We recently had a chance to interview Kenton Fletcher, Designer at Eutechnyx, as we talk about the upcoming NASCAR The Game: Inside Line.

Have you fixed the issue where the caution would still come out in some situations even when cautions were turned off?

Cautions have received a lot of attention in the new game, and should now be much more accurate. It's always a difficult area of the game to get perfect because in real NASCAR cautions often depend on human decision making, but so far the response to the new caution system has been very positive.

Will Pocono and Michigan be resurfaced and will Bristol be reconfigured in this year’s game?

Our art team has been strongly focused on refining each track and trying to ensure that they match the real tracks as closely as possible. Pocono and Michigan have the new surfaces but unfortunately the changes to Bristol just came too late in the season for us to get into the game.

Will wheel users have the same acceleration as analog users?

Yes they'll have the same acceleration. The dev team has also been working hard to fine tune the game for a wide variety of wheel controllers.

Can we race the Bud Shootout, Duels etc. at full distance? Also, can guys like Kyle Busch and Jimmie Johnson qualify in the 20's and 30's and even 40th?

Yes, all the Sprint Cup events can be run at full distance. As for the drivers, each is individually setup to perform on different tracks based on their real world statistics for that track type. While you could see a Kyle Busch or Jimmie Johnson qualifying further down the field, it's much more likely that they will qualify strongly on tracks where they excel in real life.

What kind of improvements have been made to the paint booth? (Extra custom decal pages, more layers, mirror tool, chrome wheels, etc.?)

Paint Booth has long been one of NASCAR The Game's more popular features and we've seen a wonderful array of extremely creative designs from the fans. This time around we've increased the number of layers and custom brushes, introduced a new mirror mode, and added a few other little touches. We're hoping to see some great new designs from the community when the game is released.

Will there be pack racing at the restrictor plate tracks? When I mention pack racing, I mean 2-3 wide and about 20-30 deep.

Realistic pack racing is something that the fans have been clamoring for, and its something that you'll see a lot in Inside Line. As with the real world Sprint Cup however, tandem racing is still an important part of the sport, and we've worked hard to capture the balance between the two.

Will we be able to upload images from internet and use them for Paint Booth?

Unfortunately this isn't something that we've been able to include in Inside Line, however we're always looking ahead so it's possible it could appear in a future title.

What improvements will be made to the online racing aspect? How will the extreme lag be dealt with this year?

Online racing has proved to be extremely important to NASCAR The Game fans and it's one of the areas we've worked at the most to ensure that the experience we provide is as smooth and exciting as possible. We've been carrying out regular trans-Atlantic tests between Eutechnyx in the UK and Activision in the US and we've been extremely happy with the results.  We've been enjoying some great bump drafting  and side by side racing in our test sessions and we're looking forward to meeting the fans in some online races once the game is released.

How will Career mode work? Will other drivers switch teams and have contracts? Multi-year stat tracking...meaning I will at Daytona the first year will it recognize this in year two? Are there any features that will keep Career Mode from getting stale?

Career mode has seen a complete overhaul this time around, in response to feedback from the fans asking for a deeper, longer experience. In Career mode you start out as a new rookie driver entering their first Sprint Cup season. As the player races they can attract new sponsors and earn prize money to upgrade parts of their car to help them work their way up the standings until they are able to challenge for the Chase and the championship. We've also introduced the Daytona Shootout and Duels and the All-Star Showdown and Race to add even more color to the season.

In last year’s game if you bumped another car one or twice it seemed to tear your call all up. For example at Daytona if you did a good job bump drafting you would end up with the car's front end torn off. My question has damage modeling been improved so it seems a little more realistic?

Our damage model has received a lot of attention, and so far the feedback from fans on the forums has been extremely positive. Our producer Dave Thompson has been releasing new images each week which we call Photo Fridays, which have shown examples of the new damage effects. These can be found on the NASCAR The Game: Inside Line forum along with the latest news and announcements from the dev team.

Since the game will be released towards the end of the 2012 season, will the 2013 cars be added as downloadable content at a later date?

NASCAR The Game: Inside Line is primarily based on the 2012 Sprint Cup season as it simply isn't possible to carry out the full approval process on the paint schemes and tracks before the season has started. We're always looking at future possibilities but our focus right now is firmly on creating the best 2012 Sprint Cup experience we can.

How long is career mode for 10 20 or 30 years long? If so we can switch teams in it? I love to drive car 24 when Jeff retire.

We're still deciding on the length of the career mode, but I'm afraid you won't be able to switch teams. We wanted the player to feel real ownership of the team they've created and to gain a real self of accomplishment when they take that team all the way to the championship title.

Will we have the ability to change the format of the contingency sponsors since they will be on a custom car already in the paint booth? (Ex. Hendrick format, Roush, RCR etc.) Will we be able to change the manufacturer decal colors on a custom car in the paint booth? (Ex. Fusion letters on Ford, Impala letters & bowtie on Chevy, etc.)

The player can choose whether contingency sponsors are displayed and also choose whether they will appear above or below other layers. It is not possible to recolor the manufacturer logos.

Will we be able to import/share custom paint jobs with other users and will be be able to swap custom paint on existing drivers like the "bud" car/etc?

Importing/Sharing custom schemes was not possible for Inside Line, but it's something that we're keeping in mind as a possibility for future releases.