CHANGING DRIVERS USING DRIVERS.TXT

A change to the patched (1.1) version is that the program will optionally read the driver list from a plain text file instead of using its internal data. This allows a skilled user to modify the driver information and add new drivers. You should be familiar with using Notepad, and be skilled at moving and renaming files and extensions. It often helps to configure "explorer" to show file extensions, so that "car116.tex" and "car116.cvs" don't look like just "car116".

WARNING: Any changes you make here are "at your own risk"... it is possible to cause the game to crash by improperly modifying these files. Consider yourself duly warned!

Drivers.txt should go in the "config" directory where options.cfg is stored. It is important to use a plain-text editor such as notepad when editing this file, because full-fledged word processors such as Word can turn it into a binary file incompatible with the program. When changing the drivers.txt, you must be very careful not to mispell a command word, leave out a statement, or make other small errors. It is a good idea to make a backup copy of the drivers.txt file before doing any editing, so that if you screw up, you can always get back to where you were before! When you run the program after editing drivers.txt, it will attempt to read the file in... if there are errors that it can detect it will use the built-in defaults instead. Check the heat.log file for information pertaining to the error found.

The file drivers.txt contains a bunch of "Driver tables", each of which defines a driver. One such table looks like this:

table Driver
number 6
name Mark Martin
chassis Stock
rank 5
ui_image MMartin.img
race_image 12
body_style fcar
end

Each driver table begins with the line "table Driver" and ends with the line "end". It is important to note that after the last table, there is another, additional "end" line to signify the end of the file. In the body of the table, there are a number of lines that define attributes of the driver. These can be listed in any order within the table, but they all must be listed, with some exceptions noted below.

You can also add blank lines, or comment lines that begin with a semicolon (;), to help make the file easier to read.

Here are the statements that define the driver:

"number 6"
This means the driver will be the "6" car. This also means that the driver will use the texture-map file "car6.tex". If it doesn't exist in paint.res or paint256.res, it will look for the file in the config directory. If the file doesn't exist there, the car will be plain white.
"name Mark Martin"
The driver's name will be "Mark Martin".
"chassis Stock"
The driver will use the "stock.car" chassis (this is the only option)
"rank 5"
This driver is the fifth-best driver, and will be very likely to show up in small AI car packs.
"ui_image MMartin.img"
This will use the built-in picture of Mark Martin in the "Choose Driver" screen. If you are adding a new driver, you should delete this line, because you won't have a built-in picture. If the line is removed, the game will look for the file "car6.cvs" in the config directory. If you paint your car in the Paintkit, it will also create a "picture" of the car in the config directory as head0.cvs (or head1,2, or 3 if you are player 2,3 or 4). You can copy this file as car6.cvs if you want to use that for this driver.
"race_image 12"
This will use the 12th small headshot for the in-race displays. Unfortunately, there's no way to add or modify these images. To use the "empty" face, choose 100 for this value.
"body_style fcar"
This will use the fcar body-style. The paintkit only has a template for the "ccar" body style, so to paint other styles you must use the Restools, available on some fan websites. This should get you started. One thing to note, is that each driver must be matched up to his or her paintjob.


EXAMPLE:

Let's add a new driver, named "Doctor Foo". We will add this to the drivers.txt, at the top:

table Driver
number 616
name Doctor Foo
chassis Stock
rank 20
ui_image MMartin.img
race_image 100
body_style ccar
end

Then, take the .tex file that you've made in the paintkit (which may be called paint0.tex, or paint1-3.tex if you are player 2, 3, or 4). Make a copy of this called "car616.tex" in your config directory. Copy the head0.cvs file as "car616.cvs". Now, start the game. You should be able to select your new car, and it should have the correct paint-job.

If you want to race against your friends using your new car, you must send them the texture files so that they can see your new paintjob, instead of a plain white car. However, they don't have to change their own drivers.txt. So you would send your friend "car616.tex" and have him or her put the file into his or her config directory, and then go racing!