Panthera Free

Cosmo° · Mar 31, 2016

The folks at Cruden recently announced Panthera Free on their website, to be released following the Automotive Testing Expo in Stuttgart (May 31 to June 2). You can find the official info here:

http://www.cruden.com/Cruden-Panthera-free-simulator-software.html

Due to a lack of communication from Ruud' side, I'm not sure what this means for Racer and the future of our content creation processes. Some of us have repeatedly tried to get in touch with them over the last year or so, without hearing back. When I visited the Expo last year, I briefly talked with Edwin de Vries (Senior Modelling & Simulation Engineer at Cruden) about where Racer was heading at the time and he had hinted at the possibility of a "re-branding" of Racer towards the Panthera brand. It seems this is now taking place.

Interpreting the press release, it looks like the physics engine might change from what we're currently using in free Racer. It's not clear to me whether what they refer to as CSVM Lite is the familiar platform or something different for us to work with.

I'm not sure yet if I can make it to the Expo this year, in order to talk to people at the Cruden booth in person. In any case, it would be really helpful to finally get some line of communication going with them again.

Silver Ranger · May 31, 2016

I'm perfectly fine with no multiplayer for now as long as the game has better ATi card support than Racer. I have the same concerns as Mr. Whippy when it comes to the annual updates, but I also agree that this is a great opportunity to do newer and better things. Looking forward to playing Panthera soon!

Raphael Buthmann · Jun 1, 2016

Link is avaiable now *_*

Mr Whippy · Jun 1, 2016

Where?

Silver Ranger · Jun 1, 2016

Ah, I got it to run with GLSL. Thanks for the suggestion, Raphael.

Raphael Buthmann · Jun 1, 2016

Silver Ranger said:
Downloading Panthera now. HURRY UP AND INSTALL!

And now when the game starts it just says "waiting for external physics" and "1 cars out of 1 expected" The game never loads.

Well poops, what could possibly be wrong with it?

Try opening via /SessionManagerLite/SessionManagerLite.exe

WELL... i was expecting more.
I'm getting strange fps

Sometimes 85, but most 24/40fps =/

And the graphics disappointed me a little bit...

Raphael Buthmann · Jun 1, 2016

At least.... physics look and feel better now. A LOT BETTER

Mr Whippy · Jun 1, 2016

Ah found it... big red button on the top menu of the Cruden site

So bug 1:

Envmap for the car reflection map appears to be rendered with the car present.

Thus we get the inside of the car reflected on the car external bodywork. Ooops.

Everything else looks fairly as expected. Needs more testing to check out everything.

I think we need something like Raven to 'launch' Panthera though. The old Racer menu system looks like it doesn't work at all any more (crashes, settings not remembered etc)

The session manager works ok but Raven just does all the same kinda things, but has the added benefit of detecting things like controller files, cars and tracks content, and all the other features like lap time records etc

Panthera is probably a good starting point to move forward from now it's all unified and stuff at Cruden's end.

Just a shame that envmap bug is in there, I hope it won't be a year till it gets fixed

Time to try get this floor/water reflection map thingy working, maybe. It'll make 'wet' tracks look awesome if it reflects cars/brake lights etc in it too

Dave

Mr Whippy · Jun 1, 2016

As per multiplayer, has anyone tried it yet?

It looks like it's still in here, at least in the racer.ini file?

sti228 · Jun 2, 2016

This game use DX 9 ?

And someone load Formula student ?

Jorila71xc · Jun 2, 2016

Looking through some of the documentation that comes with Panthera, it looks like you need an active install of Matlab Simulink to use the Formula Student or any cars that use that type of external physics model.

It may make those advanced physics models cost prohibitive for many, since it also notes that some student versions can only handle 1000 blocks of information and the model included with Panthera free contains 5100 blocks.

For more info refer to pages 3 &4 of the Panthera_Free.pdf included in the download package.

KS95 · Jun 2, 2016

Can't answer half the questions in the questionnaire, how are you guys downloading this?!

Mr Whippy · Jun 2, 2016

I'm unsure who created the body paint shader for the car, but it's not showing off the nice car model or the Racer graphics abilities very well.

But, it does hide the envmap error nicely because it's so dull. Hmmm.

As per Formula Student, I think we need MatLab to make it work, and that is £1,500. So I'll be sticking to the old physics for now I think haha!

As for download KS95, just say other, n/a, or hobby or whatever is available. I think it's just for their marketing needs more than anything else.

I'll try have a play with the 2nd uvw mapping and the reflection shader (floor based) soon... that's if there are any working shaders included with Panthera that use those features.

I have a feeling they're not working/implemented yet in this version though

Dave

skybh · Jun 2, 2016

I've just had a brief look

Very happy to see a new version of Racer, a bit sad that i can't play with my g25

Looking at developper guide page 34 made me happyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy !
Let's calculate much variables such as average speed or speed limiter value

radome · Jun 3, 2016

Mr Whippy said:
...
As per Formula Student, I think we need MatLab to make it work, and that is £1,500. So I'll be sticking to the old physics for now I think haha!
...
Dave

How about GNU Octave? It's quite compatible with MatLab.

I can't get it to run in Wine yet but I'm certain it's a minor wine configuration issue. I was able to run 3Dmark06 successfully in another "bottle"

Mr Whippy · Jun 3, 2016

skybh said:
a bit sad that i can't play with my g25

How come?

I'm using my G25 here.

Just create the a profile called g25.ini and put it in controllers folder, then point to it from racer.ini.

The 'launcher' for Panthera seems to fail with a custom controller setup loaded unless you add it specifically to the launcher 'lau' file though.

Ideally Raven can be tweaked to simply launch panthera.exe since Raven is a launcher 'heavy' with much better functionality for our needs.

This lite launcher seems to be useful for specific configurations with specific hardware and car/track content, but less flexible for our kind of needs.

Dave

Mr Whippy · Jun 3, 2016

Well after some quick testing the water map reflection map doesn't seem to be working.

Has anyone else had a look?

I have this feeling for the boat simulation videos we've seen the water shader has just used the live envmap instead which would work ok for most water type purposes?!

Gonna check UV 2nd coords in a short while, if I can.

Ruud, it'd be cool for some details on the rendering elements that have changed/not changed since the last Racer betas!

Cheers

Dave

Mr Whippy · Jun 3, 2016

radome said:
How about GNU Octave? It's quite compatible with MatLab.

I can't get it to run in Wine yet but I'm certain it's a minor wine configuration issue. I was able to run 3Dmark06 successfully in another "bottle"

I've no idea on Octave... worth a try with someone familiar with both MatLab and Octave I suppose!

Stereo · Jun 3, 2016

radome said:
How about GNU Octave? It's quite compatible with MatLab.

I can't get it to run in Wine yet but I'm certain it's a minor wine configuration issue. I was able to run 3Dmark06 successfully in another "bottle"

Simulink's mostly independent of Matlab (they just work together, but as here, Simulink can be used for external simulators) and Octave hasn't got an equivalent.

Mr Whippy · Jun 3, 2016

I'm gonna test uv2 stuff tomorrow, but it looks like there are some shaders in the folder using them, so well worth a try via Max > Tracked on a test track.
Just trying to add some items to the Asphalt Test Track... and it won't be an easy update to the latest version

I forgot these later versions of Racer had a whole new z-buffer and extinction implementation for the rendering of things.
My brain is now melting trying to get the asphalt shader (from the asphalt track) working here nicely, using environment reflections/cube maps for the road surface.

It's a shame Ruud didn't spot the asphalt track/PBR/PBL shaders stuff and implement the framework a little for this version.
He's the best placed person to streamline the shaders and write it all as he's making changes like doing this z-buffer and extinction re-work (why were these actually done? I can't see any practical difference on my huge tracks?)

Right now I think I need Stereo to help re-write them so they work but at this point.

The core maths/implement is all good still I'm sure, it's the shadowmapping/atmosphere re-writes and all the v2p castings that are frazzling my brain

I'm eager to hear from Cosmo on the default physics as he was keeping a keen eye on them a lot in the last few versions iirc.

Lastly, has anyone tried the sounds that were meant to have been added for late (non-free) Racer versions?
I recall seeing sound trees for damping compression sounds etc?

Cheers

Dave