GamerMuscle – Why Setups Don’t Matter – The Depressing Truth

British comedian, VR addict, and avid Sim racer GamerMuscle once more tackles a question you don’t want to ask yourself. Is sim racing setup tweaking worth while?

In his latest Talk and Drive using Assetto Corsa, GamerMuscle tries to explain why he personally does not really care about fiddling with car setups in sim racing titles. He asks himself the question… Does all the work and time you putt into a setup will make a significant improvement on your performance? will it turn slower drivers into competitive racers?

While we don’t fully agree with the statements in the video, it is nevertheless a very interesting question.

In our humble opinion, sim setups can both be very simple or hugely complicated. The actual value of a dedicated car setup depends heavily on a multitude of parameters which can be very different across the choice of sim racing platform.

The inner workings of a tyre model, the aero simulation, the car-track combo, and your personal driving preferences will all work with or against you when tweaking a setup. In essence, how good does the driver/gamer understands the needed alterations, and how accurate did the developer implement these parameters into his physics model?

In truth, yours truly has often managed to tweak his car setup and actually end up with a very uncompetitive or sometimes even undrivable car. Then again, with the help of some skilled fellow sim racers, I have also had the pleasure of shaving off those all important tenths, that make you run in the front of the field. So is guess it all comes down to the following. How good are you in tweaking the setup, and how good is the simulator in letting you.

Feel free to share your personal view in the comments section.