Supermodel Forum

Ha, that's absolutely bonkers! The amount of times using my wheel I've had a 'serious' attempt at trying to get a decent finishing place in Le Mans, and I normally always end up in 6th place, with just the one time I managed to come in 4th (after assigning myself the 'special' car). Welp, first time using the Le Mans Network, just using a pad, not putting any thought into how I was racing, I managed to come 2nd - I'd made the Ferrari the special car, so had a little help.

At one point I wasn't even looking at my screen, as I'd swapped over to the Player 2 screen to coin up and start a game, before swapping back to P1. When the time ran out on P2 I actually came to a complete stop, so I could swap back to P2 and coin up and start again. At one point I'd crashed so many times my car caught fire (something I've never seen before!) and I looked like one of the boss cars that'd be on the receiving end of a repeated rear ending from the Porsche in Chase HQ. I pitted in to repair the damage, which also gave me a chance to try and shunt player 2 onto the track on the way out. And I still came 2nd! Insane.

Ahhh, Y'know I hadn't realised on my first network playthrough, that the attract mode on the Player 2 machine was acting as live cam of my race. The attract mode says about the race always being on, I used to think that just meant if you were playing in multiplayer another player could jump in anytime, but I think what it actually means is that the race starts once the machine is turned on and is constantly going the whole time the machine is on, regardless of whether an actual player is actually playing it. Which would make sense as, when I've played two more games in a row, the starting weather and night/day conditions vary themselves each time. So, if I'm right, the attract mode in the game is actually live footage of the ongoing race that never stops. Man, that's so clever.

MrThunderwing wrote:Ahhh, Y'know I hadn't realised on my first network playthrough, that the attract mode on the Player 2 machine was acting as live cam of my race. The attract mode says about the race always being on, I used to think that just meant if you were playing in multiplayer another player could jump in anytime, but I think what it actually means is that the race starts once the machine is turned on and is constantly going the whole time the machine is on, regardless of whether an actual player is actually playing it. Which would make sense as, when I've played two more games in a row, the starting weather and night/day conditions vary themselves each time. So, if I'm right, the attract mode in the game is actually live footage of the ongoing race that never stops. Man, that's so clever.

It's too bad the original developers of this and other Model 3 titles aren't aware of how much time we've spent exploring these games. Whenever I'm working on a particularly obscure but challenging project at work, knowing that no one outside our team will ever see it, I can't help but think about how many countless man-years have been spent on now-forgotten software, most of which has never even seen the light of day. A game like Le Mans 24 would have been the sole focus of months of several people's lives -- maybe longer if you include code that was developed over years and re-used in multiple games. There would have been frustrating challenges that took weeks to crack, along with the accompanying joy and satisfaction, and lots of thought and pride put into aspects that might go casually unnoticed to 99.9% of players (like this "live" attract mode).

I know I feel pretty good when I hear about my software still running in production years after I left my old job. Although in that case, it's not because they want to, it's because they can't extricate themselves from its tendrils

I'm sure some of the original Model 3 team must be aware of Supermodel? And if they are, hopefully they look upon yours, Ian's and the rest of the guys who've had a hand in Supermodel's development with some pride that their work is living on in modern systems. When I think Sega Model 3, the first face that pops into my mind is Toshihiro Nagoshi, who was always associated with AM2 and the more well known Model 3 stuff Like Scud Race and Daytona 2. But I always think that Le Mans 24, which I'm fairly certain was produced by a different Sega team, is a real overlooked classic. It was so ahead of its time, with all the dynamic night to day changes and different weather conditions and as we've now seen, the whole live race aspect. I really hope the game's producer (which Google tells me is Manabu Washio) knows that his game is still being appreciated today.

MrThunderwing wrote:I'm sure some of the original Model 3 team must be aware of Supermodel?

I'd be surprised if they were, actually. The Japanese developer community has surprisingly little contact with the outside world.

I really hope the game's producer (which Google tells me is Manabu Washio) knows that his game is still being appreciated today.

I'm sure he'd get a kick out of firing it up on his PC Even cooler would be having an iOS port to really show off how far computing has come since those days. Who would have imagined that within less than a couple of decades you could *simulate* top-of-the-line arcade boards on single-chip battery-powered devices in the palm of your hand.

Man, this discovery is fantastic!

I tried so hard to 1cc this game and gave up as something that seemed impossible.
I've got a 2nd (faulty) romboard of the game so will try and sort out the faulty roms then link 2 pf them up and try to 1cc again.

The video capture should be a bit better compared to last time as I've upgraded my capture setup, the colours were a bit off on my old setup.

Thanks!

Little bit of a necro bumpr here, buuuuut...
https://youtu.be/_HEIRkj_Au8