A SimHQ "Second Look" Feature
New Developments in Grand Prix Legends

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How Absolutely Refreshing!

And in which other simulations do you encounter and have to deal with broken down cars limping back to the pits, just as you come blasting out of a blind corner over the crest of a hill, all four wheels off the ground?!

Whether you’re very familiar with GPL or not, join us in a celebration of this truly unique simulation and discover in the second part of this article what new mods await us.

Lola T-70

Overview

To help us gaining an overview of the various mods in different stages of development, I’ve talked with Arturo Pereira, who is well placed in the community to know about all things GPL:

“There are several mods in the making, though with different degrees of progress due to limits on the availability of time we have. The mods that have been started are: Cortinas, 1968 Tasman Cup, 1935 Grand Prix, 1937 Grand Prix, 1951 Formula 1, 1955 Formula 1, 1968 Formula 1, 1967 Formula 2, 1967 USAC, 1967 Sports Cars, 1971 CanAm, and the 1974 Lancia Stratos. The mod that we are working more at the moment is the 1967 Sports Cars, though all the aforementioned mods are active and we can drive them. The main problem is, as usual , available time. We have also plans to make the 1966 CanAm, 1955 Sports Cars and a 1970 or 1971 Indy Car mods.”

Arturo continues:

“The whole process of developing a mod includes: cars, physics, menus, sounds and AI. In some cases, we also need to modify or to make some tracks that were raced by those cars. For instance, in 1967, the Sports Cars or Sport Prototypes raced in a version of Monza10k that had chicanes, so Ginetto and other guys are working in a version of Monza 10k with chicanes. We have already tested online and it works ok. As usual, there are some things to tweak here and there, but I think it will be released with the mod or sooner than that. We are also thinking about making some enhanced version of Le Mans La Sarthe for this mod.”

So, all these mods will have separate physics, modeled as accurately as is possible and, as I’ve learned will also include historically correct brake fade for the Grand Prix cars of the thirties and fifties (be very afraid!) thanks to the work of Richard Cooke and Nigel Pattison.

As for release dates; we know much better than to ask for specific dates!

The CanAm Chaparral 2-E

Early Years

When GPL was released in October 1998 it completely redefined the standards, so far ahead was it of anything preciously released. It quickly grew a reputation as being overly difficult to drive which perhaps was not quite untrue as everyone dipping their proverbial toes in the water found that the experience was completely new. With the competition taking several years to catch up — some would argue they never truly did — and deliver comparable driving physics perhaps the difficulty in controlling the 1967 F1 cars will now seem slightly less daunting.

Patches from the developer rectified some early shortcomings in the set ups, making the cars a bit more realistic and more predictable in their handling if that is the right word, without sacrificing the incredible physics; GPL was still a most challenging simulation to drive. Force feedback was introduced and I distinctly remember just getting a brand new Voodoo3 graphics card a fortnight before the D3D patch was released! OpenGL was supported alongside DFx but it wasn’t an option for me with a 500 MHz CPU and a 4 Mb Graphics Card, and this illustrates another early problem with GPL — It was, and if modded to the max, it still is very processor hungry.

Today’s single and duo core CPU’s will run GPL smoothly at the maximum frame rate of 36 and with all options maxed, but older AGP based machines might still struggle with some of the track add-ons made available by the modding community, and as for running GPL at 60 fps, well, this may just be a development which will cost a few CPU cycles yet again.

Silverstone - 1951

With cars and track numbers growing, the front end to manage all the available options is the wonderfully useful GEM+ add-on by Paul Thurston, which will let you configure anything in GPL from within the GEM+ interface. This is the best way to manage the various season mods as GEM+ will take care of patching and building the correct .exe files, ensuring the correct physics are used in the various mods.

GEM+ v. 2.5.26 is required to handle the mods

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