-Ambient occlussion on the hood seems a bit broken, please ignore it.
Do you want a sports car but only own a Pontiac Aztek? Well look no further for the Pontiac Azztek Freak!
Yes, the front of the cockpit has been cut off to create a coupe.
Yes, it is RWD.
Yes, it has a V8.
No, it’s not awesome.
What more could you want?
ARM32_-Djadania-_Pontiac_Azztek_Freak.car|attachment (110.2 KB)
Wow!!!
Thats pretty fukkin fire, looks like a HotWheel for real for real
you look like a hot wheel
Says the childish one.
There are now two days (and a bit) left! Time to finish up your entries.
So far I have received entries from:
@Djadania
@Isabella
@PhirmEggplant
@Nolan_Cables
LMJ DESIGN PRESENTS: THE PONTIAC AZTEK ADVENTURER
THE AZTEK ADVENTURER. BY LMJ DESIGN.
Any news on the progress? 
Yeah reviews are coming, expect them Friday or so as one big dump 
Been busy with Christmas and New Years but should be able to finish what I couldn’t beforehand soon.
Absolutely, I understand that.
I am just a bit more curious than usual to see the results, to know if I should pick up ARM or plan for the next standalone challenge since I am not going to do both 
.
“See you later, Steve.” As he spilled out of the dimly lit bar around 1am after another night of pure adrenaline, Jon stopped to have a quick smoke and consider his options for his beloved Aztek.
The first one he looked through was:
Pontiac Aztek GTC Custom
Aesthetically, was this car properly eyebrow raising? Yes. However, other than subverting expectations, there was nothing particularly punk rock about its’ looks, and the rear end left something to be desired. It was far too expensive to service (over $4000 a year!), which could be expected of a racey car like this. However, it didn’t really back up its’ 495hp and racer bodykit with stats. It was not the most sporty (let’s just say its’ freak was matched), was the least drivable, and the power came at a cost: turbo lag for days. Despite this it barely hit peak RPM. As such, I discarded it.
"Pontiac Aztek “Nightcrawler”
Aesthetically, this car ain’t bad. It’s also quite cheap at $26.5k, and cheap to service at $1100 (keeping the original V6). However, upon closer inspection is really where this car falls apart. The deep gray paint, black cladding and pink accents are a dope color combo, and the sporty additions to the body such as the front splitter and hood scoop are nice if perhaps a bit subtle. However they clash with the stock height suspension and pink/black faux beadlock rims. Hard long life tires? What objective do those fulfill? It’s not sporty and it’s not got the best drivability, despite the aggressive front splitter. It’s comfortable but not outstanding offroad despite keeping the coil rear end. The engineering and styling on this car is plain confused. As such, I scratched it from the list.
Pontiac Azztek “Freak”
Upon opening this entry, I was shocked and outraged. “What is this?”, I shouted as the other loiterers outside gave me a funny look. The correct reaction indeed. This is exactly what I was looking for in terms of styling, it’s completely outlandish. The V8 in this car is also absolutely glorious, with 430hp and an excellent linear powerband. Unfortunately, being from a restomod company just beginning to branch out into more intensive body mods, the GT look and execution didn’t hold up on closer inspection too well. The new A-Pillar features a massive blindspot and the windshield is very abruptly vertical. It’s also anyone’s guess what’s hiding behind the massive fuel filler door on the passenger side. The stats aren’t noticeably bad and the sportiness is the highest in competition… but still failed to ditch the solid rear axle. Sigh.
Aztek DK by Hexe
The aesthetics on this car are spot on. The lifted suspension and offroad tires combined with the thoughtful, elaborate wrap (though I might get some flak for Metallica being listed… I’m sure that could be addressed) and the giant horns (RIP mpg) really hit the sweet spot on that punk rock look, and the bumper stickers on the rear especially are hilarious. Best of all, with excellent offroad capabilities and a bunch of additional kit like a winch and snorkel, this car actually backs up that bark with some serious bite. It also is quite comfortable and features all the modern conveniences one could desire, right down to the simple HUD, active suspension and 10 speed automatic gearbox. Despite that, it still came in at $5k under budget. I could totally see pulling up to a nice rocky trail in this, or going down to the music hall to practice. It’s great at a variety of things that appeal in my everyday life, and my aspirational life too. This is the nicest entry here features wise, and would certainly be deserving of a win… had a certain car not pulled out all the stops.
Pontiac Aztek Adventurer by LMJ Design
From the minute I opened the email, this one had me hooked. A log cabin? On the back of an Aztek? Absolutely outlandish in the best way possible. Practical, too. I could absolutely picture going out into the woods with my dog in this and enjoying nature to the fullest. The GM tent was a nice feature… however this is not only more comfortable and insulated (perfect to keep my guitar in tune!), and also features a stove. It also managed to be $8k underbudget, which is even more insane considering it’s not half bad in terms of stats and still manages a premium interior- by far the most beautiful, modern and well-executed interior design here. It certainly could have put some of that money to use in other ways though, like improving this from a softroader to a true adventure machine. However, for what I’d be doing with something this top-heavy it definitely goes far enough. Oddly enough, this entry is also the only one to ditch the coil rear suspension, which definitely explains a lot. Anyways, being the completest package and best value, I placed my order to LMJ!
Congratulations to @Knugcab for being the winner of this Automation Restomod!
In order of succession, should he decide not to host:
2nd:@Isabella
3rd:@Djadania
4th: @Nolan_Cables
5th: @PhirmEggplant
Post-mortem:
So… to be honest, this challenge left me a little baffled. After seeing the initial interest, download count and then watching it spike further as the people from the announcement thread tumbled in, I thought this formula of loosening the rules to make ARM more accessible without losing its’ soul was a clear success. Then I watched nothing happen for weeks and weeks until eventually a few entries trickled in… so I ask y’all this. Especially those of you that started something but got no further. What about this challenge caused you to lose interest after downloading and what could I (or other future hosts) do to improve the formula for future iterations?
I will take up hosting, and since I have a couple of ideas, I will put up a voting thread.
Also, I will follow any discussion regarding HelloHi’s question with interest.
Not specifically something negative, but when thinking Punk-rock I have trouble coming up with something immediately, I never really had that “Aha!” moment so I just did what I thought would be funny, I think that might be one of the bigger problems.
That and the Aztek was pretty hard to modify and change in my opinion, which is why I just kept most of the base car and just “cut it in half”.
I guess the best way I can say it is indeed, I never got an “Aha” moment where a lightbulb shows up above my head with the prompt, you could say it was slightly too open (In my opinion).
For me it was a multitude of factors. I started with a good idea, then there were a flurry of challenges (think I did 5-6 in a few weeks incl. many collabs), kinda got burnedout by the time I came back to it, also needed to get QFC going, and then my idea was not panning out, I was not able to execute in the time I had left unfortunately. Nothing related to the brief tho, but I also did not put a lot of time working with the body, so no feedback there, but it looked challenging due to the uniqueness of the base car.
I had a hard time modifying the base car, and I couldn’t really figure out what was wanted from the prompt (it seemed too open). Plus I got a bit burnt out on automation stuff.
I messed around with it a bit before my pc went kaputt and that body is ancient, and iffy to work with
It was a good concept, mightve done better with a different base but it be what be
I downloaded the car, though I was burnt out from Automation and decided to do less challenges which I could reheat builds. More so that it would’ve taken some more time than some other challenges to work with the car provided albeit being less of a hassle as compared to the Renault 2CV.
Honestly, I think it was more of an effort thing of which at this point of time less and less people are doing challenges until Al-Rima of which it might ignite new interest.
I was prepared to do something, then rushed to the new Alpha, made a few builds, then realised it would be complicated to go back to the stable branch, so I accidentally locked myself out of starting a build.
