The Story of Spa67
The first time, John Basara’s files were posted, was in 2006, he made the ribbon of the whole track thinking that the elevations were final and the track needed a total make up. But till 2010 there was no one working with the files. At this time, the track was only the road and grass on the trackside. The layout was in many ways different to the original papy track. There were no 3DOs placed or built, the altitudes of the track only edited until Les Combes and the textures were only placeholders.
Hatzi came to the project in March 2010. He started to correct the existing altitudes. Roman (sky) was already in the team and supported Hatzi and ginetto. Hatzi also started working on the gtk file in building the landscape. He also added some existing 3DOs. With the help of ginetto he started to correct the layout. So ginetto is the good angel of the development who had always helped immediately when Hatzi didn't know how to do something, because he never made a complete GPL track. After the first year the track was an alpha-version and on a promising way.
Hatzi started to build new 3DOs for bushes, trees and areas which couldn't be built with the traces and walls within the GTK, like the Eau Rouge bridge section. At this time, Roman started the work on his extraordinary ground textures. This kind of realistic and high resolution textures were never seen before on a GPL track. The next big step was the joining of Thomas Laechele (thl) to the group. Thomas had made excellent texture updates for existing tracks. His skills in creating textures of the horizon, all kinds of vegetation, houses and hills vastly enhanced the look and feel of Spa '67.
Stefano built the houses and their textures at La Source and other places, and contributed the trackside vehicles and many further details. Thomas and Hatzi started to build the houses and hill 3DOs. Hatzi made the 3DOs and Thomas created the textures. Most of them were basically pictures of the buildings which are still there, or sometimes inspired by Google street-view. Most textures were completely new creations. Hatzi also started adding all sorts of stuff (poles, spectators, electricity cables, more trees, more bushes). Meanwhile Michel supported the group with friendly research, and Duncan provided further photos and info. Rob Hunter offered advice at various stages of development.
In 2012 Phil entered the group and made 3DOs for the pit buildings, the main grandstands and the ad-boards at Stavelot and start-finish. Remy Roesz joined in November 2012 and painted some pit adverts, those on the left wall at La Source and the boards after the pits. To have a case of more realism, we also decided to reflect the weather and sunshine conditions on the textures. At this time it was clear that there must be different versions of the track 3DO and different versions of the resolution of the textures, so slower computers could also make the track drivable. In May or June 2013 Duncan came back. He had already been part of the group some years before but then left without any information of his plans. He made some textures and did an extremely detailed research work for all parts of the track. Together with Hatzi he edited the altitudes in many parts of the track. So the last 2 years were a time of fine-tuning.
Greg Liebzeit helped to bring the project close to completion. He made the camera file with the help of Michel's photos and keen direction, optimised the AI behaviour, and created AI sets which replicate history with remarkable accuracy across several seasons. He also tested with zeal, as did Michel. Chris (silence) created some textures and chose the resolutions for the standard texture pack. Stefan Roess made an online grid and volunteered to host the track files, while TvO designed the Spa '67 website.
In April 2014 ginetto took over the leadership of the group, made numerous fixes and optimisations, and managed the finalizing of the track folder and the installer. But he had to leave in July for some months. In October Hatzi was back again and the group decided not to wait for ginetto's return. The hard voluntary work of the team with its ups and downs, times of great progress and periods of stagnation, times of conflicts, personal crises, but always with the aim to create something extraordinary, in mind now comes to an end. We hope that many people all over the world will have a great challenge, when driving on this extraordinary legendary racetrack!
The team of Spa67
Installation
To install Spa67, run the installer and follow the instruction carefully.
Note: Installed Spa67 track folder is located in [game folder]\tracks\spa67
IMPORTANT:
To run the track with '67 F1 cars you MUST install GPL 67 Patch v1.3.
If you cannot find gplc67.exe in your GPL game folder, that means you haven't installed 1.3 patch or configured with GEM+.
Please download the patch from GPL 67 Patch v1.3 or at SRMZ and follow the instruction carefully.
After installing the 1.3 patch, GPL will still display "GPL.1.2.0.2" in game.
To play, run the game via GEM+ or gplc67.exe instead.
The track also requires V2 rasterizers, available here: V2 Rasterizers or at SRMZ
Configure & Troubleshoot:
If you get the error "Could not initialize replay system" or have FPS problems, use the standard textures (not the hires update). If you still have problems, use the lowres texture pack and/or the LITE 3DOs.
Please reduce the graphics detail level from 100 to 99 to cure graphical glitches.
You can set this in GEM+ by clicking the 'Graphics' button.
On the website you will find a spa67_LITE.7z package.
This LITE version features fewer objects and shorter draw distances, for older PCs. Extract its files in the spa67 main folder to activate.
You can also use the LITE trackside 3DOs with the FULL spa67.3DO; to do so simply delete the loose spa67.3do you have just extracted.
You can also download alternative texture packs:
The high-res pack increases the resolution of some textures, for modern powerful PCs.
The low-res pack reduces some textures, for older PCs.
On the website you will find a spa67_SERVER.7z archive.
This contains the bare server version, including Stefan's wide grid.
Fog effect:
When running the '65 F1 and '67 GT mods, fog is displayed to simulate a rainy atmosphere. To remove the fog, open "track65.ini" or "trackGT.ini" and make the following change:
[ fog ]
type = 0
There are additional archives inside the installed track folder:
AI seasons:
Want to know why Graham Hill is so slow in the practice sessions and then starts from the rear of the grid? Do you find that Michael Parks crashes very, very frequently in the practice sessions? To answer these and many other questions unarchive the _AI.7z file to your spa67 folder and find the 'Race reports - AI explanations' folder.
Please install the realistic AI and historically correct carsets by following the instructions within the folders 'Global AI files', '1967 Historical Spa Sports Cars', '1967 Historical Spa F1 Carset' and '1965 Historical Spa F1 Carset'.
Team Pit Boards:
The _TeamPitBoards.7z archive contains a pit signalling man for each 1967 F1 team. To use this option, unzip and copy the board.srb file from the relevant team folder into the spa67 main folder.
1967 Belgian GP Race Reports:
To read a huge collection of articles about the real race posted by Michel, click here.
Downloads
Options
These should be installed over the standard version. Unzip them into the spa67 folder.
Bigger textures for fast PCs.
Smaller textures for older PCs.
Fewer objects and shorter draw distances, for older PCs.
For hosts only, includes wide grid and no objects.
Patches & Addons
V2 Rasterizers - Required to run the track.
GPL 67 Patch v1.3 - Required to run the track with '67 F1 cars.
Spa67 Track 1955 Conversion - For GPL-55 Mod.
If you are using a x64 (64-bit) PC system with at least 4 GB RAM (virtual memory) we also recommend using the 4 GB Patch. Several GPL drivers have reported that the 4 GB Patch has a positive impact on their system. For example the demanding Spa67 track runs smoother.
Credits
Project Leader: Hatzi
Base GTK: John Basara
GTK development: Hatzi
fine-tuning track altitudes: Duncan, Hatzi
GTK fine-tuning: Duncan, ginetto
3DOs: Hatzi, Stefano Zampedri, ginetto, Phil Woodward
Horizon and Texture kings: Thomas Laechele, sky
Additional textures: Stefano Zampedri, Remy Roesz, silence, Duncan, Phil Woodward
Optimising and bug-fixing: ginetto
Camera file: Greg Liebzeit
Historical AI modelling and optimising AI: Greg Liebzeit
Historic research and Pictures: Duncan, M Needforspeed
Webpage design: Tommie van Ostade (Original), SV3000 (New)
Testing: Spa67 team, GPLRACER team and others
Hosting the private forum: Grand Prix Legends Repository
Hosting the track: GPLWORLD.de & SimRacing Mirror Zone
Special thanks to
All the community for giving me the right support for making this happen!
All the special guys that developed the tools for editing every Grand Prix Legends related things!
The notorious Papyrus for giving me lots of fun!
Enjoy,
the SPA67 MOD team
23 December 2014