With too much time on my hands I spent a little time admiring the scenery at Prague. The detailing lavished on the scenery is gob-smacking. In the process of looking around I came across a road section that is normally hidden from view. No great shakes in itself but, you would never see it if you werent looking down between the track. So why was it rendered?
On the full circuit, after the big sweeping first right hander you head along the riverside. On your left you flash past some white concrete blocks which cut off a short stretch uphill. Follow the track around the top to the open parkland area and you have the huge right hand sweep. If you stop and look down over the left hand fence you can see the cut off short section. However down there hidden from view is another section of track/road. It leads up to the left hand side of the bridge with the greenish arches, carries on past and back down to the main track (again blocked on the left by white concrete blocks). At this point look to the right hand side of the track where the crowd is gathered. There are more concrete blocks. Look past the spectators and a well rendered track/road follows the riverside away and out of sight to the left. So where could this go to? Well, there are already two opportunities where the track could cut back over the river via bridges. Back near the start line opposite the fizi pop girl there is a wide open street section that could be linked up. Or:
refer back to the huge right hand sweep in the parkland. Follow the circuit from there to where it kinks right before the 180 degree left-hander (with the tram lines). One the right (only really noticeable when running the full circuit in reverse) there are more white concrete blocks. A well rendered track/road can be seen sweeping up and away to the left. Moving your view side to side suggests, to me, that it seems to be modelled some way into the distance given the layout of the tree tops.
Truth be told this is most likely wishful thinking on my part but surely an extra ribbon or two for Prague would make sense given the massive detail lavished on the track. And yes, I like racing at Prague.
Even more interestingly, take a peek over the inside armco barrier at Spa-Fracorchamps between Courbe Paul Frère (Turn 16) and Blanchimont (Turn 17) and look at how well the kart circuit is modeled.
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In this instance, I know it appears that a suspicious amount of effort has gone into modeling something in the environment that cannot be seen from the circuit when racing. To see the kart track, you have to stop your car and go into photo mode, elevate the camera well above the car and look down over the armco barrier. Based on aerial photos and maps, the kart track appears to be modeled precisely as it exists in real life yet the track is well below the level of the racing circuit. Studious attention to detail or precursor of things to come? That remains to be seen.
Same thing goes for the Autocross track on Road America by turn 5 and 6 and the Snake Pit for Indy in the infield of Turn 1 at Brickyard.
The Snake Pit will forever stump me because the rumbles and and track are perfectly rendered out. Also the Tudor series is racing on it this year! Why not add a third variation??
I suspect that the extra bits we’re seeing here and there are just as likely left over from the scanning and early building of the tracks and not necessarily harbingers of things to come. Bearing in mind that I am notoriously absentminded, I seem to recall some discussion somewhere from those who went to Prague to scan the area and they had mentioned that they scanned what they could without any firm notion at that time as to what would actually be used. As for the extra details at Spa, Road America and Indianapolis, they were likely captured/scanned simply for being part of the overall environment with absolutely no intention of those extra details ever being made usable in the game.
We’ll have to wait and see what happens.
For the record, I can neither confirm or deny that clues about future additions can be found by downloading and using my paints. Repeatedly.
