How to change shift light?

[Spinelli]

I removed the rev-limiter in all the 60s cars and turned the 70s cars into a hard-limiter so you don't loose any power until the rev-limiter (massive flaw in most vehicles in many ISI-based engine games like GTR 1, GTL, GTR 2, and more).

The problem with removing the rev limiter - or rather raising it to an extremely high value like 30,000 RPM (since there doesn't seem to be a way to simply disable the rev limiter) - is that the shift light also changes.

How can I change the shift light and specify the RPM for it? In the engine file, I looked for something like the following (just an example) ShiftLightRPMActivate=6800 but I can't find anything like that. Is it in some other file?

 

[jgf]

I believe the light triggers at the shift point specified in the .eng file...but there may be individual car parameters that override this. I've noticed many add-on cars where the HUD shift indicator and the indash indicator are not synched, one often triggering several hundred rpm before the other (and I'm never sure which to trust).

For example, in the .car file is something like "Display1RPMLightsRange=(6800,7800)". I haven't yet played around with this.

 

[Spinelli]

I believe the light triggers at the shift point specified in the .eng file...but there may be individual car parameters that override this. I've noticed many add-on cars where the HUD shift indicator and the indash indicator are not synched, one often triggering several hundred rpm before the other (and I'm never sure which to trust).

For example, in the .car file is something like "Display1RPMLightsRange=(6800,7800)". I haven't yet played around with this.

Thanks. I'll try playing around with that for a start.

BTW, I'm assuming the following was fixed in the GTL Anniversary Patch but, in the vanilla game, many of the cars have the engine RPM limiter, the in-car tachometer, and the HUD tachometer all reporting different RPMs. For example, the Mini. The engine file says max RPM is 8200. The in-car tachometer reports max RPM around 7400 RPM. The HUD tachometer reports max RPM around 7900-8000 RPM. I checked other cars too and they all had the same issue. How in the world did a developer not notice such an important, not to mention basic, thing when making a racing sim/game? What a mess!

 

[jgf]

How in the world did a developer not notice such an important, not to mention basic, thing when making a racing sim/game?

Many games have production schedules moved up and are released with everything "working" but not finalized. No idea if this was the case with GTL but I'd not be surprised.

 

[Johnny Speed]

I removed the rev-limiter in all the 60s cars and turned the 70s cars into a hard-limiter so you don't loose any power until the rev-limiter

Oh! This is interesting. Do the 60's cars blow the engine if you over-rev them?

 

[Spinelli]

Many games have production schedules moved up and are released with everything "working" but not finalized. No idea if this was the case with GTL but I'd not be surprised.

Ya, the whole thing's a mess. I'm in the middle of calibrating the cars. I've, so far, completed all the TC65 cars so that redline on the dials is actually redline according to the engine file. However, the dials are still completely different from the HUD dials except for max RPM. I don't care about the HUD dials themselves as I don't use them but it's got me asking: which dials are inaccurate, the in-car dials or the HUD dials?

For example:
I fixed the in-car dials of the Mini so that the engine's true 8200 RPM (it's rev-limiter) actually shows as 8200 on the dial. Before, when the physics were at 8200 RPM, the dial was only at around 7400. The HUD dial also shows around 8200 (I never messed with the HUD dial). However, before the 8200 redline, the in-car dial and HUD dial are way off from each other. For example, 4000 RPM in-car dial might only be 3300 RPM HUD. 6500 RPM in-car dial might only be 5800 HUD.

On top of that, I also checked the speedometers (haven't messed with any of them, not in-car dial nor HUD) and they don't match either. With the Lotus Cortina, 120 mph in-car is around 115 HUD. 5 mph difference is almost 10 km/hr. At some speeds, the differences are even bigger than 5 mph. It's just a huge mess. Are the HUD and in-car both inaccurate or just one of them?

I need to download some sort of HUD which tells me actual revs and speeds from the physics/telemetry and then compare my in-car tach and speedo dials to that to make sure they're accurate.

 

[Spinelli]

Oh! This is interesting. Do the 60's cars blow the engine if you over-rev them?

Yes, you can blow the engine or slowly damage them if you do it too much or for too long or at RPMs too high. That stuff's modelled in the engine physics file. Engine lifetime at what revs and how it drops from there according to time, RPMs, temp, etc. That stuff's all in there.

The problem is that I don't know how to change when the shift light occurs. GTL cars with shift lights usually have the light coming on around 250 RPM before the rev-limiter stated in the engine file. If you raise the rev-limiter to, say, 30,000 RPM to effectively remove the rev-limiter, then the shift light will come on at like 29,000 RPM.

I can't seem to find a setting that simply dictates when the shift light comes on but it's got to be specified somewhere or else how would devs and modders create shift lights in the first place?

 

[jgf]

In the .eng file is-

RevLimitRange=(6200, 100, 0.0)
RevLimitSetting=0
RevLimitLogic=50 // RPM range around current setting where rev limiter operates

The only thing I've played with is range; the first number is the redline, I believe the second is the gap from redline to shift light, no idea of the third (it's usually 0.0).

There is also-
LifetimeEngineRPM=(6100, 95) // (base engine speed for lifetime, range where lifetime is halved)
The first number is a "do not exceed" rpm, every time you go over this there is engine damage; not sure how the second number factors in.

Interesting that this particular engine has a redline of 6200 but will take some damage every time it goes over 6100.

And-
LifetimeAvg=10800 // average lifetime in seconds
LifetimeVar=2250 // lifetime random variance

The first is self explanatory, the second is a +/- range around the first; so an engine with 10000 avg and a 2000 var would fail somewhere between 8000 and 12000 seconds under normal operation; this is reduced by the effect of the LifetimeEngineRPM above, and by the "LifetimeOilTemp=(100, 3) // (base oil temp for lifetime, range where lifetime is halved)" parameter.

The XD mod for GTR2 also works in GTL and will display, among other things, the life of the engine as a percentage; if you're abusing the engine you will see this number decrease as you run laps.

 

[Johnny Speed]

The problem with removing the rev limiter - or rather raising it to an extremely high value like 30,000 RPM (since there doesn't seem to be a way to simply disable the rev limiter) - is that the shift light also changes.

Edit: It didn't work. The rpms stopped climbing at 8000 rpm (On the HUD) no matter where I
set the RevLimitAvailable= (0 or 1). Oh well.
____________________________________________________
Original post:

I took a look in the files and I found under: GT Legends\GameData\Teams\TC-65\Mini Cooper
S
I found a "Mini.hdc" file. In that file I found:

[ENGINE]
RevLimitAvailable=1
SpeedLimiter=1 // Whether a pitlane speed limiter is available
Normal=BMC1275
RestrictorPlate=BMC1275

I didn't have a chance to try it, but what if you just changed it to RevLimitAvailble=0
Maybe that will do what you want? I will try it when I can, maybe later tonight.
Hope this helps.

 

[Spinelli]

In the .eng file is-

RevLimitRange=(6200, 100, 0.0)
RevLimitSetting=0
RevLimitLogic=50 // RPM range around current setting where rev limiter operates

The only thing I've played with is range; the first number is the redline, I believe the second is the gap from redline to shift light, no idea of the third (it's usually 0.0).

From rFactor and GTR2 modding sources I read, it goes like this (example):

RevLimit Range=(6200, 100, 5)
6200 = rev-limiter
100 = by how many RPMs the rev-limiter changes every time you adjust it in garage / car setup
5 = how many rev-limit choices you have available

So the above would have: the rev-limiter at 6200, each adjustment increase by 100 RPM, 5 total rev-limit choices to choose from, like this:
6200
6300
6400
6500
6600

Most modding sources I read say that if you don't want the rev-limiter to be adjustable in the garage setup, then the last # should be set to "1", eg. RevLimit Range=(6200, 100, 1). GTL cars have this set to 0 so, I'm guessing, 0 and 1 both work and do the same thing.

RevLimitSetting=3
This defines which of your steps is the vehicle's default. In this example, "3" would be 6500. Apparently "0" is the starting point. So, if you want RevLimitSetting to be the first value (6200 in this case), you'd set RevLimitSetting to 0. If you want it to be the second value (6300), you'd set it "1", and so on.

RevLimitLogic=300
This means the rev-limiter will actually start slowly cutting in and decreasing your vehicle's engine power more and more starting from 300 RPM BEFORE your actual set rev-limit. Say we have the above example's rev-limit set to 6200, your engine will start decreasing power more and more starting from 5900 RPM! If you raised the rev-limit to, say, 6500, then your engine will actually start decreasing engine power more & more starting from 6200 RPM!

Have you ever noticed, in tons of ISI-engine based games (including GTR1 and GTR2) and vehicle mods, that you always seem to loose power when trying to use as much revs as you can? If you noticed that, have you also noticed that, regardless if you raise or lower the car's rev-limiter, that this phenomenon does not go away and therefore it's always better to shift earlier than your rev-limit regardless of how low or high you set your rev-limiter to and regardless of your engine's power curve? That's because of this setting having too high of a value (or having any value other than 0 or something tiny like 10).

I have noticed this phenomenon for around 15-20 years with ISI engine based games and never understood why so many cars made you loose power. It was so UN-satisfying having to shift early in many cars (eg. GTR1, GTR2, F1 cars, etc.) in order to get maximum acceleration regardless of engine power curve, regardless of what RPM the rev-limit was set to. I had no idea what "soft-cut" limiters were until a few months ago. When I finally learned about them, a light-bulb went off and made me think, "maybe this is the problem all these years with all these cars I've driven". Low and behold, that is EXACTLY the problem. After setting RevLimitLogic to become a "hard-cut" limiter (setting it to 0), all the cars behave perfectly, ie. I don't get an "artificial" constant loss of engine power before my rev-limit. If you do want a soft-cut limiter, I would advise 150 as the max but preferably under 75.

RevLimitLogic basically changed all these games for me. Setting it to 0 now makes it so much more satisfying playing so many cars, including just about all GTR1 and GTR2 cars (at least the vanilla cars). If I'm looking to get absolutely every tiny ounce of performance from, say, my GT1 Ferrari 550 GTS, I can now absolutely rev it to whatever I have it's rev-limit set to rather than always mysteriously loosing power beforehand and therefore always having to shift-up one or so shift-lights early. Not to mention the sound accompanying all this. It just makes all cars so much more satisfying to drive & experience.

 

[philrob]

Very interesting Spinelli, all these years modding and i did not know this.
I just adjusted the cars in the TCL mod RF2 version and it seems to work in this too.( not all were set wrong but they are all 0 now, time will tell)

 

[jgf]

Ah, so that works like the spring and shock adjustment parameters. Thanks.

I work mostly with GTR2(P&G) fifties/sixties cars, in period, so have merely moved the rev limiter past the redline ...if you hit the limiter you have probably already suffered some engine damage.

Converted many GTL cars to P&G (though few actually mixed with the P&G cars), and found a lot of backdating necessary to get the cars to their original specs - period tires instead of vintage (often with slight suspension changes) with correct sizes, correct torque curves and gears (50-100hp more than original is not uncommon in GTL). Correct weights are often an issue; GTR2 wants dry weight plus driver, some listings are just dry weight (which may or may not include water and oil), some are curb weight (all fluids but no driver), some are gross weight (all fluids and driver) ...and it is rarely specified which is referenced (so read everything and make an educated guess).

(I need to get a life, lol.)

 

[Spinelli]

I had some more time to test things out. There seems to be a way to "manipulate" the game into effectively disabling the rev-limiter while still having the shift-light come on at the same RPM as when the rev-limiter was enabled. All you have to do is set RevLimitLogic to a negative number.

According to all my tests, the number makes no difference, it just needs to be negative.

Also, I used the on-screen display dash of my Next Level Racing Motion Platform to compare actual RPM to the in-car tachometer gauges since the NLR platform gets it's data straight from the game's telemetry. I'm happy to report - after I fixed the RPM gauge's calibration for all cars - that the tachometers are now perfectly accurate all throughout the rev-range.

I tested the speedometers too using the NLR dash. I made no adjustments to any of the cars' speedometers but, the one I tested, the Lotus Cortina, was spot on. 20, 30, 40, 50, MPH all the way up to 110 MPH were all perfect. At 120 MPH, it looked like the guages may have been 2 MPH or so off but that's fine for me.