Racer v0.9.0 RC5 released

Ruud

RACER Developer
Get it at http://www.mediafire.com/file/zdn8i0kntl3h579/racer0.9.0_rc5b.7z
[URL edited at 16-11-2012, 17:07 for some bugfixes]
Get a racer.exe/pdb bugfix at from http://www.mediafire.com/file/ny6a8gju5oaracb/racer090rc5c_exe.7z (which fixes that braking with locked wheels would give extra force instead of less).

A note about the audio: a bit more is planned to add to audio. Mainly an extra 'noise' sounds for each surface when going off the AI line. Then there's also an idea to use understeer & oversteer values to select samples, instead of taking skid values per wheel, since understeer sounds different from oversteer. Experimental a bit though.

Enjoy!
Ruud

Changelist:
- Ctrl-I now inverts debug readout colors (it used to roll through the debug readout views)
- Onyx compiler improved with bugfixes, type-casting.
- Onyx pointers (hm).
- Onyx now supports float const ('const float x=0.5'), while, for and do-while.
- Onyx supports basic yielding of scripts (coroutines, triggered each frame).
- Onyx internal function abs(), sqrt() added.
- A default Cg shader is created for materials without an explicit shader. To avoid black materials.
- car.ini's now accept wheel<n>.pacejka.negate_camber. Some TIR files/coefficents out there
seem to reverse camber (inverting influence on Fy tire forces). This option inverts camber sign
as it goes into the Pacejka formulae.
- lighting.cg no longer adds Ks (specular) to the ambient term.
- .f32 file support for textures in .shd files; future development for sky colors.
- Added $water_reflection texture map for shaders, in the same way $mirror exists. This works with renderer.water.*
to render a mirror image of the scene into a 2D reflection map, which can be used for a water shader.
See also water_f.cg/water_v.cg in data/renderer/shaders.
To be elaborated.
- The default debug text color is now white again.
- Timing is passed to the Cg shaders in TrackEd for some animations.
- Explicit low LOD steering model removed; use the model LOD available for the regular model (steer.model) (in car.ini)
- Car cameras can explictly turn the steering wheel on or off (camera<n>.steering_wheel=0 or 1). The default is 1 (added to data/cars/default/car.ini).
See also http://www.racer.nl/reference/carphys.htm#campos
- Number of materials in a track raised to 6000 (from 4000) for some nasty import tracks.
- TrackEd's generate template shader generated '<unnamed_QObject>' for unloaded textures.
- Added engine.shifting.cut_ignition in car.ini; instead of cut_throttle=1, you can leave throttle open and cut
part of the ignition instead. A value of 0.5 for example will output 50% of engine torque to the clutch/gearbox/wheels,
so is smoother while shifting.
- Autoclutch during shifting linearized; it was now squared, making for a less smooth experience.
- New combined slip method for tire forces; #7. From Pacejka's book, the Similarity method. Does not require
optimal_slipratio and optimal_slipangle anymore. More info on http://www.racer.nl/reference/wheels.htm#tireforces
- When the tire left the surface, slip angle and ratio were reset to 0. This was not realistic for a bumpy surface,
since you lose a lot of traction when the tire is bouncing a bit. Now it keeps on tracking slipAngle/Ratio.
- Different fonts (Eurostile)
- Added dyn_standard_bump_ao_f/v.cg shaders for ambient occlusion map (much like the mix shaders really).
- After all these years, on Win7/64bits with 32-bits Racer, got PerfKit working with PerfKit v2.2.0.12166 from nVidia ('debug 6 1').
- Added 'float serverTime' uniform for Cg shaders to get (an estimate of) the multiplayer server time. To sync vertex shader effects across multiple PC's.
- Added active differentials basics using Onyx. See http://www.racer.nl/tutorial/differentials_active.htm
- Added a global 'lowpass' DSP option. Mainly used for testing for a future 'muffle' parameter per car to soften incar sounds.
- Added track audio per surface (in special.ini). If not defined, the default global surface type audio is used.
See http://www.racer.nl/reference/tracks_surfaces.htm

------------------------------------------------------------------

Bugs (currently known specific to RC5)
  • Gearbox shift times not working properly, step from 0 > 1 clutch position over the time rather than smooth linear transition.
  • Water reflection not rendering, needs clarification on functionality.
  • Qlog discrepancies (I'll let Boomer clarify those.
  • Odd console readouts about tyre slip angles or something popping up (same goes for gearbox manual/auto setting, doesn't need to be console displayed imo)
  • PerfSDK not working as advertised, broken?
  • Multiplayer joining to IP's seems glitched, the person joining has their brake stuck on and are unable to shift
  • The Multiplayer Lobby does not let you connect, and subsequently let you host, despite the right ports being forwarded. (Anyone else experiencing this bug?)
  • The particles pop-out of existence at the end of their specified lifetime instead of fading away smoothly. It would be nice to have some better control over the fade-in and out over the lifetime of the particle since tiresmoke starts out thick and opaque then disperses and becomes more transparent over time, while gravel or dirt fades in a bit at first then eventually fades away.
  • Smoke flickers in the reflections, as though it's missing every other frame.
  • Replay bugs: No smoke effects, ghost car is left on track.
  • The starter sound plays all the way to the end of the sample instead of stopping when you let off the starter.
  • Ghost doesn't work on endless tracks.
  • track special.ini: timeline.point_to_point=1, timeline.auto_return=0 - The auto_return setting doesn't seem to work here. I have a point to point track and the car resets 3000ms (3s) after crossing the finishing line, but I don't want it to.
  • No reflection in the Racer garage when selecting a car.
  • The unsprung weight apparently applies a downforce, try making a 150kg rear axle with the front
    suspension lighter and the car will act as though it has high downforce when jumping off of a ramp.
  • If the wipers are set to rotate in opposite directions then the intermittent position does not rotate back and forth smoothly. It snaps back.
  • In RC5c at least, the camera bug is still evident, and on Carlswood (spline based cameras) you can often get stuck so you can't get back to the in-car camera view which is really annoying! - Courtesy of Dave
 
Here are two more bugs to add to the list...

No reflection in the Racer garage when selecting a car.

The unsprung weight apparently applies a downforce, try making a 150kg rear axle with the front
suspension lighter and the car will act as though it has high downforce when jumping off of a ramp.

Alex Forbin
 
Alex, I apologise, I assumed the DOF file format worked differently. Apparently if you don't input vertex colours then it must fill the output with black. This is the reason why your cars are showing up black. I've removed the link to avoid any further confusion.
 
Did anyone saw that the camera buttons (pad num) to move cameras are reversed ?

Another issue, the backfires are still not working here, idk really...what's happening inside Racer code.

Other issues with shadows I had, as shown in skybh Highway track with his AMG...

Just a wish, I like to see clouds inside the TOD system & set them accordingly with the time, so at night, it would be something like clouds 0.1 or even 0 & then around 12am get them to the max value of 1.

And maybe it's time, to construct some minihud shader by default, many tracks are now including real street networks & frankly, it looks ugly to see the car position (F6) flying around...you know what I mean :)

Anyways...was also thinking about shaders & all the issues it's generating & this ugly fight between ATI & Nvidia...what about trying to make it also DX compatible to avoid this everlasting struggle to fix as many errors on both sides ?

On old ATI GPUs, we need to deactivate the mipmaps in envmap to avoid the default Racer crash in most recent Racer versions...In motion blur options also, there's less we can tweak as ATI users...
 
I know it's an age old issue but ATI really are skimming on features to save a few quid.

Ruud is one man and it's easier to make good shaders with full shader language capability in Nvidia (or fully supported drivers).
Making ATI would take Ruud more time for no gain at all.


It's a weakness of Racer I will agree but it's just as much ATI's job to make better drivers as it is Ruud's job to make Racer support ATI cards limited drivers.

Dave
 
Has been that way for a few versions now... I personally hate it. I just can't get used to it.

While we on the subject of cameras. Currently if you are holding 2 keys own to rotate the camera and release one the camera doesn't know it, you must release BOTH keys then hit the single key.
Being able to change the damping of the external camera would be nice too.

Alex Forbin

P.S. Why won't the forum let me PM you?
 
Following up on the comment Alex Forbin made about unsprung masses applying a downforce on the vehicle, I did a couple of tests to see what might be going on there. First of all, I think we've had this behavior for a long time, but I personally never made the connection to unsprung masses. There is a lot going on when you drive over a ramp that dynamically influences the attitude and response of the vehicle, so isolating a single "culprit" can be tricky and one has to keep in mind that Racer doesn't simulate all the related effects (such as wheel gyration forces for example).

When you change the unsprung mass on one side of the vehicle only, you obviously also change the total mass of the vehicle, but perhaps less obviously so, the total mass distribution. This is what I think is the relevant point here, the relative position of the total mass CoG versus the sprung mass CoG.

In my tests, I used my version of the Baja truck that comes with Racer. I set a speedlimiter to 28m/s so I could clear the gap on good old Physics test track with higher accuracy of repeatability. The truck has a static total mass based weight distribution of 55.0% front, sprung mass based it's 58.4% over the front. In this state, the truck exhibits a backward pitching attitude over the jump with a medium severity.

Lowering both unsprung masses to 10% and ~57% respectively, the weight distributions stayed identical and the pitching attitude remained comparable as well.

Adjusting unsprung masses so that the total mass based weight distribution went further away from the sprung mass based one, the pitching increased noticably, regardless of the total amount of unsprung mass.

On the other hand, adjusting the unsprung masses so that they produce a total mass based weight distribution that coincides with the sprung mass based one eliminates the pitching behavior subjectively. Again, this was true regardless of the absolute amount of the masses, from ~10% up to 300% of the default amount, as long as the two CoG positions were congruent.

As a countercheck, I tested the response of the vehicle with default unsprung masses, but total mass based weight distribution adjusted to match the sprung mass based. This was done by relocating the suspension pickup points in the z-axis. The resulting weight distributions were both 40.0% front and 60.0% rear. The vehicle behaves neutrally in this condition, too.

To sum up, to me it looks like the sprung mass based CoG is the centre of pitch rotation for the vehicle. If the total mass based CoG is position at a distance to it, the greater that distance is, the greater the resulting pitch torque becomes.
 
Found a fun way to test the weird differential behaviour... (in this case a type 3)

FqiRKT6.jpg


Back up to a wall until the car is touching it at a slight angle, then throttle up in reverse. Every couple seconds, the car will inch away from the wall, then bump back into it - despite the wheels spinning the same way the entire time. This triggers the 'changed sign' message, since the car starts heading forward, then reverses again.

It doesn't seem to happen at all when in 1st gear touching a wall with the front of the car.
 

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