Update Speculation thread

An EV is just a vehicle that is powered by electricity instead of normal fuel. If you want to buy an EV because it has something you like that a gas car doesn’t offer, go right ahead. If you buy it to “save the world” however...then there’s a problem. A HEV is basically a gas vehicle with an electric motor for assistance, or sometimes the other way around. For those who want high MPG without having to deal with all the problems an electric car might have. CUVs are this strange thing called a crossover. Kind of like a lifted wagon with the rear of a hatchback. Very sloped and car-like. Unlike real SUVs they are unibody instead of body on frame and normally aren’t as capable or useful as an SUV. Most “SUVs” that you see today are actually crossovers, with exceptions such as 4runners, wranglers, suburbans, ect.

 

Why Are we Talking About This!

 

In other fields - rail transport, aeronautical, naval... - autonomous driving has been a thing for quite some time. Given the fallacy of human nature, and given how much easier it is for morons to set themselves behind the wheel of a car than, say, at the helm of a cruiser, that can't really be a bad thing, to be honest...

 

Autonomous driving is good for public transportation because driving 8 hours a day is very tiring.
People buy and drive privately owned vehicles mostly for two reasons:
1. The number of public transport vehicles are not enough
2. Fun to drive.
For people who see driving as a burden, autonomous vehicle is ok if public transport is not enough to satisfy their needs. For people who enjoy driving, human driving is good. Therefore the right to drive on public roads should be preserved.
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Giving the fact that most vehicles in BeamNG demolition derby killed by overheating as a result of radiator leaking. An all-electric demolition derby would be fun.
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All-electric powertrain is not bad at all. The problem is most EVs have too many so-called "smart" anti-features.

 

So far all autonomous designs seem to be aimed at the first category, urban transport that would likely replace taxis more than privately-owned cars.

Coexistence with human-driven vehicles is often quoted as one of the biggest challenges to overcome before autonomous drive can reach widespread application, so nobody is really expecting everything on wheels to turn autonomous in a matter of a few months.

 

Look at THIS.

There is not a single car between 2002-2008. From gameplay point of view, you can only have banger races, derby, historic races etc. set in these years and later. This is gap that need to be filled, sooner or later.

 

Why are we talking about this!
This is Update Speculation Thread.

 

We are speculating about future content. Please stop backseat moderating.

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I’d think that we’ll see some form of modern SUV (maybe a 2006 CUV of some sort) before or after release, and I suspect that we might also see some sort of 30s/40s art deco car. I have literally no proof of this, but that seems to complete the variety holes nicely.

 

Sorry

 

EV - Electric Vehicle
HEV - Hybrid Electric Vehicle
CUV - I believe it's Crossover Utility Vehicle. Imagine a Nissan Juke or a Mazda CX-3.

 

I feel as if the electric cars in BeamNG are far too loud too. In real life there is only a very faint whine from the motor. Also, if you don't want electric cars in this game.. You need to realize that this game features production vehicles, although gas guzzling shit-boxes are fun, electric cars are pretty common commuters now.

 

Yeah they are a bit too loud. On top of that it’s impossible for them to catch fire as of now unless you use the button and they can drive underwater even if the car is completely submerged. Probably should be fixed before they add a dedicated ev in.
As for cars that I think should be added a minivan from the 2000s to fill the car gap would be nice. A modern American sedan is also needed since as of now there aren’t really any modern American cars. Crossovers are a type of vehicle that is currently not represented at all in this game so one of those probably need to come eventually. Hopefully a new one with a wimpy turbo i4 engine, FWD and AWD variants, and wacky styling that makes you want to launch a bus into it.

 

The problem with this is Beam has a limited number of developers, and it takes a while to add new vehicles. An early-mid 2000s SUV and Pickup would both add almost nothing that the Roamer and D-series don't already, other than a slightly more powerful engine and different styling. Same with a early-mid 2000s car, although it could get around that by also being a new segment (eg. a FR midsize sedan). A minivan, CUV, hybrid and EV are all decent ideas, although the hybrid and EV both fall into the same issue of not adding much either. A hybrid would probably be best introduced as an option for an already existing car, like the sunburst or ETK 800, and the eSBR4 already fits the EV bill. A modern supercar would be interesting, but would require a lot of work to add something that would only be useful in one scenario (track racing), and once again wouldn't achieve much the SBR and Bolide don't. Also, the BeamNG physics engine doesn't handle modern composites very well.

They mean Electric Vehicle, High Efficiency Vehicle, and Compact SUV/Crossover SUV, respectively.

 

google it

 

The problem is, by gaining realism, you sacrifice fun. The same thing happened when they added a limiter to the reverse gear on the eSBR. Going backwards at ridiculously high speeds like Big Rigs: Over the Road Racing, but then they fixed it. If they make it so that electric cars short out or something when they touch water, we lose an interesting and entertaining gameplay mechanic.

What I do think should be improved is the vehicle damage app. I think there need to be more shapes or at least more configurations. No matter if your car is rear engined, missing parts, air-cooled, electric, or a bus/truck, the app still shows a car with an ICE in the front and a radiator. It may not be practical, useful or necessary, but it would be more accurate.

Also, it's supposed to only appear when damage is taken, but occasionally it won't appear at all. It's still a little buggy.

 

Also, as exhaust damage is now a thing, that would be a nice addition to the damage UI.

 

I think a modern SUV would add a lot to the game. I'd love a truck or SUV with a lot of power and safety and control features like traction control and a sophisticated air suspension. Something similar to a jeep trackhawk or BMW something series would be a lot of fun and a very unique experience in the game. 700 horsepower pushing around a 4000 pound, top heavy vehicle with modern technology would be so much fun.

 

You aren't wrong, but we do have the ETK 1300 mod for that.

 

Use the ETK 1300 mod to hold you up. It seems that the devs have really planned out the future updates for BeamNG and it seems to be map reworks, D-series and H-series revamps, and the Soliad Wendover.

 

It is true that the mining of battery materials is problematic. At the same time, the same is true for anything oil based.

Of course car industry wants to sell more and new cars.... but in reality they have been so busy selling their gas guzzlers that they have become complacent and stopped being particularly innovative. Yet the most important factor for car replacement is sitll rust and old age.... rust counter measures actually seem to have decreased over time. My friends drives an Audi 80.... it is over 20 years old yet has basically zero rust. Meanwhile my 2010 Focus shows first signs of corrosion although being less than half that age.

And then there is the block box ICE... an engine so complex and so expensive to properly check for defects that a lot of cars - although repairable in principle - are sent to the scrap yard because the owner is afraid of nasty engine related surprises coming up after another expensive repair. Meanwhile even basic low tech electric motors can go a million kilometes without any issue.

Few cars live longer than 15 years before they are scrapped. ICEs are partially responsible for that. Not only is it very expensive to do a full check up of the engine (due to required manual labour of dissassembly) but the exhaust cleaning burns morey money than fuel. A fact not helped by more and more integrated components. I mean the watercooled turbo of the ecoboost 1.0 liters is really a feat of engineering but god help you if it breaks down. The repair bill for that will probably net you a driveable used car. Did I mention that Ford was cheap on some thermal isolation for a while? If you are unlucky a water connector gets loose while driving starving both engine and turbo of badly needed coolant. Bonus points for the fact that the "smart" sensor placement and configuration neglects to inform you about this "minor" issue. Usually the first sign of trouble is a piston going trough the engine block one way. Efficient engines means high power output per ignition means very little time to shut down the engine when something goes wrong.

Bio fuels are an interesting concept but outside of niche applications they will never be competive to anything. For the energy and money required to get a litre of them you could easily drive your EV a few hundred kilometers. Environmentally friendly or not (which is dubios if you are honest), price will be their undoing just like hydrogen will most likely be dead on arrival, at least for cars.

Actually, the right to drive on private roads should be preserved. It is the same discussion as with the speed limit at the end of the day. It is fine if you want to endanger your own life but not the life of other people.

Public roads are for public transportation needs and not for your joy, especially not if that joy endangers other participants.

However, It seems safe to say that it will take at least several decades until manual driving is outlawed: For starters, it only makes sense when all cars can drive autonomousy. And since cars survive 15 years - with a rising tendency due to increased electrification and harsher competititon this would be the minimum time period where both types of "driving" exist. Also a lot of people do enjoy driviing and I dont see them becoming an irrelevant minority anytime soon. Finally, with increased automated driving software security issues are going to be pronounced... probably sadly leading to some death even. Once you are in a fully automated car, you are at the mercy of the computer and anyone who might control it. So is your environmet. Just like a driver running amok, a computer running amok can cause devastating damage, possible even more so due to being more crash resistant than the squishy human. This will lead to a slow down in market dominance and also lead to the development and deployment of some security features like emergency brakes and computer kill switches. So dont worry... you will be at the wheel for a long time to come.


Yet, in the very long term.... those issues will be sorted out and cold statistics will prove that far less people die due to the computer than due to human error. And this will be the time when a growing percentage of the population will demand that human error be outlawed outside of private streets.

I am sorry if I break anyones illusions here... but the computer IS a better driver. It is ludicrous fast and would consider the time it takes a single wheel to spin one single rotation at 300 km/h more than an aeon of eternity. Ample time to consider all possible options and beginning to execute the most prudent one. It has no human limits... it actually can look in all directions at the same time and as such never "flies" blind the way all human drivers do when the look left or right or behind.

Real time sensor data grant it unrivaled control over the vehicle. It knows everything.... every little detail.... every minor bump, the current traction value of the wheels, the weight distribution... and then it uses all that data end the enormous processing power to evade and steer with a precision well above anything humany possible. If it is physically possible, it it will evade any obstacle, pushing the car closer to the limits of the physics than any human would ever dare or even have time to consider. It might even trigger a temporarly - for the computer - loss of control for maximum evasion potential and then catch the car again with little effort. It will communicate with incoming traffic so that this incoming traffic steers grant sufficient "loss of control" space. Further away traffic will steer and brake less. It will automatically inform emergency services about a near or actual crash with accurate information about how many passengers and pedestrians where involved. It will inform central traffic control about the accident, causing all vehicles on the roadways to create an rescue lane. The automatic emergency vehicle will use this lane at best possible speed.

Later, sensor data will be evaluated to find out the cause of the almost accident. Guilty party will be punished, but all will be glad that nobody died today in what would have been an almost certainly fatal accident in a human driver world.


Lastly... even with less sophisticated software and hardware there is one undenieable advantage of a computer driver. It has no emotions. It cant be bullied. It obeys the traffic laws no matter what. If the speed limit is 80, it will drive 80. Not 79 and not 81. It will casually ignore the 10 km trail of drivers behind it. It will brake for a pedestrian even if a driver truck is right behind it. It will then use its pleasant computer voice to inform the driver of the truck that just scrapped your car that he should take a good look at his driving license, because he will never see it again, because an 3D 8K video of his misconduct is already on the way to the police.

Is that dystopian enough for you guys?

I think that if they make the electric cars in the game any quieter people with loud computer fans wont hear anything anymore.

Fun fact, hydrogen/fuel cell cars are electric cars. They have a relative large battery pack because the fuel cell cannot deliver a lot of power fast. In many ways, fuel cell vehicles are like an range extender for an EV. They slowly regenerate the battery over time but a battery you need as the fuel cell cannot handle the amount of power demand electric driving requires. This is one additional reason of why I dont believe in hydrogen cars.... you still require a battery and you need a fuel cell. It is very likely that in time more battery capacity will be both cheaper and more reliable than a fuel cell.


I still think that a fuel cell vehicle could be an interesting addition to the game.

• Longer ranger compared to equal technology level pure EV (as of today)
  
• Battery slowly regenerates over time.... full range at low to middle load conditions)
  
• Hard driving overloads the fuel cells capacity to regenerate the battery, so the battery drains.
  
• Once the battery is empty, driving stops, however regeneration can keep up again and the battery fills up slowly again.

What also could be an interesting addition to the game was an ICE to electric conversion done by the owner.

From the 3 different types of EV we right now only have one:

ICE car factory converted to EV (eSBR 4, medium range due to not enough space for more batteries)
ICE car owner converted to EV (basically replacing the ICE with an EV while keeping the gearbox and most of the car intact otherwise. Short range due to little space for the batteries availalable.
Newly built and designed EV: Meant from the ground up for electric driving, this car has maximum electric range and a full "skateboard" battery design maximizing range and keeping center of mass down.

Why it would be interesting?

The owner conversion would be playing with an electric motor and its quirks in an ICE tranmission car. EU version with manual, US version with classic automatic gearbox.

The pure from the ground up EV could be used to show the different driving physics of the common "battery skateboard" design. It also could show off the unique design opportunities of a completly different (and usually smaller) drive train.


Hybrids are also an interesting option although I think we already have the great mod for that. Personally I also think that Hybrids will increasingly die out in real life as the two engine system only ever was really interesting when one engine alone was not up to the job. (The ICE being to thirsty and the electric motor being having to little range due to poor batteries)

Why have the disadvantages of both when you can go with just one by now? A Hybrid has an electric drive system and an ICE. It still suffers from expensive exhaust repairs, regular oil change intervalls and still directly pollutes the neighbourhood. Modern downsized turbocharged non hybrid ICE also have melted away a good portion of their consumption advantage and while they will steal beat any ICE, the difference has become relative small. I think that Toyota has rally not done itself any favours ignoring pure EV for so long.... by know I know the third former Prius owner that now drives a full EV that is not from Toyota because Toyota doesnt have a compelling offer.