Vehicle Prototyping changelog

Added

• THE STUNT PLAYGROUND: a huge new play space right outside the city's east gate, packed with jump ramps for the first time
• Rows of ramps lined up for every driving direction, west to east, north to south, and diagonal, with clear lanes between them so you can cruise or send it
• A five-height kicker ladder, a big-air launch with a landing mound, a banked bowl, a wall ride, mounds and tabletops
• A ball field you can plow straight through, kickball-style red rubber balls, cone slaloms and cone clusters, and every prop is real physics that flies when you hit it
• Cones politely refuse to wedge under your car, they pop out the side instead
• Flipped onto your roof? After a few seconds a prompt points you at R to reset

Improved

• Everything is faster: about 20 percent more power and top speed across the whole roster
• Reverse is finally fun, 40 plus mph backwards on the road cars instead of the old 10 mph crawl
• You now spawn one block from the exit avenue, pointed straight at the new playground

Fixed

• The H key row in the hotkey legend lines up with the rest of the column

Known Issues

• The kart and pickup reverse slower than the road cars, their gearing keeps them at 19 and 26 mph backwards, that is their character for now

Added

• The entire vehicle physics stack now ships as a free public library: the Vehicle Physics Kit, installable from the s&box Library Manager (search fieldguide). Suspension, tires, drivetrain, assists, chase camera, all of it, MIT licensed.
• Want to build your own driving game on these physics? Install the kit, open its demo scene, and you are driving in under a minute. This game is the showcase, the kit is yours to keep.

Improved

• The game now runs on the published kit as its physics baseline. Under the hood this was a full re-platforming, but your hands should not notice: the physics is verified byte-identical to v0.3.1 across the whole regression battery. Same cars, same feel, open engine bay.

Fixed

• (v0.4.1 same-day hotfix) Wheels now spin the correct way while driving. The visible tire rotation was mirrored, so a car moving forward showed its wheels turning backwards.
• (v0.4.1 same-day hotfix) A car left near a stop now actually stops. Unless you halted perfectly, the tires used to keep turning and the car kept creeping in place with the skid sound droning on. Now it settles to a real stop and goes quiet. Launches from a standstill are unchanged.

Fixed

• Cranking the engine torque way up on the go-kart no longer makes it wobble left and right. Under heavy power a wheel could spin far past the rev limiter for a split second, so one rear tire would light up while the other kept grip. Drive power now respects redline every physics tick, on every car.
• The kart no longer locks into a turn at speed. Hard cornering under sustained full throttle could send the rear tires into endless wheelspin and wipe out their sideways grip, so the kart kept rotating no matter how hard you countersteered. Traction control now cuts power fully when the rear breaks away, and engine power eases off approaching redline instead of camping on it.
• High-torque karts can actually corner now: at maximum engine torque the kart used to become undrivable through tight weaves even with traction control. With the fix it threads a full slalom cleanly.

Added

• D-pad up cycles the drive mode (Casual → Sport → Sim): on keyboard it's the new B key
• The bottom-right hotkey legend is controller-aware: gamepad buttons when you're on a pad, keyboard keys otherwise
• While the gearbox is in manual, the legend shows the shift binds (E / Q on keyboard, R1 / L1 on pad). They disappear again in auto

Improved

• The auto/manual gearbox toggle moved to d-pad down, and both toggles now visibly flash on the HUD when pressed
• The gear display always shows whether you're in AUTO or MANUAL

Fixed

• Your drive mode no longer resets to the car's default when you switch cars or respawn
• The "invisible wall" at speed on town streets: streetlight poles stood too close to the lane and the widest car could clip them; they've moved back from the road
• Crosswalks now sit on the approaches to junctions instead of across the middle, and lane dashes no longer draw through them
• The park footpath stays inside the park on every layout
• The inn's awning now hangs over its front door instead of a side wall
• Sealed the gaps at all four corners of the town perimeter wall

Known Issues

• Reverse coasts as far as forward does. Press W to brake while reversing; a stronger lift-off slowdown is under consideration
• The kart can pin the rev limiter in Sport/Sim from wheelspin (no traction control in those modes by design); a mild kart-only traction aid is under consideration

Added

• Sound slider: set the game volume from the Tab menu (new installs start at a polite 25%)

Improved

• Full controller navigation: Start opens the menu, d-pad left/right swaps cars, and analog triggers still give you variable throttle and brake
• The hotkey legend moved to the bottom-right corner, stacked vertically so it's easier to scan
• You can see your game version at a glance in the menu (v0.2.0)

Fixed

• Sport mode shifts properly now: no more screaming on the rev limiter in 1st gear waiting for 2nd, and no bouncing back down after the shift