>> Think of it as the equivalent of pulse width modulation as used for
>> brushless DC motors, or fuel injectors on a car. The current or fuel
>> is pulsed out in tiny bursts at some frequency to result in some
>> average rate of flow. The duration of each burst and the frequency
>> determines the amount of input the player is trying to achieve.

> So it's a key repeater you're saying?

The player has to do the key repeating in this case.

I was explaining how button "steering" works, with just filtering,
but without the assist. Say the tires have 20 degrees of steering
angle to either side. To get an average of 10 degree left angle, the
left key must be tapped so that it's ends up being pressed down
50% of the time. Without any filtering the steering would instantly
transtion between 0 degrees and 20 degrees, a 10 degree average,
but with +/- 10 degree variation. What flitering does is slow the
response rate of the steering to key presses, usually some type of
ramp up, where the initial rate of movement is small, and then
increases the longer that a key (or button) is held down, so that the
steering angle doesn't oscillate much if the key is tapped reasonably
fast. Using my example, the end result with filtering might be a 10
degree average with a +/- .5 degree variation if the key is tapped
fast enough (as opposed to a +/- 10 degree variation without
any filtering).

>>> No idea what you're talking about there - I don't *do* NASCAR period.
>>> define what you mean by "enhanced" please.
>>
>> Think of it as the equivalent of a semi "auto-pilot".
>>
>> As an example of an "enhancement", a players actual steering inputs
>> would only have to be somewhat close to ideal, and then the game would
>> modify these inputs to make them very close to ideal.

> Now that's just plain cheating. Like the recent addition of speed
> proportional steering that has appeared in high end cars. If you
> mean the amount of steering lock is determined by the maximum lateral
> g's at the apex speed.

That's speed sensitive steering. Set to 100%, then steering input
becomes lateral g input at all speeds.

Steering assist is where the game steers for you. At 100% you don't do
any steering all, the game does it all for you and you're just along
for the ride. How perfect the steering assist is at 100% depends on
the game. Some racing games setup the assist so that lap times are
a bit slower if all the assists are on, while others may produce
close to record lap times.

Another variation on steering assist is that the game requires that
you at least press left or right in order to start the car steering,
but then takes over after that. Depending on the level of assist,
it will enhance your steering inputs so that they more closely follow
the ideal line. The game still steers for you, but you have to press
left or right to initiate the steering, and as long as you hold left
or right down, the game will do most of the steering for you,
adjusting the actual control inputs based on speed, conering radius,
bank angle, grip level, ... . In the case of Live For Speed, the
steering assist for digital contoller was too good, so they backed
it off a bit to less than ideal, and the player generally has to
tap the left or right arrow keys in order to achieve optimum lap
times.

In the case of Need For Speed Shift, digital steering doesn't work
well at all. Player with gamepads have to use the joystick to steer.
Shift does have steering assist, and setting it to low seems to help
some players. Setting it to high generally hurts lap times. The
braking assist and/or ABS on generally hurts lap times.

In the case of Need For Speed World, digital steering works OK, but
I suspect that analog steering will produce better lap times, based
on my experience with the Beta tests.

In a strange twist, most of the sim-oriented games have steering and
braking assists, while most arcade racing games do not (other than
filtering and some enhacement of digital inputs).

>>>> before being fed into the physics engine, which is shared by both
>>>> digital and analog control inputs.
>>
>>> Did you get this from their website itself or is this your own
>>> wording?
>>
>> My own wording, although braking and steering assists, where the game
>> brakes and steers for the player can be found in a few sim-oriented
>> games, as options for a player new to racing games.
>>
> I much preferred it when such things were limited to separate background
> programs. Is that the case still or is it actually built into the
> software?

The assists need to be built into the game, since only the game would
know the conering radius, bank angle, and grip level at each section of
track, which is required in order to steer for the player. Filtering to
smooth out digital inputs could be done outside of the game.

> Are there league restrictions placed on these cheats at all?

Depends on the game. On some racing games, a race server can restrict the
options, such as no assists, and limiting the view option to in car only.