Home Ed 3D Driving Simulation Game Beginner Drivers

I have to return this because I (perhaps stupidly) was not aware that a wheel and pedal were required for using this software.Why is it not plainly stated in the description of requirements?

Good for beginning drivers. Not intended to replace behind the wheel, but good practice. Set-up can be difficult the first time.

I and my grandsons are very disappointed with our order. The thrustmaster Wheel came with instructions and loaded easily without problem, However, the Driving Simulator disk came without loading instructions. The autoload did not work, but using past training I loaded the setup program from the ddive window. My operating system is Vista, and I have enough memory, so the program should function okay. After loading, a SimRide icon appeared as it should have, a menu window appeared after initiation and if I selected car1 or car2, "Bstart" did nothing but beep. No action, nothing happened. The other options were useless, like "Bconfig." Junk software. After investigating the software, I recognize it is very old software, which has been "fixed" to run on modern PC operating systems, but failed in my case. Based upon Window's standards, it is junk. I contacted AplusBsoftware without response at this time. Even if there is a fix, I do not want their software. You can imagine the disappointment my grandsons experienced. I hate it.

I am reviewing the 2010 edition of Simuride. On the main website for A+B Software, they indicate that there is a 2011 edition available with additional features like parallel parking. From the box, the minimum system requirements are: 2 GHz Processor, 1 GB RAM for XP / 2 GB for Vista & Win 7, Graphics Card: GeForce 76xx, ATI Radeon 47xx, or equivalent. I ran it on XP.Setup: As the other reviewer noted, setup is really a pain. If you find that you are crashing a lot, here are the changes that helped me:1. make sure resolution inside the program is the same as your monitor resolution under "properties"2. make sure "indexing service" is allowed in the hard drive you install under3. make sure all settings are set for lower quality:- Windowed instead of Full Screen- 3D Acceleration: Software Acceleration- Reduce Distance to View Objects- Quality/Processing Speed: lowest setting4. I also had to setup the "steering wheel configuration", even for the default settings, and sometimes I have to unplug/plug the wheel so the program can "pick up" that the wheel is connected.Even with all of these changes, the program still crashes quite a bit but overall there are fewer crashes with these changes.Program: For the program itself I would say you would get more out of just getting a good driving instructor. There are 5 different "starting" locations that connect together but you are mostly driving on open roads with low traffic. I was hoping to practice driving with more cars on the road. I didn't find the report feature that helpful since you are mostly getting flagged on speeding and not stopping at the right point for red lights or stop signs, and not specific driving skills. In addition, for things like backing up or parking, it's just too different from the actual context of driving to be very helpful, even with the aerial view. You also have to get used to using the keyboard for things like starting the car, signaling, and checking your blind spot.I think it would be helpful if the program had actual "modules" or lessons for testing specific skills, but as it is, I don't think it's worth spending $75 on when it's mostly just simulating driving on open roads. You also have to spend money to buy a wheel if you don't have one already and that can be anywhere from $40 to $300 dollars depending on the brand. Unfortunately, I haven't found any other programs comparable to this one that attempts to simulate real-world driving. Anyone else know any? Leave a comment if you do.

I was really starting to worry about this product because the two high rating reviewers Jack Rella & M Brown) were suspicious, and after I purchased the software it started to bother me a bit, so I took a closer look at their review history. They both had reviewed every driving software (including this home version of SimuRide AND the $1100 SIMURIDE) as well as quite a few books and every review for all of the products all made reference to how good the $1100.00 SimuRide software is in comparison to other software or how good a companion it would be with the $1100.00 SimuRide. In addition, all the reviews were done on the same day, AND none of the items reviewed were 'purchase verified'. I mean honestly, why would you buy every driving ed. software if you were going to spend the $1100 for the Business class SimuRide software? Presumably a person purchases this software to save money on Drivers Education. Right? And why would two people do the same thing? I dunno, it is just suspicious to me.So I was thinking that this was some really crappy software that a couple of employees/creators were trying to bump up the reviews while pushing their $1100.00 software for, I assume, schools or drivers ed. instructors.However, I was pleasantly surprised. The product is as advertised. A bit antiquated, but is does what it says it is supposed to do. It installs fast, and even worked with an inexpensive ($25) USB multi-platform steering wheel I bought on clearance.I wanted to verify other reviewer complaints about issues installing, configuring, and running the software. The computer I am running it on is a Dell P3400 running Windows 7, 4 gig ram, and with a newer PCIe video card so I can eeek out as much as I can out of this four year old computer. I installed the software first to see if it would work without the wheel, and it did run, but the mouse would not work and car buttons were not really mapped to the keyboard, so you can't drive without the wheel. Still, that is fine as the wheel is necessary for this tool to be effective. I then connected the wheel and tried it, but it still didn't allow me to jump in and start driving. I then had to do what all men hate to do... read the installation PDF located in the install directory. It tells you that you need to run a configuration program in the installation directory to configure the wheel with the software. This is unusual, or at least a bit 'old school,' but I did it and it worked just fine. The PDF also states that a computer needs to have a slotted video card and not an 'on board' video card. That is something they should have on the Amazon web page for buyers to know before buying. That may also explain the other reviewers/purchasers install and running issues.I am not disappointed at all with this product. This is a well spent $40. The software works well enough to give my 15 year old daughter a familiarity for driving that should make our parking lot driving and post learning permit lessons much less stressful and dangerous.I will update this review after my daughter has used it and include her reaction as well as how effective it was as a drivers education simulator.

Goo

Fun software to have... It helped me get my drivers license last year...