Re: optional 360° gamepad/thumbstick steering

Maybe. There is a speed=sensitivity function in the game, to allow for accurate steering across different driving speeds.

I assume this 360 degree of enabled input would not conflict with that, only add extra double accuracy.

But maybe the feature will have to come with an option enable disable or adjust the speed=sensitivity function. The amount of steering available depending on speed. 

But other than that, its simple. 

In an fps game you can turn the camera to any direction, 360 degrees. Simply apply that to the steering wheel. and you have 360 degree of steering. 

What is even extra good is that the f1 cars already by their very nature have 360 degree steering. A roadcar would have 900 degree. But 360 is a perfect for f1 or f2.

So in that sense I simply see allot of compatibility of this feature with this game. I highly doubt it will be difficult to design a functional 360 degree steering.

Altho at the bottom max degree of steering, there might be a conflict between left and right. They could either add a deadzone to make it 350 degree, or simply code it to not be possible to cross the 180 degree limit from left to right or from right to left. 

Yeah the bottom left and bottom right will have to be seperated by some artificial blockage when accidentally going over the limit, like 181 degrees to the left becoming 179 degrees to the right. There would have to be some two way barrier that limits oversteering from crossing the border. 

Yeah like a mandatory neutral before allowing change of direction?

Nah, that doesnt seem logical. You gotta think about easy engineering. 

When the Y-axis has a negative value, the x axis is not allowed to move from negative to positive value, or from positive to negative value. 

And when the Y-axis has a positive value. The x-axis is allowed to change from positive to negative or from negative to positive.

That way you have full 360 degrees of freedom with a blockage or lock at the max steering, bottom left/right.

Yes that is genius! So logical.

Y=180, X=0 neutral and positive value of Y allows X to change from positive or negative value. 

to the left anti clockwise. 

Y=179, X=-1

Y=0, X=-180 halfway left

Y=-1, X=-179

Y=-179, X=-1

Y=-180, X=0 full left

Y=-179, X=+1 limitted to x=0 or -1 because y has a negative value  (the change of x to positive value when Y is negative, is blocked or limitted to X=0 or X=-1)

Maybe limit both to 179 for total of 358 degrees. 

Indeed 

I am by no means an expert.  but it seems logical. Otherwise just copy fps game camera coding and use it for steering application. 

Y=0, X=-180 half left 

Y=-1, X=-179 more than half left

Y=+1, X=-179 less than half left.

No transitional issues on 90 degree left or right. It can easily go further or retreat to more or less steering. 

The only issue is bottom max Y=negative values. 180 degree lock. when X=0 and Y=-180. Has to block X values from crossing/transitioning state(positive/negative). So Y=-179 and X=+1 has to be blocked somehow when steering left.

So if Y is negative X cannot change between positive or negative values. Otherwise it would go from max left to instant max right by accident. 

What about the inaccurate values?

For example X=-50 and Y=65

Or the almost accurate values. As we cannot assume that all thumbsticks on all gamepads are accurate to produce precise values around the outer edges of the thumbstick.

@ivun3
Why cant I reply anymore?

EDIT:

Yes HAHA! Your post was also deleted right after you added calcules. Oh man! We are trying to post a way to calculate/convert thumbstick input to steering degrees! Please let us post the actual math?

Yeah it seems so. cant post calcules. Which is kind of weird. Seems like the forums have calcules phobia. it is considered spam. We are trying to display calcules. But maybe post in image. 

ok hope it works. small file.

Yeah I already read it a while ago, and ur right. There needs to be an automated way to translate x, y values to degrees.

and I spent over 10 hours to perfect THIS! Codemasters dont have to do anything! haha. 

Only write the logic gate in correct code and voila. 

100% always accurate 360 degree steering based on this formula I made and the logic and according sub logic gates it has to go through. Here it finally is! The complete masterpiece. All the formulas and codes to allow for 360 steering on the left thumbstick, based SOLELY on the x and y values of the left thumbstick.

I hope you enjoy this!

All the wonder on just 409 kb jpg image. 

Haha, ordered chaos, I love it! 🙌

I cant wait to use it. This is so amazing. Love the huge formula. 

So lets say I wanna know steering angle of x=76 and y=-34

I enter x and y values as positive in formula. 

I got:  65.9 degrees.

y is negative and x is positive

So logic gate 4

subtract answer from 180 degrees and make positive. 

180 minus 65,9 is 114.1 degrees positive. meaning clockwise or to the right.

It works! just knowing x and y as 76 and minus 34 we got an angle of positive 114.1 degrees of steering to the right. 

the sublogic gate is false tho and has to be fixed. 

Yeah, I got so exhausted making the actual formula. then I had to do logic gates. but sub logic gates not tested. Both logic gates needs further fine tuning and work. I leave it as is for now. I'm gonna take a rest. This has made me really tired. 😳

I gotta admit tho. I kind of got addicted to developing this formula for 360 steering on left thumbstick with y and x axis only. Even tho I'm tired, I wanna fine tune the logic gates. 

Logic gates seem fine, but sub logic gate can be deleted maybe. 

I'll try with a higher y value.

so x is 23

and y is -72

put in formula, I get:

17,7 degrees. 

y is negative and x is positive

so logic gate 4

subtract answer from 180 and make positive. 

180 minus 17,7 is 162,2842 degrees to the right.

Hey it works so great! But you can delete sub logic gate it seems they dont add much. 

Maybe test for positive y values and then check if its really necessery for logic gate 1 and 2.

Ur right, I should delete the sub logic gates, at the bottom, altogether.

the 4 main logic gates work fine. 

I did x is minus 78 and y is 18

formula gives 77 degrees

x is negative and y is positive so 

Logic gate 2, make answer negative.

is minus 77 degrees of steering. So 77 degrees to the left.

so

-77,0053832080

For X, Y is -78,18

Im gonna do couple more to see if main 4 logic gates are really sufficient 100% of the time. So far so good.

Yeah... I did two logic gate 1 values of higher x or y. And both time the sub logic gate was completely irrelevant and flawed. Delete it.

if x is 43 and y is 22

enter formula and get 62.9 degrees

x and y both positive, so logic gate 1 is leave outcome.

X, Y, (43, 22) is 62.9 positive degrees, so to the right. 

Now I switch to check

x is 22 and y is 43

enter in formula and get 27,0955 degrees positive to right. 

again both x and y positive so logic gate 1, leave answer as is. 

we get 27 degrees, positive so to the right.

It works flawlessly. No sub logic gate necessery. You probably made it from exhaustion. haha. but otherwise works perfectly fine! on any and all values and all 4 main logic gates.

wonderful! thank you!

Now we have not just proof, but a formula to proof that 360 degree on thumbstick works. negative 180 to left and positive 180 to the right.

LETS CELEBRATE WITH SOME MORE 360 DEGREE ROTATIONAL STEERING OF OUR CUP OF COFFEE OR TEA! 🙌

You did it man. You developed the coding necessery for 360 degree steering on left thumbstick, transposing x and y values to degrees through 4 logic gates. your paper jpg. ITS THE BOMB! Excellent! 

So to sum it up. I can't post the formula, it gets deleted as spam. So here is the image. formula and logic gates.

For transposing any x and y value of the left thumbstick to degrees of positive or negative rotation, up to 180 degrees positive or negative, right or left, clockwise or anti clockwise. 

@ivun3

Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant! It wont get better than this. To bad spam filter does not allow posting of formula for people to text copy. It had to be in an image. But this is it! It's all of it! ALL of it... And it's brilliant!

Now let's get ourselves some full 360 degrees of freedom racing! 

Thank you, yes. This is really all of it.

Now we just need a coder to implement it into the game.

I like your paper photo more! haha just kidding. But it did look very chaotic and cute. Like a frankenstein trying to work it all out. Messy chaos of orderdness. 😉

It was raw and pure 😎

Now its smooth and neat. 🤓

@LooosyWheely

haha, I know what you mean. I added allot of little bits of commentary and tips and clarifications on the paper image.

Let's do one more for fun. And call it a day. 

X is minus 80 and y is minus 50

formula result: 57,9946°

x and y is negative so logic gate #3 is subtract answer from 180 and make negative. 

180 minus 57,99 =122

and make negative

is -122,0054 degrees

(X, Y) = (-80, -50) 

is - 122.0054 degrees steering.

That is 122 degrees of steering to the left. Anti clockwise.

It ALWAYS works! I love it! 😃

My formula is so accurate. mmmhhh... 🤓

I wanna do an easy one. X=-50 and Y=50

The result should be -45 degrees. Obviously.

But lets put the x and y values in your formula, just for fun. 

Result...

Yep my phone remembers the previous calculation using your formula. I changed the x and y values to 50. 

Calculated the result and it was a perfect 45 degree. 

x = neg and y = pos

which is logic gate #2 = make answer negative.

that is -45 degrees of steering =D

So that is to the left. Anti clockwise. -45° steering

The formula is perfect, as long as the 4 main logic gates are applied. Which require negative or positive value. And the formula strictly only allows positive values. So if x is minus 50 then the formula accepts only if you enter 50. and not minus 50.

So how do we ignore negative values for x and y in the formula? And yet, not in the logic gates? 

If we are going to automate it, which is the whole point... Automation xP

Then we need a way for y and x to always be positive. Especially when they are negative. for formula. 

How do you ask a computer to do that for you? 

Maybe we should make the current 4 main logic gates into 4 sub logic gates and make a new main logic gate removing all minus values and make then positive for the formula, yet not for the 4 sub logic gates, which are your current main 4. because positive and negative are necessery there.

Ok, more improvements! You're my man. 

So 

For Formula:

if (x<0) then multiply by -1

if (y<0) then multiply by -1

enter values in formula

check 4 logic gates for neg or pos x and y values and apply the correct logic gate.

Sounds good?

I am not a coding expert xD

Well, that was easy... I thought it would require a whole bunch of extra codes.

I provide the problem, you provide the answer. xD

Good teamwork.

Now we need to make it so that negative values only become positive for formula and not logic gates. What kind of line of code would do that?