Yeah they added “action keys” that can trigger different percentage presses (20-40-60-80-100%) as a “fix” because the bobsleigh blocks they added in the new game were not keyboard friendly and they wanted to even the playing field. They eventually changed the physics to get rid of that specific need (but not completely) but they are still useful in some situations.
Download the newest game! It has a free access tier which gets you access to the first 10 tracks of the quarterly campaign and to the ranked mode. It is a bit limited but enough to see if you might get back into it. There is a decent community on reddit for the game.
There are advantages and disadvantages to all the control schemes depending on the types of tracks you play, the surface you play, and the car/environment you play.
Most good players play with controller because there are many situations you run into where you want the precision of steering a specific amount around a corner, or you are playing a track where you want to either speed drift (SD) at a specific angle (e.g. fullspeed or higher speed dirt/grass/plastic) or want to keep your steering under a certain angle to no slide (e.g. low speed dirt/grass/plastic).
There are techniques such as neosliding where it is much easier to do them in keyboard as it requires multiple taps in quick succession. It is also easier to play keyboard when you need to make turns where timing of a full steer is important (e.g. ice).
Considering cars other than the stadium car you start getting into situations where one control scheme is far superior than others. The snow and rally environments require smooth steering so wheel is superior there, but controllers are a good middle ground. Desert is faster with tapping movements over smooth steering so keyboard is a bit better there. I recall canyon is a bit better with keyboard as well.
This all applies equally regardless of whether you are playing older or newer games.
Seconding Trackmania, though I’d recommend playing the latest one released in 2020 rather than Nations Forever. A year’s access to everything is $20 and you get tons of content to play.
For a game that is at its core can be played at the highest levels with just 4 buttons it is incredibly complex with an insane skill ceiling. I’m pretty good and the difference between me and the top players is absolutely insane. The game is a bit beginner unfriendly, mostly because you are going to suck against good players because there are tons of mechanics that the developer tells you nothing about and unless you watch a video you aren’t likely to understand why players are leaving you in the dust.
This is the game where you get people who can hit a jump at just the right angle so they thread the needle through a series of holes barely larger than the car while travelling at speeds well above 300mph (welcome to TrackMania, I don’t think there’s a speed cap). They also do it using keyboards. Seriously. High-level TrackMania players use keyboards, not gamepads or, god forbid, racing wheels.
The max speed is 999 km/h, which is only acheivable with speed drifting, but speed in excess of 800km/h are not uncommon to hit in certain kinds of tracks. Your statement about controls also isn’t correct, most of the top players play with controller, but there are some that are keyboard players, there is even a couple insane ones that play wheel (most notably Granady).
If you want wireless, one thing to be concerned about is the latency of the gamepad. gamepadla.com tests many controllers for their latency.
Personally, I’ve just gone with xbox with their PC dongle. I only like controllers with the sticks in the xbox/nintendo configuration and the latency is great with their dongle. I also like that it uses standard batteries so I just keep some rechargables at hand for when it runs out. On the downsides, there is no low battery indication on the controller, so occasionally it just dies in the middle of use.
I’ve heard nothing but problems about the reliability of these. One streamer for my main game is sponsored by them through their org and occasionally rages about how many they have broken just playing.
Humble Bundle was cool when it was an occasional event focused on charity and indie devs. Once it became something that was going pretty much all the time it quickly lost any interest I had.
Oblivion had quality of life improvements that made it a better game IMO. Yes Morrowind was bigger and deeper, but it was also a frustrating game that didn’t age very well.
It really does feel like Starfield completely killed any excitement for Bethesda games, everything since Oblivion has been a step in the wrong direction IMO.
Sorry I should have said 2003, it came out in November of that year and this is supposed to be a yearlong celebration of Trackmania. The earliest game most people have experience with was TMNF/TMUF which came out in 2008 and United does include all the old cars so maybe that is your reference date?
The original Trackmania game came out in 2003 and contained 3 environments with different cars: Snow, Rally, and Desert.
The latest Trackmania game came out in 2020 and as a celebration of the 20th anniversary of the original game they have been adding the old cars from the original game into the latest game.
On PC I’ll buy digital because worst case if it comes unavailable I’ll torrent a copy.
For consoles I am staunchly in the physical camp because it is more likely I’ll be able to play those games in 10 years when the maker has shut down their store.
Even some isopropyl alcohol works. My controller was drifting and I took it apart to blow it out and give it a good cleaning with alcohol. Works flawlessly now.
I hope so too. Tribes Ascend was one of the few shooters I’ve enjoyed despite HiRez’s best efforts otherwise. If they can put together a good game I’ll be all over this. Few things in gaming are as sweet as the sound of a blue plate special.