Live For Speed: Latest Graphics Report Progress

Paul Jeffrey · Apr 30, 2019

As many of you are aware, Live for Speed is going through something of a refresh at the moment with new lighting and improved graphics - the latest of which can be seen below.

Having been in the wild now for longer than any other active racing simulation, Live for Speed continues to receive plenty of care and attention from the development team. With a wave of new visual updates having been teased over the past few months, this classic racing title continues to make strides towards maintaining a modern vibe in light of a raft of new and impressive racing simulations having hit the genre since build one released all the way back in 2003.

The title might be getting a bit long in the tooth now, but that hasn't deterred the development team from continuing to pour time and energy into the software, and I'm sure you will agree the recent progress made with the game certainly looks impressive...

As many of you know from the forum and Twitter, Eric has been working on Kyoto and Scawen has been working on a new lighting system. In this month's progress report we would like to show you some of the work in progress and talk a bit about the lighting.

The Kyoto track is not yet finished. There is still more detail to be completed and holes to fill, but we thought you would like to see how it is coming along.

Because of the way the new shadow system works, there is no longer a need for a limited number of lighting setups per track. I tried an experiment to allow the user to set the time of day for the lighting. The sun direction is calculated from that and the geographical location of the track. It became very tempting to try to allow all times of day and night. If that was to happen we would need working headlights, so I had a go at that as you can see in these screenshots.

We now have a simple interface to control time. You can select live time, so the tracks are lit according to their geographical position at the current time. Another option allows the time in game to be offset relative to real time by a number of hours (and days). For example you can start your race in the daytime even if it is really evening. Finally there is still an option for fixed time, which is useful at least for development purposes.

Here is a video of a sunset at the Autocross area :

I've recently been experimenting with real time generated skies to provide a lot of variation for the different sun positions. It's an interesting subject but it brings up the issue of exposure that is encountered with cameras (and eyes) in real life. An iris control can adjust the exposure.

All very interesting stuff, and it just goes to show, just because a sim has been around for a while, doesn't mean it still can't be a player in the modern sim racing landscape.

Live for Speed is available for PC now.

Check out the Live for Speed sub forum here at RaceDepartment for the latest news and discussion regarding the old but still very much gold racing simulation.

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melanieuk · May 2, 2019

David Wright said:
DX9? When did they move to DX9? I thought they were still on DX8. They were back in 2005.

Some time last year I think.

Marc Collins · May 2, 2019

Fired this back up after literally years...

16:9 is widest resolution that it supports? Once I confirm that I'm stuck with empty space at the sides of my screen, I'll test physics and FFB for myself to see how it compares to more recent vintage sims

Fat-Alfie · May 2, 2019

I am running a single 2560x1080 screen and the sim fills it, with no black borders.

I have widescreen effect set to 'no' and screen res set to 2560x1080 - 60hz.

Patrik Marek · May 2, 2019

it's a such a small market though, and against RF2, AC, pCARS, iRacing, ... it will be really tough to make money

Spinelli · May 2, 2019

Awesome game. Needs some physics improvements in some areas (all games do, nothing is perfect) but it's one of the best, if not the best, in other areas of physics like "natural" grip/stability and oversteer.

Marc Collins · May 3, 2019

Fat-Alfie said:
I am running a single 2560x1080 screen and the sim fills it, with no black borders.
View attachment 303915
I have widescreen effect set to 'no' and screen res set to 2560x1080 - 60hz.

I have a 144 Hz monitor, but otherwise it is set the same (including 'No" to Widescreen Effect). If I knock it down to 1920x1080 it stretches the image to fill the whole screen. Put it back to 2560x1080 @144 and it displays the correct sharp image, but in a space that looks like 1920x1080 with bars at the side. Windowed, full screen, etc., nothing fixes it. @Fat-Alfie, are you sure yours is displaying at native resolution and not stretching a 1920 image?

!?!?!?!?!

RKip455 · May 3, 2019

So I've never tried this... what's the best way to purchase? The entire game or minimal first?

Also, is there Mods to get like for AC/rF2?

Dirk Steffen · May 3, 2019

LFS needs:
- SDK and super intuitive modding support for modders easily converting their existing mods of cars and tracks into LFS (fantasy cars and tracks always were the biggest turn off)
- support of a real racing series to promote the excellent LFS engine (think Formula Ford, F3, Goodwood FOS vintage Mini Cooper racing, ....)
- online content store where the dev, modders and users can share free mods, paid mods and DLC in a convenient, user friendly way
- a new, creative payment system that allows different builds in “stages” of LFS so people can use It for free, if they want to, can choose to pay a subscription fee for organized competition participation, can choose to buy a perpetual license for a “full version” that allows them to have multi player access, free updates and certain DLC packs (but lacks the subscription based e-sport aspect)

Just like rF2 LFS is a racing sim which always had great potential but did not evolve out of its own choosing (rF2 just about scraped around that corner and is heading in a right direction - It would be great to see something like this happening to LFS as well).

More racing sims is always good.

Naliport Halulam · May 3, 2019

Dirk Steffen said:
LFS needs:
- SDK and super intuitive modding support for modders easily converting their existing mods of cars and tracks into LFS (fantasy cars and tracks always were the biggest turn off)
- support of a real racing series to promote the excellent LFS engine (think Formula Ford, F3, Goodwood FOS vintage Mini Cooper racing, ....)
- online content store where the dev, modders and users can share free mods, paid mods and DLC in a convenient, user friendly way
- a new, creative payment system that allows different builds in “stages” of LFS so people can use It for free, if they want to, can choose to pay a subscription fee for organized competition participation, can choose to buy a perpetual license for a “full version” that allows them to have multi player access, free updates and certain DLC packs (but lacks the subscription based e-sport aspect)

Just like rF2 LFS is a racing sim which always had great potential but did not evolve out of its own choosing (rF2 just about scraped around that corner and is heading in a right direction - It would be great to see something like this happening to LFS as well).

More racing sims is always good.

What the hell, you want it to become an overly complicated DLC/souscribtion fest ? not everyone has the capacity to throw money left and right..

It's fine the way it is, the only things that need to be done is modernizing the graphics ( which is on the way ) and more visibility via popular platforms.

Dragon60 · May 3, 2019

A bit more improvement in FFB would be nice.

RomFil · May 11, 2019

after play automobilista, this is game look like better

AccAkut · May 24, 2019

I honestly don't understand what these two guys have been doing for the last ten years, especially Eric. A single Lidar based track and two redesigns, with a third somewhat on the way?
Even if "we have families and so on" means caring for elderly and handicapped, how do they do this, and how can LFS still sustain income for these two and their kin... I thought at this stage server costs would outweigh whatever licences they still sell.
I mean, as comparison, look at the list of tracks The Very End, another former LFS user turned 3D artist, created for Wreckfest (to be officially included soon even) https://steamcommunity.com/games/228380/announcements/detail/1615015161609500330:

Kristiansand Raceway
Crash Alley
Simstox Showdown - Request and model from Stuard Cowi (and mostly the credits)
Arendal Triangle
Dune Race
Elevated Eight
Birkeland
Bugbear Island
Richwood Oval
Emmen Raceway
Michigan Speedway
Bristol Motor Speedway
Woodhill Raceway
Hillside Raceway
Rugland Motorbane
Greenlake Valley
Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium
Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium Derby
Pit Race - A track inspired by a track with same name from the legendary game Carmageddon (1997)
Ringwood - Track original created by Stuart Cowi, ported and updated by me (The Very End)
Eagles Nest - Remember high suspension!
Chalk Canyon 2017
Hurtfull Five
Talledega Superspeedway
King's Lynn Raceway
Bridge To Nowhere
Red Pike Arena 2017
Red Pike Race 2017
Lupines Hill (Lydden Hill)
Nevada Freight Depot - Range of layouts, check them out!
Nevada Freight Depot Derby - Two layouts
Rock Bottom Derby
Rock Bottom Race
The Slow, the Fast and the Stupid (SFS)
Pine Hills Raceway
Black Sails Valley
Aremark Motorbane
Redwood Ring Oval
Redwood Ring Rallycross
Derby Banked Eight
Orange Speedway (1957 layout)
Sca Ultimate Raceway / Sca Fig. Eight + snow configs
Dune Race - various layouts including night racing
Dakar s01 / s02 / s03 - maybe more in the future
Lakewood Oval
Farmlands S1, S2, S3, S4, S5

Credits
* Stuart Cowi (Madcowi Productions) for Lydden Hill and Simstox trackmodells, certain assets, models and tips, thank you!
* Sam Gibson for the great texture help on King's Lynn Raceway. Always appreciated!
* STRmods for digging up and fixing old BB assets (foliage) which is used in the snow tracks.
* Harmalarm for the DD2 track models, with I have used as base to further develop on into Wreckfest.

I know its "derby" style environments, but still... I just don't get it. I made my KRB Audi and Lotus basically by working on it Friday evenings and Sunday mornings only. Around a year for each car. TvE did his tracks working fulltime or studying fulltime too.

Naliport Halulam · May 24, 2019

@AccAkut sickness, family problems ? who knows.

Dr. Death · May 25, 2019

AccAkut said:
View attachment 307303 I honestly don't understand what these two guys have been doing for the last ten years, especially Eric. A single Lidar based track and two redesigns, with a third somewhat on the way?
Even if "we have families and so on" means caring for elderly and handicapped, how do they do this, and how can LFS still sustain income for these two and their kin... I thought at this stage server costs would outweigh whatever licences they still sell.
I mean, as comparison, look at the list of tracks The Very End, another former LFS user turned 3D artist, created for Wreckfest (to be officially included soon even) https://steamcommunity.com/games/228380/announcements/detail/1615015161609500330:

Kristiansand Raceway
Crash Alley
Simstox Showdown - Request and model from Stuard Cowi (and mostly the credits)
Arendal Triangle
Dune Race
Elevated Eight
Birkeland
Bugbear Island
Richwood Oval
Emmen Raceway
Michigan Speedway
Bristol Motor Speedway
Woodhill Raceway
Hillside Raceway
Rugland Motorbane
Greenlake Valley
Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium
Wimbledon Greyhound Stadium Derby
Pit Race - A track inspired by a track with same name from the legendary game Carmageddon (1997)
Ringwood - Track original created by Stuart Cowi, ported and updated by me (The Very End)
Eagles Nest - Remember high suspension!
Chalk Canyon 2017
Hurtfull Five
Talledega Superspeedway
King's Lynn Raceway
Bridge To Nowhere
Red Pike Arena 2017
Red Pike Race 2017
Lupines Hill (Lydden Hill)
Nevada Freight Depot - Range of layouts, check them out!
Nevada Freight Depot Derby - Two layouts
Rock Bottom Derby
Rock Bottom Race
The Slow, the Fast and the Stupid (SFS)
Pine Hills Raceway
Black Sails Valley
Aremark Motorbane
Redwood Ring Oval
Redwood Ring Rallycross
Derby Banked Eight
Orange Speedway (1957 layout)
Sca Ultimate Raceway / Sca Fig. Eight + snow configs
Dune Race - various layouts including night racing
Dakar s01 / s02 / s03 - maybe more in the future
Lakewood Oval
Farmlands S1, S2, S3, S4, S5

Credits
* Stuart Cowi (Madcowi Productions) for Lydden Hill and Simstox trackmodells, certain assets, models and tips, thank you!
* Sam Gibson for the great texture help on King's Lynn Raceway. Always appreciated!
* STRmods for digging up and fixing old BB assets (foliage) which is used in the snow tracks.
* Harmalarm for the DD2 track models, with I have used as base to further develop on into Wreckfest.

I know its "derby" style environments, but still... I just don't get it. I made my KRB Audi and Lotus basically by working on it Friday evenings and Sunday mornings only. Around a year for each car. TvE did his tracks working fulltime or studying fulltime too.

"There is life outside LFS, its not just constant uninterrupted 50 hours of working on LFS"
"Eric and i do not have any other job, we are working hard on LFS"
I recognize that the pace picked up but if that statement isn't a controversy nikki lauda and michael schumacher are laughing their asses off in public TV right now. You cant say that you have other things to worry about than the game then say the game is your main source of income. Its not like the game is free and all you get are donations. People still give you money for the damn game. WORK ON IT!. ITS YOUR JOB!

Neilski · May 25, 2019

Dr. Death said:
You cant say that you have other things to worry about than the game then say the game is your main source of income.

Well, they can and they did say exactly that, and it's not all that hard to reconcile the two statements.

I have to read the remarks as meaning that although it's their only job, they are enjoying life - their way - and taking their time about it. So, maybe not working 40 hours a week, maybe not even 20?? Who knows...
I personally wish they were doing it faster, cos I really loved LFS, but it's their baby and they can do it as slowly or as quickly as they like. That's the beauty of being self-employed: nobody gives you orders.
And as for all of us who purchased S3, we knew what we were doing. There were very clearly no promises about timescales - Scawen went out of his way to make that really crystal clear.