Quote: Also, you can notice that the polygon count is EXTREMELY high (around 5.5k), but whenever I reduce it, the model gets twisted. How can I reduce the poly count without getting the model screwed?
If it's triangulated, there's pretty much no way to do it properly on a mesh like this without retopologizing it by hand. (= Building a new mesh on the surface of the old one) There are automatic poly reducing tools, but as you could see first-hand, they often tend to screw up a model. They work okay on irregular stuff like rocks or trees, but on precise meshes like cars...
If it's made up of quadrangles, you can quickly select edgeloops that are not essential for the shape of the model by double-clicking and deleting them. Make sure you really delete the edgeloop WITH the vertices that belong to it! Simply hitting backspace will make Maya leave the vertices there, resulting in nasty n-gons. You'll have to hold Ctl and RMB, then select
EdgeLoopUtilities>To Edgeloop and delete to properly delete the loop. (Make a keybind for it if you have to do it often
)
What you could try if the model is made of triangles, is using Mayas "quadrangulate" function. (Mesh> Quadrangulate) It can give you decent results, but only if the mesh's topology used to be made of quadrangles before it was triangulated on export. If not, the result will most likely be quite...creative.