Assetto Corsa Competizione Won't "Support" Modding

[Paul Jeffrey]

Kunos Simulazioni reveal more on the moddability of the upcoming Assetto Corsa Competizione, and it probably won't make for happy reading for some...

With a brand new game engine in the form of Unreal 4 alongside what is a reasonable short development timeframe until Early Access release, Kunos Simulazioni have confirmed that the new title will not follow in the footsteps of the original Assetto Corsa and support modding right from the very beginning, no doubt leaving many content creators disappointed to miss out on the opportunities afforded by the greatly improved graphics engine in ACC.

Although not officially supported, the possibility does remain however for talented community members to work out how to bring content to the game, as has been proven by some hardy souls over in the original Project CARS - it just means that tools and ease of access to modders will not the as it was in the first AC title.

Understandable given what Kunos have to go through to get the game to market later this year, but no doubt a blow to those players who enjoy sampling what the community have to offer. You can check out the full Kunos statement below, taken from a recent FAQ article on the 505Games website...

Assetto Corsa’s structure was designed from the beginning to be moddable. Being developed with UE4, AC Competizione processes data and assets through a completely different structure and file format. Therefore, the game will not be compatible with mod contents created for Assetto Corsa. Also, our team does not have enough experience with UE4 to tackle both the development a brand-new game and the challenges of supporting an open platform in the time frame available for this project.

We are fully aware of the importance of modding and its contribution to the success of Assetto Corsa. It’s a great way for new talents to emerge, for the community to “suggest” new directions and/or simply to make a product richer. It is not a coincidence that some of the best community members are now contributing with us to the evolution of the software.

However, for ACC this element will have to be put in stand-by mode for a series of reasons. The most important one is that we have given ourselves an enormous task of rebuilding, once again our software from (almost) scratch. In a world where pretty much, every product you see on the market in simracing is an evolution of games that have been on the market 10-15 years ago, our approach is to get a big axe and reset things to (almost) zero before starting with a new project. ACC is no exception.

In this case the task is rendered more complex by the fact that we are using, for the first time a third party engine that we did not design ourselves and the truth is, given the amount of time we have available to deliver ACC to the public, we have more than enough on our hands trying to figure out how to use the engine effectively to also think about how to make the platform moddable.

As you can imagine, this has been source of endless discussions in the last year and half as every decision comes with pros and cons, there is going to be pain no matter what your final call will be. It goes without saying that we believe we made the right call even if that means losing the huge benefits of a moddable platform.

We know this might not cover everything, but over time we will continue to answer your most frequently asked questions! Once again, we want to thank our community for the outpour of support you’ve shown us since our announcement last week. We absolutely cannot wait to tell you more about Assetto Corsa Competizione in the near future!

Assetto Corsa Competizione should be available on Steam Early Access Summer 2018.

Check out the Assetto Corsa Competizione here at RaceDepartment for the latest news and discussions regarding this exciting upcoming sim. We intend to host some quality League and Club Racing events as well as hosting some great community created mods (we hope!). Join in the discussion today.

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Do you think modders will find a way to mod ACC? Will the lack of official modding support hurt the game in the long run, or do you think it a sensible approach by Kunos given the new technology in use? Let us know in the comments section below!

 

[lhcaetano]

It's nonsense to talk about Modding in an official racing game simulator title that replicates BlancPain in every official detail. Modding are for open gaming environment where who mods makes their way of reality come to be. So why the fuss? Eventually Kunos will start to release AC2 as and open to race/drive style and eventually with support for mods.

 

[Patrik Marek]

It's nonsense to talk about Modding in an official racing game simulator title that replicates BlancPain in every official detail. Modding are for open gaming environment where who mods makes their way of reality come to be. So why the fuss? Eventually Kunos will start to release AC2 as and open to race/drive style and eventually with support for mods.

yeah, like mods for GTR2, Race07, GT legends, ....

 

[Raig Strehlow]

the sound could also be difficult, if they really use 3D Binaural Audio. I dont think many Modder can record sounds in that way.

 

[ALB123]

Eventually Kunos will start to release AC2 as and open to race/drive style and eventually with support for mods.

Where did you get this information? I would be very interested in reading the interview or forum post written by a Kunos employee who confirms what you say. Or, is this just something you assume will happen at some point in the future.

 

[Michael Hornbuckle]

Or, is this just something you assume will happen at some point in the future.

Bingo!

 

[lhcaetano]

Where did you get this information? I would be very interested in reading the interview or forum post written by a Kunos employee who confirms what you say. Or, is this just something you assume will happen at some point in the future.

Hi! It's just my assumption, of course. But I think the only way that this could never happen is, given the ACC success with official BlancPain series, they could end up starting a second official project like Formula 1, Nascar, Official endurance with LMP1s and etc, to a point where they won't bother anymore with an open to race style like AC was. If this happens, I just hope they create some sort of DLC between the official projects with the street cars for us to race in their new U4E with night and rain.

 

[ALB123]

Hi! It's just my assumption, of course. But I think the only way that this could never happen is, given the ACC success with official BlancPain series, they could end up starting a second official project like Formula 1, Nascar, Official endurance with LMP1s and etc, to a point where they won't bother anymore with an open to race style like AC was. If this happens, I just hope they create some sort of DLC between the official projects with the street cars for us to race in their new U4E with night and rain.

I had this lengthy reply written up, but I decided to delete it. Hey, maybe that will be the exact path Kunos takes moving forward.

 

[vegaguy5555]

I'm a strong supporter of mods in games.
History teaches that the most long-lived videogames are moddable in most of their parts, if not entirely. AC is not an exception.
Said that, I understand the approach from Kunos and I can't wait to try the new game at Misano!

Plus, I didn't get from anything I heard, so far, that they won't support the moding community, just not for the first year or so because they're going to be busy and don't want to make any promises they have to waste time dealing with later is my guess.

 

[Pixelchaser]

my bet is that kunos go on to do what SMS did and build their own proprietary software for the job, which will include built in modding tools.

 

[ALB123]

my bet is that kunos go on to do what SMS did and build their own proprietary software for the job, which will include built in modding tools.

Proprietary software for what? The game engine? Sound engine?

 

[AccAkut]

my bet is that kunos go on to do what SMS did and build their own proprietary software for the job, which will include built in modding tools.

ehm, they have done the exact opposite, by moving away from their own sound engine first (to FMod) and now moving away from their own graphics engine. Both for the better as far as I can tell

 

[Pixelchaser]

I just think they might write their own engine again, eventually. based on the unreal facilities, and that cold involve modding ... anyway I hope the unreal engine is successful enough.

 

[ALB123]

ehm, they have done the exact opposite, by moving away from their own sound engine first (to FMod) and now moving away from their own graphics engine. Both for the better as far as I can tell

Precisely. I thought Kunos employees have been pretty clear on this matter. If they ever decide to do an in-house custom game engine it will have absolutely nothing to do with ACC. Maybe a different project many years down the line...

 

[Shawdad]

Definitely not surprised. I imagine they get there eventually with maybe a "AC2"

 

[CobraCat]

yeah, like mods for GTR2, Race07, GT legends, ....

GTR started out as a mod for F12002, haha

 

[Mr Whippy]

Why let people mod when you can sell DLC?

Only reason they did it for AC was to get buyers.

Now they have hundreds of subsidised car models/tracks etc, just re-release and away you go to high margin returns.

Open community made driving game in UE4 can’t be far off if AC have done it.

 

[mantasisg]

This subforum is so incredibly funny

ACC modding discussions - First and the only thread - ACC will not support modding.

It was very obvious immediately at the moment when it was announced that ACC is themed GT3 Blancpain simulator. No need to speculate anywhere further. Also the message by Stefano is also perfectly clear - less content - more flexibility for improvements.

I just see one shortcoming for that, lack of variety of vehicles. GT3s are very strict planted handling cars, they don't do lots of things some other cars does. Tracks are also pretty much a single standard. Which one is the most bumpy ?

 

[InsaneOzzie]

Personally I have no issues with a mod free, category specific sim, as mentioned prior in this thread, Codies F1 series has done well with that strategy.

The one thing I see with this new venture that Kunos has entered is that ACC & the U4E will work much like a testing/proving ground for future AC2 or any other sim that Kunos may produce. So keeping this first project limited in its production size is smart management imo, it will make it easier to iron out the bugs that may appear compared to a massive AC style release, also, they won't have to spend hours developing modding tools for the community that consume production/testing time.

I'm looking forward to the sim racing future with Kunos, they've stepped out of the box and are prepared to explore new territories, which will hopefully bring a new class of sim to the community, and raising the bar for all developers.

 

[lionofjudah72]

Hey All,

I am probably going to get loads of flack because of this, but anyway heres my thoughts.

I would rather have the rain and day night aspect of this game than been able to mod, Because the only game Thats seems to do this these days is the aweful bug haven PC2. So having this in the hands of capable developers is an awesome relief for some end users like myself. Who would just like a change in games, besides hot dry tracks, like other games.

Rain in the night is going to be epic

Thanx Ant

 

[ShredatorFIN]

Wouldn't modability make cheating also easier? If aim is at eSports, lack of mods might be a good thing.

It creates a bit more pressure on Kunos though, because modders can't assist with features, like real head motion, crew chief, content manager, gbW, minorating, helicorsa, sidekick, SRS and RSR did. Most of those are a must-have for me in AC1.

Hopefully the camera movement is like Real Head Motion, and there is some kind of crew radio. Creating something as good as Crew Chief by Jim Britton would be an enormous task, so support for that would do (shared memory API)

Amount of cars and tracks in Blancpain is fine... but inbuilt features need to be better than AC. There is some promising news already with Leaderboards and online rating system confirmed.