What a view - I want THAT on my sim

[Amanda]

I've just spent 11 hours re-downloading rFactor 2 after seeing Longford released.

Driving this track with period-correct cars felt, excuse me in advance, ****ing amazing.

Now I'm in love with historic content, and I'm here to ask @Marcel Offermans something:
Look at the view bellow:

I want more historic tracks. Tracks from when sex was safe and racing was deadly. Specifically, the old Nordschleife as shown above.

I know I've given rFactor 2 a hard time in the past, but you guys continue to impress after each release. More than ever, now I really felt the potential that rFactor 2 has. If I wanted it to succeed before, now I want it even more.

I'm a 3D artist and I'm making a game in Unreal Engine. I'm listing myself to do free work in upcoming historic tracks if there's more coming. Normally I don't do this, but I'm posting some of my early (and latest) projects so that the community can judge if I'd be of good help or not. This is why I'm doing this publicly instead of privately.

So, here's a link with some of my favorite projects: https://imgur.com/a/qJp0XhQ

- On the first image, most of the 3D meshes were downloaded. This was done to speed development of my game. All meshes are freely licensed even for monetary gains. Lighting, texturing all done by me. This was a quick test project;
- On the second image: studying about depth of field and ambient occlusion factors that would look realistic for a real life camera. Only the book was downloaded, everything else modeled by me;
- Everything on the third image was done by me;
- Most objects on the 4th image done by me. Project was mostly to study AO values for the only source of light in the scene, which is a small window (you'll see it on the next images);
- 5th image is another angle of the same project displayed on the 3rd image;
- 6th and 7th image: all done by me as well;
- On the last 2 renders, the same project for the 4th image. You can see the light coming from the window. Only the woman was downloaded as it's also free and laser-scanned ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

If S397 is planning on releasing new tracks, send me a PM and we'll work something out I'm unemployed so I have free time to help you guys out.

Cheers

 

[Amanda]

If anyone's interested, here's the video comparing the old green hell vs now:

 

[dajdosta]

Though I'd love to have the old track there is probably zero chance S397 will make it before modern track.
Unless some modder like woochoo creates it.

 

[dajdosta]

Though I'd love to have the old track there is probably zero chance S397 will make it before modern track.
Unless some modder like woochoo creates it.

 

[Marcel Offermans]

Hello @AmarildoJr let me respond in public. First of all, it is great to hear that this classic content has sparked your enthusiasm. Judging from the many responses in the Longford release thread (and recently when we released the March and Brabham cars) you are definitely not alone!

So, you're interested in building a track? Let me explain your options.

First of all, if you want to build a specific (classic) track, you can start such a project yourself. That way you are in full control of every aspect and make it a real labor of love. That is what "woochoo" did for Longford. We provide some tools and documentation on how to build tracks, and there is a vibrant community that is always willing to answer questions and provide further tools. When your track is closer to completion, you then have a couple of routes you can take. You can of course release it yourself, or you can discuss with Studio 397 the options of making it an official release (free or paid). In both of the latter cases, we will want to make sure that everything is either scratch built or that you've properly licensed any IP that you used. That includes getting a license or permission to release the track, if rights holders can still be found.

Then there's the option of working directly with Studio 397, either as part of the core team or as an independent contractor. In those cases you loose a lot of the freedom, as you will have to build things according to our guidelines and schedules. And of course, beforehand we will want to have a proper job interview with you, as well as look at some of your existing work. We are always working on new tracks, but the details of those we usually won't discuss in public until we're ready to do so.

I've looked at some of the work you posted. Those are all scenes that are rendered (not real-time). They look good to me, but this does not tell me much about your ability to model for games, with restricted polygon budgets and specific techniques to model materials and create good looking and efficient textures. So if you want to apply for a job, we would want to see your abilities in that area, and you would not be talking to me, but our senior artists (as I have too little experience in that area to really evaluate people).

I hope this response is helpful, and I am curious in what direction you want to take this. There is a lot of content that could potentially be built and people here and on other forums will always have ideas for tracks that have not been done yet. The downside of building tracks is that they are a lot of work. I guess anybody that has built one can confirm that. So you really need to be sure you know what you're starting as you might be working on it for months (full-time) or years (part-time, next to a day job). I don't want to discourage you though, the results can be very rewarding!

 

[Amanda]

Hey @Marcel Offermans

I was actually hoping to help in terms of you guys saying something like "hey, we need these buildings done" and "we have some data of the track surface, would you like to help build it up"
Nothing paid, just volunteer work.

I didn't expect it to take this long to build a track! Seems like a lot of work. I bet it's worth it! Though unfortunately I don't have the time do build one all by myself right now.

But if somehow you guys still need some informal help and it's nothing super duper urgent, I'd love to participate.

This is my first project in Unreal Engine

One of the key elements of development I'm working on is optimization, both in polygon count and texture size. I believe entertaining should be accessible to as much people as possible, so when I develop some of the models for this scene the first thing in mind was to create them with the least amount of polygons as I could while making them look natural, specially since this an architectural visualization project and, contrary to simulators, things aren't passing at 200 mp/h hehehehe. For the other models (legally downloaded, since I'm using them to speed my learning in Unreal Engine) I was able to reduce texture size and poly-count by a lot (between 60 to 95%).

I just re-installed Windows, so I can't show it inside the Unreal Engine until I re-download it. But here's a video showing what I learned in two weeks: creating a main menu and proper functionality, loading of the map, user interaction (doors open and make sounds, the couch opens an interactive menu), proper lighting, pause menus, and so on.
The emphasis is on the living room for now.

I can send you a working build of it if you want to try it out. It runs natively on Windows, but I'm planning to also release it on Mac, Linux, and mobile.
No need to install or to give it admin privileges. As most Unreal Engine games, all you need to do is click on the game executable ("apartment1.exe").

But I completely understand if informal volunteer work is not something S397 is looking forward right now, specially since I'm not really planning on working to build a full track.

Anyway, have a nice day