Toca 2 came with my first pc in the early 2000', it was this game that got me hooked to racing videogames (also MS flight sim 98 to a lesser extent), good memories and a very classy soundtrack.
Great promotional video, I will surely update my mod and attempt to make some progress to my next project.
First step is to find a workflow that you are confortable with, even if it's flawed at first but with time you will include various other or even your own techniques, and always keep an eye for additional informations (tutorials, documentations).
Just finish something damn it .
Edit : sometimes triangles are inevitable , just try to use as much quads as possible.
Yes you can still do that of course, the whole shrinkwrap workflow is especially useful when the mesh density increases (which is inevitable when you want to reach a certain level of details), what you want when you model a car is to not mess up the surface flow when adding details, which is harder to achieve without any guide, the more vertices you have the more harder for you to manually keep every surfaces as clean as possible, for eg :
I just added a bunch of details on a surface
but now I'm struggling to keep them follow the car shape, because simply there is too many vertices and it will take forever to position them perfectly
as you might noticed the surface doesn't have a proper flow, but if I had a guide and used the shrinkwrap modifier it wouldn't be an issue at all
This is the result when I apply the modifier
This is what you should aim for for the time being.
For SubD modeling, try to avoid using triangles outside flat area, its algorithm doesn't handle it well especially near edges or holes, it's not an absolute rule but for good result this is what is considered good practice for organic surfaces (cars, planes, animals, human etc..).
Nice, try to keep it as close as possible to the original car, it might be frustrating in the beginning but it is all positive experience for future projects, with time and practice you will become more comfortable with your topology planning, I think it's the hardest part in the learning process since any badly placed N-gon (which I don't recommend to use) or tris will become instantly visible in the end result (shiny surfaces doesn't help either).
You can definitely use subdivision in game modeling, but since LFS tris budget isn't very high it will take you some time to optimize your model directly from a higher resolution mesh. For future reference, what I recommend is to use the shrinkwrap modifier in combination with the snap to surface tool on a non detailed guide that only retain the general shapes :
It's a little bit advanced for a beginner, but it is something worth knowing if you want to have the best result.
Another attempt at integrating a totally custom made car into LFS, this time it's a small light Lotus-like RWD coupé, with a total length of 4.02 m and 1.74m (without mirrors) in width.
It's a proper modern car, with actual styling cues like sharp body folds and distinguishable LED light signature, but it keeps the same commitment from the driver as any old school sport cars ( I mean this is just LFS forcing my hands with its physics engine which behave the best for 90's era cars).
This will probably have multiple engine configurations, one to compete with the TBO class and another one closer or in between the RAC/FZ specs, I m still undecided about this.
Also this model will have a higher resolution version for rendering.
Now hopefully I will do a better job than my previous mod.
I m nowhere near an expert even tho car design is something I dreamed to do as a career since a long time, but being born in this country is something that limited my possibilities greatly...
As for the XF2, I think I was too generous with the car width, 10 cms less and it would probably give a way more coherent dimensions, plus the car width around the windows area should be narrower too (and the side windows length too):
because like said previously, with the progress that car manufacturers made in passive security, cars have way more "thicker" bodies which make them larger than older cars, this is something I didn't translate as realistically as I hoped.
As a test project, it opened my eyes on some elements that I used to neglect when it comes to vehicles creation, definitively modding a car into a simulator is a good way for me to improve this hobby of mine, If I ever create another car, It will definitely be an improvement over this project.
Which is weird since I used pretty reasonable dimensions .
Anyway, mistakes were prone to happen since it's my first modding project, I learned alot by doing this car and I hope I won't make the same mistakes if I ever make another LFS mod .
Yes of course, you can do whatever you want with the engine sound, just keep in mind this is still a GTI, a civilian car that is supposed to sound somehow sporty without going overboard.
I double checked the left and right indicators mesh colors, everything seems fine ( the mesh color is white ), there is nothing I can do for now unless if I just apply an orange color to the base mesh, which is not something I want for the front/rear light style to be honest :s.
Are you using a Direct drive wheel ? I changed the caster value in the latest version, it didn't improve the ffb feels ?