FA+
Shop
Racing in The Matrix
8 years ago
General
I've been putting a lot of time in with GTR2 lately, trying to make my way through the different unofficial race series (gives me specific cars and tracks to focus on). Currently testing and tuning a Ferrari 360 GTC at Autodromo Nazionale Monza (or just "Monza" to its friends).
Strangely, there have been a few instances lately as I fly down the back straight toward the Curva Parabolica that I become suddenly and acutely aware that this is nothing more than a huge collection of numbers. Yet... I can hear the engine. I can see the stitching in the leather of the dashboard. I can look out the window and see the trees, the catch-fencing, the famous podium as I shriek past on the front straight, the underpass under the original banked oval. I can even feel the car fight me as I lock up the back tires going into the Variante del Rettifilo, the tail squirming and threatening to step out sideways.
I can see and hear and feel it all... but it's all numbers. Loads and loads of mathematics and functions, computed at high speed and then represented to me via sight and sound and tactile feedback. There is no 360 GTC. It isn't at Monza (although Monza is a real track that exists in Italy... or does it?). There is no 3.6 litre V8 two feet behind me screaming out it's seductive tune. No coolant circulating through the engine and radiator, even if I can get a temperature reading on it and the engine oil.
It gets even more absurd when I think about going back to the garage and adjusting settings on the car. When I dial out rear wing, what exactly am I doing? I mean, do I think that's air flowing over the rear wing and pushing the car down? When I dial out rear wing, all I'm doing is changing a variable in a formula somewhere deep in the simulation so it gives a different result when fed a set of inputs. And the altered result of that formula feeds others to affect ride height and tire grip and aerodynamic drag... but it's still just numbers!
You know, I know this car doesn't exist. I know that when I drive it around a track, the Matrix is telling my brain that the tires are gripping the track, the bumps and ripples in the asphalt rattling the steering wheel and the engine is working to propel me down the track, exhaust snapping and popping on deceleration and that the sun is sinking low, spreading orange light in the windows of the car. After ten years, you know what I realize? Ignorance is bliss.
If you're ever on a Multi-user text system, try not to think about how it's all nothing more than a huge database. You think when you type "west" that you're moving in a direction? Into another place that on a map would be to the left of where you were? "West" is a link to another database entry. It's your brain that interprets it as a direction that can be traveled to a new place.
And yet... all those database entries, all linked together... they can make some pretty fantastic worlds.
Strangely, there have been a few instances lately as I fly down the back straight toward the Curva Parabolica that I become suddenly and acutely aware that this is nothing more than a huge collection of numbers. Yet... I can hear the engine. I can see the stitching in the leather of the dashboard. I can look out the window and see the trees, the catch-fencing, the famous podium as I shriek past on the front straight, the underpass under the original banked oval. I can even feel the car fight me as I lock up the back tires going into the Variante del Rettifilo, the tail squirming and threatening to step out sideways.
I can see and hear and feel it all... but it's all numbers. Loads and loads of mathematics and functions, computed at high speed and then represented to me via sight and sound and tactile feedback. There is no 360 GTC. It isn't at Monza (although Monza is a real track that exists in Italy... or does it?). There is no 3.6 litre V8 two feet behind me screaming out it's seductive tune. No coolant circulating through the engine and radiator, even if I can get a temperature reading on it and the engine oil.
It gets even more absurd when I think about going back to the garage and adjusting settings on the car. When I dial out rear wing, what exactly am I doing? I mean, do I think that's air flowing over the rear wing and pushing the car down? When I dial out rear wing, all I'm doing is changing a variable in a formula somewhere deep in the simulation so it gives a different result when fed a set of inputs. And the altered result of that formula feeds others to affect ride height and tire grip and aerodynamic drag... but it's still just numbers!
You know, I know this car doesn't exist. I know that when I drive it around a track, the Matrix is telling my brain that the tires are gripping the track, the bumps and ripples in the asphalt rattling the steering wheel and the engine is working to propel me down the track, exhaust snapping and popping on deceleration and that the sun is sinking low, spreading orange light in the windows of the car. After ten years, you know what I realize? Ignorance is bliss.
If you're ever on a Multi-user text system, try not to think about how it's all nothing more than a huge database. You think when you type "west" that you're moving in a direction? Into another place that on a map would be to the left of where you were? "West" is a link to another database entry. It's your brain that interprets it as a direction that can be traveled to a new place.
And yet... all those database entries, all linked together... they can make some pretty fantastic worlds.
I mean your brain the "computer," and its just processing sensory input as the code (numbers) in this giant equation we call life. Things like emotions become the variables that can "tune" (much like the rear wing) the experiences that occur.
What's kind of funny to think about is, when the layers of simulation get deep, your brain can still sort it out. You are operating a computer, that is operating a world, that has a virtual you in that world, operating a virtual car, that is receiving inputs....it's all layers.
But as you say, we have experiences some pretty fantastic worlds inside the chaotic soup of billions and billions of 1's and 0's.
And the people are real, too. Oh, thery're not really dragons and mongooses and stuff. But there is a reality there.
Also, I hope the game of moving cars made of numbers remains grand fun. :)