Just for reference, here are my favourites on each platform.
Each support modern XMPP extensions, interoperate very nicely with each other, and (at least in my opinion) look good!
As a note of caution, I used Oracle’s free tier to run a personal Matrix server, and it got deleted without any advance warning after a few months. I migrated to another provider and haven’t had any issues for 2+ years now.
I’ve had good fortune converting some family and friends to use XMPP.
People always mention fragmentation, and while there is some truth to it, it can be massively minimised by choosing blessed clients and servers for them to use.
In my case, I run my own server, and thoroughly test the clients (especially the onboarding flow) that I expect them to use, so that any question they have, I can help them out with quickly. Since we’re all on identically configured servers, it minimises one whole class of incompatibilities.
There is still unfortunately a bit of a usability gap compared to Signal - particularly on the iOS clients. But they have come a long way and are consistently improving.
That was fun to watch! I liked how you pretty much recreated the old Mika Häkkinen move on the Kemmel Straight
Any tips for preparing?
I found getting teammates to sit in the server with me and analyse my driving / give me live feedback was really helpful! We would rotate and give feedback to each other. Often it wasn’t just what they were telling me, but the fact I knew someone was watching made me more focused on what to improve.
This is probably too specific to be helpful, but because the VEC had 3 divisions at the time, in the few days before a race the practice server would have 70-80 cars on at peak times, which was absolute chaos. That was pretty useful for practicing traffic, for sure! But any way to practice with real drivers definitely helps.
It’s one of the things I love about ACC with having to deal with rain and so on which can really mix things up
Definitely, I love how dynamic the sims are getting and hopefully this will keep getting better across the sims! It makes it much more interesting when there’s a bit of rain in the mix :)
Very nice setup! That’s quite a collection of wheels you have - how do you find the build quality compares? Do you have any preferences between them?
Also - how do you find your PC for iRacing? I’ve heard iRacing is much more optimised than rF2 - I had a similar spec of PC but would still get the occasional stutter sometimes. I’m guessing with those specs in iRacing it would be buttery smooth? :)
I played rFactor 2 for a couple of years and raced GTEs and GT3s in the Virtual Endurance Championship and GT3 Endurance Series.
I really enjoyed the team aspect of the races and built some great friendships that have lasted even now I’ve taken an extended break from sim racing. The highlight every year was the 24 Hours of Le Mans - I have really fond memories of doing the night shift at 4am with the one or two other people online, knowing we had to carry the car to the morning.
I really enjoyed the multi-class racing. There was always someone in my mirrors and the first couple of times the prototypes would come to lap us each race would always be so hectic. I can vividly remember the feeling of dread being in a very intense battle at Spa, having the leaders stream past us leading up to Eau Rouge.
Another thing I loved was just racing as part of a team and the pressure of not letting me teammates down. In a weird way I enjoyed the underlying feeling of dread in the couple of days leading up to each race, the peaking in the laps before I took over the car, and then in longer races, the way the fact it didn’t go away after my stint as I knew I had to get in the car again later on! Then when we’d cross the line, there was always such great relief knowing that I wouldn’t have to get in again.
Those rain screenshots look so nice. It’s so cool to see how much progress the devs are making at the moment, especially compared to other sims.
I originally suggested Monal to my friend (who is quite into iOS and really appreciates a well designed application) and she found the same, but then she tried Siskin, and was happy enough to use it to this day.