NASCAR Racing 2 questions

[ACracing]

Hello, everyone. As a quick background, I've been part of the NR2003 designing community for a while. I'm very familiar with using WinMip2 for customizing NR2003 tracks. I've recently started running on NASCAR Racing 2, have noticed a lack of resources online, and I've started to amass every file I can track down in an attempt to bring the game "back to life," as it were. James' recent thread was very helpful, and I've also spent countless hours clicking links in the Wayback Machine following links that eventually lead to dead download links but I'll sometimes hit the jackpot.

I've been tackling some MIP work in the game, converting "NASCAR Racing Series" signs to the old Winston Cup Series signs. And I've figured out a painless way to get paint schemes into the game. I've been tracking my progress over at Stunod. The past few weeks, I've taken a crash course in PCX files and 256-color palettes and have hit some snags, so I'm hoping someone on these forums can steer me in the right direction.

My workflow is to use WinMip2 to unpack the track .dat file, use MipExplorer to find what I need to change, go into WinMip2, open the mip, export as bmp. I then use GIMP to make changes to the BMP while keeping it in indexed mode to preserve the palette. I have sunny.pcx and cloudy.pcx from the respective track set up in the final BMP's folder when I open it in WinMip2 in the N2 setting. And that's where my first problem happens. I generally get a white-screen BMP or it's even offset by 68 pixels! What in the world?! I've remedied this by using WinMip1's N2 options. Then everything works fine in terms of creating a MIP.


^ In the base resolution of the game in DOSBox, the signs always look good. ^

The problem comes when using the nGlide wrapper for the 3DFX version...


^This is how the sign/MIP looks when you first encounter it on the track... ^



^ But the weird thing is that a quick ESC and jumping back into the game fixes it! ^

I feel like I'm on the right path with my workflow and everything, but something is amiss. A quick glance at the issue may make it seem like it's a nGlide/3DFX issue, but I'm just hopeful someone here has encountered this problem before. I've experimented with nGlide configurations and my DOSBox output modes, but I haven't cracked the case.

I've been posting over on Stunod about my updates to the game, but I feel like the content would be more at home on these forums. I already have a firm handle on realistic driver skill ratings, editing track files for tailor-made racing, and I've streamlined the car-painting process. I plan on posting much more about NASCAR Racing 2, whether it's questions/links/tips, and hopefully an exclusive NASCAR Racing 2 forum could be set up in the future. Thanks for reading.

[Pavel 69]

Hi,
I've checked mips you have send me. Everything is ok it seems except for small row of palette colors in the bottom left corner of each texture. It looks like your GIMP or Winmip1 placed this information on image. For me WinMip2 works without problem here. I can save mip files. But your description with 'white screen' BMP make me think that wrong WinMip's game mode was used. Can you try saving mip with selected N3 mode? N3 mips are the same as N2/99.

About bad colors. It looks like wrapper problem, it picks few wrong colors during first track entering.

Just for the test I want you to try this. I noticed low framerate on your videos, maybe DosBox runs slow. Long time ago I made for myself N2 game folder using N99 windows exe files, game runs much smoother in windy. Everything is from N2 + GNS1997 Expansion pack but main exe files and some cockpit details are from N99, tracks are original with my updates. N99 uses same game physics as N2 but has some improvements to AI behavior. Also Papyrus added double file restarts.
https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1...drive_link
There is two windy exe files: Nascar2_win.exe - game with software graphics, Nascar2 3dfx_win.exe - game with 3dfx graphics. You can use nGlide or dgVoodoo wrappers to run game. I prefer dgVoodoo. So try running your track updates to check if problem is still presented.

Some notes:
Don't select Trucks. There is no truck folder so game will CTD. Cars are 1996 Cup. Other series are in cars sub-folders. I usually remove all cars from main folder and copy cars from needed subfolder.

[ACracing]

Pavel, this is unbelievable! I just had Windy running like a dream. And you're right about the framerate. I won't be able to dig into MIPs until later. But wow. Thanks!

[Pavel 69]

Great!
Forget to add. Race weekend menu and after the race car screen is little off. Because player's car 3do placement is hardcoded into exe, I couldn't change it.

[ACracing]

Great!
Forget to add. Race weekend menu and after the race car screen is little off. Because player's car 3do placement is hardcoded into exe, I couldn't change it.

That's a deal-breaker, Pavel 

[Arenacale]

Some notes:
Don't select Trucks. There is no truck folder so game will CTD. Cars are 1996 Cup. Other series are in cars sub-folders. I usually remove all cars from main folder and copy cars from needed subfolder.

Firstly, this thing is freakin' baller. I've been running an NR1999 setup recently, but getting it with the N2 aesthetic is perfect (especially since I now have a big box copy of N2). I copied over the trucks folder from NR1999 to try to get it to work - it was not letting me load races until I copied the ROL folder and objs.dat from NR1999, then the trucks work fine. The CTS tracks run fine but corrupt the race menu, I guess because of a palette issue with the track images and logos. Regardless, this is a huge win and makes N2 easier than ever. 

One question I have is regarding the car bodies. I'd love to make a more generic shape than the stock "everyone drives a Monte Carlo", but don't know where I would begin on that. I have experience with low poly models from extensive Monster Truck Madness 2 editing, but no clue if my workflow there could work on N2. Is there a best way to go about it that you know of?

[ACracing]

Pavel, is there a way to increase the replay size? I know the manual says it's dependent on the amount of RAM your computer has. In DOSBox, I'm able to change the memory size to the max to allow for at least 140 minutes of replay saved during a race. In the windy version, it seems to max out at around 13 minutes.

[Pavel 69]

Open NR1999.ini from main game folder with text editor. There should be parameter:
rem REPLAYLEN 5000000

Try to increase it.

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One question I have is regarding the car bodies. I'd love to make a more generic shape than the stock "everyone drives a Monte Carlo", but don't know where I would begin on that. I have experience with low poly models from extensive Monster Truck Madness 2 editing, but no clue if my workflow there could work on N2. Is there a best way to go about it that you know of?

Because there is no any truckset for 1996 or 1997 years I never bothered to add trucks to this windy N2 version. For me N2 track versions represent years around 1995-1997. For 1998-1999 I can use NR1999.

To add trucks you need ROL and OBJS dat from NR1999 install to have proper cockpit and menu displays. Also you need to change tracks txt files to include settings for trucks: BLAPT, RELST, TIRET.

Track and event images from N99 tracks are not compatible with N2 menus. You will get wired colors when using them. Some palette tweak is required to make it work in N2.

About carshape. It's not very easy task to change them. You need to understand structure of decompiled 3do file. But editing is possible. For example I made update for default game car. Original car has flat roof because there is only one square polygon there. I've split it into three parts and made it bit rounder. Also I've split some square polygons from front hood into several triangles to eliminate texture distortions there and to make shape bit smoother. So overall it's possible to edit carshape  If you want to try I can try to help you.

[ACracing]

Open NR1999.ini from main game folder with text editor. There should be parameter:
rem REPLAYLEN  5000000

Try to increase it.

---

I've tried changing that number by adding an extra zero and removing an extra space between REPLAYLEN and 5000000. Nothing seems to work. Not a huge deal, but if you have any other ideas, let me know. I have to let the game run 15 minutes every time I try something to see if longer replays are saving, so I'll take care of that part of the troubleshooting haha.

---

Also, I noticed this line at the bottom of your Pocono track file:

AIDMG 1 150

Safe to assume this is for AI damage? Do you know what those numbers mean? Is it possible to turn off AI Damage at tracks?

[Pavel 69]

It's strange that replay settings doesn't effect anything...

Also, I noticed this line at the bottom of your Pocono track file:

AIDMG 1 150

Safe to assume this is for AI damage? Do you know what those numbers mean? Is it possible to turn off AI Damage at tracks?

This line is not used by N2/99. It's from NR3 track.