Project UCGO cars and OMP racing

[Raven]

Maybe a bit odd that my first addons for Orbiter will be ground vehicles, but there aren't many cars available for UCGO. And I'm a gearhead, so the question is: would anyone be interested in developing a ground racing project?
The idea was sparked off by DanSteph's UCGO and dougskeenan's Indianapolis Motor Speedway and International Airport, which brought together two of my favorite gaming genres. I started imagining an interplanetary racing circuit with realistic tracks like Laguna Seca, Twin Ring Motegi, LeMans, Barber Motorsports Park, etc., and fictional tracks on other planets and moons to take advantage of different atmospheric and gravitational conditions. Proof of concept testing with my WIP Lamborghini (before investing time in realistic .cfg's) showed a top speed of 200mph (321km/h) on Earth and 219mph (352km/h) on the Moon with noticeably different handling characteristics.
The plan is to create classic/modern/exotic/concept cars, racetracks with nearby or attached spaceports, and an MFD or module to track start/finish, lap times, and wins. Drag racing is already possible wherever there's a runway, so no worries there. I haven't started learning how to build surface bases yet, but it doesn't seem too complicated. The problem comes in with coding whatever would track laps, but with the talent around here I'm sure someone could do it.
The concept: load your car(s) into a ship with universal cargo deck or similar, fly to a landing area near the track, offload, and join your friends for a race on an OMP server.
At this point I'd like to see who's interested to decide whether to pursue it or find some other way to kill time at work this winter. Besides, we can fly insane spacecraft, why not have hot cars to drive around port? No offense to Dan, but I once owned an '86 Chrysler Laser. Not my best automotive memory...

Current list of cars which can easily be converted to UCGO within Dan's recommended poly limit, by no means all that can be had:
Exotics/Supercars - Lamborghini Murcielago, Reventon, and Gallardo, McLaren F1, Pagani Zonda C12S, Jaguar XJ220, Lotus Elise and Europa, Chrysler ME-412, Ferrari F430, Aston Martin V12 Vanquish, Opel Speedster
American Classics/Modern Muscle - Shelby GR1 and '67 GT500, new Ford Mustang, new Chevrolet Camaro, still looking for a new Dodge Challenger, can get almost anything between '64-74
Concepts - Italdesign Cala, Cadillac Cien
Asian Performance - Nissan Skyline GTR R34 and V35, 370Z, Toyota Supra Bi-Turbo

 

[Face]

I'd say keep 'em coming... if you can make something for Orbiter that is interesting to you, by all means: do it.

I would also suggest you take a look at the ORL project for your multiplayer ideas. This project has the infrastructure for race course tracking and such in place, although for air tracks. However, it shouldn't be a big problem to modify the race track definition files to lower the pylon areas to the ground level, so cars can do a racing with this infrastructure as well.

regards,
Face

 

[Raven]

RCMFD looks like a good start, thanks Face! I can probably do an sc3 vessel to simulate the "tree" for starts and convert it to .dll so it can be spawned with scenario editor, then use remote key send to start "countdown".
Looks like the only real hang-up right now is community interest. Sure, I could build all this for my personal use, but releasing a load of work to an uninterested target audience wouldn't be very satisfying. The point of sharing it is to add something fun to the community and the OMP world as a whole. I'm sure that first successful MP session was a big payoff for you in terms of seeing the results of many hours of work!
If the online racing idea doesn't get anywhere, I'll still add a few cars, but it wouldn't be as much fun, which is the whole point of this venture.

 

[garyw]

We had a little chat about something like that on IRC. Personally I think a Race down Ascensions runway, followed by a UMMU sprint to a DG then three laps of wideawake would be hilarious and if you could tweak the cars performance like in an F1 game I think you'd have a great bolt on for OMP.

 

[Raven]

Oh, I can tweak a car. Dan's car .cfg's have stats for max speed, engine power, brake force, and lateral grip. Realistic performance is simply a matter of testing and tuning. With a bit of research I should be able to get about as close to real life as a computer possibly can, which is kinda the idea. My biggest problem with racing games is unrealistic physics. Not to point fingers, but many popular game franchises use completely different physics for different game modes! Specifically, road racing versus drifting. Granted, any intelligent driver will use different suspension and tire setups for different applications, but when velocity overpowers friction, you have a slide, regardless of the equipment. When road racing, some games will not allow drift while drift modes won't even use countersteering to prolong a slide. I think the Orbiter engine and Dan's setup will provide the element of realism I've been looking for.