[FIX] Game Crash Upon Vehicle Collision / Damage after Installing new ones

Hey everyone,

I wanted to share a solution for a specific, somewhat rare crash I encountered recently. After some testing with custom requested add-on vehicles, I noticed the game would immediately CTD (crash to desktop) whenever a car sustained any visible damage or was involved in a high-impact collision.

If you are experiencing this, the fix is likely simpler than you think.

The Cause

The crash happens because the game looks for a high-detail collision model during an impact, specifically a _hi.yft file. If your custom vehicle folder only contains the standard .yft and .ytd files without the "high" version, the engine can't process the deformation/damage correctly, leading to a crash.

Please note that while a _hi.ytd file isn't related to the crash, it is good practice to include one to ensure your high-resolution textures are preserved in-game and I suppose are going to get loaded when you're closer and not when it's further away, saving up resources.

The Solution

You don't necessarily need a dedicated high-poly model to fix this; you just need the game to find a file with the correct naming convention.

1. Navigate to your vehicle's installation folder.

2. Locate your main model file (e.g., police.yft).

3. Duplicate/Copy that file.

4. Rename the copy by adding _hi to the end (e.g., police_hi.yft).

5. Ensure both files (police.yft and police_hi.yft) are in the same directory.

Once I added the duplicated _hi.yft file, the crashes stopped instantly. While it’s always better to have a proper high-detail model provided by the author, this "copy-paste" method is a perfect 2-minute workaround if the file is missing.

Hope this helps someone else! I’m writing this down mostly so I don't forget it myself if it happens again in six months.

Cheers!