MMG Spa 2007 v1.0 Release Options

[Petros Mak]

Hello all, the MMG 2007 Spa v1.0 is now released and you can find it via the link below. For now we only have mirrors for Mediafire, Fileplanet and Adrive but more are being made. Filefront upload service is down for maintenance so we have to wait for that one.

Enjoy

http://www.makmodgroup.com/mmg_spa_07.php

[Klutch]

Great thanks, Petros.
I sure this track will be best.

[Juliański]

Great job. The best Spa I've ever seen. I'm waiting on your next tracks.

[richrosa]

Thank you so much for SPA-fantastic track.

[chingchel]

Thanks everyone! What a good way to start a day with a fantastic track ready for download!

[imacken]

Thanks Petros/Steve.
Track is really good, but the AI timings are quite a way out.
MMG qualifying 1:51-1:55 - real F1 2007 1:45-1:47.
Can this be tweaked Steve?

[Steve B]

Thank you very much guys.
Sorry it took so long but as you can see I haven't stopped working.

I am very happy that you like the track, I hope you get a sence of actually driving at SPA.


I will do my best to try and get the AI times down imacken.

CHEERS!!

Steve B

[togy]

Thanks.Good Job.

[crbassassin]

i couldn't get the track to load

[Petros Mak]

Just for future references. When errors like that occur its 99% corrupt download. Now the downloads work as they have been tested, so either your net conked out while downloading for a brief second or something happened that corrupted the download. Re-downloading will fix it. Sometimes I find I have to download things 3-5 times lately with all these download places. Dunno why its been happening lately but yeah. Just re-download and you should be fine.

[simracer]

This is a very average looking track indeed, certainly not the best Spa ever.
The transparencies are all messed up on the fences, the spec settings on the track have been set to black to mask what looks like horrific mapping errors on the road surface (in fact nearly every spec setting on the track is black???), the window transparencies are not set up right and there are no reflections, some of the textures and mapping on the tso's looks very basic and just plain terrible, the whole of the track looks oversaturated and very cartoon like, the list is sadly quite long. A lot of these things are a quick fix (half an hour for transparencies and windows, a lot of it would mean remapping and retexturing (a good few days work)
The Simbin version of spa would have been a far better base to start with, and as they have given permission to convert their tracks as long as a dvd check is included it would have been not only legal but a good way of supporting them too.
This for me is not a keeper, nice try but not worth keeping.

[Petros Mak]

Just so you know, this track is made for rFactor, not simbin's title. We're supporting rFactor here, not simbin. Our GTR Evo mods support Simbin's GTR Evo, but our rF mods have no reason to support simbin when its not a simbin product.

[imacken]

Just so you know, this track is made for rFactor, not simbin's title. We're supporting rFactor here, not simbin. Our GTR Evo mods support Simbin's GTR Evo, but our rF mods have no reason to support simbin when its not a simbin product.

Petros/Steve.
I'm afraid I've got to agree with simracer. Now that I've got over the initial excitement of your Spa being released, and enjoying the driving aspect, I'm seeing all sorts of horrible things!
Examples of things that look poor are:
- the sponsor banners. They have no depth and look 2 dimensional, e.g. Martini. They don't blend into the background at all.
- the stands just look unfinished, especially the roofs. (Look at the ones on the left after turn 1, or the Bridgestone building.)
- look at the way the sky moves compared to the horizon, e.g. near Pouen corner.
The whole track just doesn't look right. It has an unfinished feel to it. No sense of immersion at all.
Now, this is the first time that I have criticised any of 'your' tracks over the last year. The quality is usually superb, but something is wrong here.
Just take a look at culmone67's rf1 GP4/GTL conversion to see what the graphics should look like. Your track drives well (better than culmone67's, but there is just no feeling of 'being there' with the rather basic graphics.
Sorry!

[Petros Mak]

Yes we know texture aspects need fixing hence why this is called a v1.0 release and not FINAL_Release as our tracks have been known to be graded in the past. Just to refresh everyone's memory. We go through this phase of releases...

Alpha: Version given to select few in MMG by the staff member to have it overviewed and tested and adequate feedback given back.

Beta: Version given to beta testers to view and give feedback for.

v1.0: Version given to public as the first of what can turn out to be a series of updates in accordance to what feedback we get from the public. Sometimes the public see's things our beta testers don't.

vX.X: X being the version and variation numbers. These updates are given out to the community until we can no longer find any bugs or updates required to be done.

FINAL: This is the completely final version that is released that will no longer be worked on in the current game it is being used in.

This structure works the same for mods, not just tracks. I hope this clears some things up.

We knew textures in a few areas needed fixing, also that some of you also failed to mention that quite a few sponsor logo's are not even 2007 logo's. We knew this already but still wanted to release this track to acquire feedback from the players. Most leagues that use our tracks change logo's anyway so that wasn't going to be much of an issue for them, the texture issue would be more for the common player which we are fixing.

But thank you for your reports as this is exactly what we wanted to see, what the community would find a problem with this track so we can then continue fixing things.

As for simracer, claiming its not a keeper or we should be supporting another company more is something I do not take kindly to. No one gets better at doing something without feedback and if you don't keep the track, then you won't see how it can progress in the future. Bear in mind that SteveB works really hard to get these tracks out and then spends countless of more hours updating them once feedback is acquired.

As for supporting simbin more, we do that with our GTR Evo mod, I don't see why we need to support them in our rFactor mods when they are not the creators of rFactor. We don't like doing rival game conversions and the only reason we do the F1C - rF tracks from RH's trackpack is because Steve does a great job in it compared to others you have seen around the net and while doing it, he learns to better himself more and more. Sure simbin tracks are great, but they would need to be cut down so much to be put in rfactor due to the resource hungry that they are.

As SteveB is the ONLY track modeler we have for our modding side, you can clearly see why it takes so much time.

[f_fisico]

hello

I have great news regarding the track textures I've spoken to Culmone67, he said that as soon as he will find the time he will do one of he's fantastic updates for Spa ......he he doesn't get any better guys
http://www.drivingitalia.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=44330

By the way if you are interested he has some new updates for some other tracks, Check it out here(Istanbul, Virginia, Machwerk):http://www.drivingitalia.net/forum/index.php?showforum=189

The tracks he is curently updating are : Nuerburg and Valencia you can find some pictures here : http://www.drivingitalia.net/forum/index.php?showtopic=44317

[Petros Mak]

I hope he won't be using MMG's track to be doing updates with, or at least get in contact with us first.

[f_fisico]

He never re releases a track, he only releases updates so if one wishes to install over your track will if not one won't
He even refuzed to update untill today, any other track considered "illegal" so there's no point worry.
Contacting him is very difficult because he's english is very poor(if you speak italian there's no problem).
Anyway check his forum I've already posted the link above

[imacken]

Yes we know texture aspects need fixing hence why this is called a v1.0 release and not FINAL_Release as our tracks have been known to be graded in the past. Just to refresh everyone's memory. We go through this phase of releases...

Alpha: Version given to select few in MMG by the staff member to have it overviewed and tested and adequate feedback given back.

Beta: Version given to beta testers to view and give feedback for.

v1.0: Version given to public as the first of what can turn out to be a series of updates in accordance to what feedback we get from the public. Sometimes the public see's things our beta testers don't.

vX.X: X being the version and variation numbers. These updates are given out to the community until we can no longer find any bugs or updates required to be done.

FINAL: This is the completely final version that is released that will no longer be worked on in the current game it is being used in.

This structure works the same for mods, not just tracks. I hope this clears some things up.

We knew textures in a few areas needed fixing, also that some of you also failed to mention that quite a few sponsor logo's are not even 2007 logo's. We knew this already but still wanted to release this track to acquire feedback from the players. Most leagues that use our tracks change logo's anyway so that wasn't going to be much of an issue for them, the texture issue would be more for the common player which we are fixing.

But thank you for your reports as this is exactly what we wanted to see, what the community would find a problem with this track so we can then continue fixing things.

Thanks for that Petros. (I didn't want to mention the wrong sponsor thing at this stage!)
I note what you said, but lots of the tracks that Steve released - Europe, Hungary, USA, France as examples - were v1 and didn't go any further. They didn't need to as they were fine as they stood. So, the whole structure that you mentioned is not at all clear to users like me.
I would also say that out of all the tracks released by you guys, a v1 has never looked as unfinished as this Spa.
(only trying to be helpful!)

[Petros Mak]

The reason the tracks didn't go further is because he and Phil had a falling out which resulted in Steve quitting for a time. I always tried to see the potential in Steve and encouraged him to keep improving his skills. If one doesn't keep trying, they will never improve. Phil however would demotivate him and bash his tracks entirely, which caused Steve to leave for about 6-7 months.

When Phil left MMG a month or two ago, Steve and I chatted and he decided to come back seeing as he didn't have Phil's negativity anymore. Steve doesn't claim to be the best track builder, and always apologises for things not being as high quality as others, but I don't give a shit about that, what I care about is that he's trying to do something he enjoys and I want to support him in that and ofcourse give him adequate feedback so he can see where he needs to better his work. He enjoys that too. But outright bashes or saying the track is shit, this is crap etc, etc, is not the way to help someone improve and keep them motivated to keep doing the job for the community for free.

This is why the other tracks remained v1.0 and weren't updated. However many of them since Steve's return have been updated yet again and we'll be going through beta testing another 4 tracks that have been updated from their old versions to something newer. When we feel they are ready for public, we will release them.

I hope this explains why so many tracks were left behind and why the trackpack never came in its entirety.

[simracer]

The reason the tracks didn't go further is because he and Phil had a falling out which resulted in Steve quitting for a time. I always tried to see the potential in Steve and encouraged him to keep improving his skills. If one doesn't keep trying, they will never improve. Phil however would demotivate him and bash his tracks entirely, which caused Steve to leave for about 6-7 months.

When Phil left MMG a month or two ago, Steve and I chatted and he decided to come back seeing as he didn't have Phil's negativity anymore. Steve doesn't claim to be the best track builder, and always apologises for things not being as high quality as others, but I don't give a shit about that, what I care about is that he's trying to do something he enjoys and I want to support him in that and ofcourse give him adequate feedback so he can see where he needs to better his work. He enjoys that too. But outright bashes or saying the track is shit, this is crap etc, etc, is not the way to help someone improve and keep them motivated to keep doing the job for the community for free.

This is why the other tracks remained v1.0 and weren't updated. However many of them since Steve's return have been updated yet again and we'll be going through beta testing another 4 tracks that have been updated from their old versions to something newer. When we feel they are ready for public, we will release them.

I hope this explains why so many tracks were left behind and why the trackpack never came in its entirety.

can't see anyone saying the track is crap or shit here and to be honest it seems daft to release a track that has some really obvious and easily fixed (30 mins tops) errors as a v1.0
but that's up to you, just when you say in other posts that your finalizing the track it does makr it sound like you consider the track to be finisheed, unless I misunderstand the meaning of final.