Hello! A few questions: change color of cars? multiplayer?

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tlm70
GP2 Newbie
Posts: 26
Joined: 21.01.2014, 03:36

Hello! A few questions: change color of cars? multiplayer?

Post by tlm70 »

Hello all!
It's good to see GP2 activity still on the net. As in a previous post from JoseFernandez I too have been playing F1GP since it came out in 1991. Ironically, I wasn't an F1 fan at all when I purchased the game for my Atari ST. I was an indycar fan that wanted something similar to the PC sim Indianapolis 500 to play on my Atari. F1GP practically introduced me to the world of formula one racing. I carried the instruction manual with me whenever I could because it was so different than what I had known of indycar racing but so much more fascinating. I now also play GP2 and GP4 mods but F1GP is still tempting to play. I have fond memories of my first impressions of the tree lined straights of Monza and Hockenheim or the tight streets of Monoco. Since I didn't have cable TV the only race I could ever watch was the Monoco Grand Prix and that was only when it wasn't being aired at the same time as the Indy 500. But thanks to bittorrent and some really nice F1 fans I have been watching every F1 season since 2006.

Recently I've been playing FK's sports car mods on GP2 while I take a break from the ICR2 and GP4 mods. I changed the color of one of the car bitmaps in the mod but when I load the newly colored bitmap into GP2Edit I see no change to the car colors at all. Any idea what I'm not doing correctly?

Also, is anyone racing online with GP2? I set up two DOSBOX sessions (one as the server and one as the client that used my internet ip address to connect to the server) and successfully started a multiplayer game but I noticed that to get decent frame rates I had to drop the Super Eagle scaler I was using in single player games. Only two human players can link up in a game but it's better than always racing against the AI.
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rremedio
GP2 Legend
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Joined: 14.01.2007, 15:05

Re: Hello! A few questions: change color of cars? multiplaye

Post by rremedio »

Hi!

No matter how you get into motor racing, falling into GP2's charm in inevitable. :D

You can also watch races prior 2006 at youtube. Some real gems there!

Your problem with bitmaps probably comes from GP2 palette limitations. The file must be a 256 colors bitmaps with the correct color palette. The best way to ensure your file is correct is editing it with winXP paint.

Can't help about multiplayer. I've tested it with two computers under the same network, but never really played online.

Cheers!
"The Fox provides for himself. but God provides for the Lion"
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Early 90s F1 forever!
tlm70
GP2 Newbie
Posts: 26
Joined: 21.01.2014, 03:36

Re: Hello! A few questions: change color of cars? multiplaye

Post by tlm70 »

If you're referring to 'MS Paint' in windows then I'll certainly give it a try. What do you mean by 'correct color palette' ? Do I need to separately save the palette of each car 256 bitmap image before I can change the color? Am I restricted to using only the colors on that palette or can I change the colors of the palette rather than repainting the bitmap image? I saw some kind of reference to that in a GP2 html general FAQ but it wasn't as specific as I had hoped it would be about car painting.
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RacerBG
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Joined: 09.08.2010, 17:57
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Re: Hello! A few questions: change color of cars? multiplaye

Post by RacerBG »

tlm70 wrote:If you're referring to 'MS Paint' in windows then I'll certainly give it a try. What do you mean by 'correct color palette' ? Do I need to separately save the palette of each car 256 bitmap image before I can change the color? Am I restricted to using only the colors on that palette or can I change the colors of the palette rather than repainting the bitmap image? I saw some kind of reference to that in a GP2 html general FAQ but it wasn't as specific as I had hoped it would be about car painting.
Use "MS Paint" from XP or earlier. It can save 256 colors BMP files. When you are using it no palette messing is needed.
tlm70
GP2 Newbie
Posts: 26
Joined: 21.01.2014, 03:36

Re: Hello! A few questions: change color of cars? multiplaye

Post by tlm70 »

I think I see where I've been making my mistake. I haven't seen it documented anywhere yet, but I think all the cars and cockpits use a single universal palette. So, if I change a car or cockpit to a color that is not on the palette the result would be just what I had before - no change is shown in GP2edit or in GP2.

Do all the other objects in GP2 use that same single palette?
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rremedio
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Joined: 14.01.2007, 15:05

Re: Hello! A few questions: change color of cars? multiplaye

Post by rremedio »

Not sure about cockpits (I think they also do), but all cars and all track objects use the same palette. The colors displayed when you drive may be different from that palette because every track (.dat) file have palette changing commands that apply to everything displayed by GP2 in a racing session (that's why some colors won't be displayed corrected at some tracks, a problem most famous because of the green cars, as those palette changing commands are most used to change the colors of grass and tree textures).
"The Fox provides for himself. but God provides for the Lion"
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Early 90s F1 forever!
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