First Assetto Corsa EVO Trailer Confirms Early Access Release Date

F40 Competizione AC EVO.jpg
Image: Kunos Simulazioni
Today is the day: the reveal of Assetto Corsa EVO gameplay on the official AC YouTube channel, and with it, the early access release date.

Kunos Simulazioni has given a first glimpse of official gameplay for Assetto Corsa EVO, the upcoming follow-up to 2014's Assetto Corsa. From January 16 2025, Assetto Corsa EVO will be available in early access on Steam.

While only brief, the video released on the official Assetto Corsa YouTube channel provides us with plenty of new info regarding cars and other elements to expect. Here are the major takeaways.


New Cars & Additional Features​

There were plenty of vehicles we already knew from official confirmation, but several new cars are featured in the trailer. The first new car shown is the BMW M4 CSL (G82), shortly followed by the interior of a Mercedes, although not the previously-confirmed 190E Evo II. Instead, it is the AMG GT2, which is featured later in the trailer.

An old Mini is seen being thrown around a track, as is a Morgan Super-3, which will appeal to the lower power and weight car enthusiasts, along with both the original and current versions of the Volkswagen Golf GTI. Other new cars shown include the Lotus Emira, McLaren 765 LT and Ferrari 296 GTB, along with the Ferrari Daytona SP3, which will make its first official appearance in a racing title outside of the mobile market.

Despite not appearing in the trailer, the Ferrari F40 Competizione will also be in the game, as shown in an official screenshot.

AC EVO night racing.jpg

It will be possible in the AC EVO base game to do full 24 hour cycle racing, so you can drive at night! Image: Kunos Simulazioni

That is it for cars, but it does not end there. The original Assetto Corsa did not have nighttime or rain driving outside third-party mods, but both featured in the GT-focused sister title Assetto Corsa Competizione. In AC EVO, dynamic time and weather will feature in the game from launch. This will include a full 24 hour cycle like in ACC and seemingly more advanced rain, judging by the standing water in some of the shots.

Plus for the points in the video featuring the Emira and Alpine A110, the reflection work on the window is very detailed. Clearly the graphics team have worked their magic. As for tracks, Brands Hatch, Imola and the Nürburgring Nordschleife were showcased in the trailer, but these were already confirmed. But there appears to be some frames showcasing the likes of Suzuka and Fuji, but we cannot be sure.

However, a few shots in the trailer showed cars driving on a public road. A couple of people on our team who live close to Nordschleife were able to identify it as being near there.

AC EVO traffic.jpg

Those living close to the Nordschleife may recognise this strip of road. Plus, could this be confirmation of traffic? Image: Kunos Simulazioni

Open road tracks are nothing new to Assetto Corsa, with the original having the Trento-Bondone Hill Climb, the Highlands and Black Cat County. But with the road being so close to the Nordschleife, is this an indication that we can leave the confines of the track and go onto public roads?

Not only that, but the shot in the trailer featuring the Morgan on that road has the M4 travelling in the other direction. Might AC EVO feature proper road traffic implementation that we have become used to in major open world racing games like Forza Horizon, Test Drive, The Crew etc.?

If you want to check out our deep dive stream we did, it is on our YouTube channel to replay.

AC Evo Google Maps screenshot.jpg

Here is the road that may have been identified as being in the AC EVO trailer, close to the Nürburgring. Image: Google Maps

Assetto Corsa EVO Early Access Release Date​

Assetto Corsa EVO launches on January 16, 2025, in early access on Steam. It is not clear how many tracks or cars will feature in the initial early access release, but we should find out more in the run-up to release. Initially, Assetto Corsa EVO will be PC-only, with a console version planned later on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S.


Is there anything we may have missed in the Assetto Corsa EVO gameplay reveal announcement trailer? Let us know in the comments below or join the discussion in our forum!
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Luca [OT]
Biggest sim racing esports fan in the world.

Comments

I've got to admit I'm not sold on the graphics here. To shiny shiny for my tastes, which makes everything look rather artificial and plastic. It's a bit like "hey, we've got a new graphics engine, lets push everything to eleven"

I'm weird though, I actually like the original AC vanilla graphics, mainly because for me the muted colour grading actually looks more realistic in many ways. I also think that of iRacing and R3E.

I'm semi watching an LMU stream at the moment in wet weather, and honestly it looks pretty bang on - nothing is really over emphasised which gives it an appearance that could almost fool you into thinking it's real on board footage.

With graphics we've reached the stage where less really is more in many ways.
I kind of agree with you. LMU has some very wierd looking aspects like the lack of reflections at night, but other details like the dirt buildup on the windscreen work really well and it makes watching onboards or the driving itself very immersive and enjoyable. With graphics there also comes a point of no return of investment and as Niels Heusinkfeldt has described it well in one of his videos: the excitement about graphics fades over time as we get used to them. Working on those little details infront of your face is more important than adding a trillion polys to the headlights in my book. It's more important that the visuals work good, that you have a clear image and that the fidelity is good with low amounts of imput lag. And this is for me the point that I am looking forward to the most. How will it drive and feel?

Yes the trailer looks nice and it's great to see all those fantastic cars and tracks, but if it doesn't sound or drive as nice as it looks then I won't spend much time with it. Granted AC was allways about the driving, but I hope that they bring some new features that were lacking in AC. Let's see.
 
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What? None of what you said makes any sense in relation to what I said. I couldn't care less about console. After how poor the console version of ACC is compared to pc I wouldn't be surprised if they don't even bother. ACC definitely didn't sell that well on console that's why it's constantly in the sales.
How is the console version poor compared to PC? Look, just to clarify - I really couldn't give a toss to argue over this, but from the strength of ACC on PS5 I went back and bought it on my PC. I couldn't really see any difference gameplay wise, apart from my PC couldn't run it well gradually compared to my PS5. I thought it was a great game! Chuck in a drivehub and I can run my CSW 2.5 no problemo.
 
I was definitely expecting it to look more advanced than AC with the latest CSP and Pure, but it doesn't that much. Which means that the people behing CSP and Pure are doing a pretty damn good job with a 10 year old sim. And sorry if that 10 year old game is the benchmark against I'm comparing Evo, but no tire flex 4 months before early access in the world most expected sim?

A lot will rest on Evo's ability to score higher than AC does today. If a handful of people from the community can give a professional game studio a run for its money on home turf in 2024, then so be it. I'll support whoever can deliver the better product. Modding is key. If Evo won't have it, no buy.
 
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I was expecting it to look more different than AC with CSP and Pure, but it doesn't. Which means that the people behing CSP and Pure are doing a pretty damn good job with a 10 year old sim. And sorry if that 10 year old game is the benchmark against I'm comparing Evo, but no tire flex 4 months before early access in the world most expected sim?
Both CSP and Pure developers consulted on Evo.
 
But if this game doesn't support modding (and I don't expect it to) then IMO the 'wide rather than deep' approach really doesn't appeal to me personally; I'm interested in racing in varied fields of track-spec cars.
I thought that's why they went back to their own engine for this, instead of using Unreal like for ACC? Because, they wanted to ensure community mod support?

They even mentioned, wanting to be able to support modders:

1727718608714.png
 
I thought that's why they went back to their own engine for this, instead of using Unreal like for ACC? Because, they wanted to ensure community mod support?

They even mentioned, wanting to be able to support modders:

View attachment 788427

Aye, so they're 'considering' supporting them (so definitely not a title built around it or for early access), in a way which looks like creating some sort of officially sanctioned store front which IMO would end up being a legal minefield further down the line. It's possible there's some novel approach to this (pre-agree deals with manufacturers and have some quality standard) but I highly doubt that would be acceptable with any teams.

Either way, don't expect mod support any time soon, so the importance of the main game's base contents and DLC are much bigger.

That said, if they can convince FatAlfie to convert his tracks to race with some mid '60s fields with 3-4 models and I'll go to Italy to pay them my cash in person!
 
I can see people are going to be very disappointed with ACE.
Modding support at launch? For a game with a new engine in early access? Before DLCs?
This isn't 2014's little independent Kunos anymore. They have a big daddy to answer to and the big daddy wants little Kunos to bring him some profits.
 
How is the console version poor compared to PC? Look, just to clarify - I really couldn't give a toss to argue over this, but from the strength of ACC on PS5 I went back and bought it on my PC. I couldn't really see any difference gameplay wise, apart from my PC couldn't run it well gradually compared to my PS5. I thought it was a great game! Chuck in a drivehub and I can run my CSW 2.5 no problemo.
I'm not arguing over it. But the console version runs poorly compared to the pc version. Visually it suffers the usual Unreal Engine bugs when it comes to console. Especially Xbox Series S. In general too 90% of people that buy it on console will have played with a gamepad which it isn't good with especially when it comes to the cars electronics that you might want to play with over the course of a race. It's just clunky. Has frame rate issues on console too even with the graphics settings being visibly lower than most PCs could run it.

All I was saying was if it sold that well then it wouldn't have been in the sales so much pretty much once every couple of months in the past 2 years it's been in an Xbox sale whether it be the main game or dlc.
 
I thought that's why they went back to their own engine for this, instead of using Unreal like for ACC? Because, they wanted to ensure community mod support?

They even mentioned, wanting to be able to support modders:

View attachment 788427
I've honestly been hoping for some sort of quality filter on potential EVO modding. I love AC and what the community has done, but there's no denying that the copy-paste, half-baked, downright awful mods outnumber the good ones 10:1 best case...at least when it comes to vehicles. If that means we get 10% volume of mods but they measure up to RSS, VRC and other quality releases, so be it. Purely personal take of course.
 
I can see people are going to be very disappointed with ACE.
Modding support at launch? For a game with a new engine in early access? Before DLCs?
This isn't 2014's little independent Kunos anymore. They have a big daddy to answer to and the big daddy wants little Kunos to bring him some profits.
Pretty sure they've already said modding support wouldn't be like it was with AC because any mods will now need to be licenced and sold. So no more free mods because they're scared of any licence issues coming back to them which they wouldn't. Most car companies I don't think really care anymore as long as you aren't making a profit from it.
 

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