BHMS: Can you tell us something about the improved damage model. What has been added, changed? Have you thought about going with vertex damage like we have seen in Viper Racing, Nascar Heat and will objects that break off the car have colision damage? Would it be possible to model tire damage in the physics model to simulate a flat tire or a blow-out? It seems that there is never a flat tire or a tire that comes apart as we see in Winston Cup, where it shreds the fenders. Is that something that the designer felt made the game too hard or is there just not a proper way to get the desired results?

Steve Myers: Visually, not much will change in the damage model other than that we have new body shapes. We have and will continue to tweak the damage model to better simulate what would happen in the real world. We have also done extensive testing with the tire model to more accurately replicate real world tire wear at each track. This has been another area that our technical partnerships with Jasper and Goodyear will really improve our product.

BHMS: Nascar Thunder 2003 was the first to implement rain on road courses. Will the new sim also address realistic weather and changing track conditions (dynamic weather)?

Steve Myers: We will have dynamic weather, but this will not include rain. When realistic weather is selected, the weather can and will change between sessions and during them. The temperature will change as well as wind direction and speed. We will also have animated flags that will give you a clue if the wind is changing direction during a session.

BHMS: Nascar Racing Series has a huge online legacy. Have you prepared anything special for the 2003 edition, like a spectator option for example? What is new in the game that will improve off-line racing experience like a career mode or a game-save feature for the people that like to run 100% races and seasons but don't have the time to do it in one sitting.

Steve Myers: We have made some nice additions to our already solid MP feature list, these include a voting system and league administrator tools. Players will now be able to vote for things like ejecting problem players or changing the track, and League Admins will now have the ability to moderate a race and throw caution flags, black flags, remove flags, add or subtract laps, and much more. For players looking to add the excitement of longer races in a shorter time period, we’ve added the ability to increase tire wear and fuel consumption rates to force earlier pit stops.

BHMS: Now that the NASCAR series is coming to an end what will Papyrus be working on for future releases and will they continue with the simulation genre? What other racing series do you think looks attractive to today's sim market. What other non-driving features do you think need to be introduced in racing sims that will draw more people into playing the game. Where driving and racing is a part of the game, but not the whole experience, what else need to be installed to take the market further ahead. In the future, will you add flexibility of the platform, for modification by the sim community, such as new car bodies, changes to physics parameters and the ability to build new tracks easily, to keep Nascar 2003 alive and on top for several years to come? Grand Prix Legends always comes to mind on something like this... a sim several years old but is even more popular now than it has ever been.

Steve Myers: At this point we have several design proposals in the works as we start charting a new course for Papyrus. Its no secret at this point that we would like to do a cross-platform game, but we will not forget our roots as the leaders of PC racing simulations. We’ve been blown away at what the user community has been doing with GPL, N4, and N2002, and we definitely believe that those efforts help contribute to the overall success of our products.

BHMS: In many interviews about Papyrus and the Nascar Genre, the name Grand Prix Legends is often mentioned in reference to physics and also other dimensions of that game. Since we all know that this will be your last version of Nascar, are there any thoughts of going back to a 'Vintage' genre racing game?? I know that there was a ground swell about a year ago from the GPL faithful to do a newer version of GPL (ie GPL2) and it was reported that Papyrus said NO! As I recall that was a pretty emphatic, NO.. Do you think that there would be interest in that aspect of racing and therefore appeal to a broad enough base to make it a worthy venture for Papyrus? Is it possible that your decision not to do a second GPL has changed in light of Nascar moving to EA Sports? GPL has long been considered the 'bar' for other sims to be measured to and yet we all know that for your company, it wasn't a commercial windfall. Why do you think now that the more advance physics model is more acceptable now that it was 5 years ago. Are we all just better drivers now and accept the challenge of the more accurate physics model.

Steve Myers: First off, Papyrus didn’t say no to a GPL sequel - the market did. Many of the people here would love to do a GPL sequel, but according to all the market research and sales analysis we’ve seen, the numbers just won’t work. It’s very expensive to make a game these days, and we’d be taking a mammoth risk on developing such a project. Remember - the first goal of business is to keep the doors open!

But just because a GPL sequel doesn’t appear to be in the cards doesn’t mean that we’re not considering many different proposals for future development. GPL is a great game, and one that we still play quite a bit around here, and although it didn’t have the mass appeal that the other titles have had, its technology base was the foundation for all of the NASCAR titles that followed it.

Regarding the “acceptability” of the physics model five years ago versus today, there are several factors at work. First, I think the common misconception people have about a physics model getting more “accurate” is that it will be more difficult to drive, and that’s just not true - especially in the case of NR2003. As the model becomes more accurate, its feedback to the driver becomes more accurate, making it less likely that the driver will misinterpret it. Therefore, it’s less likely the driver will lose control of the car. Another thing that must be considered is that 1967 grand prix cars are, obviously, quite different from 2003 stock cars. The GP cars have a much higher power-to-weight ratio, much less downforce, and skinny, treaded tires. Therefore, they are inherently much harder to drive. So, it’s not exactly an apples-to-apples comparison.

I want to say thank you on behalf of Papyrus to Black Hole Motorsports and everyone else in our ever-expanding community for supporting us through the years. I know you are going to be very impressed with NR2003 and I hope you will continue to support us in our future endeavors.