Six Months Of Le Mans Ultimate: Looking Back At The First Half Year

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LMU Cover Image.jpg
Lamborghini SC63 x Peugeot 9X8. Images: Studio 397
After six months of close competition across some of the world's greatest circuits, it is time to look at how Le Mans Ultimate has been doing - it has not all been smooth sailing, however.

Le Mans Ultimate was first released back in February of this year to mixed reviews and a sceptical potential fan base. Instead of a full release, publisher Motorsport Games and developer Studio 397 instead opted for the Early Access route on short notice. When LMU was released, it was unfinished with stability issues and a lack of up-to-date game modes and content. However, Le Mans Ultimate was dragged up by its spectacular driving physics at the same time, the most important aspect of any sim racing title.

LMP2.jpg

LMP2's three-wide, Le Mans.

Upon release, Le Mans Ultimate split the sim racing community seemingly down the middle. One half appreciated it for what it was, namely a full grid of 2023 WEC cars including proper hybrid systems for the Hypercars, and the other half trashed it because of the lack of 2024 content, game modes, and functionality. Never mind the general skepticism towards Motorsport Games by many.

Over the last six months of development, Le Mans Ultimate has come a long way, though. It is not perfect, but what have the team behind the title got right and wrong, and what is needed in the future?

The Addition Of DLC​

Another controversial topic that hit the world of Le Mans Ultimate fairly recently was the addition of multiple DLC packs despite the title still being in early access. The community was again seemingly split down the middle with some not bothered about paying for more, and others outraged that MSG and Studio 397 added DLC before releasing the game in its entirety.

The first paid DLC came in the form of the debut of Imola, the updated Peugeot 9X8 and the Lamborghini SC63. It was received well upon release, with people praising the content and its quality, however, the action of paying for content in a game that is not fully released yet still stained the release for a lot of sim racers. MSG's CEO Stephen Hood had been up front about this, mentioning a need to balance the books.

Le Mans Ultimate Lamborghini SC63.jpg

Lamborghini SC63, Imola.

Overall, the inclusion of paid DLC was expected, but maybe not this much this quickly. Multiple other avenues need attention within the core game like more game modes, major stability fixes, driver swaps and the big one; a full release of the game before porting it for console players. Before a full release, these core issues need to be attended to.

Despite the paid DLC dramas, there has been a widely appreciated free DLC added to the Le Mans Ultimate DLC store: The BMW M Hybrid V8 Hypercar, also included is the Le Mans art livery, was actually the first bit of new content. The car is competently competitive in the sim and adds a crucial competitor to the grid for everyone to enjoy. More free DLC is planned, so even players who do not buy any of the 2024 DLC can still race select 2024 cars.

Balance Of Performance Issues​

In an article from April of this year, we delved into the issues that Le Mans Ultimate has to fix for it to be successful, especially with the DLC being added in before game modes and crucial bug fixes. One of these issues we covered was the Balance of Performance bias or BOP.

The Ferrari 488 was by far and away the most dominant car in the GTE field in the first four months of the game's life. From April until August, that has not changed. The Bronze-rated online races, the most populated series within Le Mans Ultimate, are littered with Ferraris and sometimes, not much else.

LMU Ferrari 488.jpg

Ferrari 488 GTE, Monza

With the addition of the 2024 LM GT3 field at some point in the future, the meta will completely change again with an entire roster of new cars, so what does this mean for the current cars BOP? Have the developers put to rest the idea of trying to balance the GTE field? Or is there another reason? Let us know what you think in the comments below.

Online Competition System Revitalised​

Le Mans Ultimate's online competition system is the crowning jewel in the game's crown. The online system originally debuted in the predecessor to Le Mans Ultimate, rFactor 2. Despite the weeks of fine-tuning within the classic sim racing title, when the mode debuted for its first few weeks in Le Mans Ultimate there were a plethora of issues.

The main problem was the stability of the online servers. When Le Mans Ultimate was first released, there was a lot of hype around it and player numbers were sky-high. This number unfortunately would dwindle quite considerably after the network issues started to plague the large majority of servers.

GTE's at Spa.jpg

LMP2 and GTE's, Spa

Since February, the servers have gotten more and more consistent with the level of demand on them stabilising. What's more, the amount of server crashes and random disconnects has been sorted out to a level where it is certainly playable and enjoyable for long sessions across multiple servers.

The competition system's combination repetitiveness has also been a sticking point for the title since its release, especially within the bronze category of racing. The combinations are severely limited due to the content available in LMU - which is not really avoidable when portraying a single series. This also means that just seven circuits are available to players if you discount Imola as paid DLC.

What is the solution? Variety in session variables and opening up race lengths, fuel and tyre usage multipliers and eventually, adding the other missing circuits in, those being Interlagos, Lusail and COTA. Some special events and series have already played around with fuel and tyre variables in recent months, so LMU is headed in the right direction in this regard. The tracks are set to join the sim in the coming months.

Hypercar, Spa.jpg

Hypercars attacking Radillion, Spa

Overall, the competition system has been cleaned up a lot since Le Mans Ultimate was released back in February, but much like the rest of the game; it is not perfect. There is missing modes (private sessions are not a thing, so no leagues are possible yet), and a repetitive nature to the returning player. Despite these downsides, the online competition system hosts some brilliant racing and brings together the best of the best for the anticipated special events. The ranking system included in the online mode is also helpful with this.

Le Mans Ultimate's Console Release​

Console versions of Le Mans Ultimate have been on the cards since the title release back in February, but finally, the actuality of a console version is starting to materialise. In its Q2 Financial Report, Motorsport Games does let onto the fact that the prospect of Le Mans Ultimate on Xbox and PlayStation is a genuine reality in the not-too-distant future.

"Given the strong reception to our ongoing development of the Le Mans Ultimate game, we have decided to accelerate efforts to bring this title to games consoles and reach a larger audience." MSG CEO Stephen Hood
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Lamborghini-and-Peugeot.png

Lamborghini and Peugeot 9X8, Imola

So with the console version on the team's radar, when can we expect to see a release? Well, it might be a bit of a wait. Le Mans Ultimate will most likely not come to consoles until it is fully released and ready to proverbially ship to the masses.

The addition of the 2024 content is not due to be finished until the very end of 2024 and the start of 2025. If we were to predict, the first anniversary of Le Mans Ultimate's release in February 2025 would be the first realistic opportunity for a console version to even be considered for an official announcement.

What do you think about the development of Le Mans Ultimate in its first six months? Let us know on X @OverTake_gg or down in the comments below!
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About author
Connor Minniss
Connor Minniss
Website Content Editor & Motorsport Photographer aiming to bring you the best of the best within the world of sim racing.

More in Le Mans Ultimate

Comments

T
wowbagger said:
Dude, honestly it sounds like you are tripping over yourself trying to use semantic silliness in an effort to prove that your favourite game is without fault.

Your posts might have more impact if you didn't try to defend every single criticism, constructive, perceived or otherwise, with wide ranging, off topic, seeming justifications.

Edit: that goes for a number of people in here.
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Did you read what I actually wrote? I wrote that stability is an issues and that features aswell as content are missing. If that's semantic sillines to you then you should reread because you are the guy tripping over this stuff with your selective reading. And I actually don't have a favorite sim because I jump between the products whenever there is something new and interesting to try. Claiming that LMU is without fault would be a bit silly given the fact that everyone including the devs acklowledges it's shortcommings and all the stuff that is missing. Hence it's still in EA.

You suggested that AMS2 isn't more popular because it's based on a Brazilian Series that nobody knows about wich looking at the content it offers makes no sense. Now you can agree with it or not, but none of it has anything to do with semantic silliness. But it's the usual approach to these discussions. When people run out of arguments they tend to bring it to a personal level. Have a good day. :)
 
W
tr1v1um said:
... When people run out of arguments they tend to bring it to a personal level. Have a good day. :)
Click to expand...
That was my point. When people have run out of arguments, stop trying to justify. Or, better yet, don't have arguments. And don't try to use semantics - "What means far, far more popular" - attempting to undermine something which is obvious, just to grind an axe.

Constant defense and attack of various sims, and trying to prove that one is better than another, is tiring and makes for rubbish discussion.

I wish you also a lovely weekend. :)
 
J
tr1v1um said:
What do you mean with "reliable"? Do you want to ask how to interpret those numbers or why they look how they look? Just a little comparison so that people think about their obsession of checking playernumbers.

These are the first six month of AMS2:
September 2020 107.4-20.4-15.96%250
August 2020 127.8-38.9-23.33%324
July 2020 166.7+51.0+44.11%690
June 2020 115.7-66.4-36.48%343
May 2020 182.1-32.6-15.18%503
April 2020 214.6--642

First six months of ACC
February 2019 103.8-51.4-33.13%275
January 2019 155.2-15.6-9.11%1,085
December 2018 170.7-0.6-0.32%851
November 2018 171.3-5.8-3.26%1,668
October 2018 177.1-142.1-44.53%2,106
September 2018 319.2--1,836
First six months of AC:
March 2014 400.7+112.9+39.24%1,444
February 2014 287.8-41.2-12.53%1,384
January 2014 329.0-28.3-7.93%1,701
December 2013 357.4+110.4+44.69%1,667
November 2013 247.0+245.3+14112.61%1,464
October 2013 1.7--8

First six months of raceroom:
February 2013 222.7+179.7+418.22%722
January 2013 43.0+10.2+31.14%427
December 2012 32.8-13.0-28.47%83
November 2012 45.8-12.2-21.08%111
October 2012 58.1-47.1-44.77%165
September 2012 105.1--452

So according to those numbers LMU is doing better than all those titles mentioned in their first six month while player numbers are generaly lower during summer.
Click to expand...

That's a really weird comparison you're making, considering there are far more people sim racing in 2024 than when ACC or AMS2 launched and if we're talking AC and RRE the number of people sim racing has gone up by probably tens of thousands. Which in all sense and purpose doesn't make the situation better for LMU.

The success or failure of LMU won't be down to what ACC or anyone else did or didn't do, it will be down to MSG & S397, don't under estimate what things like Aris and his stream did for the popularity of ACC, i.e engagement!

If the same things happen like rF2 then the results will be the same as rF2, as an example, go back a few years there were people who had genuine problems and issues with rF2 and really wanted it to work or wanted more development in other areas, so they would post on S397 website, the responses from the community would genuinely be, it's not the game it's your system, next would be rF2 has the best physics and ffb so it doesn't matter anyway, finished off with why don't you go and play something else, well guess what! a lot of people decided that's exactly what they're going to do and now look at the numbers of rF2.
 
T
So from where do you take those fig
JustinMe said:
That's a really weird comparison you're making, considering there are far more people sim racing in 2024 than when ACC or AMS2 launched and if we're talking AC and RRE the number of people sim racing has gone up by probably tens of thousands. Which in all sense and purpose doesn't make the situation better for LMU.

The success or failure of LMU won't be down to what ACC or anyone else did or didn't do, it will be down to MSG & S397, don't under estimate what things like Aris and his stream did for the popularity of ACC, i.e engagement!

If the same things happen like rF2 then the results will be the same as rF2, as an example, go back a few years there were people who had genuine problems and issues with rF2 and really wanted it to work or wanted more development in other areas, so they would post on S397 website, the responses from the community would genuinely be, it's not the game it's your system, next would be rF2 has the best physics and ffb so it doesn't matter anyway, finished off with why don't you go and play something else, well guess what! a lot of people decided that's exactly what they're going to do and now look at the numbers of rF2.
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From where do you take those figures that the amount of sim racers has gone up by tens of thousends of people? If you let aside AC, wich - and this is just a suspicion - had quite a big influx due to it's price and people coming from Forza or GT with people enjoying the car culture, free roaming aspect and it's mods, none of the other titles had considerable growth that would support that argument. This genre on PC is very, very niche with AC being a rare exception.
 
pz666
tr1v1um said:
So from where do you take those fig

From where do you take those figures that the amount of sim racers has gone up by tens of thousends of people? If you let aside AC, wich - and this is just a suspicion - had quite a big influx due to it's price and people coming from Forza or GT with people enjoying the car culture, free roaming aspect and it's mods, none of the other titles had considerable growth that would support that argument. This genre on PC is very, very niche with AC being a rare exception.
Click to expand...

The amount of actual sim racers hasn't gone up... The amount of casual gamers who like cars who go fast and own a PC has...

Similar to the rise in F1s popularity not being about the cars or the racing, but the drama involved with the behind the scenes TV series...

Although since that COVID bubble has burst numbers have dropped over the last 3 years that bubble inflates the ACC picture, as well as other titles released during the COVID sim racing booms... There's still more people who race on PC more than a decade ago, but there's a lot more casuals looking for a plug in and play game than there were at any time in sim racings previous history on PC... Even though they're spending much less time on the daily doing it than they were 3 years ago...
 
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Amereto1
tr1v1um said:
So from where do you take those fig

From where do you take those figures that the amount of sim racers has gone up by tens of thousends of people? If you let aside AC, wich - and this is just a suspicion - had quite a big influx due to it's price and people coming from Forza or GT with people enjoying the car culture, free roaming aspect and it's mods, none of the other titles had considerable growth that would support that argument. This genre on PC is very, very niche with AC being a rare exception.
Click to expand...

How many people took up the hobby since the lockdowns, how many people took up the hobby now hardware is more affordable, how much has titles like iracing, AC, grown in that time, how many people have started sim racing in the last ten years, how many people have gone from casual controller gaming to buying a wheel or fully fledged rig, the number is clearly in the ten of thousands when you're talking growth of numbers over the last 10 years, there's a huge amount of people that wasn't old enough to go out and buy a wheel 10 years ago and mummy and daddy wouldn't spend that kind of money, just by going off iracing alone who's membership is over 250,000 sim racing has grown by tens of thousands over the years. MSG said they sold 100,000 (can't remeber the number but I'm sure it was this) copies of LMU, It is a niche hobby but there are people out there who sim race, you can't say the amount of people sim racing today is equivalent to 10 years ago.
 
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J
tr1v1um said:
So from where do you take those fig

From where do you take those figures that the amount of sim racers has gone up by tens of thousends of people? If you let aside AC, wich - and this is just a suspicion - had quite a big influx due to it's price and people coming from Forza or GT with people enjoying the car culture, free roaming aspect and it's mods, none of the other titles had considerable growth that would support that argument. This genre on PC is very, very niche with AC being a rare exception.
Click to expand...
The point I was making is you can't measure what your doing today against what your competitors did 10 or 5 years ago as a measure of success.
 
T
I guess when this title will come out of early access it will be a very good addition to the lineup of sims out there. Thats also when i will have an eye on it.
 
Havner
JustinMe said:
so they would post on S397 website, the responses from the community would genuinely be, it's not the game it's your system
Click to expand...
And that's exactly what's happening on LMU forums ;-)

Unplayable, Constant CTD's - Audio Related?

I don't know why I keep coming back to it thinking it will be any different. I cannot complete even a short 15 minute race with AI, let alone race online or longer races. I'm constantly getting Crash to Desktop at random times with no rhyme and reason. Sometimes during menu, sometimes during...
community.lemansultimate.com community.lemansultimate.com
 
T
Amereto1 said:
How many people took up the hobby since the lockdowns, how many people took up the hobby now hardware is more affordable, how much has titles like iracing, AC, grown in that time, how many people have started sim racing in the last ten years, how many people have gone from casual controller gaming to buying a wheel or fully fledged rig, the number is clearly in the ten of thousands when you're talking growth of numbers over the last 10 years, there's a huge amount of people that wasn't old enough to go out and buy a wheel 10 years ago and mummy and daddy wouldn't spend that kind of money, just by going off iracing alone who's membership is over 250,000 sim racing has grown by tens of thousands over the years. MSG said they sold 100,000 (can't remeber the number but I'm sure it was this) copies of LMU, It is a niche hobby but there are people out there who sim race, you can't say the amount of people sim racing today is equivalent to 10 years ago.
Click to expand...
This is the point where I wonder how you meassure all of this. I don't consider a sold copy or a number of cummulated subs as an indicator for how many people are actually racing. Going by that logic I am racing iRacing right now. Project Cars 2 has sold millions and there are like 250 people playing right now on PC. Are there more people who get in contact with it? Most likely. Actively sim racing? Not really tens of thousends more than let's say five years ago when ACC or AMS2 were released. I don't know how to get the number of people actively playing iRacing on average but avergare numbers for most current sim racing titles haven't gone through the roof. I know some people rave about the peak numbers and for the people selling their games the number of sold copies or subs counts more than anything else, but unless you have the chance to play more than one racing game at a time it doesn't tell you anything. It's Sunday evening, central Europe and there are barely 25k people simracing while most of those numbers come from AC. And with the danger of sounding like some elitist sim racing nerd, but there is whole lot of difference in the target audience between a free roaming simracing game like AC and a very focused title like LMU. You can't casually drive around in LMU as @pz666 described it perfectly.
 
Metla
Premium
Anyone else noticed both sides of this discussion are fabricating scenarios to support numbers they imagined in order to support their own bias?
 
Amereto1
tr1v1um said:
This is the point where I wonder how you meassure all of this. I don't consider a sold copy or a number of cummulated subs as an indicator for how many people are actually racing. Going by that logic I am racing iRacing right now. Project Cars 2 has sold millions and there are like 250 people playing right now on PC. Are there more people who get in contact with it? Most likely. Actively sim racing? Not really tens of thousends more than let's say five years ago when ACC or AMS2 were released. I don't know how to get the number of people actively playing iRacing on average but avergare numbers for most current sim racing titles haven't gone through the roof. I know some people rave about the peak numbers and for the people selling their games the number of sold copies or subs counts more than anything else, but unless you have the chance to play more than one racing game at a time it doesn't tell you anything. It's Sunday evening, central Europe and there are barely 25k people simracing while most of those numbers come from AC. And with the danger of sounding like some elitist sim racing nerd, but there is whole lot of difference in the target audience between a free roaming simracing game like AC and a very focused title like LMU. You can't casually drive around in LMU as @pz666 described it perfectly.
Click to expand...

My previous quote wasn't regarding "Actively sim racing?" that number fluctuates depending on various factors, but regarding people who had never sat behind a virtual steering wheel prior to 10 years ago, all I mentioned was people who "started" this hobby within the last 10 years which I agreed with the previous comment is in the tens of thousands if not more.
I also agree with sold copies or subs is not an indicator of active users, LMU selling 100,000 copies but only getting daily numbers of a few hundred makes absolutely no sense.

LFM started something like 4 years ago and they have somewhere in the region of 180,000 registered users, these people would have been racing or competed at some point or another in either ACC, rF2 or AC within the last 4 years, no casual driving, drifting or anything else, now there's no way to accurately measure anything but to think 160 - 170,000 of those people were racing longer than 10 years ago is a bit far fetched! (give or take because they are not obviously all genuine accounts)
I can't measure the numbers but when I think North America, South America, Asia, Central & Eastern Europe alone it seems absolutely logical to me that thousands of those people would have got into sim racing within the last 10 years.
 
wolftree
Amereto1 said:
I also agree with sold copies or subs is not an indicator of active users, LMU selling 100,000 copies but only getting daily numbers of a few hundred makes absolutely no sense.
Click to expand...

Time zones exist. Also most people don't play games their entire waking life, some people may own a bunch of games but have only a few hours per week to play them. A conservative estimate puts the number of copies owned on Steam at 30x the all-time concurrent number of users. For LMU, this estimate would be 140,000 copies sold.
 
T
Metla said:
Anyone else noticed both sides of this discussion are fabricating scenarios to support numbers they imagined in order to support their own bias?
Click to expand...
Tbh, I have more interest in the discussion if sim racing has really boomed that much and would like to get some kind of confirmation for this, like x-th times more people are simracing on average nowadays. Because besides the usual suspects the numbers for most products seem farily low. wolftree added a good point about the time zones.

You don't need to like or hate a certain product to find certain questions interesting to answer.
 
pz666
tr1v1um said:
Tbh, I have more interest in the discussion if sim racing has really boomed that much and would like to get some kind of confirmation for this, like x-th times more people are simracing on average nowadays. Because besides the usual suspects the numbers for most products seem farily low. wolftree added a good point about the time zones.

You don't need to like or hate a certain product to find certain questions interesting to answer.
Click to expand...

For me there's a very small venn diagram in sim racing that has "People with the money for sim racing on PC" and "People who have the time to race everyday"...

Thus making the casual sim racer the easy target for anyone looking to make money with a casual experience... They aren't playing it everyday or rage quitting and ranting on websites or discords because they've not only invested a lot of money but time as well... So they're an easier crowd to please... Just make it look and sound good and you'll be fine... Oh and it has to work on VR... Just as long as you can win races on default set ups... They're happy with 30 minutes once a month or less...

Most hardcore sim racers who take physics and what happens to the suspension on the set up page seriously are a minority, but they fill the iRacing, AC, rF2 and LMU servers where most set up directions make sense and there's respect for the professional drivers that comes from the mistakes that happen in those titles... Some need eye candy and love GT3 so have sacrificed physics for what ACC offers which is a similar experience just with some odd set up directions and allowances, but Kunos nailed the race elements and to those which that matters the most, they'll stick to ACC despite it's flaws that have sent Kunos back to their own engine...
 
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Johnny-S
Premium
I'm a VR entusiast but racing is one area that I don't mind doing pancake. I was keen on this game from the start and bought it on release. I soon gave up on it, though.
I'm not that picky - I still drive in rFactor, GTR2 and GT Legends - but it felt flat and pretty characterless to me.
I just updated to Windows 11 and reinstalled this game and in all honesty, I couldn't see any difference.
Also - as long as they don't have a practise option, I will be steering clear of it (pun intended). To me that's the SOP basic ingredient - somewhere to get used to the cars and the game engine, to work on techniques and set-ups without pressure other than the stopwatch and my own targets.
Last time I buy from these devs, though - and I have enough decent titles and am of an age where it wouldn't matter if that meant it was my final motor racing purchase. I got into racing on PCs to remember the experiences I had when I used to race in the '80's. This game isn't that, and not just cos the cars are different.
 
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D
Online there are practice servers for the upcoming events. Offline you can choose various length practices if that is your desire.
We expect some movement on features by the end of the month. Specifically the Co-op driver swap appears to be nearing completion.
Dip your toe in from time to time.
 
T
Johnny-S said:
I'm a VR entusiast but racing is one area that I don't mind doing pancake. I was keen on this game from the start and bought it on release. I soon gave up on it, though.
I'm not that picky - I still drive in rFactor, GTR2 and GT Legends - but it felt flat and pretty characterless to me.
I just updated to Windows 11 and reinstalled this game and in all honesty, I couldn't see any difference.
Also - as long as they don't have a practise option, I will be steering clear of it (pun intended). To me that's the SOP basic ingredient - somewhere to get used to the cars and the game engine, to work on techniques and set-ups without pressure other than the stopwatch and my own targets.
Last time I buy from these devs, though - and I have enough decent titles and am of an age where it wouldn't matter if that meant it was my final motor racing purchase. I got into racing on PCs to remember the experiences I had when I used to race in the '80's. This game isn't that, and not just cos the cars are different.
Click to expand...
How would updating to Windows 11 have any effect on how it looks?
 

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