Multiplay Up-Close: The Drivers of Malaysian Sim Racers

February 1, 2009 by Chapree

Part of the folks that made up MSR.
Image credit: MalaysianSimRacers.com

One of our Shrine writers, Linkinstreet recently had an opportunity to interrogate interview some of the members of Malaysian Sim Racers (MSR), one of the largest and most active Simulation Racing enthusiast group in the country. The group already had 7 seasons so far and are now looking forward for Season 8, which to be held soon.

Most of local gamers doesn’t really realize the existence of MSR since we are accustomed to mainstream arcadish racing games such as Need for Speed series and Race Driver: GRID. But those in the active racing circle have always recognized MSR racing series as the most challenging series in the scene and have an uppermost respect for their drivers, who loved racing sims such as rFactor and GTR series.

They also maintain an active presence at our own Lowyat.NET Forums’ Competition, Leagues & Clans section. Jump in for the excellent and lenghty interview with drivers of MSR by Linkinstreet, whom himself recently has joined the ranks of MSR.

Malaysian Sim Racer Official Website

First of all, let me clarify that sim racing might not be as easy as arcade one. Having tried it myself, I can fully attest to that. So for me to be able to join them in races every weekend was quite a privilege. Some of them have really good car control, vying for racing line with bumpers just inches apart, and when seeing it unfold in front of you, sometimes you feel like you are seeing a real race with racers in real cars.

The interviewer would like to thank MSR members PCCrazy and also EvoHahn for this interesting interview. Thanx guys!

Linkin:
First off, what make you guys start all of this? I mean a local sim racing league was unheard of really in the age of arcade racing in this country. And who was the original members at the time?

MSR:
A long time ago, some of us participated in rFactor leagues in Europe. I’m proud to say that our Malaysian drivers did very well there. Since our ‘wonderful’ broadband connection (at the time) hampered our progress, we decided to form our own league. So the first ever race was a GTR2 race at Imola on 5th November 2006 won by alan. Since then we have had some 50 plus races and 5 seasons.

Original members? Let me see : Madnoren, izzNatta, Soze, ronmd, alan, kimi and meself (evoHahn).

Linkin:
To tell you the truth, I was not really used to sim racing growing up with the usual staple of games like Need for Speed. The first experience I got of Simulation was when the F1 fever hit Malaysia in 1999. So can you tell me, is there any difference between arcade games and simulators like rFactor and Live for Speed? I mean do racers have to use different approach to their racing?

MSR:
When we mentioned sim, we are talking about simulating real world experience. To make it comprehensible from a layman’s point of view, a simulator tries to imitate a racing world that is precisely alike to what a real driver will be experiencing.

To start with, real world have parameters such as weight, mass, friction, and etc. These parameters are what we call physics. When we have physics, we have constraints and boundaries. Understanding the basic principles of physics is compulsory to become successful as a sim racer and real world racer. Try asking any real world driver on this subject if you think my credibility is a suspect.

Need for Speed on the other hand has a set of basic code with no real world parameters as an input, hence the lack of realism. When I talk about realism, to make it simple, a 2kg car with a speed of 300km/h is physically impossible to take a 90 degree 7.5 meter wide road bend at almost full speed. Let’s say if it can, will the tyres in the game take the load without bursting? Yes it will since it has no character of a real tyre compound. The developer of NFS intentionally did so since it’s not commercially viable to do sim titles as it’s hard to pick up by the masses. We can’t compare NFS or GRID to Simulators since the three are in a different territory to begin with. NFS is for fun, you see the turn and you turn. There is no thinking or commitments attached to it. Real life techniques are inapplicable to some extent.

Look around you; simulators nowadays have become so sophisticated that its capability of rendering multiple complex mathematical formulas is being utilized all over by racing teams. Yes, including that of McLaren and Ferrari if you wondered. For your information before Hamilton’s first GP experience, Ron Dennis asked him to sit hour’s time in a simulator to get accustomed to the feel of F1 car. Yup, the only thing that was missing is the g-force. But looking at it, with the test ban at least the driver has miles under his belt.

(Interviewer’s note: Yep. Intel paid millions to Image Space incorporated for them to test the power of at the time the just launched Core series to see how well it was in calculating real life data. rFactor and LFS was so good in simulating and crunching data in real life that most of the F1 teams opted to use them as their official simulator. Go to any team’s roadshow and you would see them use either of these two)

Simulator in my opinion is going to change the racing world forever as more teams currently have the financial capacity to adopt its usage. Not to mention that you can test a talent for reduced cost now.

Ah, I’ve got to touch a bit on issue of old habits die hard. I did mention about understanding physics just now, people just think they know real car driving techniques because they give the impression like they are the real heroes on typical Malaysian streets. If you have the time, go check, it will be to your surprise, many of these self proclaim real street racer have no clues as to what constitutes proper driving techniques let alone physics. Simulators will surprise them of how wrong they actually are in driving principles and techniques.

(Interviewer’s note: True enough. I was a victim of that when I first moved to sim racing using F1 challenge years ago. Even tho the car was lighter and grippier than a car in Need for Speed, I can’t drive it like I did in that game. It took me 2 months to fully grasp the basic principle of sim racing. Slow in, fast out. And as one real life racer once said, to go fast, sometime you have to go slow.)

MSR is for the hardcore racing fan who understands real world racing. Because participating in a real world racing requires you to have the financial capacity and time. So simulator falls as the better substitutes for people seeking real world experience at their convenience. MSR provides for that. So if you think you are one of us please have a visit or try simming to see whether you are one of us, the sim junkies.

Linkin:
Quite a good summary thar. Anyways, on average, how many people joins for a race? And usually when does a race held?

MSR:
On average we have around 15-16 drivers per meeting. And some come as far as from Canada to join us. And our races are usually held at Sunday night every week, unless something comes up. If that happens we would postpone the race to the end of the season. Most of the time we have to wait until some members comes back from their dates :3

Linkin:
So right now what kind of racing series are you guys running in your league?

MSR:
We are running rFactor with the GTR conversion mod. Note that we don’t follow the official race calendar, but tracks that we voted ourselves. That means we would race at places such as Bathurst and Pasir Gudang, which are not official GTR races in real life. And the mod itself is quite awesome in a way, as the cars are fast, and yet with the closed top design, drivers are braver to attempt pass compared to open wheel as the damage penalty would be smaller. We’ve seen some good races this season because of this and we hope that this would continue throughout.

Linkin:
*Laughs*. Sounds fun. Anyways, won’t that lead to unwanted incident? I mean someone WOULD be uberexuberant and pull a move that would endanger someone else right? So do you have some guidelines or like marshals to oversee these races?

MSR:
We have developed specific set of rules and regulations for members and marshals to refer to. The rules are there not to hinder anyone from having fun, its existence is to ensure the objective of MSR is being met at the end of the day. We want participating simracers to have fun while learning the real world etiquettes. This, we believe will make MSRians a better driver in the league and in the real world.

Ryugan is our chief marshal, a really serious bloke when it comes to marshalling though. But he is as sweet as a candy in real life. I think maranello can attest to that. Besides ryugan, we have many working with him to oversee the rules and regulations meted out are being carried.

When someone broke the rules, a penalty is imposed just like real world. But most of the time MSRians are happy to accept whatever penalties coming since the spirit of fairness is already there. So it’s hardly any issues imposing penalties. The MSRians are soft and kind people. But sometimes they rammed each other’s butt in the race. But all is well after the race. We will keep learning to produce best rules and regulations and we are hopeful that the MSRians continues to keep learning as well.

Linkin:
So do you guys have your own site for us to visit?

MSR:
Yes. You can visit http://www.malaysiansimracers.com for more information about us, or just to see the latest information and videos. And we do have a LOT of videos, done by our members which showcase some of the best scene that happened during a particular race weekend.

Linkin:
Let just say that I am interested in all of this. How do I join?

MSR:
First, a PC… I’m kidding *laughs*. You’ll need rFactor which can be purchased online at www.rfactor.net and preferably a wheel – but if you have a joystick, you can use that. But a wheel would be the best choice, and beside, a Logitech G25 is not that expensive anymore.

Linkin:
Well now that the current (GTR) season is coming to an end, what do you guys plan on racing on next season?

MSR :
We ran open wheel mod and tin tops mod alternately. So next season we’ll run open wheel mod. *cough*gosearchforCTDPModF12006*cough*. It should be fun. The open wheel means that the drivers have to drive more carefully as it has a much higher speed, but low level of car damage tolerance compared to tin top cars.

Linkin:
Nice talking to you guys. I wish all the best for your league.

MSR:
Thank you.

Posted in Interviews, Local eSports, PC