Car not showing up in spinner

[papanoel]

Hi guys,

I'm setting up a mod (for personnal use) which is a compilation of various mods I like (more precisely, I take a few cars from these mods and put them in a compilation mod).
I have roughly 700 cars now but some of them don't show up in the cars list. I checked everything I could but can't find the solution.

The mod structure is this:
[GAMEDATA]
...[VEHICLES]
......[MOD_NAME]
.........[CAR_BRAND]
............[CAR_MODEL]

The [CAR_MODEL] directory contains all the necessary files (hdv, pm, cam, sfx, headphysics, engine, gear ratios, mas, damage, cockpitinfo, gen, veh, etc...)
All I do is copy files from the mod I'm taking the cars from to this directory.
Then, I change a few lines in the .veh file (classes and category) and add "BaseVehiclePrice=xxxxxx"

Next, I edit the .gen files. I eventually modify the search path to:
SearchPath=<TEAMDIR>..\
SearchPath=<TEAMDIR>
SearchPath=<VEHDIR>
(I never really understood how this worked but I get good results)

If the car uses a mas file common to other cars, I put the file in the [MOD_NAME] directory and modify the gen file accordingly. For example:
MASFILE=[MOD_NAME]\cmaps.mas

And that's it.

Then, I launch RFactor and the car appears in the car list. It usually shows up in the spinner and loads without errors.

But sometimes, it doesn't show up in the cars list. I'm pretty sure I do something wrong but I can't figure out what. Usually, it happens because a file is missing. So I check the .veh and .hdv files to make sure all the necessary files are present in the car directory. Nevertheless, despite making sure everything is in order, mysteriously, some cars never show up.

Do any of you may know why this happens ? What did I do wrong ? Any help would be appreciated because I'm at a loss to know how to solve that problem.

 

[jgf]

In general if a car does not show in the menu it is a .veh problem (class, hdv, etc.); if it shows in the menu but not in preview it is usually a problem in the .mas file (missing or misnamed gmt), game will crash if you try to load. Also check the spinner.gen file and the car .gen file for correct paths and file names in the SearchPath=<VEHDIR> section. And watch for loose files, often wheels or driver textures, that may be scattered in a mod; they need to be either in the root folder of the mod or in a specific car folder (check the original file/folder structure).

When merging mods it is so easy to overlook changing a path or moving a file and not allowing for that in paths. (I've been merging about a dozen assorted GT mods in GTR2 into one big "International" mod and have spent more time tracking down and relocating loose files than anything else.)

 

[papanoel]

Thanks for your reply.
What I recently learned is that there can't be 2 identical .veh files (I mean having the same name). Correcting this allowed me to solve the problem for a few cars. Also, .veh files can't be too long. IIRC they can't be more than 20-21 letters long.
But despite this, some of the cars still don't show up. One of them is the Subaru BRZ from the RFM GT300 mod. I managed to add the other cars without trouble but this one seems to be quite reluctant. Any hint ?

 

[jgf]

Yes, none of the physics files (hdv, tyr, eng, etc.) can have the same name, even if in different folders, the game scans all those files when loading no matter where they are located. Likewise talent files, the file name doesn't matter, the location doesn't matter, but the driver name inside does.

For the ones that do not appear now, are they in the menu but the image doesn't show, or they are not even in the menu?

 

[papanoel]

They're not even in the menu (sorry I should have been more precise).
When this happens it's usually because I forgot the headphysics file (by the way I can't understand why I need to have this file in the car directory while in the other mods it's in the mod directory). But I checked again and again and I don't think I forgot copying a file.

As for the physics files, I found many identical hdv files but it doesn't seem to be a problem as both the cars sharing the same file appear in the menu.
Driver name and talent file don't seem to be an issue in this case.

 

[papanoel]

They're not even in the menu (sorry I should have been more precise).
When this happens it's usually because I forgot the headphysics file (by the way I can't understand why I need to have this file in the car directory while in the other mods it's in the mod directory). But I checked again and again and I don't think I forgot copying a file.

As for the physics files, I found many identical hdv files but it doesn't seem to be a problem as both the cars sharing the same file appear in the menu.
Driver name and talent file don't seem to be an issue in this case.

I finally found out the problem (well, that was many months ago but it might help someone):
2 cars had the same team name. Therefore the car in question did appear but not in the right place.