new track (from TORCS)

[wahrhaft]

I have ported "dirt-3", one of the tracks I like from TORCS, to VDrift. If you would like to try it, you can download it from: http://wahrhaft.homeip.net/vdrift/dirt-3.zip

A few notes:

• The track's in-game name is "Australian Countryside" to make it more user-friendly.
  
  The only real graphical issue is that the ground was multitextured in TORCS. I combined the two textures together, but it doesn't look as nice as the original.
  
  Besides porting the track geometry, I also applied the original friction and bumpiness settings from the track. The units looked to be the same, but it's hard to say if it has the exact same effect on the cars.
  
  I set up the track type as "sand" because it was the closest to dirt. If a dirt type gets added someday that kicks up a bunch of dust particles (might look at doing this myself too), I'd switch it over. One of the fun details of dirt tracks in TORCS is trying to see when you're passing someone.
  
  This track is under the Free Art License. Details are in the about.txt.
  

[nomoo]

Good track, many thanks!

[joevenzon]

Cool! I checked it into svn. Nice work.

[joevenzon]

Unfortunately at the moment there's no way to specify surface parameters for the traced part of the road, so it is always seen as asphalt. If you move the roads.trk file out of the way, then you get the cool bumpy, low friction surface, but now you get angular bumps where the polygons of the road connect together. I'll put this on my TODO list.

[joevenzon]

Oh, I see you've already got an issue open about this with the fixes spelled out.

[wahrhaft]

Thanks Joe.

Actually, the issue I posted was specific to using a surfaces file. I switched away from using the surfaces file because there are a few segments of road that are still dirt but have different properties.

Would there be any problems or performance implications if vdrift used the bezier for collisions, but the world geometry to get the surface type? IIRC this is how it should work when using surfaces.txt.

I can post a new issue about this tonight.

[joevenzon]

That will dent performance a little but I don't see any way around it.

Also, do you want SVN access? I've been busy for the last few months so haven't had a chance to work much on VDrift. My schedule is clearing up so I will eventually get around to making my way through the issue list, but in the mean time, if you want to make a run at any of this, let me know.

[wahrhaft]

Lately I've been trying to knock items off my "things I started but never got around to finishing" list (such as this track). I should be pretty good in that department fairly soon, and then I'd be happy to take a stab at these issues. I took a look at that section of code back when I posted the original issue, and I don't think it will be too tough to do.

SVN access would be more convenient than passing patches around. What information will you need from me?

I'd also like to try porting the alpine tracks from TORCS in the more-distant future...

[joevenzon]

Just PM me with your desired user/pass for the source SVN and then your sourceforge account name for the data SVN.

[joevenzon]

The surface loading is fixed in R2599.

[NaN]

The surface changes somehow break the on track detection.
Meaning no AI, no drift score, no lap times. :?

[joevenzon]

Oops. Fixed in R2604.