As a direct ancestor of iRacing, the ‘Grand Prix Legends engine’ had multiple stock car racing false starts, before eventually releasing as NASCAR Racing 4. The original NASCAR 3, cancelled and replaced by one that used NASCAR 2’s engine, is barely remembered.
Video game development is full of names that have made groundbreaking steps you’ve never even heard about. Shawn Nash is a behind-the-scenes pioneer responsible for SODA Off Road Racing’s incredible physics, Papyrus’ graphical advancements and iRacing’s use of laser scan data for the physical track surfaces.
This interview with RSC, published in 2021, details his early life and career, through both his own company, Papyrus, Electronic Arts, to his time at iRacing.
ND is the first home release racing title that attempted a 3D perspective environment, but wasn’t the first home release to offer a first person perspective.
Initially released in Arcades and likely based on Dr Reiner Foerst’s Arcade-only Nurburgring title, the home release for the Atari 2600 featured a ‘chase cam’ perspective and did not add a cockpit view or manual gear changes until the Commodore 64 port in 1982, one year after those features debuted in Commodore’s Road Race.