MADNESS has been developed over the past decade by some of the most talented people in the games industry with the programming team averaging approximately 20 years of professional game development experience each.
MULTI-CORE
The MADNESS Engine has been written with multi-core/processor architecture in mind. It is a cross-platform engine and development framework with a reputation for high-performance and industry leading visuals and physics.
MODULAR
The engine has been developed with an abstract approach which offers programmers and designers the possibility to gain in efficiency and create platform agnostic content from day one. MADNESS’ modular structure also allows it to be configured in a variety of ways to suit each project’s requirements. The ability to break down items such as render jobs and physics iteration steps into smaller chunks means that they can be balanced across threads efficiently with very little CPU idle time.
PROTOTYPING
In today’s highly competitive markets, it is OEM’s best interest to replicate test environments that provide reliable and real-life data with a minimum CAPEX and accelerated time to market. Virtual prototyping is a key area in vehicle engineering design, contributing to the zero-physical prototype vehicle development.
ADAS
ADAS and autonomous vehicle systems are the newest and progressively most visible part of this trend, as cars are including more and more sophisticated diver aid systems. These are costly to develop and difficult to validate in realistic driving conditions calling for more and more sophisticated man/machine interfaces which must be understandable and easy to use. These systems necessitate the use of high-performance driving simulators as the behaviours of the vehicle needs to be of high fidelity.
ASSETS
Our ‘to the centimeter ‘ laser scanned circuit library is the ultimate asset for profession-al simulation. Our licensable models comprise high definition LiDAR models as well as circuits that are used regularly for testing. Our library of assets contains standard tracks and city tracks. Bespoke tracks such as manufacturers’ test tracks or specific city tracks can be designed upon request.
Used by Professionals
Our simulation technology is used by professional racing drivers to practice for real life-races . Drivers’ feedback on the other hand help us refine the simulation using experienced real-world scenarios.
It performs
A.I.
Advanced AI with decision making
PHYSICS
Advanced vehicle physics/driving dynamics system
MULTI-LAYER
Static multi-layered surfaces changing properties dynamically depending on environmental data
NVIDIA PhysX
Advanced physics for world physics, characters and objects with NVIDIA PhysX support
REALISTIC
Realistic depth of field and motion blur
LIGHTING
Radiosity, lightmapping, gloss maps, and anisotropic lighting
ENVIRONMENT
Advanced environment simulation (e.g. time of day, dynamic and localized properties)
HDR
HDR lighting and displacement maps, per-pixel, per-vertex and volumetric lighting
SURFACES
Proprietary Live Track 3.0 technology which provides real-time information of the current state of the surface
Highly detailed
Our engine’s rich set of features, combined with a high detailed tire model and simulation of up to 2000Hz, easily scalable, make the MADNESS engine one of the most highly detailed racing software simulation engines available.
Key Technical Features
LIVETRACK 3.0
With LiveTrack 3.0 powering a dynamic track environment and selectable weather conditions, you might leave the pits with a pristine car but it never stays that way for long. Just like in the real world, mud, snow or dust will build up on the car; the wipers will likely be clearing more than just rain; windscreens can become dusty and scratched. But claim victory in a race and you can wear the dirt on the car as a badge of pride for the effort you’ve put in.
WATER SIMULATION
Livetrack 3.0 has a built-in water simulation technology that simulates rainfall, saturation of the ground, surface water and puddles in real time. Each point reaction is based on the material and temperature of the surface. Each simulation point is able to communicate with its neighbours, moving bodies of surface water to the lowest points of the surface detail all in real time.
Water can be interacted with via vehicle tyres moving surface and saturation levels. Inputs come directly from the weather systems (such as ambient temperature and levels of rain falling on the track) and from vehicle interactions (so tyres moving loose materials onto it and transferring heat from the tyres to the track). It also supplies data to the tyre model (so how much loose material is under the contact patch) and to the audio/visual systems.
UNDER THE SURFACE OF LIVETRACK 3.0
Making a track look amazing in the game is only part of the deal. With the latest version of LiveTrack, each track is a living thing, evolving over the course of a race event through both changes in the weather and the actions of the cars themselves. In an opening practice session, the track might be relatively ‘green’, but come the race it can be rubbered-in from all the cars at the event, with thick black lines criss-crossing the track and dirt and gravel scattered over its periphery from moves that pushed the boundaries in every sense. Taking an exemplary base geometry, LiveTrack implements dynamic track evolution, along with changeable weather and wind direction as well as seasonal variations. Track temperatures, ambient temperatures, height above sea level and time of year are all added in to the mix: you’ll likely be a little faster in the summer than you are in the winter just due to the natural atmospheric conditions. Every time you visit a track, you can have a different experience. In fact, every time you visit a corner you can have a different experience!
SNOW? MUST BE TIME TO RACE
Whatever the day, it’s always the right time to race – and the date you choose to race on has a direct impact on the track and its conditions. Compete in the spring and the trees will be coming into bloom – nature will be alive. Race in the height of
summer under a blazing sun (or rain, if you so choose!). Blast through falling leaves in autumn as the landscape morphs into oranges and reds. Spot the hardy spectators in the grandstands wrapped up for winter as the trees are bare and
the air crisp. Or bring down the snow flurries and cover your world in a blanket of white. Each track will have a unique characteristic depending on the time of year, which can be used as a base to build up bespoke racing environments when used in conjunc- tion with the dynamic weather options and the incredible effects that
LiveTrack adds in. Days will be shorter or longer, using exact data driven by the position of the earth relative to the sun on that date, affecting the ambient light just as much as prevailing weather conditions.
SETA TIRE MODEL (STM)
Our tire models, physics and handling are extremely advanced. Our revolutionary Seta Tire Model (STM) plays a key role in performing the most authentic driving simulation experience. STM is a full dynamic tire simulation with three modular simulation components:
CARCASS SIMULATION
Our carcass simulation is a finite element simulation with specific computational optimizations specific to real time tire simulation. The carcass is discretized into small connected “elements”, each one flexing and deforming due to forces.
TREAD SIMULATION
The tread simulation used in Project Cars is a finite difference simulation of the contact patch, with the tire tread “flowing” through the contact patch. The whole tread itself is discretized into elements much like the carcass, but the contact patch itself is a finite difference grid.
HEAT TRANSFER SIMULATION
The heat transfer simulation handles heat flow between brakes, wheel well, rim, carcass, and tread layers. The heat transfer amongst tread elements, from tread elements to the road surface, and from the tread elements to the air are handled directly by the tread simulation (including advection and evaporation). The pressure of the tire is maintained by the carcass simulation via the ideal gas law.
VEHICLE MODEL
The MADNESS engine isn’t just about superficial visuals but also has a global reputation for highly-detailed simulation and physics. The tyre model, physics, and handling are the most advanced in the games industry—so advanced that professional racing drivers use it to practise for real-life races. Drivers also provide feedback to the team regarding handling to help refine the simulation using qualified real-world scenarios. This interlinked relationship between drivers, engineers, tyre manufacturers, and auto-makers is the core fabric of design that guarantees the fidelity of the simulation.
MULTI BODY SOLVER (MTS)
Our multi body contains a set of rigid bodies with mass representing the chassis, fuel, driver, wheels and spindles of the vehicle and a set of constraints including hinges and joints to represent the suspension system.
Thanks to a set of powerful computation algorithms that solve equations of motion, Madness MBS is used to calculate the current position and velocities. Madness engine then uses the accelerations of the vehicle’s chassis and suspension (including ensuring the bodies are in a valid state), weight transfer and tyre load from the suspension.
CHASSIS COMPLIANCE
Madness engine uses real world values generally supplied by the manufacturers to represent the chassis including mass and inertia. We try to represent different types of suspension systems within the multi body solver to match directly with the vehicle.
VR IMPLEMENTATION
The VR implementation in the MADNESS engine was designed from the ground up to be fully extensible, allowing us to easily add support for upcoming hardware, including motion controllers and HMDs.
We work closely with many key players in the VR hardware industry to ensure that we are always abreast of upcoming hardware and work with them to implement support in our engine as soon as is feasible. Thus, we ensure that our engine is always up-to-date with the latest developments in the VR industry. Our VR setup is fully featured, in that we can render the same high-quality visuals in VR as on a flat monitor, so long as there is sufficient graphics process- ing power available.
We already allow the player to get up close with the cockpit internals – and given the processing power needed we could do this for show- room quality visuals of a car interior.
CUTTING-EDGE VR
Facebook-owned Oculus chose “Project CARS” in VR as a primary launch title for the Oculus Rift headset where it rated highly as one of the most compelling VR experiences available. The release of “Project CARS: Game of the Year Edition” with HTC Vive support confirmed the software to be at the forefront of the VR software space.
FEATURE RICH
The engine runs at a high frame-rate for a smooth experience and utilises device-specific features such as Asynchronous Time Warp and Re-Projection. In addition, the technology displays the user interface via a projected plane in order to provide the user with intuitive access within the VR environment.
FLEXIBILITY
VR implementation is game- and project-agnostic and is fully compliant with both
the bespoke Oculus SDK and the wider OpenVR interface used by HTC Vive and many other compatible VR devices. VR features can be used in any suitable application from Virtual Showrooms to Asteroid Mining simulations and beyond, while the flexibility of the VR implementation combined with high-resolution make our VR suitable for any target application.
