Cilandak Town Square GP, RIP Cory Monteith, and a new WIP

It's time to going three topics again like I did a long time ago in my old blog!
Many things happened during the fasting month of Ramadan, most of them are the loss of great figures. First, we lost Allan Simonsen, a Danish endurance racing driver whose life ended after a Le Mans crash, then following days we lost a Timezone Center at Citos and is to made into a boutique in light of its closing. Today, we lost another one: Cory Monteith, best known as Finn Hudson in Glee. If you happen to watch this series, I know what you feel and what you are going to feel: grief. Yup, this character has faced many things, including dates with that cheerio Quinn, the golden girl Rachel, and friends with Kurt Hummel.

Here's an article from New York Times about this...

Cory Monteith, who played an upbeat and outgoing young student and singing coach on the hit Fox musical comedy series “Glee,” but who battled substance abuse, was found dead in a hotel room in Vancouver, British Columbia, on Saturday. He was 31.

The police said that Mr. Monteith was found dead in his 21st-floor room at the Fairmont Pacific Rim hotel in Vancouver around noon after he missed his scheduled checkout time. They said that there was no indication of foul play and that people Mr. Monteith had been with earlier were being interviewed, but that they believe he was alone when he died. 

The coroner will try to establish the cause of death, a police statement said. 

Mr. Monteith, a 6-foot-3 performer with a youthful countenance and a soft-spoken demeanor who described himself on his personal Twitter page as a “tall, awkward, Canadian, actor, drummer, person,” gained worldwide attention when “Glee” made its debut on the Fox network in 2009. 

On that series, Mr. Monteith played Finn Hudson, an Ohio high school student and football star who initially had no interest in joining his school’s struggling glee club for fear it would cost him his popularity and social standing. 

But once drawn into the singing squad, Finn became a crucial member, sharing vocal duties on its signature cover of Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’,” and also sharing romantic tensions with his fellow students Rachel (Lea Michele) and Quinn (Dianna Agron). In recent episodes, Finn graduated from high school but returned to coach the glee squad of which he had once been a member. 

“Glee,” which recently finished its fourth season, is one of Fox’s biggest hits of recent years, especially with younger audiences, although its ratings have been dropping for the last two seasons. 

A press representative for Fox said on Sunday that production on the new season of “Glee” was not scheduled to begin until later this month or early August, and that no decision had yet been made about how the show might deal with Mr. Monteith’s death. 

In March, Mr. Monteith announced that he had checked himself into a treatment center for an unspecified substance addiction. He had acknowledged in an interview in 2011 that he also sought rehabilitation when he was 19. 

Cory Allan Michael Monteith was born on May 11, 1982, in Calgary, Alberta, and raised in Victoria, British Columbia, after his parents divorced. He dropped out of school at 16, having attended 16 different schools by that time, and worked at many jobs before winning his first professional acting roles in his early 20s. 

Mr. Monteith appeared on television shows like “Stargate Atlantis,” “Supernatural” and “Smallville,” then landed his role on “Glee” with the help of an audition tape on which he sang REO Speedwagon’s 1985 No. 1 hit, the love ballad “Can’t Fight This Feeling.” 

The news of Mr. Monteith’s death elicited an outpouring of grief and remembrances from friends and colleagues. 

Dot-Marie Jones, a “Glee” co-star, wrote on her Twitter account that Mr. Monteith “was not only a hell of a friend” but an “amazing” man “that I will hold close to my heart forever.” 

Mr. Monteith’s press representatives at Viewpoint Public Relations said in a brief statement: “We are so saddened to confirm that the reports on the death of Cory Monteith are accurate. We are in shock and mourning this tragic loss.” 

The Fox Broadcasting Company, 20th Century Fox Television and the executive producers of “Glee” said in a statement: “We are deeply saddened by this tragic news. Cory was an exceptional talent and an even more exceptional person. He was a true joy to work with and we will all miss him tremendously. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and loved ones.” 

According to some news reports, Mr. Monteith is survived by his parents and a brother. In an interview in 2011, Mr. Monteith had said that he hoped his struggles with addiction would offer an example to others. “I don’t want kids to think it’s O.K.

Thankfully, out of this grief, I managed to post my thoughts on my LiveJournal post (aka my fandom blog) about what would happen after his loss. Will his character find a new portrayer or change the plot line. As I browsed on one of my joined forums, one user said that the show should stop in respect of him. The only thing I said was if Allan Simonsen's family willed to continue the race after he passed away, why not? There are actually more chances and choices coming, and we don't know what Glee producers and staffs would do...

Moving on to GeneRally because I can't post too much Glee in this blog and this blog is meant for updates for my game stuffs (the former purpose is better suited to my LiveJournal and Tumblr tbh...). After some refinements, new tracks are released. There are three of them: Citos GP, and two mini track project tracks Naitodori and Karbanks.

Just as I promised....

Cilandak Town Square GP is a track I made whose WIP and article I wrote and showed in the last post. The course is described as Norisring with flooring arts, semi-technical, has long straights but focus-demanding due to its hairpins, and exciting because the course runs through the Timezone center via a right hander, leading to another turn outside where diners can be seen before heading back to the Start/Finish straight that are filled with pricey restaurants and the like.

The course has two configurations: GP and short, with the short course having less technical parts, allowing for a high-speed race like AVUS does.

Course details follow:

Complete technical data of GP and Short courses

What you will see and what you will drive...

Get your mall racing fix in GR NOW!

Then there are two new Mini Track Remix Project tracks: Naitodori and Karbanks, both are #9 and #8 respectively. First up is Naitodori.

Described as a "Night Drifting Track" located in a parking space in Japan, Naitodori is an embodiment of what it exactly says on the tin; Two Katakana words Night (ナイト - Naito) and Drift (ドリフト) formed the track's name, complete with the fact that it TAKES PLACE in Japan. Wanna Drift at Night? DL.

Last but not least is Karbanks. Again, its name is a portmanteau, this time it's "Kart" and "Banks", implying that this is might be a kart track and it has a banked turn. However, the real purpose why it's named that is because its banked turn is heavily inspired by Mario Kart 64's Mario Circuit where the banked turn lies beneath the giant mushroom as you drive there.

DL Karbanks for an exhilarating drive through the banked right hander now!

Finally, I can show you what I'm working on: Classic GTs, as in GT cars in 90s era. 90s era GTs are considered as the best and most memorable era of GT racing. At that time, McLaren F1s, Porsche 911s, and Ferrari F40s colored almost every GT races available back then, from Le Mans to BPR Global Series, and so popular that Sega fit the three mentioned games into Scud Race with Dodge Viper and later Le Mans 24 with Porsche having 911 GT1 instead of its Scud Race-featured 911.

It's still a very long way since there are tad so many cars I'd like to make. To be honest I've never done a big project involving many cars like this before, but since this is 90s GT and I loved some McLarens and F40s thanks to Scud Race and BPR Global Series and Le Mans, I had to do it, and I have to tell you I have joy working these cars.

Currently made cars are...

Porsche 911 (Elf Haberthur Racing), Nismo GTR LM (Two Le Mans 1996 entrants), and Ferrari F40 (Works team in red and Pilot Pen Racing in blue)

Porsche 911 (Advan Racing) and Ferrari F40 (IGOL Racing)

Callaway C12 R (Team Agusta Racing), Marcos Mantaray GT2 (works team), and Venturi 600LM (works team)

Those are the ones that are made out of the following list:
- Porsche 911 GT2 x2
- Callaway C12 R
- Marcos Mantaray
- Venturi 660 LM
- Nismo Skyline LM x2
- Honda NSX
- Toyota Supra LM
- Aston Martin DB9 x3
- Porsche 911 GT1
- Chrysler Viper GTS x4
- Jaguar XJ220
- Chevrolet Corvette C5 R
- Lotus Esprit LM x2
- Ferrari F40 LM x3 +1
- McLaren F1 x5
- Panoz Esperante x2
- Lister Storm x2
- Alpine A310 GT x3

(bolded names signifies that they are already made)

Well, hopefully with this loss, we can assure that Glee continues as it is with a tribute episode to Finn if the producers are to write such plot, and hopefully I can manage to have new tracks and cars. [R]GARAGE is a Garage of Creations after all...

~[R]

INSIDE THE MALL: Cilandak Town Square - RIP Timezone Citos

Welcome to Cilandak Town Square! aka Citos!

After a long while, I thought maybe I should continue my "Inside the Mall" series after I posted one a year ago. Well technically it's months away from being a year but who cares? Ramadan is coming, and I remember I posted that in Ramadan too. Furthermore, I can't just focus to the malls nearby my home, and in fact, I no longer am active in that mall anymore since the newest update is that while the Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune 3DX+ there costs three coins and one coin is worth IDR 1500, I don't have a choice but to leave that place unless I want to take crowns there (I remember that I want to be the fastest in my area, starting from Parung).

Time is very fast; now that I'm in college, there are nearby malls with MT3DX+cabs near my college like Cinere Mall, Bintaro Plaza, Pondok Indah Mall, and Cilandak Town Square. This opens a new world for me to explore and that I wanted to live my life like it's 2007 onwards. And this time, to make sure that "Inside the Mall" series is meant to be random posts with interesting sentences to read and not too much focusing about MT3DX+ cabs nearby my home, my next destination is Cilandak Town Square!

So what is Citos? It was opened in 2002 and is meant to be a mall with a Town Square concept. Hmm...

But there are restaurants everywhere! Are you sure it's a "mall" or something?

The first time I went there is in 2004 with my father, my elementary years, where I had encounters with some childhood series characters. After some sightseeing there, I hopped in into its Timezone where it had Maximum Tune / 2 (CMIIW) at the moment. And that is where it is my first time that I drive in manual with 6-speed transmission. That was the time I was unaware of Maximum Tune until the day, in 2007, where I was staying at one of my relatives' house in Tangerang area and went to Supermall Karawaci to play some MT and finally get a card in which the card I made is a bayside blue Nissan Skyline GTR V-Spec II aka the BNR34 I continually use until NOW.

The exterior of Timezone in Citos... Too far much?

Due to Maximum Tune series, the mall's Timezone was heralded as one of Indonesia's most crowded arcade game centers, not to mention it opens until 2AM (according to some players who played there), and since then it was the main appeal for MT fans alike, and guys there won't reluctant to give their seats to other guys before they have finished their "business" with the machine. In fact, other than MT cabs and any other cabs as well as some animal data carddas games, there were Sega Rally 3 cabinets before they were replaced by another racing game cabs whose name I can't tell you due to its too high mainstream level.... I think this place was the only one with Sega Rally 3 in it.

The left magazine once made the right one a recommendation, and so it happens... I was going to post this on my Livejournal but well, I post it here nonetheless... It was bought months ago, November 2012 for exact. Granted, there were two copies available and a copy cost 229K if my memory served me right. And just what's that thing on the middle?

It was also the time that I bought the thing on the right of your screen. Speaking about magazines, there are two places where you can find imported magazines/books/novels there: the one near the Foodmart, and the other located on the upper floor. I bought this because as a fan of fandom I have to take many opportunity before it's gone forever. Furthermore, there aren't very many copies sold here in my country...

Also, Citos is known for having lots of restaurants; it's all up to your tastebuds. There are various restaurants to keep you starving, ranging from fast foods, traditional, to modern cuisines. The price ranges can be quite high, but less than 200K if I'm not mistaken. Furthermore, you could also have a hangout place for you and your friends/family, and you could even taste a wood-fired pizza there.

A diner and a chain bread restaurant (it's not just a bread restaurant though!) seen here. Not pictured above them is a Burger-related fast food chain.

The flooring is also quite meaningful; it's got this "Sun to the moon" flooring which orange paint sadly got worn out now. It's all now black and white, and the detailed painting of the crescent moon has turned into a mere grey silhouette. Just compare Citos in the past and the present (this can also be seen on my previous pics...)

The map of Citos itself. You could see that this map shows the exact flooring colors before their colors worn out nowadays.

Sadly as I posted this blog, the Timezone at Citos has been closed for good. All the arcades there are crying and uncertain where the arcade master would take them to. In place of this place, there might be a boutique sooner or later after all arcades there are gone. And it turns out TZ is not the only victim there; Cilandak 21 is also closed and is now replaced by a gym, still under construction as this post is made.

Here's how the arcades' tears sum up:

"Dear Customers, we sadly inform you that the TZ CITOS is permanently closed, we would like to thank you for all your loyalty for the last eleven years. Your remaining credits in your TZ card here will be transferred to the nearest TZ center at Pondok Indah Mall (2nd floor) and will be active as of 4th July 2013. We are looking forward for your presence either in our nearest center or any other TZ centers across Indonesia and hope to continue our special friendship with you loyal customers. It wasn't an easy decision to close this TZ center, but this decision was made after we consider all the choices carefully."

TZ Citos's Cabinets' cry. Its virtual roller coaster ride was packed down days before this was happened. FYI this center also have "Mega Stacker" in which there are big prizes if you win the game...

The MT cabinets are not exempt from crying...

Thus, the only choice now for me is to commemorate Citos into a racing game, in which I've got a challenge like this by myself: "How do you fit a nearby mall into a game with track editors and such?" The answer is here:

It is far from complete, I tell you...

 This is the grand project in GeneRally to make a playable GR track based on Citos. It was initially a project for fun only, but looking at the condition happened there, I think this would go down as a tribute for Citos Timezone, no more, no less. It is still a WIP, but I will tell you if it's complete. For now, I've completed two small tracks in GeneRally, but until the next post, I will tell you what they are and how the project is going. That would also mark my site's update too.

- RIP TZ Citos - 2002-2013. Wish all your arcades are delivered to the right place...
~[R]