Hello, my nickname is AshCountach and I have a problem. It started with Rockband, well, I've actually always had this problem, but let's just say it began there. I started playing guitar at 15, but never had an interest in playing the drums, that all changed on Nov 2007 when Rockband was released. I loved the Guitar Hero games and remember rushing to Gamestop to pick up one of the two copies they had on hand of the very first game back in 2005. It was awesome and I can't believe I'm still playing these games after 14 years. Thanks Harmonix.
Two years later Rockband came out with the full band and once I started playing that plastic drum set I was hooked. I remember modding the drumset with socks to dampen the sound and also hoping that my plastic kick pedal would never break. Then Rockband 3 came out and it had a Midi adapter that would allow you to connect electronic drums to the kit and Boom!! There goes the dynamite.
I jumped in head first and went with the gold standard and bought a Roland electronic drum set just to play Rockband and I have never regretted it. I also got two of my friends to do the same thing as well, Rusty, who even went farther with it than me, and then Keenan who bought my old set after I bought Rusty's old set. So at least I'm not the only person with this problem.
Now if this was the only instance then I may have a case for being a bit crazy, but uh, yeah, well, sim racing happened. Strangely enough, after looking up the purchase history this also started in 2007. I had already had a couple of basic racing wheels, the Xbox 360 wireless racing wheel and the Logitech G27 wheel, pedal and shifter set. I was using TV trays and desk mounts at this time but I never really like that setup. So I bought a Playseat sim stand on May of 2007.
Then in 2012 I bought my first Fanatec Wheel, Shifters, and pedals and the Playseat just wasn't able to handle the torque the new wheel put out so I bought an Rseat rig then about 4 months later I bought the Obutto Revolution racing seat/computer desk which I've been using ever since.
The problem with hobbies is that they can be expensive, my problem is that I have too many of these hobbies. So this past year I had been debating on whether to get a motion platform for my Sim Setup. I looked at videos and reviews for about 4 months then finally decided to pull the trigger on the Next Level Racing Motion Platform. I ordered the NLR and waited about a week for shipping and then opened up the box and one side had a dent in it. So I had to ship it back and wait for that whole process to complete, but good things come to those who wait.
Then came the fun part, how to merge the NLR with my current Obutto rig, which was the main reason I waited so long in making my decision. There is a standard bolt pattern for car seats and of course the NLR doesn't follow that standard since they sell their own seat. Luckily I found a forum thread with other Obutto users that had already figured how to mount the seat so I had to take a hand file and make the holes larger on the NLR itself which I was really hesitant to do, but trying to make a special bracket would have been more difficult. The process only took 40 minutes and the seat when on smoothly.
When I was looking at motion platforms there were two types, a seat mover or a whole rig mover and there are endless debates on which one is more immersive. I ultimately decided on the NLR, which is a seat mover, mainly because of its size and quietness, it's small and compact, but has a ton of power. I've had to tone down the movement quite a bit because a little motion goes a long way. The NLR reacts so quickly that you can feel when the rear end of the car starts sliding out allowing you to correct it which is amazing since it's only the seat moving around. The first time I flipped my car in Dirt Rally I actually thought for a second that I was going to be thrown out of the car.
The NLR comes with some easy to use software which makes setting up motion profiles for each game or for specific cars in a game a breeze and you can even make adjustments real time and feel the effect. It supports almost all of the sim racing games that I play and also supports transducers so I can control all of my buttkickers to give me some extra tactical feel in one software package. I've actually become a racing snob in that I really don't want to play any racing game that doesn't support motion. Pairing this with VR and it becomes the ultimate racing experience.
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