Making perfect loops with Excel

[rickets007]

I was trying to find a way to easily make loops in the map editor for MTA. It sucks trying to place each piece one by one. I decided to try to calculate the coordinates and rotations in Excel. The spread sheet I made accepts input for the following parameters.

center coordinates (the coordinates of the loop in the world)

radius of the loop

# of pieces to use for the loop

offset (lateral distance between entrance and exit points)

The results were very good. This is a loop with radius 30, 44 pieces and an offset of 20.

As of now the spread sheet can only be used to make loops along the x axis and the data exporting part is a little tricky. Here it is if anyone is interested.

MTA Loop Generator

I'm looking for suggestions on how to make this program more efficient and possibly add more parameters. I am not a programmer so I don;t think there is much more I can do with it.

[Guest]

cool good job! looks very hard made...

[Sprinter]

That looks really sexy Good work.

[BetaDevil]

good work

[SDK]

maybe you could let us input how many loopings the excel file makes,

on the pictures it only shows one looping

but maybe making two loopings behind each other,

like you'll have to give a parameter "how much loopings"?

could that be possible?

[rickets007]

Check out this 100 radius 96 piece 100 offset loop. It is almost too big for the draw distance limitations.

I put this huge downhill section before the loop so that you are going insanely fast when you get to the loop. You can just barely make it in the Infurnus if your lucky. It's not easy. Here is the map in case anyone wants to try it.

Insane 200ft Loop Map

w00t!

[rickets007]

The best way to continue the loop is to create additional loops but adjust their starting position by your offset distance.

[SDK]

that's a big looping

[Azu]

You should make it make Corkscrews, and Half pipes, etc. A FrontEnd for this would be sweet.

[Hedning]

Looks like this http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i124/ ... en0002.jpg

Cant you write a better step by step tut?

Or maybe download Camstasia Studio demo version en record how you do it.

[rickets007]

Well, I actually just made the excel sheet to prove that it could be done. I never intended to distribute it as a program. As far as a front end and a better tutorial, I'm afraid there is not much else I can do. I have some theories on how to improve what I have but lack the programming skills to impliment them. We need somone who can build a program using my equations. It could have a nice frontend GUI and would automatially generate a text file with the values input into the correct syntax.

What i'm saying is that I require help to to improve the program anymore.

From looking at the screenshot it is difficult to tell what the problem is. I suspect there is an error with the rotation syntax in the map file. I think that the rorations are correct in the map file but a syntax error could cause MTA to ignore the rotation values.

[Aeron]

mIRC...

[rickets007]

Okay, the problem is using commas as the decimal separator. It seems that the rotation values need to have a period as the decimal separator. It's puzzling why this only seems to affect rotation. I never had the problem because being an American I don't use commas. ;p

[Hedning]

U said you had fixed it, upload the new version?

[Kray-Z]

Thanks!

it works now, lol look what it made

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i124/ ... en0003.jpg

[Kray-Z]

U said you had fixed it, upload the new version?

Hedning you also have to replace the , with .

in NoteTab Light

[Hedning]

YAY now it works!!

BUT now I have another problem =(

I want the loop in a different angle how do I do that?

[Kray-Z]

Yes I have that problem too.

[Ransom]

Nice tool, stickied. I hope someone helps you to improve it.

BTW, you can edit out the tabs easily in notepad too. Simply tab from the left ledger or after a word, and select all the tabbed space, and copy it into the "find" field. For replace field, simply hit spacebar once (one space).

[rickets007]

Alright, I have added a '# of loops' parameter. You can also control the direction of the loop (right or left handed) by making the offset negative.

I will look into adding an 'initial rotation' parameter. This will likely only be for rotating around the z-axis.

[Kray-Z]

I repeated a loop here

by changing the y ax with + 100

here's the map and some screenshots if you wanna check it out

http://www.rogepost.com/n/3828479302

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i124/ ... 0002-2.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i124/ ... en0001.jpg

[SDK]

woah, already stickied

I'll try this out after my exams

[Kray-Z]

lol I again repeated the same loop, it's the default one just did + 20 on the y ax, badly it can't render more than 5 loops

but it sure is fun!!

try the Infernus instead of the Sandking

http://www.rogepost.com/n/7903269895

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i124/ ... 0003-2.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i124/ ... en0004.jpg

[SDK]

lol I again repeated the same loop, it's the default one just did + 20 on the y ax, badly it can't render more than 5 loops

but it sure is fun!!

try the Infernus instead of the Sandking

http://www.rogepost.com/n/7903269895

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i124/ ... 0003-2.jpg

http://i71.photobucket.com/albums/i124/ ... en0004.jpg

are these loopings actually useful in a race (for everybody?) i didn't tried this out yet with my exams

[Kray-Z]

Sure they are, they are perfect loops! I recommend you to try that map.

The 2 maps I posted are testing maps of repeating loops to let you guys see that there can be driven on it and to let you guys know how to let it repeat, I don't think I can help Rickets007 about how to improve the program as I don't know anything about programming

This is usefull and it saves me time

Thanks Rickets007 and I wish you good luck on improving it with someone who knows about programming