Longford Private Preview Test reviews

Discussion in 'Third Party Content' started by DurgeDriven, Dec 20, 2014.

  1. hexagramme

    hexagramme Registered

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    I have two questions regarding the track.

    These funky shadows... Track or car related?
    [​IMG]

    The F2's can't for the life of them slow down properly for the hairpin at the end of the lap.
    Can anything be done to prevent this?
    [​IMG]
     
  2. woochoo

    woochoo Registered

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    I'm getting similar shads with the F3 Eve/BT20/DW-12 at Longford. Seems the shadows are offset by a small amount. I've never seen a setting for it, but it does look like a track issue.
    Lime Rock v2.0 seems to work properly.

    As for the AI, that corner used to be hell for AI in rF1 with lots of cars. It's much better with rF2, but it seems it still causes trouble. I'd think it would be better to fix in the code somehow, and that means less work for me too :)
    I just spent a couple of minutes watching F2 cars pile into the haybales almost every time. I know there is support for car-specific AI paths, so i'll consider it, but 'one size fits all' suits me better
     
  3. hexagramme

    hexagramme Registered

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    Thanks for your reply. :)

    Do you think it would help if I let the AI practice a bit? Don't remember exactly what it's called, but that test day thing where the AI tries to optimize its lap time.
     
  4. DurgeDriven

    DurgeDriven Banned

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    F3-Rookies we can do that H !@! :confused:






    loooool :p
     
  5. woochoo

    woochoo Registered

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    I've just done some testing for F3 AI calibration and then tried them in a race weekend.

    The Spark F2 with the wing sort of improved. It was able to take the corner really gently. Quite slow. In testing they were stopping well before the corner and crawling around. In the race it was just slow and wide missing of the apex.

    The other Spark seemed to just manage to keep away from the hay, but was still on the dirt. About as fast as the winged spark.

    The Eve F2 didn't seem to learn anything. In the test days, the first time it just got worse and worse, going along the fence as far as the ambulance (that's why it's there, from the rF1 days and the CSGT 917 AI..). The second time i think they were just hitting the hay... I don't think any of there were failing to at least turn as far as the hay after the learning though. None seemed to hit the tree or go left of the tree and around the back, so maybe there was some learning.

    My premises/reasoning/excuse for not bothering with separate AI paths for them:
    Most cars work well enough.
    The Spark and Eve F2s don't work out of the box, but some calibration might help them.
    Neither the Spark or Eve F1s will make the corner either (calibration might help), though the BT20 does work ok.
    It could take me many hours or a day or two before i decide/realise that a hacked AI path does or doesn't help.
    If a hacked AI path does help, then at some point if there is a code-change to the AI or cars that fixes the problem, the cars that I've hacked an AI for will then be slow and broken.

    So I'm going to right ahead and assume that tweaking the cars or the AI code is the best and most correct option, and neither of those are things that I have to do :)
    Therefore I can avoid tearing my hair out over things i don't understand or have required access to, and get on with... you know... making the track. :p
     
  6. DurgeDriven

    DurgeDriven Banned

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    You left out the big one.

    Single player is for pussies :confused:

    jk jk jk :D

    hehehe
     
  7. bwana

    bwana Registered

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    was parked on the tennis court " Just waiting for a mate" .. great concept DD
     
  8. hexagramme

    hexagramme Registered

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    I totally understand your point mate. You shouldn't bother with AI paths right now, at all.
    Sounds like a solution might come from ISI further down the line.
    I'll give it a go with the AI calibration and see if I get some improvements.

    Thanks for your reply. :)
     
  9. woochoo

    woochoo Registered

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    Good day Gentlemen, and potentially Ladies, and I guess potentially Transgendered people,
    Firstly, I'm not doing the public/final 0.97 release in the next 24-48 hours, and probably not the 24-48 that follow those, in case anyone was wondering, but the track is in pretty good shape for a release sometime quite soon.
    Secondly, with some help from Luc I've fixed the shadow issue posted earlier (sunblocker horizon mesh wasn't set to No Render).
    As a result, I've also fixed a couple of other broken shadow problems.

    So It's getting better and better.

    And since the test (v0.96z) is running it's course fairly well, and it's nearing the end of that course, I'll make the download link public for anyone if they want to check it out (this is not a christmas gift, just coincidental timing :p ).
    Durge has been kind in hosting online testing fairly regularly (and distributing links), and Brian has run the circuit a number of times in rotation on the F3 Fanatics server, so look for those servers if you want to try it online.
    I have done some work fixing some things since the test began, so it's not completely current anymore. Any errors reported in this thread will still be in 0.96z. And the official public version will be ready soon, so don't bother if you're not that interested.

    The test's version number is 0.96z. Here is the current changelog for the public v0.97 (most of it is in 0.96z too)
    +@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@ V0.97 @@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@+

    - Road: New T1/main textures.
    - Road: Small texture changes and increased resolution, and modified material settings for detail textures.
    - Road: Some variation to road edge geometry.
    - Road: Some small adjustments to road camber and crown.
    - Road: Some reduction of the more extreme bumps.
    - Road: Added some road surface repair patches.
    - Road: Higher polygon density in some corners (makes more precise RealRoad effects).
    - Road Lines: Some changes in resolution, normal maps, and material settings of decal lines.
    - Road Lines: Added small, fictional yellow paint markers to the yellow pitlane line to indicate pit-in/pit-out for speed limits.
    - Roadside Kerbs/Gutter: Updated some textures and increased some resolutions.
    - Terrain: Initial implementation of new terrain shader (from rF2 build 860)
    - Terrain: Mostly new textures.
    - Terrain: Added geometry to some verge edges for variation and texture lerping.
    - Terrain: Some verges have changed from grass to gravel.
    - Terrain: Added shadow casting meshes for some steeper terrain areas, and global sun-blocker, to improve morning/afternoon lighting.
    - Terrain: Added some basic terrain reflection meshes where appropriate.
    - River: Added geometry to river and river shore, to improve mapping and appearance.
    - River: Adjusted water textures and material properties.
    - Trainlines: New trainline meshes, adjusted textures, added specular and normal mapping.
    - Viaduct: New Model (more polys, more pixels, more precise).
    - Pub: Some small upgrades to textures and material.
    - Pit Building: Some basic stopgap updates to the pit building (a new mesh is planned in the future).
    - Control Tower: Some quick and basic texture adjustments.
    - Water Tower: Higher resolution texture, and material adjustments.
    - Culverts: New models for Viaduct, Tannery Straight, and Newry Road culverts.
    - Roadside Marker Posts: Replaced with new models and textures (including reflectors).
    - Hay Bales: Textures retoned and higher resolution.
    - Fences: New wire texture for fences (includes rusty barbed wire).
    - Fences: Added normal mapping to some fence elements, and increased texture resolution for some fences.
    - Fences: Adjusted Fence collisions outside of Turn 1 to reduce severity of 3-wide AI incidents at the start of a race.
    - Trees: Rearranged some poplar trees after Newry Corner.
    - Trees: Fixed some broken shading on some trees.
    - Trees: Fixed some Z-fighting on some distant trees.
    - Trees: Replaced some tree walls with massed X-trees.
    - Sponsor Banners: Adjusted some textures and added specular and normal maps to some banners.
    - Lights: Shortened attenuation of streetlights and floodlights.
    - Shadow Meshes: Removed some old-style dummy shadow meshes from some buildings (now using the visible mesh to cast some shadows).
    - AIW: Adjusted fast path on Tannery Straight to reduce AI crashes in wet conditions (some may still occur when low-grip cars are side by side).
    - AIW: Some adjustments to create (a quite subtle, hacky) wind shear reverb effect on power poles.
    - Physics: Some changes to physics of movable objects (hay bales, marker posts, signs)
    - Indy Aero: Included VehicleConfig.ini to force Indy DW12 to use Roadcourse aero package.
    - Optimisation: Some batching and adjustments to some draw distances may produce small FPS improvements.

    +@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@+

    =====================================================

    =======Known Issues, Non-Implemented Features, & Notes=======

    ===The AI
    - Sometimes they'll hop onto the dirt banks on the inside of a few corners.
    - Some cars may collide/crash in the first corner of a race (more likely in rainy conditions), in the Viaduct section, along King's Bridge, and on approach to Tannery Corner.
    - F1 and some other cars may collide with tyre markers (not so catastrophic with new HAT profile - v0.91).
    - The AI cars struggle to form up to the 3-2-3-2 'Hisoric Grid' after a warmup lap, so skipping the warmup lap or using a different grid layout might be considered.
    - ISI Historic Spark and Eve F1/F2 cars don't usually make it around the final corner (running AI calibration in a test session may help).

    ===Animations
    - Some of the animations have small glitches and sometimes the marshal's headphone's are floating (not yet a fix priority).

    ===Wet Road Reflections
    - Fences and some terrain areas are not currently in the reflection list due to the nature of the reflection system.
    - For some undiscovered reason, reflections of some trees/bushes/buildings etc may appear and disappear (popin/out) in the road reflections in a manner inconsistent with the mesh's origin (efforts have been made to bias the system to produce more accurate results).

    ===Shadows
    - Some popin, popout, and awkward shading of trees/bushes/buildings etc.

    ===Bridges
    - Bridge structures don't currently extend down into the river bed mud. When bridge structures are updated, they will.

    ===Terrain Shader
    - Using terrain shader launched in rF2 build 860. Older builds of rF2 will not render terrain correctly.

    ===Terrain Decals
    - Slight blur/darkening where grassy road-edge decals blend into terrain.

    ===Normal Mapping
    - In a couple of areas one or two of the normal maps don't seem correctly oriented with the lighting system.

    ===Performance
    - There is a framerate drop of around 30% when exiting Mountford Corner (the final corner) and in the Viaduct section (there should be FPS gains on low track detail modes if needed).

    ===General Efficiency / Optimisation
    - This project was started as a beginner some time ago, and has been a learning experience. Skillz, philosphies, techniques, and technology have progressed in that time. As a result, and the size of the circuit, updates are a rolling process, and there isn't usually time to do all desired updates at or by a specific time.
    It is planned that the older models and textures will be updated, optimised, or replaced.

    ===Continued Development
    - The main target of development will be updates/remakes of a number of buildings/structures.
    - 3D trees for track-side trees are planned (some unreleased work has occured but it is time-intensive).
    - New tent models are planned.
    - New house models are planned.
    - Separating painted lines from road textures (pitlane and grid lines are already separate).

    =====================================================


    This release is slightly crippleware/watermarked/incomplete:
    - No realroad profiles
    - In-game floating text message
    - Not all final additions and adjustments have yet been made.

    downloads:
    7zip file including ReadMe.txt :
    https://www.dropbox.com/s/bhliuj3jk61ai78/Longford1967_0.96z_PRIVATE_TEST_2014-12-18.7z?dl=0

    rfcmp only:
    https://mega.co.nz/#!NRZgnaTK!TGfQY4aIQ5J8l2xg4JgJ4IQC5PLYmGc_RjVf8P5WDqQ
    mega key, if needed : TGfQY4aIQ5J8l2xg4JgJ4IQC5PLYmGc_RjVf8P5WDqQ

    Have a happy end to the year, and a good start to the next one... and beyond... :)
     
  10. matf1

    matf1 Registered

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    Such awesomeness, this track and you have more than done it justice. Merry Christmas WooChoo and thankyou so much for your dedication to this classic.

    Sent from my Nexus 4 using Tapatalk
     
  11. A13

    A13 Registered

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    Marvelous work :)
    Thank you very much for the preview version and Merry Christmas :)
     
  12. sg333

    sg333 Registered

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    Thank you very much, and Merry Christmas! :)
     
  13. jpalesi

    jpalesi Registered

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    An idea : on rF1, it was possible to get such issue mostly with converted GPL tracks, on straight lines where you could have really large polys. Of course with real road it won't be the problem here, but it could be a start.
     
  14. woochoo

    woochoo Registered

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    Thanks for the support, Mat, A13, sg333 - glad the track is still being enjoyed :)

    Hi JP, thanks for the idea, but it was my own failure to tick the No Render box for the sun blocker. One way or another the underground sun blocking mesh was interfering with every other shadow blocking object in the scene. With No Render checked it still blocks the sun at dawn/dusk as well as it ever did, but no longer messes up the other stuff. From now on I'll be double-checking that all my shadow-only objects are set for No Render too :)

    Having looked at the problem for a little while trying to figure what was actually happening, it turns out something like this was happening:
    The 50cm or so of the model that was closest to the ground was being completely ignored by the shadow system (that's how it appeared anyway). I tweaked some shadow bias settings in the viewer which helped, but they didn't persist in the cam files or into the game. Then it came down to the old "hide almost everything and see if it still happens". Hiding everything but the road, terrain, and some buildings did fix the problem. Happily, one of the first few things I tried turning back on was the sun blocker, and then it was a matter of examining it's settings. A few clicks later and it was all working properly. So, there's a little tech writeup in case anyone has the same problem in the future.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Dec 24, 2014
  15. Hedlund_90

    Hedlund_90 Registered

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    The track is absolutely stunning! Great work woochoo!

    The only thing I've noticed on my first run is that "heavy rubber" doesn't do anything, it's still green. Don't know if it's track or build related though!

    :)
     
  16. woochoo

    woochoo Registered

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    Hi Hedlund, firstly, nice shots in the screenshots thread :)
    To you question, no, none of those rubber profiles will work. They're from the last build, but I left them there to remind me to do fresh ones for the next public build. I didn't bother with new ones for the test version :)
     
  17. DurgeDriven

    DurgeDriven Banned

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    Still catching flies I am...........................:eek: spit spit


    lol

    Got to get a NSX night racing going here, magic make sure you have wind immersion on ..........


    and play some cops and robbers 2 way road...........
     
  18. DurgeDriven

    DurgeDriven Banned

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    I sent you a PM link days ago and good rubber in room.


    Not too much just enough, I suggest setting about 0.2- 0.3 x wear for sessions.

    Select LONGFORD for rubber
     
  19. jpalesi

    jpalesi Registered

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    Hi S., thanks for the reply, didn't know about this sun blocking mesh thing.

    I did a quick test, one thing that I didn't like and that I saw on multiple tracks, is the non-billboard trees that casts shadows on themselves.
    I saw there's a T1 No shadow shader, did you try it ? if it doesn't fix it, I might have an idea for that.
     
  20. woochoo

    woochoo Registered

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    thanks for hosting some rubber, Durge :)
    Yeah, it's true that they can look bad sometimes, but at some times of day the self-shadowing can look nice.
    I think they might be a little better now that the sun blocker issue has been fixed too, though they do change their mip or detail at some inconvenient moments, sometimes.
    But yeah, removing (bad) distractions is something i usually consider to be good, and I gave them a test, and it's not like they're bad without self-shadows, so on balance it's probably a better move to remove them, so thanks for the suggestion :)
    In case anyone was wondering, yes, they do still cast shadows on the ground :)
    I've pretty much given up on making trees look perfect until I can do proper and efficient 3D trees (speedtree support would be nice, though probably unaffordable).
     

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