also really why bother? i mean Alfa.....Corsa, the outcome is clearly obvious

 

A reflex I learned from playing alot of Gran Turismo back in the old days kinda saved my ass once. My car lost control in a bent, I started sliding, I immediatly controlled it as if I would do in GT and it worked... lol

 

Thers another story to proove that playing sims gives you a good idea of what to do when something goes wrong

 

i have to say a lil bit but thats only if u just got done playing kinda does it to me a lil foot feels like leadver:

 

Racing sims are ok but after driving/racing in real life they're just ho hum for me. You can feel how far to push it in real life, from every part of your body, the car becomes an extension of you. As far as the poll goes I'm sure some people go and drive fast after playing, should they be outlawed? no

 

I don't race but I got the same feeling, I always brake for old people that have to cross a street, or watch out for other things, but I do drive quite fast. I learned the limits of my parents car at this point and if I drive every day during the week, I can drive the car as if it's... well I dunno, it just feels as if I could make any turn in any way I want.

When there's a lot of traffic I follow the rules, but if there's plenty of room for manouvering... the hell with it, push that pedal and get some gas!

 

Even if you do drive a bit harder after playing a sim, you would quickly adjust back to your 'normal' style of driving.

I love racing sims and fast cars...but that doesn't mean i have to drive insanely fast on the road all the time.

I usually drive at the speed limit - maybe a little over if visibility and conditions are good but I don't ever push it really hard...I don't drive a race car so why should i drive like I do?

It always makes me laugh seeing people ragging the sh!t out of their Saxos for no apparent reason.

Not worth taking a chance speeding, especially as a younger driver as the police will throw the book at you if they catch you, let alone if something happens as a result.

If someone does try to drive their real car like they do in NFS...then they're an idiot.

Edit: To answer the question, they're bound to affect some people. Anyone seen that video of those kids who try to drift their MX5 (and crash it) after playing Initial-D?

It's the same as with everything. Some people take it too far...like those people who got stabbed for killing someones warcraft character or something. lol.

But, anyone who tries to drive a standard road car on a road with standard road tyres etc like you would drive the Lister Storm in GTR shouldn't be on the road anyway.

 

I know only one wheel locked, your brakes sucked and you may have already known this, but your story just makes me want to point out that most people figure that the fastest way to stop is to lock out the wheels, which is flat out wrong. So few realize that static friction is greater than kinetic friction. Static is where the wheel is turning and isn't moving relative to the road surface, allowing the tire treads to dig in a little into the pavement. In kinetic the tire is just skimming on the surface. This is especially bad on a wet road, and cars will stop around half as fast compared to not locking the wheels if not worse. I personally have heard people say things like, "I slammed the brakes and the car just wouldn't stop."

Also anti-lock brakes are even worse in stopping distance because the brakes will completely release whenever the wheels lock (look at the truck commercial with the giant see-saw). Even if you can't perfectly press down the brake to stop faster than slamming it, you'll still have control over the car, and if it's an anti-lock system you'll not only have more control but probably stop faster too.

Back to the poll, I really don't think racing games have any effect at all on people's driving. Anyone stupid enough to try out some stuff in the games probably would have found something just as dumb to do if they never played it. For people with gaming wheels the mechanics and feel of everything is still just too different from real driving. (I tried one once) I'd also like to add that playing MS's flight simulators with joysticks didn't quite make me feel like I was flying.

 

If I have to stop quickly I always put the gear lower too, makes the car slow down alot aside from braking, combined you got a very fast stop. Dunno about the US, but here in Europe the cars are manual transmission.

I only had 1 accident uptil now and as silly as it is, it was when I was driving like 5mph...

I saw a person on the sidewalk do something strange, it caught my attention as I had to predict wether he was going to do smt dangerous or not and suddenly, the car infront of me did a sudden brake, I noticed it but I was to late to stop the car. The damage was minimal, the bumer and the right light was f*cked, that's all.

@Khenglish, I hate racing wheels for games, they're very unrealistic indeed.

 

I reckon that playing a racing sim can't hurt but there's no substitute for real experience and being able to feel thru the seat of your pants what the car is doing and where the weight on the springs is and being able to feel when the car is about to lose grip and spin out...just can't be done in a simulator. Myself, I learned how to drive decades before there was any sort of racing video games...and Pole Position didn't exactly simulate things well lol. Despite my comment above I actually drive very conservatively on the road...and occasionally I go out on the thousands of miles of dirt and gravel logging roads here where there's no cops or traffic and let it all hang out in my '67 Pontiac GTO or Jeep Grand Cherokee...the Goat is funner though with it's front engine and rear wheel drive and very predictable sliding. I had a mid-engine Porsche for awhile and didn't care for it since it wanted to do 360's with no warning.

 

I'd say no.

If you're not intelligent enough to tell the difference between the two you shouldn't be driving anyway. Driving sims may help people become better drivers because you can get rid of your road rage in a game instead of on the streets.

Of course, after playing arcade drivers I go try stupid things in my own car, but never on the road.

Edit:

My father has a '66. Those cars are gorgeous

 

Worry not. I do indeed know this.

 

oh cool...don't see many old Goats around anymore outside of car shows. Mine is actually the first car I ever bought...worked my butt off on the local farms to buy it (used) and I'm not known for selling things but I'm too cheap to just give it away and too attached to it to not keep it. It ain't real pretty anymore...it could use some body work and a new paint job but then I wouldn't want to take it out on the logging roads and spin gravel so what's the point I say? I mean the car was meant to be driven fast yes? When I see some urbanite driving a Turbo Carrera at 30mph I just want to yell "give me that and stop wasting horsepower!" anyway I won't bore and stroke y'all anymore lol I have no idea if racing games affect driving...I think some young men are just gonna drive too fast regardless...we all certainly did long before video games and fortunately most of us didn't kill ourselves or anyone else in the process and got a little wiser in time. Banning racing games is just silly IMO...be smarter to ban taverns from having parking lots.

 

Manual is widely available but most people get automatic or dual-clutch transmission. My dad's car has the latter. I think it's the manual clutch that intimidates a lot of people, which is why the dual-clutch style has become popular.
I've pretty much learned how to drive stick in racing simulators. Since I've got an automatic car, I've never put it to practice in the real world.

I never do anything stupid in my car. I know it's capabilities. Never had a ticket, never had an accident, knock on wood. I hate driving actually. Driving on Ontario roads is stressful. A lot of people doing dangerous things, breaking the rules of the road. I doubt video games caused all that. I've also noticed the larger the vehicle, the dumber the driver, especially those damn minivans.

 

Exactly, i know my cars limits and i dont push excessivly.
Yeah if theres a country road and its early morning and the weather is good il have a bit of fun, but hell who doesnt?
Motorway i stick to limit or just obove 70~80mph (UK) i cant really go any faster anyway otherwise the rev's would be to high and it would drown out my music my cars only geared to do about 110~120Mph max bit 0-60 is about 5.5s
As for accidents ive had non, touch wood lol.
I do think racing sims help you learn a track, i have done a few track days and have been too donnington park, and as you will know thats on GTR 2 which gave me a load of help when i actually went to donnington, yeah there was more feedback from the car and so on.....but the track was the same i k new the track so i drove it quickly to start with.

 

Yes!

Here it's BMW X5 drivers. They will cut you up every damn time.

Same with X3 drivers and the 1-series...they just seem to attract 'that kind of person' lol

School mummies in the huge merc E-classes are often very agressive drivers too.

 

isn't there an option to vote that driving game improve youre driving skill. well I think they do. especially racing sims, since they are so real you can actually learn a driving skill from trying it in the game.