Bare Minimum to Make an Already Available Circuit into Reverse

I don't know anything about modding and sure as heck don't know anything about graphics "stuff" (alpha channels this, vertex buffers that, etc.). I would just like to know the absolute minimum required to race on an already present track (Eg. the new Mills just released today) but in reverse.

No physics, AI, graphics, start lights, or pitlane stuff are required to be changed. I just want to be able to lap (and online) in the other direction.

I'm guessing all that is required is to switch the sector 3 timing line to being sector 1, and vice-versa. Then, If the pitlane isn't "smart," to set the pit-in timing line as pit-out, and vice-versa. Yes?

Will I then have a fully functioning (besides A.I. and startlights) reverse track?

 

The AIW & pitlane stuff is required as the AIW defines the direction (remember that pesky notification that says "wrong way"?). The timing gates & pitin/pitout are objects that have to be moved.

So budget modder would use 3dSimEd (or Blender with Traveller's scripts) to move the timing gates and then dev mode to create the new AIW.

 

If you reverse the sector 3 and 1 timing line then that should automatically allow the game to know which direction is correct since the order should also be "1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, ..." and never the other way around which would imply driving the track in reverse. This should therefore remove the necessity of having to create an AIW just for the sake of the game knowing the proper direction the track is to be run. No???...

 

Need to change 3D curbs to wavelength or whatever

 

Unpack, 3d simed, pivot all the timing gates 180 degrees... re export their GMT's.
Load Devmod and re-do the AIW, fast line, pit line.. save and exit
Repack

 

If you reverse the sector sequence you are doing...nothing more than reversing that sequence, getting no lap times at all (xsect mesh face), yellow flags and getting DQ.

To change to reverse layout you need a new AIW, and xsect facing the new direction.

And btw...deja vu;

http://isiforums.net/f/showthread.php/21402-Reverse-tracks-needed

You can find all these infos in a thread you already open last year, asking the same questions.....

 

Lol

 

I totally forgot about that thanks.
Is 3DSim some sort of 3rd party art program?

Every track already has a pit line, fast line, AIW, etc. Isn't there a way i could use all the current ones and just click a button which reverses the directions rather than pointlessly having to design all that stuff again? I couldn't care less if the AI weren't optimized for the reverse layout.

 

3dSimEd it's a converter software.

What you need 3D side is to swap sectors and rotate 180° (as already explained in the other thread).

As for the AIW you need a new one. No magic buttons sorry.

 

LOL... Spinelli, you are a persistent cuss when you don't like the answer

 

Well i'm trying to understand if there is a way around it or why it is the way it is.

I mean if all the information is already perfectly present (AIW, pit in/out lines, sector lines, etc.) then why can't I just simply reverse it and be done with it?

Regarding specifically the AIW: If you want a train to travel in the opposite direction, do you have to destroy and build a brand new train track? Of course not. You just make the train travel the opposite direction. Simple as that. What is so technically difficult and/or complex about simply having a switch/reverse direction button which - at the click of a button - simply switches the direction of the AIW? I mean the leading modding platform, after 10 whole years (rFactor 1), stil isn't capable of such an unbelievably basic feature? Instead, you have to trash and create an all knew AIW, pit line, fast line, etc. even though you have one right there for you to use (if you could just simply switch the direction)?

 

Someone could write a program to reverse the AIW (*), but recording a new AIW isn't so difficult. And the timing objects are the way they are because "3D"... that is surfaces in 3D are single-sided, so they have to be flipped and swapped. Again, a program could probably be written to do that, but to do the whole reversal job proper, you're going to be manipulating other 3D objects anyway (pit lights, braking markers, etc.), so rearranging the timing objects is easy & second nature for a trackmaker.

(*) see that script Bink wrote called "AIW Thing": http://isiforums.net/f/showthread.php/23697-aiw-thing-video-(6)

 

It has been already explained in both posts you started. If you made the effort to try to understand what has been explained in those posts, you would understand that there is no other way around.

You have your own idea of what a track needs to work, but don't seem to accept what it actually needs to work.

You are getting replies from actual track modders but you keep saying that everything required is already there which is not true because you don't know what is actually required.

Consider accepting the fact that it is not so straightforward to create a reverse layout.

Enviado desde mi GT-I9505 mediante Tapatalk

 

An explanation explaining why seemingly straitforward things (like simply switching the direction of the AIW) is all I'm looking for.

I'm going to try doing this in the next few days; I'm just trying to get a before-hand idea of what to expect because I don't think it's going to be as straightforward as I orignally thought.

 

Problem is you seem to miss what an AIW is.

It is not just a rail you can treat as a symmetric variable...but a series of paths and events which are using vectors so if you are searching some magics (like just clicking few buttons or put a minus sign here and there) to output a mirrored AIW, THIS IS NOT POSSIBLE.

Said that I don't really understand what you are trying to achieve with all these questions about the same thing because it is not up to you; it's all about the modder/author decision.

You have been already answered about Mills; saw curbs can't be managed in the other direction so we decided to NOT produce a reversed layout.

If you want a reversed track you need to model new saw curbs, swap and pivoting 180° all sectors, same for lights, semaphores, digital flags, reverse the entire grid, move the SC slot, redo all pit/garage/spot headings and all AIW path, move and rotate all brake marks, optimize traps (if needed) to avoid crashing straight on a concrete wall instead a gravel trap...

...oh wait, these things have been already answered here ;

http://isiforums.net/f/showthread.php/21402-Reverse-tracks-needed

 

Ya, ok so without resurrecting that old thread, I'll paste a quoted post here:

If we Ignore the last points about markers/signs, gravel traps, and curbs then is that list a good guide for listing the bare minimum for everything I need to accomplish in order to convert a track to reverse? If so, is there anything on the list I can exclude if I just want a bare minimum working track (like, for eg., maybe the corner workers)?

 

Kerbs is something you shouldn't ignore. Mills for example, the kerbs won't work backwards. Ok, 'technically' you could just avoid driving on them.

 

Yes and you've been already answered 20 times.

Sorry but this is starting smelling as trolling...