# I want to drive !

Here is the manual for the players who want to drive in Speed Dreams 1.4.0.

Note: The following screenshots may appear slightly different from what you'll really get ; they were actually shot for the 1.4.0-beta1, and some details have changed since then in the buttons shape, colors and highlight effects ; definitely nothing bad ;-)

First of all you should install and run Speed Dreams ; for that, please read see the INSTALL file here.

After that you'll be able to drive a car with a joystick, a steering wheel, or simply with the mouse and/or keyboard.

Before that, you may want to know about the project contributors ... The Credits menu is here for that.

Take a while to navigate in the different chapters through the up and down arrows. And get back to the main menu through the Back button.

Now, back to the race preparation !

Wait ! A last but important tip : never forget to hit the F1 key if you need help about the available keyboard shortcuts in the current menu ...

You first need to configure a "human player" in order to choose you car and control device(s) : go to the Player Configuration menu.

To select a player to configure, click in the "Players" list box on one player's name. You can also :

- create a new player through the New button under the list box (all default settings),
- copy the selected one with the Copy button (all his settings will be copied, you'll then need to give him a new name),
- delete the selected one with the Delete button.

Here, we have selected the player named "Player".

To change his name, click in the "name" field and edit it with usual keys.

Tip: If you do not want to come back later to change the car / control settings, create here multiple players with different cars / control settings ...

This configuration screen is also used to:

- Select the player's car:
  1. First select the car's category you want:
     - 36 GP: These terrible Grand-Prix cars of the thirties
     - Supercars: The ones you dream of, in their unmodified version
     - TRB1: The Speed Dreams setups of the well known GTs from Torcs
     - LS-GT1: The future awesome Speed Dreams GT1 series
  2. Then select your car within the category.
- Select the transmission mode (automatic, sequential or grid)

- automatic: Just throttle down or brake, the computer takes car of the gears
- sequential: Shift up and down like in a F1 car
- grid: Enjoy the good old grid shifter, like grand father's

- Program the number of pit stops you want for the race, so the initial fuel amount is adjusted accordingly.
- Change the player's skill level:
  - Rookie: No damages (0%), high traction (+40%)
  - Amateur: Small damages (50%), high traction (+35%)
  - Semi-Pro: Medium damages (80%), medium traction (+30%)
  - Pro: High damages (100%), low traction (+0%)
- Select the auto reverse function (engage automatically the reverse gear when the car is stopped and you continue to brake).
- Configure the control device(s) (see below)

# Player's Control Configuration

To configure the controls click on the "Controls" button

Now, click on the control you want to change ...

... and then press the keyboard key you want to use for that control, or a mouse button if you prefer, or even ... move the mouse if that control have to be assigned to a mouse move event.

Tip: To unassign a given control, click on it and press the Escape key.

You can also use a joystick, a gamepad, or even a wheel with/without pedals/gear lever ... See the Vojtech Pavlik's joystick driver site for more information on how you can have your device work under Linux. (see also Linux Gamers FAQ).

The control configuration screen is a bit different if you choosed the grid shifting mode, but it works the same way.

Tip: If your device was not plugged in (you forgot), just exit from the control configuration screen, plug it in, and then get back ... This time it should work.

Proceed with all the controls you want to configure (you can use device buttons, axes, ...).

Then you probably want to calibrate the relevant axes, if any specified.

Note: Of course, the "Calibrate" will only appear if you selected a mouse or joystick axis.

Just follow the calibration instructions on the screen.

The calibration screen is a bit different when you choosed the mouse.

Note: If you selected at least one mouse axis and one joystick axis in the Control Configuration menu, don't be surprised if the mouse and then the joystick calibration menus appear one after the other : you actually need to calibrate the two devices.

When the calibration is done, press the "Next" button (yes, the screenshot showes a "Back" one, but it is not totally up-to-date ;-). If something went wrong during the calibration process for a device, don't panic, use the "reset" button to start over the calibration for this device.

You'll have to save your control settings before exiting (unless you want to cancel all through the Cancel button).

And then save the players settings (or Cancel all of your changes through the Cancel button).

# General Configuration Options

You can configure general options using the "Options" menu

The screen display configuration is done in the "Display" menu

You can adjust the screen / window resolution, the colour depth, the display mode (windowed or fullscreen), the video initialization mode ("compatible" normally works, while best may produce odd graphic effects ...).

Use the Apply button to validate your changes.

Note: If the program does not restart with the parameters you have chosen, don't panic, just edit the "screen.xml" file and reset the values to a more conservative choice (this file is normally located in ~/.speed-dreams/config under Unixes, or /speed-dreams.settings/config under Windows).

Advanced: Under Windows, you can also set the maximum screen refresh rate (Hz) during the game : if your real hardware screen refresh rate is 75 Hz, it's useless (no harm, only warm and noise ;-) to use a higher value as your CPU will work for nothing. Under Linux, use your video driver configuration tool and set the "Sync to VBlank" option to get the same effect.

If you are experiencing problems with the mouse cursor, you can try to launch Speed Dreams with the "-m" option (hardware mouse cursor). And if you have texture problems, you can try the "-s" option to run in single texture mode.

The Graphic parameters are located in the "Graphic" menu

The following parameters are customisable:

- Visibility: The depth of view factor (> 0), you can go beyond 100%
- Smoke: The number of smokes per car (>= 0)
- Skid Marks: The number of skid marks per car (>= 0)
- LOD Factor: The cars LOD (Level Of Detail) threshold (>= 0.0)

As a general rule for all these parameters, greater values will need a more powerfull system : play a little to find the ones that fit best your hardware

The Open GL settings can be changed in the "Open GL" menu

You can enable or disable the texture compresssion if your hardware supports it and adjust the maximum texture size (as the number of pixels for each side of a square).

The Sound parameters can be changed in the "Sound" menu

You can disable in-game sound, or select the OpenAL or PLib backend (OpenAL generaly gives a better 16 bits sound ; choose PLib if OpenAL doesn't work or according to your taste). You can also adjust the master volume (from 0 to 100% of the current OS level).

The Simulation Engine settings can be changed in the "Simulation" menu

You can select here the physics engine you prefer :

- Simu V2: The current official engine (2.5D) ; the cars and robots are optimized for this engine
- Simu V3: The future Speed Dream engine (3D) ; experimental for the moment

The AI opponents settings can be changed in the "AI Opponents" menu

You can change here the AI opponents global skill level (same possible values as for the human player skill level).

# Racing

Go to the racing menu:

Select one of the race types : "Quick Race" is the one, if you want to be able configure everything for the race.

Configure you race (note you have here a shortcut to the "Player Configuration" menu) :

Select the track you want to race on ; you can choose it in 4 categories :

- Grand Prix Circuits: Permanent circuit tracks
- Road Tracks: Countryside and in-town tracks
- Dirt Tracks: All terrain tracks
- Speedways: American "oval" tracks or alike

Note the screen background gives you an overview of the currently selected track, while the track outline is displayed on the left.

Once you found the track you want, click on the "Accept" button : you've reached the drivers selection menu (AI and also human ones).

On the right, the list of the available drivers : you can filter the drivers list by car category and by driver type (human, AI USR and AI Simplix) you've reached the drivers selection menu (AI and also human ones).

On the left, the list of the selected drivers : to select a driver for the race, click on him on the right list, and then click on the "(De)Select" button (or hit the space bar). To unselect him, click on him on the left list, and do the same. You can also change the starting grid order with the "Move Up" and "Move Down" buttons : they change the position of the selected driver in the left list.

When happy with the selected drivers, save it with the "Accept" button.

Finally, configure the race length (as a number of laps or a distance) :

And ... start the race !

Be patient, the game is loading everything ... but be ready !

On your marks !

Press F2 to cycle through the driver views:

At any time during the race, press F1 to get help about all the commands (and pause the game). Beware, most views, cameras and the map keys are "modal", so if you hit them multiple times, you will get different variants of the view / camera / map.

Now drive as fast as you can ... and try being faster that the robots !

(at the end of each race, you get the board, and know what's still to improve ;-)