Quote from killmeimgod :

basically, these is just new textures which we can download from the internet by ourselves meh

LOL Textures are nothing without models for them to skin ! , the lighting system is something totally different. You obviously know very little this subject

Quote from NENE87 :

Amazing Devs, keep going!
Since 2002 i follow the progress,
you're a rockstars for me ^^

Kind regards from belgium

Maybe kartcross??? and Hillclimb can be implemanted later?? ^^

That would be perfect !!
Imagine LFS Rally-Stages in this concept?
LFS would look amazing!

I really enjoy this game and I would play it far more often if they would let me radically increase the number of AI drivers on my private server.

3 drivers/CPU is really dumb in 2020.

Better and better!

Doesn't it deserve its post in NEWS section?
https://www.lfs.net/news

I think, 3d clock hands will eventually bring 3d dashboard needles.

Quote from nacim :

Hello !
Nice type of update, feels like dev notes, really makes me discover the complexity of the engine and tool set, love it !

On a more artistic note, Eric you are rocking it ! Your texturing work is impressive !
I feel like you are using hard edges everywhere though, any reasons you don't have some nice bevels on the edges of buildings or sidewalks for example ? I feel like it would create a better surface for the lighting to "catch on", and create a smoother, less video gamey feeling
Also like three_jump said just above, I really feel like everything is just too clean, older building could benefit having some grime and dirt applied on them

I guess Eric is more concerned about polycounts, Bevel can easily double or triple them depending on the complexity of the object.

There are some techniques to fake them without affecting the base geometry (bevel shader ?), but I never saw this kind of shaders in a video game.

Quote :

I found two small things in a screenshot, see the attachements, it looks like the occlusion is a bit too strong, maybe it isn't aware that the mesh for the fence is transparent and creates and occlusion like an opaque mesh ?
And a small shadow light leak, like you already fixed tons of already

Anyway, as usual, keep it up guys!

Same with the image I linked bellow, but I prefer a bugy vertex AO over floating objects.

Anyway @Scawen it's always good to read your progress reports, thanks for keeping us updated! and I hope 2021 is the year for us to try all those goodies !!

Ah, the endless joy of progress reports! Looking very good so far - even better if the big parking building in sc will be accessible to do a little driving up and down the ramps.

Keep up the good work!
Go go ScaViEr!!!

peace, mo

Wow. The work on S. City looks amazing! You know. It's really nice that you go into the progress reports of how things are coming along, Scawen. I've learned there's so much that goes into this. The thought of how a car scrapes along on different surfaces... Man. There's a lot more to it than just making a polygon go around in a virtual circle. And yeah. Like what's been posted earlier, South City looks a little empty at this point. How do you fill that in? Like if you put people in the background and detail them, in a few years they're going to look dated. Like say if ten years everyone decides to dress like the 1890s or something. Or all that weird cosplay becomes so mainstream it gets incorporated into regular style clothing. I know that sounds dumb and a little nit-picky, but I remember something. Years ago back when the cars had the really cool tinted windows, I made a skin for one of the cars, I wanted to include a screen shot of it on Fern Bay with what I had thought were girls in one piece bikinis...... I'm still a little traumatized by that Scawen. For a while I thought there was something going on with Eric that y'all wasn't telling us about. So yeah. Y'all might wanna pay a little attention to the pedestrians.

Quote from Racer Y :

Wow. The work on S. City looks amazing! You know. It's really nice that you go into the progress reports of how things are coming along, Scawen. I've learned there's so much that goes into this. The thought of how a car scrapes along on different surfaces... Man. There's a lot more to it than just making a polygon go around in a virtual circle. And yeah. Like what's been posted earlier, South City looks a little empty at this point. How do you fill that in? Like if you put people in the background and detail them, in a few years they're going to look dated. Like say if ten years everyone decides to dress like the 1890s or something. Or all that weird cosplay becomes so mainstream it gets incorporated into regular style clothing. I know that sounds dumb and a little nit-picky, but I remember something. Years ago back when the cars had the really cool tinted windows, I made a skin for one of the cars, I wanted to include a screen shot of it on Fern Bay with what I had thought were girls in one piece bikinis...... I'm still a little traumatized by that Scawen. For a while I thought there was something going on with Eric that y'all wasn't telling us about. So yeah. Y'all might wanna pay a little attention to the pedestrians.

Not so much pedestrians, more along the lines of spectators i guess you mean

Can't wait to drive this! Thanks for your continued hard work.

Quote from nacim :

I feel like you are using hard edges everywhere though, any reasons you don't have some nice bevels on the edges of buildings or sidewalks for example ? I feel like it would create a better surface for the lighting to "catch on", and create a smoother, less video gamey feeling

I think so too. It looks great, but quite 'crisp', particularly on the curb and building edges.

Quote from bishtop :

Not so much pedestrians, more along the lines of spectators i guess you mean

Yeah. Spectators.... but come to think of it, pedestrians could be fun.

Quote from THE WIZARD DK :

or this CRAZY idea..
https://www.lfs.net/forum/post/1953923#post1953923
scratchmarkings:
https://www.lfs.net/forum/thread/91778-Wall-impacts-Scratchmarkings

3planesoft.com made a screensaver with pedestrians(Nvidia optimized) :


spectators going to the grill and sit down by a table.
marshalls going from place to place by fences.
HQ walkway having people going back and forth looking busy.
garden barbecue in a house garden in the distance, smoke from the chimney.
people walking across bridges . walking the dog in the forest.
it truly would be a game changer if made. especially for rally stages and cruises.
but also racing would benefit with a touch of life to the track.
i experimented with a tree file. and i successfully put a cat on a branch on a tree.
minor detail you wont notice while driving really. but if you explore you will suddenly find out its there.

Stop. Please.

Scratchmarkings on barriers (similar to skidmarks on tarmac) would be a cool addition at a later point (and maybe even not that difficult, given that contact can already be detected). Not sure if colored markings (car skins) are possible but that would be the cherry on top

Spectators are not really visible once the racing gets going other than in packed grandstands and on the side. I suspect that this is also one of the easier additions to do that can be done later as it doesn't invalidate / change anything related to the actual track layout. Given that the current spectator models are dated I suspect that at some point they will probably be updated as well.

I'd be interested to hear Eric's thoughts on "environment is too clean" and in general, as track and now apparently city planning(!) is his work.

It would be cool to see some actual editor screenshots as well.

It will be so much more easy for Eric if LFS supported multi-layers textures, because as of now he needs to add some sort of "floating" geometry with alpha textures if he wants to add tags or other type of imperfections, which will of course make the scene heavier on the hardware.

Personally I am not that bothered with a "too clean" environment for the time being, those kind of things can be easily updated after the public release, I am pretty sure that even after the final release Scawen will continue to update the graphic engine.

Quote from lfsrm :

It will be so much more easy for Eric if LFS supported multi-layers textures, because as of now he needs to add some sort of "floating" geometry with alpha textures if he wants to add tags or other type of imperfections, which will of course make the scene heavier on the hardware.

Personally I am not that bothered with a "too clean" environment for the time being, those kind of things can be easily updated after the public release, I am pretty sure that even after the final release Scawen will continue to update the graphic engine.

Well. When you're trying to get a PB or pass someone, all the little details really aren't noticeable. And they really shouldn't be.
But look at it this way. A model railroad track. You go to the store or whatever and buy one. You set it up in your house somewhere. Now you got this little toy train going around in a circle. It looks impressive - for about a minute and a half. So then you go and buy little trees and a little building to put around it. It's a little more interesting but gets boring still. Then let's say you go total nuts about it, mount it on a board, do landscaping, lights add all sorts of little details. That little circle is now something that will mesmerize people and keep them occupied for a while. All those little details enhanced the train set.
And now I'm thinking a little deeper.... Different looking people for different tracks. In a real life setting, would spectators look the same at Fern Green as they would be as Ashton Club? I don't think so. Especially after having seen a race track in Jamaica. Go to a drag strip, then go to a GT circuit and you'll see what I mean.

Bravo to the team. Scawen, Eric and Victor you guys do some incredible work!

I realized that the thread for the September Progress Report is locked. What they ought to do is UNLOCK it and re title the thread to say NEXT September Progress report. Yeah. I know. Dumb joke. Wake me up when September ends.... another dumb joke. I gotta a question about the day/night racing modes. Setting and rising suns. If we held long endurance races, would that effect happen? And the effect of the sun's position has on shadows. I'm guessing all that's been factored in?

Quote from Racer Y :

I realized that the thread for the September Progress Report is locked. What they ought to do is UNLOCK it and re title the thread to say NEXT September Progress report. Yeah. I know. Dumb joke. Wake me up when September ends.... another dumb joke. I gotta a question about the day/night racing modes. Setting and rising suns. If we held long endurance races, would that effect happen? And the effect of the sun's position has on shadows. I'm guessing all that's been factored in?

Yes

I can't wait for my computer to explode with this update.. nice screenshots

Looks nice

Quote from MousemanLV :

Looks nice

As track looks better it becomes more obviously that cartoon car models needs more polygons.

Quote from THE WIZARD DK :

i used the screensaver example because it has pedestrians in multiple directions doing multiple things in a screensaver with a filesize of 73.0MB which i think todays machines would be able to handle easy.
https://www.3planesoft.com/nature-screensavers/sun-village-3d-screensaver/
and it probably wouldnt take long for Scavier to make. Nvidia have 3 of his screensavers on their website:
https://www.nvidia.in/coolstuff/screensavers#!/3planesoft
and noticed the guy few years back and started helping him out.

Package size doesn't matter in terms of computing complexity. You could generate textures and models algorithmically in code and have an incredibly small binary while still executing a complex world.

That demo is also from 2009 which is ancient at this point. Not to mention moving spectators does nothing to actually improve the parts that matter for a racing simulation. If you're driving, you wouldn't notice the spectators moving, and if anything you'd probably disable it becuase even 5 extra FPS is better than nonsense eyecandy.

Scawen, great work. I haven't played in years but I check back now and then to see progress. I'd like to get back into it when the physics gets updated. How are you getting along with that and the tyre model?
Would you also mind breaking down your project plan? I.e. what's next after fern bay, and everything in between the official release (I take it it's still in beta?)?

Thanks!

Happy New 2021 Year! I hope this is the year we all hope for. And to be the year where Live for Speed will shine again. It deserves it.