The Nonsense is Back, Evolved as Ever!

Racing. Track featured is Trial Mountain v5.3 by nomscar.

Well, I had to say that I wasn't as active in blogging as before, not knowing what I had to write. That, however, has changed and the motivation returns to me after a series of events in the past few weeks. I had doubts that people would still read blogs now that people are more interested towards video blogs, but even then some things are better done as a blog post rather than a video blog, especially when I think about the fact that I haven't had the sufficient resources for it.

Progressing from my last blog post, I've been into a lot of things that might constitute as a "recovery towards my older self"; I've started watching series once more, starting with some Gundam series. Before the last post, I actually delved myself to G Gundam with its large portion of ham and other things. Earlier this year, there were screenings of select Gundam compilation movies, mostly Universal Century ones, but the best part was that I actually watched Mobile Suit Gundam 00: A wakening of trailblazer which has been something I wanted to watch myself. On the series side, I've finished Iron-Blooded Orphans (best series I've watched so far!) 00 (more of a re-watch), SEED, and last but not least I'm completing Gundam Wing as I speak, of which I had to say... this series has some bonkers storyline. Other than that, I'm still on my mobile games nonsenses; my luck on the latest Tekken (Round 2) collaboration on KOF ALL STAR left me in a bitter taste, while things are going positive for Real Racing 3 said of things, as the latest update has the long-awaited Mitsubishi Lancer and Subaru Impreza, as well as the motivation to do the 2021 F1 events as the older rounds of Season 1 are expiring soon.

But the main star of the topic is the top-down racing game I have been playing for years: Turbo Sliders. The OG game might have little to no activity but it's got a new breath in the form of Turbo Sliders Unlimited, a game that allows for even more degree of customization, both in the car livery and trackmaking at the moment. There is, however, one new name in town that can be considered as what happens when TS has a working pit stop useable for both players and AI drivers, all along with a unique set of cars, physics, and tracks. Ladies, gentlemen, and friends outside the binary, we are talking about Applimazing's Ultimate Racing 2D 2, the sequel of Ultimate Racing 2D.

Ultimate Racing 2D 2 is a top-down racing game that allows up to 20 players in one race, complete with a qualifying session, tire dynamics, and strategies, plus with a working track editor. To top it off, the game adds more cars compared to its previous installment and an ability to do multi-class races. It does sound like whatever I would envision TS to have given that I had this ambition of creating a multi-class endurance racing with working pits and a strategic driving model. Yes, this thing breathes like TS, looks like TS, and feels like TS, albeit a couple of differences.

WAIT, HOW DID I GET THERE?

Long story short, amidst my break on content creations on TS, I laid my eyes on UR2D2 and decided that blowing a part of my salary on top-down racers like this would be a good idea, so buying it I did, along with Tabletop Simulator and art of rally. The game was on sale and doesn't disappoint with the affordable price, and even with the Open Access state it's in, the game does have a big potential, especially with a strong community. Speaking of community, it was Mike Nike, a fellow TS veteran, who actually invited me to the game's Discord server, exposing me to an active community that runs a variety of different leagues, from traditional racing leagues to managerial AI-based leagues.

As it's been said before, UR2D2 bears a number of similarities to TS; supporting up to 20 players in a race with online capabilities. On top of that, it's possible to set a qualifying session to determine each player's starting positions before the race. Tire wear, tire compounds, and damage can be enabled for the race if desired, allowing for pit stops, and even an AI would enter pits too if you're the type of person who prefer racing with the AIs (think power79's bots being a reality). It doesn't stop there as it is possible to have different weather effects as well, whether if it's a fixed by you players or randomized through probability.

UR2D2 offers a plethora of car classes, with each class consists of 10 cars and is packed with their own set of specs, categorization, and dedicated track type for them, plus an ability to set your own car color for your selection(s) and some come with their unique paint parts, not to mention you can rename the team(s) and driver name(s) to your own liking. Bored racing just a single class? Multi Class option is your friend, allowing you to assign different car classes to either one team or every driver for a race, you can just low-key simulate endurance races on this game!

On paper, UR2D2 plays like a hybrid of TS and MiniRacingOnline. While you can clearly see TS in terms of general driving model it has, it's got some elements from MRO namely the weather, selectable cars for each class, unique car specs for each class, and tire strategies. Another interesting note is that UR2D2's AI skill approach seems to take a hybrid approach; it's possible to define unique AI levels for different drivers through LapClass in TS's AI file, while for general audiences MRO's slider bars has been a no-nonsense approach. This means that you can simply set the slider for a particular driver to adjust their skill level.

In conclusion, if you're coming from, say, either TS or MRO, most of your skills can be transferred to UR2D2, as the game bears familiarity for both titles. Mind you, this familiarity isn't limited to the gameplay, but apparently the car making in particular. This gave birth to some of my first creations like the Daytona Coupe and, my most prized creation, the Nissan Skyline GT-R R32. Other cars followed, like the Ferrari F40 and Mazda RX-7 FD, and I've recently made other set of cars set to be released soon. All these cars are available on Steam Workshop, of which a Subscription would download the game's content and render the content playable in game.

YET ANOTHER NEW APPROACH

Comparison between two Skyline R32s; shown left is the Turbo Sliders WIP, shown right is the finished product released as a Ultimate Racing 2D 2 mod (image rotated for comparative purposes).

After hours of playing, I realized that I might need to get myself to a car making mojo once again, but I didn't know where to start from this point. I know that car images in UR2D2 are similar to how things are done in TS only rotated 90 degrees clockwise, but my only issue was, most definitely, with quality. On surface, some of my cars that have been released for TS were actually good but the shadings are rough on the edges, and I realized that the brush tool might not be the "end all, be all" solution to this problem. I mean, you can use brush tool to shade MRO cars, but would it work on bigger scales? Yes and no; yes for some small details, and no for the rest. To recap my approach from the last time I did this, I:

1. Trace the car's shape according to the available blueprints;
2. Made sure the pillars are being worked first for the car's windows, if any, using Pen tool and Subtract Shape option;
3. Layer the windows accordingly so that I can draw interiors along with glass effect;
4. Revise the lighting effect for the windows;
5. Start working on the car body's shadings and details as usual (although not documented on that post), using a combination of Brush tool and Pen tool, as well as Layer settings.

But even then, I sometimes get overwhelmed with the process. There were a couple of question I'd ask to myself... "What scale is used to fit the car?" is one of those that always linger especially when I thought that maybe the driver model I use might be too small for some cars, Red Bull X2019 Competition is one of them, comparing the cockpit to the other cars based on production models. It turns out through putting labor hours to the UR2D2 car making the answer was simply to make sure that a car with 2000 mm width is 40 pixels wide in game. Any car less wider than mentioned would have an adjusted number that may be rounded up or down to the nearest even number. In other words, I'd take the blueprint first then resize it according to its scale, giving me the base for the car body tracing. Once that's done, the window comes next and it follows the same step as it is.

But here's the fun part: the Subtract Shape option isn't the only tool on the table. The freelance graphic design job I had during the early 2021 thought me that Vector Mask is a thing, meaning that it's now easier to manage a particular layer's limit for the shading works and accomodate revisions where possible. This also allows more complex layer masks and organizations, like, for example, main body shading that shouldn't cover the rear wings as it'd have its own shading layer, allowing for a more manageable rear wing coloring for base road cars that have them, saving the layer count. 

URD2D car making is so similar to TS's, I can just port the car back and forth. Here's an upcoming URD2D WIP on TS.

Car shading itself is also revamped, relying more on Gradient tool and Pen tool more. Gradient tool is used for shading on some parts with other shading details are done by the latter. Layer manipulations (for Opacity and Fill) are also done to achieve desire shading effect, but at most times the Soft Lighting option does help with shading more than conventional method mentioned, allowing for a more immersion. Last but not least is the Bevel and Emboss effect which resulted in expected effects that might not possible with Brush tool alone, with the caveat of not setting the mentioned Layer Effect too high. Last but not least details like door lines and door handles, as well as other things, proceed as they are.

While this evolved process isn't fully used for the first four cars I've released, this lays foundation of how my future cars will be, as well as an ability for a shading revamp for the existing cars. I have inherited tons of WIPs to myself and it won't take long for them to finally see the day. Granted, completion of the cars as a UR2D2 mod would also spell a potential TS release as well. While the Daytona Coupe is already on TS, I kinda wanted to re-release it with a revamped version while incorporating the extra cars from the existing pack with a new design. I've also managed to port one of my upcoming UR2D2 creations to TS and see a great potential when it's completed. It's just that I might not release the cars to TS as an individual car but rather a part of a themed pack so as to not clutter TS's car select screen. Should I revamp these cars, maybe I'd consider adding the drawn driver model too like in the TS WIP?

SOME REFLECTION ON THE NEW SPIRIT

Some of the upcoming releases for Ultimate Racing 2D 2 by yours truly, utilizing the new car creation method explained above.

Walking through how I got this far, it went as far as the Daytona Coupe as the first car to be made into UR2D2. Despite the car being already on TS, I randomly thought that I might do something with the car, giving it a new look which includes a new set of shading work. I thought to myself that perhaps this would be yet another medium to perfect my car making and graphic designing at the same time just like TS did for years. At that time, I haven't got the full motivation yet, only a whole Daytona Coupe car randomly made just for fun.

However, the Daytona Coupe was something of a prelude of my creation career restarting. Of all cars I could make, I decided to make the Nissan Skyline GT-R R32 because I wanted to make this car on a top-down racer simply because we haven't got a Skyline R32. Interestingly enough, the "Godzilla" is exactly the same car I kept building during when I was doing 3D modeling at a random whim, so it kinda came full circle. The shading work wasn't as hard as other cars given the shape so it checked out, and the best part was when I wanted to make the racing version of it where there aren't any drastic bodywork changes to trace. It's a Group A touring car after all, and most of the cars on this class don't seem to have fancy bodywork changes.

Skyline R32 Group A liveries from left to right, clockwise: Calsonic, HKS, Axia, and Taisan Klepper.

There was, though, a challenge; creating 20 (!) liveries for the Group A Skyline is already a challenge, but there are two particular ones that do give out a high difficulty: the HKS livery, driven by Osamu Hagiwara and Yukihiro Hane during the 1993 All-Japan Touring Car Championship, and the Axia livery run by Object T, driven by Tom Kristensen and Hisashi Yokoshima a year before in the same series. Sure the HKS pattern is one of those iconic designs in the world of motorsport, but you do wonder how this pattern would look on top down racers like this. That, however, doesn't top the hardest challenge that is the Axia livery in which the livery has an outlandish, artsy motif and resizing them for smaller scales meant that the challenge increases, but in the end I've managed to pull it off. Keep in mind that throughout the work I only used blueprints, reference pictures, die-cast decals, and other things. Outside of the motorsport liveries, the DELTA one is the only fictional livery included in the pack, with the car being driven by the antagonist in the Chinese movie Thunderbolt. The thought process of including it was that I did it for funsies as to fill the already-packed grid. That said, anyone reading this who has watched that movie at least once would be thinking about when I'll be making Mitsubishi GTO.

The Group A Skyline to date is still one of my most popular creations on this game, with the first part garnered 45 subscribers and second part garnered a whopping 66 subscribers. How I'd get those numbers I don't know but I am thankful that people would enjoy this creation and that it's worth the effort. The Daytona Coupe cars have above 25 subscribers which made it my second-best as well, marking a strong start for my car making return. With an active community like UR2D2, I'm glad that my car making journey has been restarted anew with more content to come. Please do look forward for the next set of my releases in the future!

A "commission" work for Levioso the Lion's upcoming league, to be announced soon. The car above is the original base design while the car below is the same car with shading applied.

Also, before I forgot, fellow player Levioso the Lion came to me and asked to help with the car's shading as he has noted my upcoming releases. I had to re-adjust my approach with the material he's given, but in the end it finished well and is ready for the upcoming league this car is featured in, with the exact league to be announced. If you feel curious about which league this car will be featured in, head over Ultimate Racing 2D 2's official Discord server to join the fun, along with other leagues and other creations from various community members!

Ultimate Racing 2D 2 is available on Steam as an Early Access Game. Get it now and race with the community today! (It's also on sale btw!)

~[R]