In Start Your Engines: Developing Driving and Racing Games, you will learn all of the secrets and programming techniques of developing one of the most popular style of games. The book features the physics, AI, and 3D techniques of driving--from road conditions to collisions--presented in a unique step-by-step format. The book is based on a customizable construction kit approach and is the first hands-on programming guide that shows you how to actually build and customize these popular games.

Start Your Engines: Developing Driving and Racing Games is a unique book that will teach readers everything they need to set up different types of road conditions, create opponents, set up road hazards, generate weather conditions, manage collisions, and much more. Not only will readers end up with the knowledge and tools they need to create driving and racing games, they get a full-featured, playable racing game that they can expand and customize with the skills learned in the book. The book shows readers how to develop live-action, interactive racing games with a unique three-tiered approach. Readers will start off by learning how to build a model for a racing game and then apply the physics to create a simple 2D (flat) game while learning how to create a variety of vehicles, race opponents, and terrain. In tier two, readers learn how to go from 2D to 3D with the same game concepts illustrating how to take the same basic idea for a game (and gameplay) and use modeling tips and tricks to begin customizing features. In the final tier, the author takes the concepts of 3D driving games to Mars with data modeled from real Mars terrain. Readers will create a dune buggy race on the planet of Mars and learn to create cool racing action at a bizarre and treacherous location.