Why there are so few mods for rFactor2?

This is not correct. I suggested it would be great to get a section of a new circuit, but this does not mean there is no documentation. In Joesville can find all necessary references. And about the new shaders, are fully documented.

 

It is sure. I will add one thing. Modding costs money too. Some books can be expensive

Sadly I think nobody heard us I said that for 2-3 years, nothing moves. I see only 1 guy who learnt 3D modelling on RacingFR.
When I learn in 2007, we are more than 1...

I must admit the old RSC (internationnal) is missing now, there wasn't a forum where everybody is.. A lot of mod/tracks stay in league and so on :/

 

rF2 encryptation has been already broken.

 

Just to clear one thing up, RSC (RaceSimCentral) was founded and owned by Mikkel Gram-Hansen, who later worked for SimBin for several years - it was never an official ISI forum, but many leagues, mod teams and even game developers set their roots at RSC - having ISI's gMotor(2) as common interest, so naturally a knowledge database evolved there.

 

That site is sorely mist to I think. I thought or was hoping RaceDepartment would have taken it's place and I guess has up to a point with a base for many race sim platforms but never in the modding community. Nothing like RaceSimCentral ever was.
It's been years now.
SimRaceway took RSC over and the modders disappeared like rats deserting a sinking ship. But most never showed up anywhere else, Not as a collective anyway. Many stop releasing mods at rFCentral as well. That site still survived the mass exits of a lot of modders at the time. I guess there was enough small, less well known mod groups continued to support it.

Simraceway had a really bad rep at the time. True or not I really don't know but it's taking over rFCentral and RSC at the same time killed the modding community and it's never recovered from it. Not to what it was anyway. Scatted, broken and never talking to each other like it was when they all worked from one base, RaceSimCentral. All moddable platforms were there.

Ripping was going on then to but nowhere near the extent it is today. The hole community got in a up raw which made total fools out of the people doing it. Not like that today. People just except it as the norm. Still hurts the people getting ripped just as much if really not more today because the models are so much more detailed, the physics, sounds, 2D graphic is all so much higher now then they ever were so far more time is put in on all aspects of modding. We have to as modders because otherwise we get forum bashed and it's not fun to be on the receiving end of the s@it! I put 110% into what I do but I know there's someone out there who's better. My time is running out doing this. I'm getting old and losing patience with it all.
The young are lazy. They just wont it now and screw the consequences. It's in that game, Rip it! Working with a mod group I have some models here that are from first time modellers, 3D modellers. There really not bad for first time. People can do it. I have proof of that right here and I hold a lot of respect for those guy's. It's a shame their no longer around. Why not? no idea.

I think a lot of new guy's learning any aspect of modding are thinking they have to do it all. We see this a lot now days. Learn 3D, Learn 2D. Physics, Sounds and get it in game all on their own.
I've never see or used a solo made mod that was any good. Not in all aspects. Modelling is a time consuming art! Physics! Today! forget it. That's a one man total commitment on it's own if you want it to be right. Not just a tweaked physics that someone else has done. I mean do it right. From scratch, for that car. Collect as much real world information as you possibly can before you even start to look at ini files for it.

I know as a 2D artist I spend a lot of time doing research and collecting the necessary logos, sponsors, brand and pics of the cars, drivers and helmets. A lot of logos off the net images are not exactly like the ones on the cars so I make them from scratch. 2 3 hours to make something that gets used once. Some are quick. I've got quite good at it now. (Tongue in cheek)

For the most part I understand why the modding community has fallen away. It's not the extra competition from other platforms around rF2. rF1 had a lot of it's own. NASCAR2003 was still very highly used back then. Plus SimBin's GT-R. F1Challenge was still going strong.

rF2 has Asetto Corsa now. Though not at the start off rF2's life. Now Pcars. What else is there that's really in the same class? CodeMasters has got PC games but not really in the same market.The only thing they have in common it you use a steering wheel, If you want to. But the comparisons stop there.
A lot I guess would lump iRacing in there to but really? It's not called rent a race for nothing. You don't mod it. Heck! you don't even own it! It's in the class of it's own and the only thing that comes close is RaceRoom now Simraceway has gone.

This post is getting or gotten to long.
Have a nice day people.

 

My comments
I mod since 2005 on rF1, and try to continue on rF2, I made a quick test on AC too, but the feature/feeling of rF2 are more close of what I expect in simulation for online league races.

I agree with that, but in Car development, some restriction of rF2 slow the developments (all the online tests can't be done in ModDev).
When you understand what has changed, you can adapt your way of working, and with your great tools, it's easier to make packages (if you are a bit developer to make scripts, it's my case).

Comming from rF1, the switch to rF2 is not too big, but there is a new bunch of feature that are not documented completely, and there is some feature moving from build to build.
In rF1, all the physics aspect was described in the files directly, it's not the case in rF2, today, we have to learn the new way of working with tires, engine, chassi flex. This is not understanding files comments, but tools and their power/limitation, and the documentation associated is not complete for a from scratch newbies usage. So these new feature tool, shall be completely documented before the modders can work with them (to make a clean job).
The free content modders work on their free time, so they need clear information to safe time, and not makes tests to be sure of some forumlas/way of working.

Agree with stonec, same topic as documentation for me. ISI give a link to the Saturation of texture with HDR if not adapted, but that is not enough, we need to get the procedure with an example to how to start from a bad texture, to get a good texture in Photoshop. Not found anything on this on the forum.

I think it's the summary of 3 years, there is many things unfinished/resolved, blocking the whole experience. There is always something locking you to plug and drive online. And on each build delivery, you cross your finger to get fix and to not have regression on old working features. This is like that until rF2 is available in beta, and continue today.

Since September 2014, the gap between ModDev and SinglePlayer is limited, so now we have a closer results, before it was not the case.

Because there is only rF2 that match with our league requirements and interesting new features compared to rF1 (and other games like AC) we continue to dig rF2 and try to make all work as good as possible. So I continue to support this game, but, we need stability and finished features before adding more ones. And for that, we need a clear statement on what feature is considered as stable and bug free (Game + modding) and their associated documentation to able the modders/players to make a clean job on the new interesting features of rF2.

Today it's more complicated to run online than rF1.

The main reason of packaging system was to allow an easy only auto download system, today, there is so many bugs in al the chain, that's hell to server administrator to launch one car on a track to host !!!. In rF1 it was a copy/paste and a .zip to host, on rF2 it's a huge work for (today) nothing sure at the end.

So I keep cross finger to get step by step the improvement, but without visibility, we don't know what are the priorities, so, can't organise/work on serious developments/events online, so we make "tests" and some fails , not easy for league to keep drivers in these conditions, and keep admins motivated. And to motivate modders, we need driver around them to drive and test in the better possible way.

 

+1
Only adds to what I said. Even if it was a 3 year summary. I actually like that assessment. I'd agree it's true.

 

If that's the case I have to appologize for the lack of information on my side - could you please provide a link to the shader documentation you are referrencing?

 

New Terrain Shader is well documented in an extensive PDF. It can be downloaded from the DevCorner.

New Terrain Shader

All information relating to the Real Road Shader is available in PDF Track Tecnolgy v.3.

There were some changes in Real Road Shader explained in this post, written by Luc Van Camp in the wiki.

Changes to Real Road Shader

As a novice modder, I can say that I have not encountered any problems so far by lack of documentation.

 

I think the tracks modding part are the most documented, but it's not the case on the new physics parts.

 

IMO the Ptool is a great tool, it should be pushed further in a way so you can develop almost the whole car physics with it.
And then of course documented aswell.

One tool for everything. Once you get used to it, it's easy to work with.
It is a lot easier to work with something you can visualize, even more so if you are starting out with modding.

 

Thanks for the response. I think this information should be part of Track technology document or at least under the track modding resources, because it mainly concerns modders and now it's lost under some Q&A section. Also perhaps some words about how to easiest convert a bunch of textures for HDR, is only way to edit them one by one in e.g. Photoshop?

I see yet again another modder who tests his track with HDR off (video), result with HDR on will look bad...

 

For who that want to test the rF2 technology data for tracks and is not able to spend thousand of hours modelling in 3ds Max, I'd suggest the software which title can be viewed at picture below.

It is able to create REALLY fast terrain and roads and export in FBX format, which can be imported in Max. Thus, you'll have to work on Gmotor materials in order to put it to work in rF2. If you're intending to recreate real terrain, it's possible too using import tools. It's a worth check out.

 

Mak Corp released some time back 1991 Mazda 787B Group C Open Beta v0.3 and there was also some pic`s about Sauber, Mercedes, Porcshe etc....I had high hopes that we get those iconic cars from early 90`s to rFactor2 but it seem never to happen. I can also see unfortunately pattern here, many modders announces mods to rF2, nothing happens and then we see tab to AC like you also can see in Mak Corps web site today.
Many here in ISI forums see me as doomsday prophet and I am sorry guys I can not help it because I don`t believe before I see download links.

 

I'm a bit extreme on that sorry (take this as a personal opinion, outside ISI), but even if you add a complete tutorial on how do things from A to Z you'll still see mistakes here and there, because untrained eyes. I mean, at the time you know what you are doing, or what you want to achieve with your mod, it's up to you to search the info you need, ask for help, trial and error...etc. You just don't sit and give up. If you do that means you're ok with your job and your own eyes are not screaming to your brain "please do something!".

What I'm saying is the artist needs, FIRST OF ALL, to have a trained "eye". If he has this ability I'm sure he'll test and learn and ask and push, all the time to find the solution.

Think about that; if you see your own track glowing all the time, what's the first thing to try? Tune down saturation and brightness of your diffuse maps. That's exactly what you need for a basic albedo map.

So, I agree to produce and collect a proper documentation, but, granted, you'll still see mods with wrong colors for the same reason you see bad 3D models, even you have a billion of tutorials available in the web.

 

^ Yep!

 

I hate to sound like a broken and cliché'ed record, but all good things just takes time.
It's the same in regards to third party modding for rF2.

At first I was blown away by the enormous amount of content that was released for AC very early in its development.
Then I felt that fear for a moment, that rF2 would actually get left behind and be forgotten in the shadow of AC.
It quickly dawned on me though, that this was a clear cut case of "quantity doesn't trump quality".

Sure, there's a lot of AC content, but the vast majority of it is junk, or semi-junk, imho.
Sure, much of that content looks very pretty, sometimes even stunning, but almost all of it has that numb, dead feeling, that just bores me after driving it for a while.
I'm not saying it's junk because I feel all the modders haven't done their job properly, not at all. It's the very core of AC that is messing up the feeling of the content I think.

So I couldn't care less that AC probably has ten or twenty times more modding content than rF2.
Amazing mods are coming to us and a steady pace, right here in rF2.
Much of the AC "exclusive" content will be brought to rF2 as well in the future, when AC has been left and forgotten and rF2 is going stronger than ever.

Again, how much content do you freakin' want?? I don't want a million cars and tracks that are "kinda okay, but nothing special".
I already have trouble keeping up, and have yet to really try out, maybe 70-80 percent of the content I have installed.
That's not even counting the gazillions of different possbile combinations of cars and tracks.

I just want what we're getting now, which is a few pieces of content of really great quality. This gives me time to get deep into that content, before something new arrives.
I don't care if I have to wait a month, six months, a year or more to get it. The more time passes, the more savvy the modders get, and the more happy we will be.
I have all the time in the world.

 

I agree.

But developers have strong influence on this as well. The trick is to limit the opportunities to do things wrong. So I think the solution is not in the documentation, but in the tools and the way things are defined.

For example - the concept of physically based materials in modern engines. Even if your engine does not support this kind of rendering, it would still be beneficial to support this kind of material definition in tools. It's all about making artist work in the right domain - you ask him what given material is like, not how specific algorithms (like specular lighting) should be configured.

If artist can define material roughness and reflectiveness, then engine has all information it needs to configure it's specular lighting and cubemap reflection algorithms. Additional advantage is that if better rendering engine is introduced, no update to content is required, since optical properties of materials do not change, so you can rely on the information you already have from artist. Only the way engine interprets and handles that information changes in order to get better rendering.

Going even further - standard material database. Or even dynamic linking of materials (set of materials provided by ISI that content can use without copying them).

 

Agree with above, some tools for sure need an update. Many track modders are quite clueless with simple material settings such as proper specular reflections. Tosch is the only modder who has got it near perfection and he spent a lot time studying rF2 engine. Also as long as some people/modders are convinced HDR off is the best way to run rF2, they will produce content that looks wrong despite having trained eye (sergioloro is one of the few productive track modders left and all his videos have HDR off...).

Regarding amount of track mods, I'm happy once leagues can host full F1 seasons. That was easily possible with rF1, still not with rF2. Some basic tracks like proper modern Spa are missing, Apex modding was supposed to do something about it but it all went silent.