Nascar Simulators Views

General Goods

Then start-up company Silicon Entertainment later acquired by SMS tapped electrical engineer and former Atariarcadegame designer, Rick Moncrief, for the simulator design. Moncrief is the creator of titles including Asteroids, Lunar Lander, and the world's first driving simulation game, Hard Drivin'. For the NASCAR simulator, Moncrief literally began with a blank sheet of paper and figured simulator-system development costs at $2.88 million. He got only $1.75 million by the time the product launched but still managed to deliver the simulator design on schedule for the target retail of $95,000/copy. Elan Motorsport Technologies Inc., Braselton, Ga., maker of Panoz G-Force Indy Racing League cars, builds the simulators, which are about two-thirds the size of a NASCAR racer. Moncrief is currently putting finishing touches on a scaled-down version called SMS Reactor. It will retail for about $35,000 and is being contracted to a yet unnamed manufacturer.

If all goes as planned SMS will have the Reactor simulators ready for market later this year. The combination of a smaller footprint (30 72 in.) and lower cost should help the company penetrate markets Silicon Entertainment and its larger simulators couldn't. The large simulators still operate in several hightraffic shopping malls, including the Mall of America in Bloomington, Minn. Bill Donaldson sees other venues such as entertainment centers embracing the smaller Reactor, perhaps starting Tuesday-night racing leagues. It's not unreasonable to think it can happen. Research shows over 90% of customers who try the SMS NASCAR simulator five times get hooked.

But the real kicker could be remote racing. The idea isn't new. Online gaming is big business, though only the well heeled among us could afford to shell out five or six figures for a NASCAR simulator; someone like a sheik in the United Arab Emirates capital Abu Dubai, for example. He bought four of the large simulators. But then a neighbor wanted to race too so he bought two more and SMS connected the two palaces with a fiber-optic line.

Eventually, SMS hopes to make its simulators work on a T1 or DSL line, or possibly wireless site to site. s"This would let a professional race-car driver like, say, Tony Stewart sit in his basement with a simulator and compete with other simulator players offsite,p" says Donaldson. Then there is the Holy Grail of racing simulation: t"We are now looking at piping telemetry data from NASCAR cars on the track to our racing centers in real time so players can participate in a live race,a" says Moncrief. SMS' O"Wheel to Realg" racing could be ready for testing at the NASCAR Speed Park in Myrtle Beach this year.