Changing your car skin

Trackmania Nations Forever (TMNF) being a free game will not allow you to change your car skin (Model) that can be seen by other online players unless you buy a license (upgrade).
You can however install car skins that YOU can see (Others will only see standard stadium car).

To do this open your My Documents/Trackmania/Skins/Vehicles/StadiumCar folder and create a new folder called Carcommon.

Then download your new car model Here http://www.trackmania-carpark.com/liste.php and save the zip file to the Carcommon folder.

Start TMNF and go to Profiles/Vehicles and your new cars will be there.
Enjoy

EV3RY, let me know if you really cannot see my car in the game. Kenguru has commented on it so I assumed it was visible to everyone. I have the free version and may buy the full but am already too addicted lol.

To the best of my knowledge free users can use and see in the game other players 2D Skins and 3D models from www.trackmania-carpark.com. You need to download and save the *.ZIP and *.ZIP.LOC files. Save them in the following folder:

Windows XP - C:\Users\Youraccount\Documents\TrackMania\Skins\Vehicles\StadiumCar

or

Vista - C:\Documents and Settings\Youraccount\Documents\TrackMania\Skins\Vehicles\StadiumCar.

The LOC file tells other user's computers in the game that your car is available on a separate server. This speeds up the load time in the game (orange progress bar) of maps and cars for everyone.

You can also change the stickers in the Paint section of the game. You cannot exceed the image size or layout. Only the coloured areas can be used. Open an existing sticker using an image editor such as photoshop or paintshop pro.

They can be found in C:\Program Files\TmNationsForever\GameData\Painter\Stickers

Save the changed file on the desktop. Use Windows Explorer and change the name of the ORIGINAL Sticker file to something else. Copy the file from the desktop to the folder you loaded the sticker file from in your image editor. Use the in game paint tool to place the new sticker image on your car. When you are done, delete your created file if you no longer need it and restore the original filename of the normal version.

Here are links to forum threads with all the colour codes etc. and a text generator:

http://en.tm-wiki.org/wiki/Nickname_Formatting
http://tm.die-webber.com/tools/KrazyColorsHTML

Have fun!

Thanks a lot for the info Tiky I didnt know you could do that!
.Welcome to the {AR} Acidrain clan forums btw.

Ps:sorry for saying you were a woman, dont know why I thought that but oops anyway lol

no probs and thanks for the welcome.

Forgot to mention some optimised driver packages you may want to try out. They will help improve frame rates on the poncy skinned tracks for one:

DNA ATi Vista - www.donotargue.com See the download links on the right hand side. The HF package is for 4850 and 4870 cards. All other Radeon users should run the 8.6 or 8.7B driver.

Omega Drivers (ATI and NVIDIA packages) - http://www.omegadrivers.net/omega_drivers.php

hic cya l8r

EDIT: Oh and this is my view so I thought everyone had the same. Poll probably bought the game tho lol. If you don't see any skins other than stadium cars you need to check the game configuration. When you start it, click the configure button. Then choose advanced options and select the Game tab. Make sure that ignore player skins is not ticked. Just bought the upgrade to unlimited version. Its £19.99 for unlimited usage (or £14.99 for six months access which is a rip-off). Gonna download it off peak cos its 1.1Gb.

Let me know what the upgrade includes please

EV3RY wrote:

Let me know what the upgrade includes please

Its the full game as a download with install key so no 3D glasses but everything else. I borrowed my sons 3D glasses from a comic and tried the game with them once. It was a load of crap and gave me a headache so not fussed about those.

EDIT: The graphics are much better in this game. I am running the same settings but all the textures and cars are more detailed and consequently more lifelike and less cartoonish. The AVP mod is gonna be interesting . It took 5 of the 6 allowed attempts to download as their server is rubbish. As an alternative you can, get it through Valve's Steam or on DVD through Amazon.

am driving a chervolet chevelle SS black with pink highlight =]

Cool, take a screenshot and post it in here. I am going to try and get a shot of the same corner I posted above for comparison of the two game variants' image quality. Will post it as soon as I can.

My custom car skins:

Aston Martin DB9 Team Cymru - http://www.trackmania-carpark.com/skin.php?id=5538
Stadium Car Welsh Skin - http://www.trackmania-carpark.com/skin.php?id=5435

My Favourite Servers:

(FG) Time Attack
AMATER[SVK]
Dutch Bulldogs 100 Pax
PROspeed shorts

My PC:
Shuttle ST20G5 Barebones
AMD Athlon 64 x2 4400+ (2.2Ghz Dual Core socket 939 w/2Mb L2 Cache)
2Gb DDR400 (2x 1Gb Corsair VS1GB400C3 8-3-3-3T, 2.5v)
Sapphire Radeon HD3850 512Mb GDDR3 PCI-E (DNA Catalyst 8.7)
400Gb Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 SATA HDD
Samsung SH-203P SATA Lightscribe DVD Multi
ViewSonic VX922 19" DVI LCD with 2ms response time

Nations forever:

United forever:

These pics dont really show the difference up that much. The vehicles and tracks are darker because there is more texture on the united image at the normal full resolution of 1280x1024 so less light is reflected.

I got myself the ford GT but it doesnt appear in my car list S:

EDIT:
Solved

Now when I choose it I says:

Runtime Error!

Programm: "The place of my Tm .exe"

R6025
- pure virtual function call


And Tm is beeing closed