Livery Editor

[RacerPaul]

Hi all I'm having a hell of a time getting my head around creating custom liveries

I don't seem to be able to change the colour of the vinyls, etc

In Pro-Street I could create some great liveries, Shift 1 was a clunky affair but I managed

In Shift 2, I'm groping around like a novice. Any hints, tips, help please?

Thanks in advance

 

[dice1998]

I'll have to agree that prostreet had one of the greatest vinyl editor systems around.

SHIFT 2's livery editor is very limited, i'd say work with the decals (manufacturers and such) and some of the other premade objects (like in team western or something), then start experimenting on making your own things (like arrows) from the primitive objects.

Patience is the key.

 

[Ardius]

Yeah, the livery editor is truly second-rate, the controls are very twitchy and the options are very limited.
This is the best I've managed so far (Steve Soper's BTCC M3 from 1992):

And its even screwed this up as now when I load the game, it moves the red stripes into bizarre locations. Probably due to the mirror function which has saved some odd rotation variable wrong.
Why you can't copy mirror single vinyls is beyond me, simply mirroring or copying the entire side is not what I always want to do!

At least they give you the ability to place a lot of vinyls down though! Oh and the camera function is terrible too..and the menu system burying all the options and functions in layers and layers of different button presses.

The whole game is one big mess really, its lucky that the core gameplay is quite fun as everything is pretty shocking really.

As for tips, eh, just try and think of an idea and use that. I did that BMW livery using just primitive squares for the stripes (including the race numbers), primitive circles for the race numbers and manufacturer decals. I was tempted to go even further and manipulate the squares and circles to put "Soper" on the windows, but I really can't be bothered as its far too much effort and this game goes and screws it up when it saves it anyway!

 

[Spagetti69]

Are numbers unlockable in this game.

I've shelved my copy waiting for patch (PS3).

Was getting on fine with Xbox till my wheel died.

Arrggh.

 

[MuchoJimbo]

I agree that the editor is so/so, the touchyness of decal placement is very frustrating, but I do like the ability to mirror to other side (never played any other NFS) so maybe this was available before.

Not sure about the numbers, looks like Ardius made the number 4 with the shapes? Not sure.

And letters would be nice to use also.

 

[Spagetti69]

No numbers, that's a missed opportunity.
Really easy to put a square with numbers in and bingo race number for online series ect.

 

[Ardius]

I agree that the editor is so/so, the touchyness of decal placement is very frustrating, but I do like the ability to mirror to other side (never played any other NFS) so maybe this was available before.

Not sure about the numbers, looks like Ardius made the number 4 with the shapes? Not sure.

And letters would be nice to use also.

I made the numbers with primitives, yes. As I said, I was going to go a step further and add the letters "Soper" to the windows but it just seems like rediculous amounts of effort.
And then the game goes and fudges the vinyls when I reload the game. 👎

 

[RacerPaul]

Thanks for the replies all 👍

I agree that patience would help a great deal, so I really should give doing a livery a good go

Ardius, that BMW looks great

 

[Mazyata]

The livery editor is a mini game all by itself. Try switching your thumbs when placing the decals so one thumb does not get too tired. It is all about luck and persistence when landing that sticker in the right spot.

I totally agree with the above posts. There are lots of other issues. Just hope they fix the jumpy sticker placement controls and add numbers/letters.

Their system is a major POS. It boggles the mind on how they released it this way. The makers and testers are brain dead. What made it worse was that they claimed it was overhauled from the previous mess in Shift 1.

 

[OLDSKOOLACURA]

I was never one to do a lot to my cars (look wise), but I put a few stickers on my S2000 and R32 and it does seem like they didn't put a lot of thought into the livery.

takes time and patience

 

[Speedster502]

I used the livery editor to try and recreate one of my favourite drifter, I managed to get the majority done despite the hideously twitchy controls, then saved the livery to continue on it at another point. Reloaded the game the next day to find it had wiped the whole livery, I've decided not to do anymore until this issue is patched.

Also, I was creating the Sumo Power Drifter, but the manufacturer logo for some bizzarre reason isn't in the list of available manufacturers. In my opinion, this is crazy the Sumo Power GT logo is plastered around particular tracks, as many other logos are, but we can't use them on our own cars?

Another thing regarding liveries but not specific to the livery editor, is the missing elements to some of the liveries (talking about the official ones here). Some of the FIA GT1/GT3 logos are missing several sponsors, and more importantly the All-Inkl Lamborghini looks practically empty because they have put the All-Inkl sponsor on but removed the '.com' part of the logo making the livery look unbalanced. I don't understand why it's like this as they already are advertising the brand by placing the logo on the car, surely having the '.com' won't make a difference? It's really quite perplexing considering they are supposed to have the official licensing of both FIA GT1 World Championship & FIA GT3 European Championship.

 

[Ardius]

Their system is a major POS. It boggles the mind on how they released it this way. The makers and testers are brain dead. What made it worse was that they claimed it was overhauled from the previous mess in Shift 1.

Woah woah woah, hold on there. Don't blame this on lowly programmers and testers. Blame it on producers and lead designers.

I used the livery editor to try and recreate one of my favourite drifter, I managed to get the majority done despite the hideously twitchy controls, then saved the livery to continue on it at another point. Reloaded the game the next day to find it had wiped the whole livery, I've decided not to do anymore until this issue is patched.

Also, I was creating the Sumo Power Drifter, but the manufacturer logo for some bizzarre reason isn't in the list of available manufacturers. In my opinion, this is crazy the Sumo Power GT logo is plastered around particular tracks, as many other logos are, but we can't use them on our own cars?

Another thing regarding liveries but not specific to the livery editor, is the missing elements to some of the liveries (talking about the official ones here). Some of the FIA GT1/GT3 logos are missing several sponsors, and more importantly the All-Inkl Lamborghini looks practically empty because they have put the All-Inkl sponsor on but removed the '.com' part of the logo making the livery look unbalanced. I don't understand why it's like this as they already are advertising the brand by placing the logo on the car, surely having the '.com' won't make a difference? It's really quite perplexing considering they are supposed to have the official licensing of both FIA GT1 World Championship & FIA GT3 European Championship.

Hmm that stuff is iffy. Licensing is a mysterious area which we will never know the exact details of. For all we know there were restrictions on the licensing that Sumo Power couldn't be featured in the vinyls list (perhaps they didn't want to be plastered on liveries which are nasty or repulsive) and the website stuff too sounds like something which can be restricted in licensing agreements. Perhaps even EA have a policy on websites? Most of the time, if sponsors are not featured in a game or altered, its due to either laws (like alcohol/tobacco being replaced by barcodes or blank spaces on old cars in GT) or licensing restrictions.
Really cosmetic and irrelevant though, there are bigger issues in this game than those.

 

[Speedster502]

Hmm that stuff is iffy. Licensing is a mysterious area which we will never know the exact details of. For all we know there were restrictions on the licensing that Sumo Power couldn't be featured in the vinyls list (perhaps they didn't want to be plastered on liveries which are nasty or repulsive) and the website stuff too sounds like something which can be restricted in licensing agreements. Perhaps even EA have a policy on websites?
Really cosmetic and irrelevant though, there are bigger issues in this game than those.

There is that, but I feel that because Sumo Power have been made quite a large part of the game (by being the final car you win from the final championship) I would have thought it could be used elsewhere. But, I don't know the licensing as you said seems weird, same situation with the web addresses (but at the same time they show Sumo Power's website, yet don't show the 'gt1world.com' that's written on the cars which is confusing). Also I never said these were big issues within the game, I was just pointing them out.

I think that make this livery editor successful all they really need to do is include the ability to use numbers/letters as well as giving the playing a more controlled way of moving the vinyls around. Also a better view point might help in some instances. Whether these things will be patched or not I don't know, I hope so. But as you said some bigger issues are to be fixed concerning the freezes and various glitches within the game.

 

[Ardius]

There are a lot of things they "need to do" to make the livery editor decent:
-Fix the movement speed and accuracy of placing and editing vinyls.
-Fix the camera so you have a wider angle and you can freely position it so that you don't have to hold it just to see. (and fix the "Front" view so it actually faces front, not Front-right like it currently does!)
-Overhaul the menus, I don't get why there are so many different variations of control scheme for different menus. On loading screens you use the Left analogue stick to switch screens, on sub-menus you use L1 and R1 - why is it not uniform? Why not just have an ordinary menu system? It makes it needlessly complicated for no reason. A serious lack of basic HCI principles here.
-Fix the bug where reloading the save data messes up various aspects of the custom livery.
-Provide more options for editing vinyls. Allow us to copy a previously placed Vinyl with its scaling, rotation and colour so we can easily place several identical vinyls rather than having to place a new vinyl and spend hours trying to make it look identical. Allow us to mirror just single vinyls as well, sometimes we don't want to mirror everything as we are only editing a small part.
-Provide "slots" or a suitable alternative so we can save multiple liveries for one car.

I'm not completely fussed about car numbers and letters though they would be appreciated, they are merely cosmetic additions. The points I list above though are quite serious issues that need to be addressed if possible (changing the menus isn't possible now but should be kept in mind for future titles).

 

[Wdave]

I would appreciate having an option to use the mouse to place a vinyl on the PC version.
But other then that I'm really having a hell of a time trying to recreate the DBR9 in British Green.

 

[Toptube]

You CAN copy/mirror single decals, not just an entire side at once.

Overall, the livery editor is pretty much copy/pasted from Shift 1, plus the ability to copy/mirror decals.

Strangely, you can no longer change the color for any of the stripes. But you could in Shift 1.

some changes I'd like to see:

besides smoothing out the movement and giving an option to slow it down...

don't use angled views as the defaults. It makes it really difficult to center and/or straighten decals. All preset views should be perpendicular in relation to the surface chose.

give us complete control over the camera. don't make it auto-snap back. forcing us to do thumb yoga while placing decals is not preferrable. Do give us a button to auto snap the camera back to the default view for the surface chosen. More camera control would also be great because when placing stuff on "top" of the car, often the front/top and rear/top are at the very edge of the camera. You never get a clear view. Combine that with the angled and limited camera control-----you NEVER get a clear view of these spots.

a decal creator would be nice, especially if they are going to omit things like numbers, in a racing game.

the way the hood color texture joins with the front/bumper texture is still screwed up in exactly the same way it was in Shift 1. If you make them different colors, the hood color texture overlaps unnaturally.

 

[Mazyata]

"Woah woah woah, hold on there. Don't blame this on lowly programmers and testers. Blame it on producers and lead designers."

Well then, whoever that was in charge was surely brain dead and all the others that was associated with them. Someone somewhere could have done something about it. In the end they didn't. Screw them.

 

[Ardius]

Well then, whoever that was in charge was surely brain dead and all the others that was associated with them. Someone somewhere could have done something about it. In the end they didn't. Screw them.

Sadly, not many companies will listen to their underlings these days. If a producer says they aren't going to try and fix issues due to deadlines or if a designer says its by design, thats that. The industry is extremely cut-throat, which leads to an enormous amount of pressure on all involved.

Its not a testers job to change the game, all a tester can do is tell the dev team what is going wrong and sometimes even make suggestions. If the devs decide not to fix it, its not the testers fault is it? Just because the tester is associated, does that make him brain dead?

We can't know why this title has been left like it has but the most common and obvious reason is a rushed job, either because the budget was falling short or deadlines were close. Its not always someone's fault, sometimes a game can become stuck in development hell, where the issues fixed cause more issues. Sometimes it is just silly producers making bizarre decisions to cut content.

To their credit, the developers have made a fun game, the physics while not amazingly realistic are at least engaging and reasonably realistic. The track selection is excellent, the car list is pretty good too. All the core elements are here to make this game a worthwhile purchase. Its just not a very polished game, its a lot like Ferrari Challenge actually, and thats no bad thing - both games are fun, decent racing games. They have released the game with relatively few major bugs, there are a few hangs and the online is a little unstable but its no worse than a lot of release-build games these days. Its a little unfair to call the devs brain dead.

 

[Wdave]

Screw messing around with the livery editor, it seems that I can unpack the textures from the Shift 2 folder.
I might just do a little tinkering with it.

 

[mad_doc_1982]

Well, I never where too deep into optical tuning and livery stuff. But somehow the whole NFS series always quirked out some creativity of myself. And what I have to face now at S2U is near as ridiculous. The lack of precision, the lack of possibilities...

I mean: why? Why not to pick up the whole editors of former entities of the series? Why to chose to strip it down by every new title? Whats the problem? Legal stuff? Okay, I say. But where is the problem with the really cool NOT licensed vinyls and decals? Because the **** SURE I want to have a skull at the hood scope of my Charger. And what have I done to anybody that I deserve to mess around with one of the worst menues I ever had to face in a NFS title?

Guys, I like you. Honestly. But let me ask ONE simple question:

If you HAD to adapt most of the bad habits Shift 1 had, wheren't there some space on the disc left for the GOOD ones?

 

[Dmarc_Atl]

UGh
placing decals is just like how the car turns in the game
its so twitchy
you move the stick slightly it does nothing
move a bit hard it jump to the next spot

 

[mad_doc_1982]

Yes man, but at least we can force the cars to behave throughout the settings of control and/or the car's setup. For the editor we CANT.

 

[P_Lav]

Yeah, you definitely need patience, but it is possible to make some o.k. looking liverys, this is the best one I made, my attempt at the 787B paint scheme on an FC.

The biggest gripe I have is the camera angles, their too close, example, the side view on most cars includes a bit of the front and rear bumpers, and the camera is too zoomed to see it, so you have to blindly apply vinyls. And also on odd angles, they're is a fair bit of distortion.

 

[OLDSKOOLACURA]

^looks pretty damn good

 

[mad_doc_1982]

Yeah, looks nice. Only benefit I had from the actual editor was the inspiration to put some rust stains on my Charger. Fits the car. In a positive way.^^

 

[Mazyata]

Ardius, now I have a better understanding. Some of this and that is fine. But this is something so obvious. I just question their logic and priorities. They sure have some things twisted. Don't get me wrong, I love this game. A fan but not a fanboy.

PLav, that FC is hot! Both my thumbs would be sore trying to attempt that! Keep it up.

 

[brainfade]

Yeah, the livery editor is truly second-rate, the controls are very twitchy and the options are very limited.
This is the best I've managed so far (Steve Soper's BTCC M3 from 1992):

I love this, but wasn't it sponsored by Listerine on the bonnet? Doesn't the texture/livery files come under .dds ?

 

[///M-Spec]

Here's my first attempt with the livery editor. Sorta based on the old Valvoline BMW M3s that ran in GT3 the mid-late '90s.

The lack of numbers is a big WTH. I also miss the flags from Shift1. BMW livery had a lot of that in the '90s.

M

 

[Ardius]

I love this, but wasn't it sponsored by Listerine on the bonnet? Doesn't the texture/livery files come under .dds ?

Yes and I have no idea as I don't have the PC version, I made this on my PS3. I switched in the Dynojet logo as I felt it fitted best (as a racing team rather than a parts supplier).
You'll also note I used look-alikes for the Shell logos too.

The only logos that are spot on are Yokohama and Champion.

As soon as I noticed that this era M3 was in the game, I immediately knew I had to re-create that livery.

 

[AeroXMetalica]

Very limited indeed, but you'll be surprised of what you could come up with. 👍