Race Track Builder News

v1.6.5.0
- Added: Straighten Road/String Object/Wall popup menu function.
- Added: Node Height Smooth popup menu to String Object/Wall.
- Added: Change Drive/Fly speed using mousewheel.

v1.6.4.0 contains:
- Added: Faster capture of Google height data.
- Added: Improved grouping of objects for AC Export.
- Added: Drive/Fly - Press D to cycle.
- Added: More resilient capture of Google data when importing track.

1.6.3.0 is now out of Beta testing. Restart Steam and Enjoy! Thanks again to all those that help test the many beta versions.

Many hours have gone into this to provide an interface that allows plugin for the height and image data. Image plugin is threaded so you can begin working on the tracks before the terrain has completed getting the image data.

Bezier curves give you more control over the track curve.

New Track Import function takes the old BTB concept and adds smarts to break up track into smaller pieces and smartly places nodes and control points to better represent the track.

A few bugs fixed and some minor enhancements made.

And the next release after this is not too far away. :)

Finally the feature 2 people have been waiting 4 years for.

Import tracks from kml/kmz files (produced using Google Earth) or from data stored in CSV (Comma Separated Values) files. This allows coordinates in Longitude/Latitude optionally with Height captured via GPS device to be loaded into Race Track Builder.

But it’s better than the old BTB import. With the Google API enabled, the tracks are automatically given height information. For performance reasons, the Tracks are also automatically split into many smaller tracks and seamlessly joined.

See Support\GPS\ folder for examples.

Video tutorial coming soon.

This is currently only in Beta version and the Beta version is still Beta because I’m not getting enough/any feedback to indicate it’s working. There’s been a few minor fixes too so I expect it’s more stable than the main release. I’d be delighted if more people responded to say that it’s working, or report any bugs. Once I am confident that the Beta is working well we’ll release this too all.

Please give feedback. Please.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/388980/discussions/0/1639789306539445143/

The next version of RTB is still in development. This version is mostly around separating the Google Maps and Height functions into two plugins that can be swapped out for other plugins. This will enable us to move away from using Google and those clever enough will be able to develop their own plugins to use with RTB. Height Maps and Laser Data anyone? 😊

Another related improvement I have made is the ability to load the Google image on a background thread, so you can start working on the laying out of the track, walls, objects whilst it gathers all the images. This also lays the foundation for adding more than one Google image to your project – something I’ll add in a future release.

As usual I have underestimated how much work has been required to extract these functions into plugins and then change the RTB interface to support. I also over-estimated how much spare time I have so things are taking longer than expected (or as expected if you know me well enough).

The result will be worth it though I am sure. Once done with this (dare I mention it) I’ll start to work on adding the long-desired Bezier Spline with control points that some people can’t live without. 😊