Community Question: What do you think about Assetto Corsa Competizione's Physics?

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There has been plenty of chatter over the past few days about Assetto Corsa Competizione's physics from sim racers up and down the grid. What is your stance on the matter?

The dedicated GT World Challenge racing platform, Assetto Corsa Competizione has been around since 2018, with it seemingly receiving its last bit of new content earlier this year as Kunos switches focus to Assetto Corsa Evo. The Nürburgring-Nordschleife finally got added to the game in April 2024, and the Ford Mustang GT3 followd not long afterward - even for free.

Despite the game having entered its end-of-life cycle, the community shows no signs of abandoning the title. But Kunos have been heavily reworking the physics even in the title's latter stages, and there are a few people who do not seem that happy about it.


This weekend is the final round of the Intercontinental GT Challenge Esports Series with the 24 Hours of Nürburgring, and Dáire McCormack - who won last year's IGTCE championship with Williams Esports - garnered a bit of attention on social media. In a Tweet, he went on to criticise the current state of ACC's physics and wished for the 1.7 or 1.8 patch's physics to return.

These comments caused a bit of a ripple effect, and have warranted us to ask all of you, how do you find the ACC physics? With our Racing Club regularly hosting races on the platform, many of you may be well versed in what is happening.

Pros vs. Joes: Different Perspectives​

One of the people to comment on the matter was Ricardo Claro, or Random Callsign, who pointed out in a video that someone in McCormack's position is trying to find any inherent advantage. The physics changes mean they have to completely change how they drive and set up the car, perhaps way more dramatically than most average joe sim racers.

Claro commented on the changes made in version 1.9 of ACC, stating that the game had major issues with the way cars reacted to kerbs for many years. 1.9 had seemingly rectified this, but that according to McCormack and a couple of other top level players dramatically changed the meta of driving and setup.


ACC has had a few of these major changes result in some unintentional exploits. Optimal tyre pressures for example are, as of the publishing of this article, set at 27.0 PSI in the dry and 30.8 in the wet. For a short time however, there was an exploit that meant it was optimal to completely maximise the pressure for the wet.

Now though, the 1.9 build of the game sees it to be beneficial to kill the traction control, which is not particularly true to life with GT3 cars. Subsequently, the slip angle seems to be more pronounced in corners. Claro even went as far to say that ACC's force feedback has regressed to even behind iRacing in terms of feel, with the consensus over the past few years being that iRacing's force feedback was not up to par.

That is why we want to hear from you. For those who played ACC both back when it was version 1.7 and 1.8, plus continue to do so now, what have you observed?


What do you make of the physics changes in Assetto Corsa Competizione? Let us know in the comments below or discuss this news in our ACC forum!
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Luca [OT]
Biggest sim racing esports fan in the world.

Comments

It feels like you're guiding a block of wood around a racetrack. I wanted to like it, I've even bought DLC for the GT4 cars, but it always feels lifeless. It's a shame because the tracks and cars are nice to look at and it's one of the few modern games the focuses on a specific series of cars, rule set, etc..
 
If someone has never driven the cars in question, by what criteria do they critique the accuracy of the physics? Thus it is a discussion of subjective impressions.
 
Have all of the DLC up to one year ago, when I uninstalled it. I find that GT4/GT3 racing to be excruciatingly boring. Might as well play follow the leader.
 
If someone has never driven the cars in question, by what criteria do they critique the accuracy of the physics? Thus it is a discussion of subjective impressions.
Information exists to formulate a more useful view than just driving the car. Like re: the iR vs ACC brake debate: ACC brakes, at least in the cars I know about, are objectively weak and require a rectangular brake trace. It's not something you need to drive the car to know.
 
If someone has never driven the cars in question, by what criteria do they critique the accuracy of the physics? Thus it is a discussion of subjective impressions.
If you're talking about comparing the very minute driving and driving technique details in order to get the best out of a particular car, then I agree, that may require a real life driver and a very, very elite one at that. However, there are tons of physics issues in every sim - albeit usually different ones from one sim to another (especially from one core physics & tyre engine to another) - that are clearly just strange, unrealistic, unnatural, "digital" vehicle behavior, IN GENERAL, regardless of car or tyre or setup or weather/track conditions or whatever.

There are even some that have existed in many iterations of some physics/tyre engines going back decades and still largely unresolved in those engines' latest iterations to this day (not getting into specifics, not going to start a game or physics war).
 
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