80s Japanese High Society Motoring L O R EThe Brand: Mikawa Motor Corporation (ミカワ自動車株式会社) was founded in the early 20th century by Japanese entrepreneur Shigeru Mikawa, initially manufacturing various automotive components and later moved on to producing automobiles based on reversed engineered Gavril and ETK models. The company went under a hiatus as a result of the war and fallen ecomony, but luckily was able to make a comeback by the 50s procucing small, efficient and reliable vehicles for the local market. Following the fuel crisis of 73 global demand for fuel efficient vehicles was high and Mikawa was able to deliver, and the rest is history The Car: This midsize saloon is the automotive epitome of peak bubble economy Japan. A full model refresh for 1985 featured sleek, oh so 80s angular styling with all the paint tones, as well as then space age levels of technology under the hood and an interior packed with more electronics than a shopping district in Akihabara, all finished up with a level of build quality and reliability that would make a period Gavril engineer want to rethink his entire career Just don't leave it out in the rain for too long.... And to make the Gavril engineers life even worse Mikawa decided to bring this baby over to the states to directly compete with whatever dated junk they were producing, featuring all of that wonderful reliability and technology, though sadly the twin turbo setup was a bit too expensive (and not really suited for period US buyers) so that remains a hidden JDM gem In addition to being the peak status symbol for period Japanese yuppies, the Avante's wide range catered from everything fromm fleet models used heavily by taxi companies and local police forces to high performance turbocharded rockets favoured by local street racers who also wanted something comfortable fot the drive home, and wouldn't upset their girlfriend with rock hard suspension and gasoline fumes. The Avante even had a brief stint in motorsports, competing in various Group A touring car series with moderate success, until a certain 4WD monster came along and destroyed everything and anything on the circuits... About the modI figured given how much I have been teasing this thing recently I might as well make a thread for it Since about 2020 or so I have had the idea of creating a lore friendly midsize, front engine rear drive Japanese saloon from the late 80s, something which I believe BeamNG desperately needs The plan was originally just to edit the 89 Pessima and square it off a bit, while changing to FR of course. Ultimately I was never really pleased with the results though, it always just looked like a butchered Pessima, so I binned the mod but the basic concept remained, so the following year I decided to take the same concept but this time, modeling the whole thing from scratch the results were just so much better, and I decided never again to hack up BeamNG vehicles and just model the sheetmetal from zero Most of the design work and modeling itself was done in 2021, and then I lost interest in BeamNG for a good year or two But I was always happy with this design and would be a shame for it to go to waste, so now that I have regained interest for Beam I have decided to fix it up and (hopefully) finish this project properly Most of the modeling work is already done it is just a matter of fixing up the terrible 2021 topology lol, and of course adding in extra parts, making textures and so on... Jbeam will be based on the ETKi, as this is basically the exact same size and identical chassis/running gear layout The car will feature a unibody FR layout with struts up front and a semi trailing independent rear (though lower grade/commercial models will recieve a more basic solid axle setup). Engines will consist of a 2 litre inline 6, the base being SOHC with EFI, as well as a 24valve DOHC variant, and to top it off a twin turbo variant of that There will also be a large displacement 6 (about 2.8 or 3 litres) for the premium luxury experience, and very basic models will recieve an inline 4 (SOHC, likely with a carb) of about 1.8litres Dimensions are 4600mm length, 1690mm width and a wheelbase of 2630mm Progress - Modeling/Texturing - 70% - - Jbeam - 10% - - Details - 30% - - Configs - 0% - Q and A/FAQQ: When will it be released? A: When it is ready. Stay Tuned Q: What Bodystyles will it have? A: Pillarless 4door Hardtop (pictured), 4door Sedan (with framed doors, less slopey roofline and B pillar), possibly a 2door Coupe, and a Wagon Q: Will it have a lot of tuning parts? A: That is the plan, though nothing too insane Q: Can I make mods of this? A: Yes, please feel free to create additional content for the Hawk Q: Will it be a paid mod? A: No. Q: Will there radio play Akina Nakamori on repeat with no way to turn it off? A: Q: Can it go fast? A: With a turbo or two, yes Q: Will you change the name/accept name suggestions? A: No. Q: Why did you make a whole new brand, and not call it Hirochi or Ibishu? A: I had thought about this for some time (several years now lol), there are 2 main reasons. Firstly the word Ibishu has no meaning, i.e it is not even a word in Japanese (I would know as I am semi fluent). Basically Gabester make up a work that sounded somewhat Japanese without thinking about it that much, and this bothers me more than it should lol Almost all Japanese companies as old as Ibishu are either names after the surname of the company founder (such as is the case with Toyota, Mazda, Honda ect...), or some clever acronym such as Nissan (which is short for Nihon Sangyo). As far as I can tell Ibishu (and Hirochi) don't conform to either of these (Ibishu/Hirochi isn't a Japanese surname and there is no acronym to my knowledge), nor is there any in depth explanation into the reason for their name, so I have decided to use my own brands with more in depth, thought out lore for my lore friendly mods, at least only for Japanese vehicles The likes of Bruckell or Gavril are actual surnames and thus are plausible, so I will just use those as I have with the Hawk The second reason is that Ibishu is kind of a 'blanket' company that seems to make every vehicle from Hondas to Nissans and even the occasional Mazda as I have mentioned before in various thereads my lore friendly mods will take the GTA approach of parodying a generally specific (or maybe a combined few) IRL models. So yeah I basically want a brand that be kinda linked to a particular company with enough imagination. If you haven't yet guessed Mikawa will mainly produced Toyota inspired vehicles and I will also have different brands for vehicles heavily inspired by IRL models from other manufactures. Credits Me: Modeling/Texturing/Jbeam editing BeamNG: various assets (Models, Textures, Jbeam) Gallery
hmmmmmm reminds me of when i have a 1000 video ideas and end up doing 0 of them because i was busy doing something else
Wow, I see you are gonna have so many projects on making alot of lore moss! I really hope one day you can be just like LJ74 and LucasBE and Finn and Theo anytime soon or maybe even a developer at BeamNG!
nice to see its finally gotten its own thread. Interesting decision with the brand names, but i agree it is probably smarter this way. the base game brands have always confused me since their names never really conformed to the trends you mentioned, and people use them as a blanket brand because its way easier (you can easily get away with powertrain, suspension, etc etc model sharing) and building lore when you've got a basis to go from, and models already in the lineup. I know I do LOL regardless, props to you and good luck. Curious though, if a community modder decided they wanted to add to your brand marquee, would you allow it? perhaps thats a specific question for a basis-to-basis discussion, but im still curious.. for reasons oh and did i mention im extremely excited for this? cuz i am
you asking if they'd allow to add to the brand gives me so many ideas, none of which will ever be done.
it certainly does I assume you are referring to this screen (which is the old, long gone pessima based model) otherwise the new one looks nothing like pessima lol good idea Thanks, appreciate it and to answer your question I wouldn't really have a problem if other modders wanted to make Mikawa branded vehicles , though it may be worth consulting with me just so that there aren't two mods that clash (in which case given it is my brand my mod would have to be the 'official' one), for example I already have plans to do a Mikawa branded AE86 and TA22 like vehicle One thing I can say for sure is I likely won't ever make any vehicles newer than about 1999 (or older than about 1960), so for modern stuff feel free to make whatever If you read the OP properly you would know
