v1.65 BETA Download link
After getting many comments about updating the first post... here it is... if you haven't been following the thread, there was a 1.50 and a 1.60 update as well. You can also find them here:
v1.50 BETA Download link
v1.60 BETA Download link
Things are getting complicated at the moment, and I might have to take an unwanted break from working on Nord. I will see how things goes in the coming days/weeks...
Worth mentioning that v1.50 and above also includes the extra 24h objects, like caravans, campfires, extra crowds, security people and vehicles, etc... this is by default enabled at max track detail settings. If you do not wish to have them around, set track details to high... it will load only the default tourist objects. This is the only difference between Max and high. Med and low further removes things... with low removing most things not needed to race, as a last attempt to get the track working on lower end hardware.
At the moment, the track is very heavy with the new forests, which all are using the same 2048x2048 texture. My max file have gotten out of hand with the memory usage, and I cannot work much further on the matter until a 64bit exporter plugin is released, and I will be able to work with 64bit Max, allowing me to use all my 8gb of ram, instead of ~3.3gb..
So at the moment, with my medium end computer, I can play with everything set to max, but it's missing some to be really enjoyable... setting only texture details to high help me achieve a steady 60fps in most cases and allows me to race some 16 AI (havent really tested exactly how much I can run, but with settings to med, I can run 29 AI no problems at 60 fps locked..)
Donation Link (thru Paypal)
Many thanks to all you that supported me during all this time, I hope the recent updates are pleasing you, on the kerbstone matter, I will lower them later if I can manage to keep working on Nord, but I can't until the 64bit plugin is released. The kerbstone are part of the terrain, and I modded the terrain a bit when I made the forest, redone a few mountains to better match reality, so I cannot get the terrain objects out of my forest max file, without breaking the forests (without importing the forests, which cause the max file to be so heavy...) Cause if I import the terrain into a new max file, and reimport my forest later, they will be broken and I will need to redo them (or I havent found a way yet... I already screwed up once when I started them)
Enjoy! In the cases where I still can't work on Nord in a few months, I'll release whatever is needed for anyone to continue work on this, if anyone wishes to do so.
EDIT: Oh and you will likely find the AI much harder now
I've fully redone the AIW.
First, let me thank the following persons: SPASKIS, Mario Morais, Tosch, Mianiak, Hoover, eth0ne, Richard, Senna12 and likely to be forgetting some. As a whole, everyone in this thread has been most helpful, and you are the reason why this has been made possible and have come this far. Thanks!
Nordschleife Guide download link (Thanks to Hectari for providing this! Give this a try, it's an amazing in depth review of the track and how to race it)
Version 0.97n download link (Updated lots of the lower resolution, nearby track, textures. Guardrails, metal post, all fences, wooden post, antenna tower, castle, environment texture (top down trees), and more... tweaked further the LODs, and fixed the rear view mirror mostly. Few popouts occurs near horizon line... nothing disruptive.)
Version 0.97l download link (Repositioned trees, moved and removed tree lines, optmized road, curbs, and scenery objects, merging and splitting them into smaller pieces, and optimized the LODs and shadows all around. Further optimization possible with shadow groups and vis groups. Reduced bump amplification on concrete extensions. Reduced dust output on the curbs and concrete a tad further. Might be forgetting stuff as usual
)
Version 0.97k (full, no update) download link (alt MediaFire link, thanks to Hectari) (new HD guardrails textures, Tosch fixed the background ordering, so the landscape should be matching now. Makes a very nice difference in game anyhow! Thanks to Richard for providing the original guardrail texture.)
Version 0.97j-1 update to 0.97j download link (alt MediaFire link, thanks to Hectari) (40mb, new cam, new panoramic background and shader to bump/spec, new tatoo at track start, 5 saved real road profile, Tosch HDR profile included.)
Version 0.97j download link (alt MediaFire link, thanks to Hectari) (redone all trees, desaturated and darkened grass a tad, smoothed out all fences and guardrails, redone the bump map on the road (turns out I made a mistake and wasnt using the right bump map for the detail map I had. Makes a nice difference. Amongst other things)
Version 0.97g download link (major texture reworking, trees, grasses, road, guardrails, fences, and a lot more have all been redone, now much lighter and much more saturated)
Version 0.97e download link (major tree work, many thanks to Tosch. Evergreen edit done by Tosch himself.)
Version 0.97d download link (remove blue in the grass, trees, or tried to, improved much the road surface appearance, much darker, better specular, and reworked the tatoos from the original textures, my 1st edit was way too desaturated, modified dust output.)
Version 0.97b download link (lighter trees)
Version 0.97a (600mb) download link
Version 0.96 download link (2x mesh smooth road mesh)
Version 0.95 download link
Version 0.91 download link
Alternate 0.91 download link (Thanks to G.Bird)
Version 0.90 download link
Version 0.80 download link
Alternate download link (Thanks to G.Bird)
Tosch HDR Profile for v0.90 and 0.91 download link
Tosch HDR Profile for v0.80 download link
UPDATE #5 (v0.97a): Lots of things actually! New grasses all around (still not blended tho), new road edges textures to match the new grasses, new gravel textures, all trees redone, and all tree mats made with a different trees, now have a variety of over 50 unique trees.
Bumps/spec maps redone for lots of textures.
Still need to figure out the alpha channel for the road textures... if anyone can help, let me know.
There is too much to recall everything, but you should see a nice improvement since the last release.
The road mesh is using the 1x mesh smooth/1x tessel I was talking about.
UPDATE #4 (v0.95): It's nearing 7am and I havent slept yet, was working on 0.96 after reading a nice explanations from wgeuze (did I got it right?) on mesh smooth. So I have 2x mesh smooth instead of 2x tessel the road mesh. But I think it is too smooth.. will try 1 mesh smooth 1 tessel tomorrow, and update the post with more informations on what's new
You can find out most about it in my first post of today... Enjoy, 0.96 coming up in 25 mins or so if I'm still awake
UPDATE #3 (v0.91):
edit: tree problems isnt fixed... false hope.
Fixed the trees problems. It wasnt a billboarding setup problem, but it turns out a bunch of trees were sitting way too low in the ground, some even completely hidden. Raised a dozens of tree objects by different amount, some up to 8-9 meters.
Fixed the over black tarmac in some areas, including paddock. Was the result of those textures mixed up with silverstone mat properties.. Reverted to brianza's for those surface.
Removed the tatoos FFB. Will work some more on this, this made it in too early, wanted to remove it, but due to a mistake I made in the scn file, I reverted to a backup, that was prior me disabling the ffb on them. Need to lower the shaking when hitting them when going thru a corner.
UPDATE #2 (v0.90):
Swapped all trees for billboard versions
Added reflections to cars
Fixed TDF (the areas which seems overly bumpy was because some road part were still defined with rF1 TDF settings, I've pretty much went all over it and fixed it)
Set the smoke output according to this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSVeALvU5k8
Set the rainspray according to these videos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_OjPNOiOXw and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JI5iFN_H2G8
Redone the skybox
Improved the tatoos looks
Improved all trees textures
Added lots of objects shadows that were missing.
Unfortunately, I can't go much further... I tried to extrude the fences, and do other stuff, like add vegetation from lime rock park, but without being able to load the full scene in 3dsmax, it's really hard to do things like this.
There are known issues in this version:
There are some billboard trees that seems to be shy when seeing from cockpit view. If you check out replays from any other view, they are fine, but some trees seems to hide. They are most of time to the left of track, and when going up a slope. I can't seem to find the problem. All trees were created the very same way, using the gMaterial tool from Mario Morais.
There are one or two tree that is flickering.
The skybox is clipping when viewing from the paddock, in the opposite direction of track. It is the only time where it does that. It's set to 9000 lod out, no clip.. but it doesnt happens when racing in any other place.
I have tried to do the wet reflections, but there are stuff that I dont understand, and it seems that I would have to create planes in 3dsmax and stuff, so again, without having the full scene, it wont be possible for me to do.
Night lighting isnt done. Again, I tried, but dont know how to. Went to dev mode yesterday, went to 5 locations from the paddock, and took coords, and added like 20m to the z axis, so the light would be positioned up in the air, but they weren't showing at the coords I took note once in game.
This is something I can likely do, if I can find how to.
UPDATE #1:
After couple of days of intense work, I'm proud to release (early) Nordschleife Tourist layout for rFactor 2.
I'm currently exhausted, so I will be taking the rest of the day easy, and will hop on it again next week.
It is very much playable, raceable, and more importantly the fun factor is there! So to those of you eager to try it out, here it is!
I've worked hard again all day long today, and swapped all road, grass, fences, guard rails materials properties for those of silverstone. All materials textures are swapped for silverstone's. (Not the primary texture, as it wouldnt look good, I tried... it then looks like a race circuit, instead of road circuit.
To my taste, it looks really good now. About halfway between rF1 quality and rF2. At times, it feels like a scratch built track for rF2...
I still have couple things to do like:
-Reflections
-A little track icon when you select track (loading screen is partly done, need a good screenshot of the track without cars)
-Make sure real roads works, maybe it does already.
-Swap more materials
-Swap textures, trees and stuff giving out that this is an rF1 track
-Maybe convert the other layouts included in the 2.2a release of the rF1 track.
-Stuff you will mention and I can do.
-Extrude fence so they cast shadows
Nordschleife Tourist for rFactor 2
Original track by com8 - Converted to rF2 with love by pleclair
Time to make an official thread about it, cause it *IS* happening
The roads have been splitted, along with the road edges, road mesh have been increased, and it now drives smooth.
There will be likely many updates to it as well, as I learn more and more, I will be improving the textures and objects over time.
My goal is to have this track shine. Nordschleife is THE track, it deserves respect!
In case you didnt follow my thread "At least I got it to run in dev mode", here are the screenshots of what I had prior to converting mesh.
Note the yelllow tint will likely be going away since I separated roads from scenery. So realroad shaders wont tint everything around the road yellow like it did.
View attachment 9086
View attachment 9087
View attachment 9088
View attachment 9089
View attachment 9090
View attachment 9091
View attachment 9092
And the youtube video (still from the same version as screenshot)
Newer video (not release)
Yes, you will be driving Nordschleife on rFactor 2 very soon my friend!
After getting many comments about updating the first post... here it is... if you haven't been following the thread, there was a 1.50 and a 1.60 update as well. You can also find them here:
v1.50 BETA Download link
v1.60 BETA Download link
Things are getting complicated at the moment, and I might have to take an unwanted break from working on Nord. I will see how things goes in the coming days/weeks...
Worth mentioning that v1.50 and above also includes the extra 24h objects, like caravans, campfires, extra crowds, security people and vehicles, etc... this is by default enabled at max track detail settings. If you do not wish to have them around, set track details to high... it will load only the default tourist objects. This is the only difference between Max and high. Med and low further removes things... with low removing most things not needed to race, as a last attempt to get the track working on lower end hardware.
At the moment, the track is very heavy with the new forests, which all are using the same 2048x2048 texture. My max file have gotten out of hand with the memory usage, and I cannot work much further on the matter until a 64bit exporter plugin is released, and I will be able to work with 64bit Max, allowing me to use all my 8gb of ram, instead of ~3.3gb..
So at the moment, with my medium end computer, I can play with everything set to max, but it's missing some to be really enjoyable... setting only texture details to high help me achieve a steady 60fps in most cases and allows me to race some 16 AI (havent really tested exactly how much I can run, but with settings to med, I can run 29 AI no problems at 60 fps locked..)
Donation Link (thru Paypal)
Many thanks to all you that supported me during all this time, I hope the recent updates are pleasing you, on the kerbstone matter, I will lower them later if I can manage to keep working on Nord, but I can't until the 64bit plugin is released. The kerbstone are part of the terrain, and I modded the terrain a bit when I made the forest, redone a few mountains to better match reality, so I cannot get the terrain objects out of my forest max file, without breaking the forests (without importing the forests, which cause the max file to be so heavy...) Cause if I import the terrain into a new max file, and reimport my forest later, they will be broken and I will need to redo them (or I havent found a way yet... I already screwed up once when I started them)
Enjoy! In the cases where I still can't work on Nord in a few months, I'll release whatever is needed for anyone to continue work on this, if anyone wishes to do so.
EDIT: Oh and you will likely find the AI much harder now
I've fully redone the AIW. First, let me thank the following persons: SPASKIS, Mario Morais, Tosch, Mianiak, Hoover, eth0ne, Richard, Senna12 and likely to be forgetting some. As a whole, everyone in this thread has been most helpful, and you are the reason why this has been made possible and have come this far. Thanks!
Nordschleife Guide download link (Thanks to Hectari for providing this! Give this a try, it's an amazing in depth review of the track and how to race it)
Version 0.97n download link (Updated lots of the lower resolution, nearby track, textures. Guardrails, metal post, all fences, wooden post, antenna tower, castle, environment texture (top down trees), and more... tweaked further the LODs, and fixed the rear view mirror mostly. Few popouts occurs near horizon line... nothing disruptive.)
Version 0.97l download link (Repositioned trees, moved and removed tree lines, optmized road, curbs, and scenery objects, merging and splitting them into smaller pieces, and optimized the LODs and shadows all around. Further optimization possible with shadow groups and vis groups. Reduced bump amplification on concrete extensions. Reduced dust output on the curbs and concrete a tad further. Might be forgetting stuff as usual
)Version 0.97k (full, no update) download link (alt MediaFire link, thanks to Hectari) (new HD guardrails textures, Tosch fixed the background ordering, so the landscape should be matching now. Makes a very nice difference in game anyhow! Thanks to Richard for providing the original guardrail texture.)
Version 0.97j-1 update to 0.97j download link (alt MediaFire link, thanks to Hectari) (40mb, new cam, new panoramic background and shader to bump/spec, new tatoo at track start, 5 saved real road profile, Tosch HDR profile included.)
Version 0.97j download link (alt MediaFire link, thanks to Hectari) (redone all trees, desaturated and darkened grass a tad, smoothed out all fences and guardrails, redone the bump map on the road (turns out I made a mistake and wasnt using the right bump map for the detail map I had. Makes a nice difference. Amongst other things)
Version 0.97g download link (major texture reworking, trees, grasses, road, guardrails, fences, and a lot more have all been redone, now much lighter and much more saturated)
Version 0.97e download link (major tree work, many thanks to Tosch. Evergreen edit done by Tosch himself.)
Version 0.97d download link (remove blue in the grass, trees, or tried to, improved much the road surface appearance, much darker, better specular, and reworked the tatoos from the original textures, my 1st edit was way too desaturated, modified dust output.)
Version 0.97b download link (lighter trees)
Version 0.97a (600mb) download link
Version 0.96 download link (2x mesh smooth road mesh)
Version 0.95 download link
Version 0.91 download link
Alternate 0.91 download link (Thanks to G.Bird)
Version 0.90 download link
Version 0.80 download link
Alternate download link (Thanks to G.Bird)
Tosch HDR Profile for v0.90 and 0.91 download link
Tosch HDR Profile for v0.80 download link
UPDATE #5 (v0.97a): Lots of things actually! New grasses all around (still not blended tho), new road edges textures to match the new grasses, new gravel textures, all trees redone, and all tree mats made with a different trees, now have a variety of over 50 unique trees.
Bumps/spec maps redone for lots of textures.
Still need to figure out the alpha channel for the road textures... if anyone can help, let me know.
There is too much to recall everything, but you should see a nice improvement since the last release.
The road mesh is using the 1x mesh smooth/1x tessel I was talking about.
UPDATE #4 (v0.95): It's nearing 7am and I havent slept yet, was working on 0.96 after reading a nice explanations from wgeuze (did I got it right?) on mesh smooth. So I have 2x mesh smooth instead of 2x tessel the road mesh. But I think it is too smooth.. will try 1 mesh smooth 1 tessel tomorrow, and update the post with more informations on what's new
You can find out most about it in my first post of today... Enjoy, 0.96 coming up in 25 mins or so if I'm still awake UPDATE #3 (v0.91):
edit: tree problems isnt fixed... false hope.
Fixed the trees problems. It wasnt a billboarding setup problem, but it turns out a bunch of trees were sitting way too low in the ground, some even completely hidden. Raised a dozens of tree objects by different amount, some up to 8-9 meters.
Fixed the over black tarmac in some areas, including paddock. Was the result of those textures mixed up with silverstone mat properties.. Reverted to brianza's for those surface.
Removed the tatoos FFB. Will work some more on this, this made it in too early, wanted to remove it, but due to a mistake I made in the scn file, I reverted to a backup, that was prior me disabling the ffb on them. Need to lower the shaking when hitting them when going thru a corner.
UPDATE #2 (v0.90):
Swapped all trees for billboard versions
Added reflections to cars
Fixed TDF (the areas which seems overly bumpy was because some road part were still defined with rF1 TDF settings, I've pretty much went all over it and fixed it)
Set the smoke output according to this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSVeALvU5k8
Set the rainspray according to these videos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_OjPNOiOXw and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JI5iFN_H2G8
Redone the skybox
Improved the tatoos looks
Improved all trees textures
Added lots of objects shadows that were missing.
Unfortunately, I can't go much further... I tried to extrude the fences, and do other stuff, like add vegetation from lime rock park, but without being able to load the full scene in 3dsmax, it's really hard to do things like this.
There are known issues in this version:
There are some billboard trees that seems to be shy when seeing from cockpit view. If you check out replays from any other view, they are fine, but some trees seems to hide. They are most of time to the left of track, and when going up a slope. I can't seem to find the problem. All trees were created the very same way, using the gMaterial tool from Mario Morais.
There are one or two tree that is flickering.
The skybox is clipping when viewing from the paddock, in the opposite direction of track. It is the only time where it does that. It's set to 9000 lod out, no clip.. but it doesnt happens when racing in any other place.
I have tried to do the wet reflections, but there are stuff that I dont understand, and it seems that I would have to create planes in 3dsmax and stuff, so again, without having the full scene, it wont be possible for me to do.
Night lighting isnt done. Again, I tried, but dont know how to. Went to dev mode yesterday, went to 5 locations from the paddock, and took coords, and added like 20m to the z axis, so the light would be positioned up in the air, but they weren't showing at the coords I took note once in game.
This is something I can likely do, if I can find how to.
UPDATE #1:
After couple of days of intense work, I'm proud to release (early) Nordschleife Tourist layout for rFactor 2.
I'm currently exhausted, so I will be taking the rest of the day easy, and will hop on it again next week.
It is very much playable, raceable, and more importantly the fun factor is there! So to those of you eager to try it out, here it is!
I've worked hard again all day long today, and swapped all road, grass, fences, guard rails materials properties for those of silverstone. All materials textures are swapped for silverstone's. (Not the primary texture, as it wouldnt look good, I tried... it then looks like a race circuit, instead of road circuit.
To my taste, it looks really good now. About halfway between rF1 quality and rF2. At times, it feels like a scratch built track for rF2...
I still have couple things to do like:
-Reflections
-A little track icon when you select track (loading screen is partly done, need a good screenshot of the track without cars)
-Make sure real roads works, maybe it does already.
-Swap more materials
-Swap textures, trees and stuff giving out that this is an rF1 track
-Maybe convert the other layouts included in the 2.2a release of the rF1 track.
-Stuff you will mention and I can do.
-Extrude fence so they cast shadows
Nordschleife Tourist for rFactor 2
Original track by com8 - Converted to rF2 with love by pleclair
Time to make an official thread about it, cause it *IS* happening
The roads have been splitted, along with the road edges, road mesh have been increased, and it now drives smooth.
There will be likely many updates to it as well, as I learn more and more, I will be improving the textures and objects over time.
My goal is to have this track shine. Nordschleife is THE track, it deserves respect!
In case you didnt follow my thread "At least I got it to run in dev mode", here are the screenshots of what I had prior to converting mesh.
Note the yelllow tint will likely be going away since I separated roads from scenery. So realroad shaders wont tint everything around the road yellow like it did.
View attachment 9086
View attachment 9087
View attachment 9088
View attachment 9089
View attachment 9090
View attachment 9091
View attachment 9092
And the youtube video (still from the same version as screenshot)
Newer video (not release)
Yes, you will be driving Nordschleife on rFactor 2 very soon my friend!
Last edited by a moderator:
