Rendy's Car Skinning Life EP 03: A Skinner's Block and a Dive to rFactor

New month, new post. As promised, it's going to be a post about skinning. This Skinning Post marks the third episode of my Skinning Life post series. Previously, I did post about working the Citroën Trophée Xsara, which unfortunately sees a sabbatical (exactly for months) due to no feedbacks given. Alas, I quit skinning for a while but not until I dive into rFactor recently. Like how I dived into GTR2, there's one rFactor mod that motivated me to try this game: the ChoroQ mod, made by Aoitori. And then myriads of ideas flow like a landslide...

But in this post, I won't just talk about rFactor alone; this would also be the time where I spill TMUF WIPs that held up for a long time. When I was working the Trophée Xsara car and that I had other WIPs that are dormant, the thing that etched in my heart was "don't spill any of your WIPs before you finished your currently-working one". Since I "failed it" a.k.a can't get to work the current WIP in a short time, I think it's time to open all my cards before others claim any of mine.

A Yours Truly Tale of MiniRacingOnline

My birthday has passed almost a week ago (15th October), and on the same week, it's been five years since I upload all my RendyTUNED-era creations. Time really goes fast and looking back at those stuffs, I can't help but wanted to remake almost all of them. Like I said in earlier posts, my trackmaking in Turbo Sliders back then was subpar compared to others.

But this time, I won't post about Turbo Sliders, rather I decided to post about my experiences in yet another top down racing game, this time it's called MiniRacingOnline, a top-down Formula 1 simulator made in Spain by Kotai. It is a top-down game unlike others: one of its most stand out features is the ability to set your car in the race like in real life, albeit limited to gearing and control settings. Not only that, it also features tire compounds (soft, hard and wet), weather effects and AIs with set personalities that can also pit. Recent versions added KERS and DRS systems to the game, and future version would include day/night cycle and the new SDL2 engine usage where, now, the map moves per your car's movement just like in classic racing games on older gaming consoles. It's been a long time I haven't touched this game, while I knew this game roughly six years ago when I was just browsing the net and stumbled upon this.

October Round-up: Site Redesign, More TS Features, GR Race recaps, Oh My!

Well, opening up the first October post is a Round-up that reports things that I'm up into and recaps things I have been into. So many happenings happen between the last post and this post. This post will underline yet new features implemented in the future version of Turbo Sliders as well as showcasing a new car of mine while writing something about implementing an all-new physics which doesn't involve an antislide value of 7. Also in this post is the recap of what I've been through in GR competitions I'm joining in. All that and a special bit of paragraphs following these topics. But first thing's first: the non top-down racing game-centered post...

FORMULA E – Motorsport’s Newest Buzz

13th September 2014 – the first race of what is dubbed as “Motorsport’s first all-electric racing series” began in the streets of Beijing, China, exactly near the Bird’s Nest Stadium. Thousands of crowd, on-track and online (yup, you read it right), have finally witnessed the race they have been waiting for since the first day the series is announced. The hype intensified as a variety of drivers, from former Formula 1 stars like Jarno Trulli and Nick Heidfeld, to Le Mans racer Lucas di Grassi, and next-generation single seater talents like Sam Bird, complete the series’s line-up.

Welcome to Formula E, world's all-electric single seater racing series that broke the mainstream in the single seater racing scene. Series CEO Alejandro Agag wanted a different element for the type of open wheel racing; which he "expects to become the framework for research and development around the electric car, a key element for the future of our cars". Through September 2014 to June 2015, the championship visits 10 cities around the world in three continents with their own famous landmarks; Asia, Americas, and Europe. In this inaugural season, 10 teams of two drivers compete in this unique racing series designed to appeal the new generation of motorsport fans, eventually making motorsport not only enjoyable for all ages but also accessible thanks to its own mobile app that allows fans to see their favorite driver's on-board view which they can rotate the camera freely.

Formula E represents a vision for the future of the motor industry over the coming decades, serving as a framework for Research and Development around the electric vehicle, accelerating general interest in these cars and promoting sustainability. It also centers around three core values of Energy, Environment and Entertainment, fusing it further with a mix of engineering, technology, sport, science, design, music and entertainment to the series.

Despite claims that Formula E is either one of those "boring" series or that all-electric car race are not their cup of tea (probably because of the dark cloud of ZEOD RC's flop in this year's Le Mans 24 Hours race), and even furthered by Niki Lauda's comment of the series being "the worst thing he's ever seen" and Sebastian Vettel's "Cheese" lament, it indeed delivered a close and tight race albeit the speed, evident by the aforementioned race. In fact, the ending delivered a surprise BANG!, you just have to witness it by yourself.

Still Alive, Even Until September Ends

Mind you, my real life has been brutal for the past weeks: college organization works, college life, and even some things that aren't meant to be done as I am unable to manage which stuff I have to work on first that I almost not give an update to this blog unlike past months where I used to post three to four posts a month. Granted, I've got my ammunition back, and the ammunition in question is of course my internet subscription. There have been lots of things for the past thirty days since the last blog post; Team [R]GARAGE being August's Team of the Month in GeneRally World Ranking, my return to MiniRacingOnline, and changes that I'd like to do for both my site and this blog.

Activity is very important, and being inactive is okay as long as you post a blog post explaining what happened that you missed your daily blogging antics or a social media post. Wonder why I said those things? Two words: GeneRally Sequel; for GeneRally 2 unfortunately, its progress is in an utter uncertainty, being less active on the social media and blog post, leaving most of its anticipated fans with question marks and speculations, even its last post explaining what happened to Kimmo, the car designer for the game, post Kickstarter failure didn't help that much, and not even its Twitter is update either. It is sad to see your highly-anticipated sequel of your favorite game lost its lights to keep its fans feel the hype, and hopefully they learn these mistakes to make its fans always certain on its progress.

Having my internet renewed and knowing that this is September, I don't think this blog needs Evan Rachel Wood where she'd wake me up when September ends. I'm standing on my own!