TORCS' main draw is the ability to program new AI drivers from scratch from the ground up, as shown by the activity on the TORCS Racing Board [1]
, a forum allowing AI programmers to compete against each other in various races using the game as a medium. It can be found here.
Tropes relevant to TORCS:
- Artificial Stupidity : The "Inferno" AI drivers before version 1.3 have a really bad tendency to go way too fast through corners, and have worse collision detection abilities the faster they go. Overlaps with Drives Like Crazy.
- The "BT"note AI drivers will almost invariably stick to the middle of the road, causing them to be far slower than the "proper" Berniw AI drivers.
- Brand X : In all releases after 1.2.4 - all of the car names are simply things like "car2-trb1". Additionally, after 1.3.2, numerous cars sport sponsorship from "Software Engineering".
- Critical Existence Failure : Played straight. A car comes to a halt and is lifted away from the track if it suffers more than 10,000 damage.
- Driving Stick : The player can choose between auto and manual transmissions.
- Game Mod: Being an open-sourced game, TORCS allows a wide range of mods from cars, tracks, graphics to even physics. This also results in many forks, one being the below-mentioned Speed Dreams.
- Hit Points : Every car has 10,000 of 'em.
- Wronski Feint : Easy to pull off against Inferno AI drivers in 1.2.4 and before, mainly because of their habit of going into corners way too hot.
Speed Dreams (started off as TORCS-NG) is a "fork" of the TORCS project, which aims to be an improved "game". Notable features include several new classes of cars, improved AI, and improved graphics.
Much of the TORCS content is forwards-compatible with Speed Dreams given some changes to fit some of the new additions, but the basic architecture is practically identical.
Tropes relevant to Speed Dreams:
In addition to the above, plus...- Alliterative Name : A few of the AI drivers. Ami Akechi, Kaito Kinoshita, and May/Mai Maeda.
- Artificial Stupidity : Despite being faster than Simplix-type AI drivers, the USR-type AI drivers have a really bad tendency to cut corners even when it's unsafe (such as when passing) or impossible (into a wall).
- Author Avatar : The development team members are some of the AI opponents.
- Bland-Name Product: Like in TORCS, cars also have their names changed. However, unlike TORCS, the names are more "namey" (for example, car2-trb1 in TORCS is a Boxer TRB-RS in Speed Dreams).
- Brand X : Many cars are sponsored by "Freio" brand brakes.
- But Not Too Foreign : TRB1-class AI driver Marcelo Takeda, a Japanese-Brazilian driver.
- Cool Car : Despite being bland-name replacements for actual cars, the majority of models are based on pretty cool cars (the Archer R-9 is based off of the Aston-Martin DBR9 as an example)
- Gratuitous Japanese:
- AI drivers Yuuki Kyousou and Yukie Tsuchigami.
- The Boxer TRB1 cars driven by the USR AI drivers are littered with catchphrases of various anime characters on the right-hand side.
- Idol Singer: Yukie Tsuchigami, according to file data in the drivers' directory.
- Itasha: Sort of. In 1.4 there were a few anime-style liveries for the Cavallo 570S1, but these were cut from the 2.0 release.
- Multinational Team : The development team. To a lesser extent, some of the AI teams.
- Shout-Out : Particularly prominent in the Longday Series GT1 skins.
- Nearly all of the cars have tire sidewalls referring to the Leek Spin meme.
- The Archer R-9 has two skins which directly reference Key Visual Arts' visual novels: a Gulf Racing-lookalike titled "Uguu" and a Jet Alliance lookalike with a title sponsor called Dango Alliance.
- If you look closely, all of the drivers are using Yuyu Co. brand seat belts and helmets.
- Additionally, a few cars have "Turn 9 Studios" decals on them - most likely a friendly jab at Turn 10 Studios, developers of Forza Motorsport.
- The "telemachi" skin for the Zentek Z7-R is a completely non-subtle reference to Nanoha.
- Dreamer's Club, a sponsor for one of the Toro R-GT AI driver liveries, is a nod at Dream C Club.
- Some of the billboards on various tracks mention Amami-branded tires.
- Continuing on the Idolmaster theme, the livery for USR AI drivers using the Zentek Z7-R is sponsored by 763 Productions... which also doubles as a Touhou reference. note
- Trackside billboards on Espie and Brondehach mention Kupo brand brakes. Several cars also sport sponsorship decals from this company.
- NetKar also gets shouted out, in the form of an AI driver - Stefano Kudos (referencing the creator of NetKar, Stefano "Kunos" Casillo).
- TORCS itself gets a shout-out in the form of a track name - "Espie" is named after a founder of the TORCS project, a Frenchman named Eric Espie. To top it off, the track takes place in France. To emphasize the TORCS reference even further, it's a remake of a track from TORCS.
- Stealth Pun: Emma Pergusa and Sophia de la Sarthe, girls named after real-world circuits (Enna-Pergusa and Circuit de la Sarthe, respectively).
Dummied Out of the 2.0 release since they drove the Cavallo 570S1 mentioned above. - Those Wacky Nazis: Some of the few downloadable AI drivers in Speed Dreams are named after real-life racing drivers of pre-WWII Grand Prix, like Rudolf Caracciola and Bernd Rosemeyer of Nazi Germany. Their racing cars are also downloadable.