GTRL Spotter Plugin for ARCA Sim Racing v1.6

The GTRL Spotter Plugin is an add-on for ARCA Sim Racing '08 by The Sim Factory that adds spotter calls, crew-chief instructions, and other helpful sounds.  It is an extension that takes advantage of the scoring and telemetry data made available through the rFactor Internals Plugin.  The timeliness of inside/outside/clear calls have been improved and you will hear Chad Knaus and Chris Osborne provide all of the calls you are used to in ARCA '08 plus the following:

• "Coming to the green"
  "One to go" (restart)

• Laps to go (20, 10, 5, 2, 1, checkered)

• Lap times that can be enabled/disabled during a race for yourself,
  the leader, the car ahead of you, and the car behind you

• "Pit road speed XX" (when requesting a pit stop and when entering pit road)
  "Watch your pit road speed" (only played during a race)

• "5,4,3,2,1, Stop" when approaching pit stall
  Wheel wrenches and wheel removal as tires are being changed
  Crew-chief instructions to repair damage
  "Go go go" when done with a pit stop
  "Stay on the apron" when exiting pit road

• Fuel warnings when getting low and when you are not going to make it another lap
  Tire flat notification including which tire is flat
  Tire warnings for excessive heat or wear including which tire is in trouble
  "Check your gauges" (Engine overheat warning)

• Notification when you receive a penalty
  Reminders to serve penalty

• "Leader is in the pits"
  "Leader is closing"

• Anthem and chatter when starting a race online
  Encouragement when moving through the top 5
  Told to wait until green flag during qualifying

Installation

1. Download (save as file) the installation package.

2. Launch the installer.  IMPORTANT* - make sure you select your ARCA installation folder. The installer defaults to 'C:\Program Files\ARCA 08'.

3. Restart ARCA '08
   
   
   The installer does not overlay any files on your system. It does disable the spotter plugin from BCR and the Maxx Power plugin since they trigger redundant events.  Specifically, the install does the following:

1. Installs Plugins\ARCA_GTRLSoundsPlugin.dll.

2. Installs GameData\Commentary\GTRL_CommentaryEnglish-USA.ini and GameData\Commentary\GTRL_ARCASoundsPlugin.MAS

3. Modifies config.ini so that GTRL_CommentaryEnglish-USA.ini is used instead of CommentaryEnglish-USA.ini.
   (Components -> CommentaryFile entry)

4. Adds a '.disabled' extension to Plugins\Arca_Spotter_Plugin_1.6.dll, Plugins\Arca_Spotter_Plugin_1.7.dll, and Plugins\MaxxxAudio.dll

It undoes all of this if you uninstall it.

Enabling/Disabling Lap Times

During a race, you can tell the spotter to give you lap times for the leader, the car ahead of you (in position), and the car behind you in addition to your own lap times. To toggle these options on and off, you need to map the "EXT" commands in your settings. Setup the following four commands (use any available keys):


When you toggle any of these options on or off, the spotter will say "10-4".
 

Using the pit box countdown

The spotter needs to know where your pit stall is. In order to teach him, you need to make a pit stop or enter a command when on pit road. When you stop in your box, the spotter will say "10-4" to indicate that he will remember your pit stall location. You can set and clear the pit stall "memory" manually by using a key assigned to EXT Select. Issuing the command when on pit road (you don't have to be stopped) will memorize the location and the spotter will say "10-4". Issuing the command while on the track or in the monitor will clear the memory and the spotter will say "copy that".

Options

GTRLSoundsPlugin.ini is located in the same folder as ARCA.exe.  The following options can be changed:
 

Release Notes

Version 1.6 (03/13/2010)
- "Coming to Green" now based on leader's track location. Should no longer overlap with "Green Flag"
- Fix for "Leader approaching" call that could be triggered by slow average lap times
- Update to ARCASetupDiffs plugin to allow spotter identification of penalty type. Version 1.2 of Setup Diffs:
  - Does't request scoring when disabled (to allow spotter to get it)
  - Fixes "Rear Toe" tag
  - Don't write a run if zero laps are completed

Version 1.5 (02/20/2010)
- "Green flag" should no longer be late (using built-in trigger)
- Further reduction of first place chatter when battling for lead
- Second attempt to eliminate double report of first lap time in practice
- No longer playing "Stay on apron" and pit box countdown during practice

Version 1.4 (01/11/2010)
- GTRLSoundsPlugin.ini can be used to specify pit speed and pace lap info when the GDB file cannot be found. (ex: Concord)
- GTRLSoundsPlugin.ini can be used to override pit speed and pace lap info found in GDB files. (to override, add "Override GDB=1" )
- Changed all commentary INI detail to 1 (no longer need to set spotter detail to 'Full' )
- GTRLSoundsPlugin.ini can be used to set tire temp/wear warnings on a track-by-track basis
- Cleaned up tendency to repeat first place chatter when battling back and forth for the lead
- Reduced the likelihood of getting the same tire temp warning after tire cools on a straightaway
- Stopped giving lap times on a restart (when last lap was under caution)
- Stopped providing the first lap time twice in practice (bug fix)
- Stopped rounding lap times (29.998 was being reported as 30.998)

Version 1.3 (11/29/2009) - Initial release

Known Limitations

Plugin limitations
- The "Go Go Go" instruction when leaving your pit stall does not fire until the car rolls forward ever so slightly. If you are applying the throttle, you won't experience a delay.
- The  repair chatter is still played when you turn off repairs

Sim limitations:
- The spotter does not always call you clear and may call you clear without having noted that a car was beside you.

Recommended ARCA Sound Settings

Credits

The plugin was created by Rob Cobb and Robbie Shook in the fall of 2009.  Some sound files are used with permission from Dave Hoffman (http://www.dwarehouse.com/).  Rob and Robbie are both members of the Good Times Racing League (GTRL).  If you are looking for a league where drivers treat each other respectfully, check us out.

Why we built this plugin:

1. The spotter that comes with ARCA is not up to the standard of the rest of the Sim. The Bridge City Racing (BCR) spotter plugin is very good and we were looking forward to continued improvements; however, a second "audio" plugin (Maxx) was released that added tire wrenches. While a nice touch, this caused concern because we don't need/want a bunch of plugins monitoring telemetry and scoring in order to play sound files.
    

2. We are attempting to run imported tracks at GTRL and so far it's been a blast. The BCR plugin does not support these tracks. In fact, they release a new DLL every time TSF releases a new track.
    

3. Robbie was able to get permission to use many sound files and he is very good at creating new ones. Rob has experience writing rFactor plugins (ARCA SetupDiffs).
    

4. We had some ideas for spotter events that were not in the BCR plugin.