Halifax GP - Streets of Aachen turned into a Race Track

Tracks Halifax GP - Streets of Aachen turned into a Race Track 1.5.2

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I'd like to share a few quick bits of feedback that I'll keep in discussion, away from a review, after giving this a shot for ~25 minutes. Used the Kunos SCG P4/5 Competizione, at dusk first and then at mid-day.

There's quite a lot to like here. I am by no means a "GT Track" snob where every lap has to be between 1:20 and 2:00 except for Le Mans: I quite like "marathon" tracks and this is a really good one. There's distinct "sectors" of this track, with the low-speed winding through the woods being quite technical and a decently high-speed Sector 3. The visuals are excellent - the buildings are a bit low-poly (fine for AC) but the trees and lighting are really high quality. Seriously well done.

I do think that there's a ways to go with this track in a few areas, though. The primary subjective one, and one that stuck out immediately, is "track legibility". That is, the ability for the racetrack to communicate to the driver exactly where it leads with sight lines, etc. It is simply very hard to tell where you're going, particularly in the wooded sections, and how to delineate one section from another.

I am absolutely not suggesting to make any changes to the layout - the sectors are unique and flow well, as I said before. What I am suggesting is that a good deal of the circuit could really use a healthy dose of GT "flair" to make a believable Grand Prix circuit. It's pretty jarring to have F1-style grandstands on the pit straight when the rest of the circuit feels quite bare. Corners could use more recognizable landmarks so that they're more easily remembered. Not every corner needs a barrier or grandstand, but quite a few corners (particularly in the wooded Sector 2) could really use arrow signs or apex bollards to both show where you're going and where to point your vision. Perhaps a tree section or two could be removed to improve sightlines through the slow-speed as well. It's difficult to track where you're going, as there's a lot of samey-ness to the track, which only compounds with the circuit's length.

Also, I feel as if the track would benefit with slightly wider roads in more than a few areas. It's narrow to the point of Touge/Downhill stuff sometimes, and I'd imagine that's not the vibe this track is going for. Perhaps I'm mistaken, though, and if that's a conscious choice then so be it. It is a street circuit, after all.

Now, for my less-subjective criticism. There is a very silly jump in the middle of two barriers at the beginning of the lap. That should probably be flattened out, as it would immediately disqualify any competition being held at the circuit. The SCG P4/5 is not a super fast car, but even with a healthy lift and a brake I was flying off it and could hear the suspension crunch. It's very "Need for Speed", and those are great in those type of games. Not so much here, I think.

There are quite a few high speed corners that really do need barriers. I personally didn't have an off at any high speed corner, but I was in Practice mode and wasn't against AI or other people, and I can see things going wrong quite quickly in a few places. More barriers in high-speeds would help both with judgment and raceability.

The track mesh feels... grainy? Almost like driving through gravel at times. If this is similar to what the actual road feels like, then so be it, but I think considering that it's a street circuit perhaps it should be a tad smoother.

I say this all the time to people I know who drive AC, and I have to say it here as well - be as liberal with brake boards as you can. There are a few major corners that have very large brake boards, and those are great. But a few box-sized brake boards in a majority of the corners helps quite a lot, and again, makes it feel like a real GP track.

Finally, the pit lane seems to be bugged - my limiter will flash on and off many times, and Crew Chief tells me each time that I'm "leaving the pit lane". Should be an easy one to fix.

Anyway, this wall of text has gotten way out of hand. I'd like to stress I really do like the track quite a bit, and with some extra work, it could really be special. Keep up the good work.

X
 
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Amazing feedback, thank you so much for taking the time. Insanely useful!

The jump after T1 is definitely exaggerated and waaay smoother irl. I did think about changing it multiple times but I just had too much fun bouncing over it. You are correct with yor feedback though and it will get smoother at some point.

Concerning brake markers, I tried to put some references on the side like benches, etc where brake markers don't fit too much from a visual standpoint but maybe that was the wrong direction and I should put markers there anyways for gameplay improvement.

The grainy track mesh is interesting. I wasn't too sure how much "grain"/texture would be enough. From feedback I know that it feels a tad too much on DD wheels while you can't feel it at all on G29 wheels, etc. On the T300 you can feel it but without it being too distractive or impacting the handling too much. Which wheel are you using? Hard to balance it so most people benefit from the track mesh.

Slim track width is on purpose. I wanted an unforgiving track where one mistake means you're in a house, tree or lantern. For example, the AI can go side by side in the first sector in the first downhill section but it's ballsy and dangerous af.
Btw, which corners would you like to have barriers? I rarely crash as it's my own track so it's hard to have a feel for it. Balancing the "holy **** I could die any minute" experience and sensible racetrack design is difficult ^^

The buildings and assets being low poly: God I hate them. I hate each and every single house on that track. I am not a 3d artist and do not have good assets or a budget to pay for good assets. It's 100% my biggest annoyance with my track. So yeah, 100% agreed. I will probably remove them all at some point and get actually pretty houses in a German style there.


And for the most important part of your feedback, track legibility.
I honestly don't really know how to deal with this issue on a track with this many elevation changes. I've heard this comment alot. Probably one of the most received feddback I've received on this track. Removing some trees on the inside of S2 could definitely help and I'll try it later today. But even sector 1 has multiple blind corners which I am also not the biggest fan of.



Anyways, I wanted to thank you again for this very indepth feedback. It means a lot to me that someone would take the time to not only drive the track, but also sit down and write a very useful and detailed list of suggestions, feedback and thoughts.
Have a wonderful rest of the week mate! :)
 
Indeed, I'm using a DD1 with fairly heavy FFB - I shoot for slightly higher than real-force output as well (generally between 10 and 13 nM of torque). So significantly higher than 99% of sim racers, I'd think. That may well make a difference with regards to the graininess of the road mesh. It may very well feel better on a gear-driven wheel. I'm just a data point there.

I would argue that brake boards of any size visually fit quite well at pretty much every notable corner in a non-remote modern Grand Prix setting like this one. But yes, more trackside objects might do just fine in a few cases.

I would have to go back into the track to see which corners could use barriers or sightline clearing. A really simple one that comes to mind is the high speed long left hander onto the straight before the final 90 degree left to the pit straight. I didn't go off there, but it sticks out as a place where a real barrier would absolutely be. I'll post a note here sometime in the future when I pick out exactly which corners could use what.

Don't worry about the buildings - performance is the most important thing, and I didn't see any problems. It's best not to get into an RT Macau situation, where the buildings only look OK and the start of a race is melting your high-end GPU.

Again, thanks for the track, and keep at it.
 
BassGaming updated Halifax GP - Streets of Aachen turned into a Race Track with a new update entry:

New guardrails, better visibility, etc

View attachment 658614
The days of accidental offroading are over.

Due to feedback and several testsessions with my league I decided to finally add some barriers where you would previously get stuck on a lantern and explode... or get banished to the shadowrealm, etc.

It's sad to see the deathtraps go and I do think that the track is a bit too easy now (compared to what it was supposed to be and was) but I do hope that this will increase accessibility and get more people to...

Read the rest of this update entry...
 
The track has come on leaps and bounds with the latest updates, nice work!

However, I would say this latest update has hammered my FPS with the 3D trees, I've lost 30 FPS in places - might be worth scaling back the number of these trees if possible?
 
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Gave this new one a quick look.

I definitely like the progress with the barriers - particularly the red and white ones. I do think that sometimes there should be runoff area before the barrier, though - the new barriers are almost uniformly right on the edge of the track, which seems a bit unnatural. So track - grass/runoff - barrier, even if the "runoff" is only a few feet due to the track's narrow nature. Of course, barriers on the edge of tarmac is a good thing when there's a hill below. There are a few cases of "less is more", though, like the 90 degree left-hander into the woods. There doesn't need to be full-guarded barriers there, particularly on the inside.

I think the barriers, if at all possible in most places, should be just a bit shorter in height. They would have the same function, but be less imposing and allow a little more of the track's character to shine through.

I am with Darin above, I am still not a fan of the road mesh. I've heard of other modders lending theirs for mod tracks if that would be better for workflow purposes. And he is right that identifiable variation in track visuals would help with legibility.

The very first slow, downwards sloping blind left hander in Sector 2 definitely still needs brake boards and an arrow sign. And generally, the brake boards could just be the little foam ones too - no need for the huge sign posts most of the time. Most of that section could also really use small arrow signs to help with legibility. Nothing huge or imposing to take away from the fact it's in the woods, though.

There is a right hander somewhere in Sector 3, with a 50 brake sign before it, that is a complete blind downhill if you dip just one wheel off. There should probably be a barrier there.

And I'm still getting the pit lane registration bug.

Still, though, this is a nice update and a positive step forward. Thanks for considering my feedback last go-round, and great work.
 
BassGaming updated Halifax GP - Streets of Aachen turned into a Race Track with a new update entry:

Performance Update, new physical mesh, props, trees, etc...

Nothing screenshotworthy was done.

Most changes are small but they stacked enough to warrant a new update.

Changelog:
- smoother physical mesh for our DD wheel boiis
- "jump" after T1 is finally removed. I was being pushed by everyone to do it since v0.1 so yeah ^^
- More props like more marshalls, etc
- New trees.. AGAIN!

I still haven't fixed the pitlane bug as I have absolutely no clue what causes it in the first place. Working on it.

New AI coming soon.

Have fun :)

Read the rest of this update entry...
 
BassGaming updated Halifax GP - Streets of Aachen turned into a Race Track with a new update entry:

Grass now behaves like grass, some bug fixes

The grass next to the tarmac now also behaves like grass and is considered off-track by the game. You can still use the grass for some time gain but it's risky.

Also changed some smaller stuff. Moved some walls, fixed some floating objects, etc...

I tried fixing the Ai but got annoyed by bugs and gave up. Ai update will come at some point.

Read the rest of this update entry...
 
BassGaming updated Halifax GP - Streets of Aachen turned into a Race Track with a new update entry:

BIG UPDATE! Many changes and improvements!

Delete the old version, clean install the new one!

Many things got changed.
- BIG performance boost. Optimizations = more fps (even more fps once the new csp version releases)
- Improved loading times

- Houses light up at night (thanks Bendors)
View attachment 712754

- New and highly improved trackmesh with a new type of tarmac

View attachment 712755

- Ambient sounds completely reworked. New sounds, more...

Read the rest of this update entry...
 
Q. As I'm using CSP 2.0, does it still apply to disable "Cache generated grids" and "Cache generated payloads", as "Cache generated grids" is greyed out and has a slightly different layout in CSP 2.0.
 

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Q. As I'm using CSP 2.0, does it still apply to disable "Cache generated grids" and "Cache generated payloads", as "Cache generated grids" is greyed out and has a slightly different layout in CSP 2.0.
1702394608147.png

Hmm, I'm on newest CM and CSP as well.
Well I mean.. does the AI still work for you? If so then everything's good, no? ^^
 
BassGaming updated Halifax GP - Streets of Aachen turned into a Race Track with a new update entry:

Hotfix: New AI; Pitlane fixed

- New Ai spline. Ai doesn't crash much anymore and is about as fast as before (~3:38 in GT3, about 2-3s slower than myself). It took me two years but I finally delivered on my promise of updating it!

- Pitexit is now smooooth. Thanks for reminding me @brinki
- Changed some sound stuff around the lake
- Prepared everything for the next CSP version
- Extended the new tarmac in the woods to the hairpin since you guys seemed to enjoy it
- Fixed random bugs

Read the rest of this update entry...
 
Hello. I just found that the ai line files for the reverse grid are defunct. It's really not something I couldn't fix on my end, but I thought, you'd want to know.
Hey, yeah the reverse layout doesn't have an ai line. It's just there for multiplayer and hotlap/practice sessions alone. I don't plan on making an ai line since I don't consider it to be worth it ^^

A lot of work for a nieche layout most people only try once. Thanks for the feedback though and have fun driving :)
 

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