Virtual Racing

[Rush Limbaugh]

Im thinking of opening a new kind of store. A virtual raceway.

Heres the idea

I want to get 20 or so of these.





Watch this

t will have the same number of brand new either dual or quadcore pcs with surround sound .

The steering wheels will be Logitech G-25s

Ill put the chassis on a 1ft high platform with a fiberglass body around them.

Also 30 inch hd monitors.


Now to the racing

Iracing motorsports simulation

I plan on charging between 15 and 20 bucks an hour and I also plan to put other racing sims on there that you dont have to pay a subscription rate for like NASCAR 2003 and GP Legends. There will be prize money and or trophies.

What do you all think?

[Saturn]

Your best bet would be to setup in a mall or other high traffic area. I think it's a good idea, but one you wouldn't want to flop. I say go for it only if you can afford for it to fail. If it takes off I'll go to it! I think it would work.

[Rush Limbaugh]

Your best bet would be to setup in a mall or other high traffic area

To expensive. i live on a main drag and theres a store 1000 ft from me for 1500 a month. It will cost about 50k to start. and I can always sell all the equipment for more than I got it for since im getting everything wholesale.

[Wheelchair]

Thats a ridiculous amount money :O And making a profit would take forever. Are you fairly wealthy, don't mind me asking?

I mean if you need money I wouldn't say this would be a good idea... but then again who doesn't need money

[Rush Limbaugh]

Thats a ridiculous amount money :O And making a profit would take forever. Are you fairly wealthy, don't mind me asking?

What can you start with 50k? Not much. Thats cheap. i once owned a slotcar track in the 90s and it cost me 60k and 3000 a month rent.


20 machines at 20 an hour for 10 hours a day would be 4000 bucks a day if i rented them all day. Rent is 1500. I think I can make a good profit. I have nothing else to buy ever again. Its all rental. Theres also a NASCAR track close by and Im planning in putting in some flight sims as well





They also make racing sims and i may get a few from them as well.

Hotseat

[Saturn]

Lets say he has 20 customers pay $15 for one hour everyday for average. In one year he would make over $100,000 dollars. It's not that far fetched. Even if I take out weekends and holidays he would still make the initial cost in a year. The key would be to get at least 20 customers a day.

[Saturn]

The only thing I'd hate to have would be the electric bill.:tooth:

[Rush Limbaugh]

The only thing I'd hate to have would be the electric bill.

Hmmm 20 pcs at 500 watts

[GrnEyedDvl]

I have some experience with this. I was in the dedicated coin op industry for 12 years, and I am still involved with PC gaming on a small scale in a LAN setup.

As in any business, its location location location. I dont know what the market in your area is like, but I would agree with other people who said try a mall. Mall rent is actually falling here, maybe its not there. Trying to set up a gaming business in a strip mall is risky at best. Maybe your slot car track did well, but thats a different sort of hobby. In the 3 cities I had arcades in: Kansas City, MO, St Joesph, MO, and Denver, CO, the mall locations did far better than the strip mall locations. Eventually most of the strip locations got turned into pool halls.

I might suggest a different approach, temporary locations, travel around with a few of these for a while and see what the market is like. We had 3 of first generation vitrual reality flight sims, similar to these, that we traveled around a bit with. We followed the craft and car shows to local malls, paid $4-500 for a week right in the center of the mall someplace, and made a killing for quite a while. That was back in the 90s and those machines went for about 100k each.

I think if I was going to get into it again with something like you are talking about, I would get 3 or 4 to start with, and do something similar. Move around town a bit with them and get some exposure. Charge like $8-10 in 30 minute sessions, this way you can rotate people in and out a bit faster.

On the flight sim side, I would seriously consider getting FAA approved hardware once you get an established location running. Maybe 2 or 3 of those mixed in with the entertainment sims. They are expensive, but they are worth it for the $$ you can charge. Most cities have very few FAA approved simulators, and they are nearly always booked out. You can partner up with a certified flight instructor and make a killing.

Good luck with it if you go for it.

[Rush Limbaugh]

I might suggest a different approach, temporary locations, travel around with a few of these for a while and see what the market is like. We had 3 of first generation vitrual reality flight sims, similar to these, that we traveled around a bit with. We followed the craft and car shows to local malls, paid $4-500 for a week right in the center of the mall someplace, and made a killing for quite a while. That was back in the 90s and those machines went for about 100k each

I was thinking of doing that as well. Putting a few in a trailer and taking them to the NASCAR track or renting them to functions.

I also have information coming from here. These are real neat



BMI gaming

[Big War Bird]

I'd be inclined to listen to GED. Start small and mobile. Set up at fairs, festivals, sporting events.

[Zuwxiv]

There was a MechWarrior place near us, it was awesome. Like you describe, but for killer robots.

It's an empty spot now, the entire shopping mall was a failure. This is in Orange County, California - prime real estate. And for years, there's been only a dozen operating businesses in the whole thing. It's evidently a 191,000 square-foot multi-level retail center gone to waste.

Rent was high, I'm sure, and it wasn't on the best spot for pedestrian traffic. It should have been a hit...

Location is everything. But you seem to have an idea that requires little investment and quick gain of profits! Just make sure to factor in electricity, labor, maintenance, etc.

[Rush Limbaugh]

I live 1000 ft from the store so I can run it almost alone. And no time or energy getting to and from work. Also remember this is not an arcade or a game. Its virtual racing. Its a raceway. I want to hold races not have kids come in and play games. These things are so accurate that real drivers use them. if your really good you can wind up racing real F-1 drivers as they use it. Lots of NASCAR and other proffesional drivers use it as well and the thing only really starts next month. Only the pros have been testing it. The graphics on youtube for instance dont have near the real quality.


iRacing interview with Scott Mckee
Darin and Shaun sitdown with Scott McKee of iRacing to discuss the future of their much anticipated service ..


iRacing Full Preview by SRT's Shaun Cole
IRacing is one of the most anticipated sim titles in many years. SRT gives IRacing its first shake down.

[Bleda]

take it from me. I worked at a gamer-cafe for several years before it went bust. in businesses like that, its easy to make the mistake of sinking all your capital into things that ultimately prove to be unprofitable. The owner of the gamer-cafe found a video game that he liked, so he decided that everyone would like it, then went out and bought 20 copies of the brand spanking new game for each of the computers. As it turns out, the games didn't get any of us current customers to play it, and definitely didn't bring more customers in the door. I guess, my advice is to diversify what you can offer to the consumer. That would entail buying up the 15-20 computers like you said, but don't necessarily buy 15-20 race stations for at least the time until the 4-5 race stations turn profit.
In any case, good luck bud!

[Rush Limbaugh]

take it from me. I worked at a gamer-cafe for several years before it went bust. in businesses like that, its easy to make the mistake of sinking all your capital into things that ultimately prove to be unprofitable.

This is not a game. Its real racing with real prize money. Its not an internet cafe or an arcade. There is nothing out there like it. I want racers not gamers. This company is owned by Rousch racing and the Boston Redsox and its only going to grow. They already have 22 million invested.

[Rush Limbaugh]

You guys have given me an idea. maybe ill just get these two

SnakeByte Car Simulator - First, Jesler created a
small footprint full motion simulator...next, a 3/4 scale Nextel Cup Race Car...and for their next masterpiece,
why not a real sports car simulator? Enter SnakeByte, using the real, full size fiberglass body of a 427 Cobra while retaining the realism in the motion, Jesler has hit
upon a "new" presentation with all the appeal and draw
of an actual 427 Cobra...but you won't get a speeding ticket in this one! Uses Projection Screen for viewing

Features Include:
Eye popping, super bright graphics.
Proven motion technology will provide years
of trouble free service!
REAL race car that you drive from a REAL race seat.
A high-quality sound system to make you feel the sound.
User friendly design for simple and cost effective operation.
Industry standard control parts and universal payment systems.
Game functions use a state-of-the-art PC, making maintenance a snap
After sales service second to none
No Hydraulics! No Pneumatics! Single Wall Plug

Thunder Carismo - Thunder is a real 3/4 scale Nextel Cup car body and modified chassis, mounted onto our proven motion base. The attractive fibreglass body
comes in a variety of colors and can be decaled to
your specs - Uses Projection Screen for viewing

Since Im an avid race fan I could go to a big race every week during the summer and put them in one of my fathers theaters in the winter. be around the same price but these things are the ultimate.

[dwringer]

Heh your mention of GT Legends [a truly, truly badass racing game] reminded me of something.... if your business starts to take off, or if you're looking for somewhat more of a hook, and you can afford it (and determine that people would actually use it) you should check out equipping your machines with TrackIR 4's... not sure if you've heard of them, or what you might think of them, but I can speak from firsthand experience that racing games are never the same without it once you've played them with it. Tilt your head 1 degree left and your in-game head can turn 10 degrees, or any other amount [it's fully programmable as to the response curve]... it's even got 6 degrees of freedom (to an extent) in supported titles, so lean up/back/left/right and your in-game character will lean appropriately.

It dramatically increases the immersion factor and does wonders for situational awareness

http://www.naturalpoint.com/ should have some info (that's the manufacturer) but if you look around on youtube you can see lots of examples of people using it.

[Rush Limbaugh]

with TrackIR 4's... not sure if you've heard of them,

I fly I-l Sturmovik everyday. Its what really got me into sims and i wouldnt be caught dead with out my TrackIR 4. Or should i say id die far more often. I plan on renting them as well. A way to gt an extra 5 bucks an hour.

[Bleda]

well that all sounds pretty good then Rush. I wish you luck

[Rush Limbaugh]

Well it looks like Im in buissiness. Just got a millionaire sold on my idea. He was buying a local go -kart - mini golf- arcade. So were going to take out the arcade and put in the virtual raceway. With 20 Hotseats using all new pcs with core 2 duo 6600s and 8800GTX vid cards and 4 flight sims. Plus CH products says they will make us customized aircraft controls for the IL-2 simulators. We will also be the first retail dealer for hotseats where you can actully go in and buy on right on the spot that I know of. Same for the Logitech G25 racing wheels.

We will also be using 28 inch viewsonic hd monitors or larger on all the sims.