Assetto Corsa reaches version 1.3 with a new DLC

[Alex Franchini]

Kunos Simulazioni have updated their popular racing sim with 64-bit support and the Dream Pack 2 DLC.

The update weights almost 500MB on Steam and brings along a revised tyre model, visual and audio improvement, and new multiplayer features.

Dream Pack 2 includes the Circuit of Catalunya (2 layouts), 4 racing cars and 5 road cars.

Be sure to check out our Weekly Whip for your 1.3 racing needs, and come join us now on our Public Server to give the new GT3's a test run!

Here is the full changelog straight from the devs:

• "64bit build
• Car physics is now calculated in separate threads
• Fixed KERS disabled in pitlane
• Added soft locks (use [SOFT_LOCK] ENABLED=1 in system/cfg/assetto_corsa.ini)
• Added support for DRS zones
• acServer is now stressing much less Go' GC and should offer more stable performances
• Added FORCE_TGT to force low res timer in assetto_corsa.ini
• acServer is now using Go 1.5, faster GC
• Added server welcome message
• Fixed gear ratio appearing with a double "/" in setup screen
• Fixed acServer unable to read ini values with a "=" character (ex AUTH)
• Fixed driver name displayer not obeying to saved settings in MP
• Fixed acServer not creating "results" folder automatically
• New algorithms to calculate skid volumes and pitch, now working globally in the entire simulation
• Added grain and blister readings in the setup info screen
• Added downshift protection to gearboxes
• Lap count is now reported using 16bit unsigned integer to server plugins
• Now using triple buffer when vsync is on to reduce latency
• Exposure settings are now persistent
• Fixed audio clicks on surface events
• Tyre flat spots are now taking into account tyre softness
• Windscreens now receive shadows
• ksEditor: now it uses the same ingame engine.
• ksEditor: added project menagement
• ksEditor: added user personalizations
• ksEditor: added floating windows and layout system
• ksEditor: added Weather and PPfilter loader
• ksEditor: added recent files/project management
• ksEditor: added node filter in scene panel
• ksEditor: added Material by Texture in Materials panel
• ksEditor: added scene icons and side function buttons
• ksEditor: added texture detail on Material panel
• ksEditor: added Texture Review windows in Utilities
• ksEditor: fixed reload texture function
• ksEditor: now the default CultureInfo is en-US (number format, ect)
• ksEditor: added FOV, Near Plane Slider, Mouse sensitivity, camera angle and position under Viewport
• ksEditor: added Dashboard tab
• acServerManager: removed some upper limits on parameters
• acServerManager: preset name/description is more clear
• acServerManager: added welcome message
• acServerManager: added qualify limit
• acServerManager: added fixed setup management
• acServerManager: fixed upload on ftp. Now cfg folder is not deleted.
• Fixed driver textures on serveral cars
• Fixed circuit outline on track selection UI
• Camera Dev App now save F1 cameras' exposure and pitch, F6 cameras' exposure, fov and position and angle
• Removed background from Performance Delta App
• Redesigned and faster code for logging
• Updated Tyres V5 for GT2 and GT3 cars, should give less understeer.
• Zonda R and Ferrari 599XX and Formula Abarth now have V5 tyres.
• Less lift off oversteer for Evora S on street tyres V5
• GT3 and GT2 cars updated aero stalling for front splitter and diffuser
• GT3 slight performance balancing
• Mclaren MP4 GT3 tyre corrections
• Fixed TC digital item showing 0 based index when multiple TC level are available
• Now showing Cold and Hot pressure readings in setup status
• Added "NA" for IMO temps reading when no set has been swapped out
• Added support for track dynamic objects
• It is now possible to join a server using admin passoword and be automatically granted admin rights
• Joining a server with admin password will override the session "closed" status
• Added "ban_id" admin command to ban a user and send straight to blacklist
• Remote cars in multiplayer now generate skidmarks
• Fixed EDL wrong calculation order"

Join the discussion in our AC forums, and get racing in our Assetto Corsa Racing Club! While you're at it, why not check out some awesome videos and screenshot in our AC gallery?

 

[Steve Bird]

the new audi & huracan: can't do fast downshifts here; trying to go down two gears quickly under braking and it won't allow.
might be the way it's supposed to be (engine protector) hmm...

I'm having the same issue. If I downshift too quickly then nothing happens.

 

[Richard Eriksson]

Still, for the 500th or so time, my framerate issues are not related to dropping below 60fps. In fact withour VSync i am never below 120, with 25 AI and all settings maxed. VSync is a solid 60 if i look at the fps counter.

However, as @Brandon Wright is suggesting, my theory (which i also proved many times over here and in steam forums) is that at a continous interval there is a dropped frame. This reads as 60fps still on the counter, becuase it is. Rendering is indeed 60fps. But motion is not. There is a desync between motion tick and rendering tick, causing motion to be uneven. This is more predominant in 60fps vsync. It is less noticable in 100hz. modes, and it got better with 1.3 as i wrote...

It also gets worse with large AI fields. But still, it's there on single car tests as well.

This has been discussed since beta 1 by many different users.

Still, it may look smooth to some, but i can assure you it is not. We measured this once on five different computers, all high end hw, using DX profiling tools. It is evident that there are frames desync on ALL machines. Therefore it is not hw dependant. It is the engine and the way motion is set up.

But as i wrote earlier, there are too many alternatives these days, to really bother.

I've been, together with others, vocalized this issue since first beta release. Still no complete fix. And everything has been researched and eliminated as a fault source, except the obvious one... The game engine itself. Which we can not fix.

But i will not give up. It is a bit better with this new physics decoupling, so perhaps there can be a way to make this go away. But it would take a rewrite of certain parts of the timing code is my guess.

And since i have so much to choose from, as far as PC sim titles go, why choose the inferior tech?

 

[Radu Oros]

There's a new setting in assetto_corsa.ini
[TIMER]
FORCE_TGT=0 ; 0 = Use High Resolution Timer until a drift in time happens, 1 = use 1ms resolution timer

Change 0 to 1, and use the frames app on screen when you're on the track. And try to understand if it solves your problem.

 

[paracletus]

I'm having the same issue. If I downshift too quickly then nothing happens.

It's a new addition to the game, and it takes some getting used to for sure. But - it might be realistic for the huracan; the "autoblip" with this car is quite pronounced (revs increase higher than most cars on the downshifts). Wouldn't be surprised if Kunos fine-tune this feature though, seems a little bit off to me.
Ferrari gt2: you can still shift down through the gears quickly, same as before.

 

[Steve Bird]

It's a new addition to the game, and it takes some getting used to for sure. But - it might be realistic for the huracan; the "autoblip" with this car is quite pronounced (revs increase higher than most cars on the downshifts). Wouldn't be surprised if Kunos fine-tune this feature though, seems a little bit off to me.
Ferrari gt2: you can still shift down through the gears quickly, same as before.

Thanks mate, I thought I had a problem with my paddles

 

[Kurei]

Well, I just spent a lil' over an hour with the update & DLC, and I'm very impressed.

Kunos must've really done some work 'under the hood', because I got the impression of improvement all across the board. I'm still trying to process all my thoughts, but here are a few.
- I swear I got a FPS boost (things just happen smoother to my eye, and it's not placebo IMO)
-The FFB changes are awesome (100% gain with very little clipping, very welcome for my setup)
-Cars felt more 'organic' with new tire model, especially once heated. Looking forward to more testing.
-Circuit de Catalunya, fantastic addition for AC, be it street-car or open-wheeler.
-WOT in 4th gear with the RT-12 R, allofmymoney.jpeg

I'm sure there will be more, but initially I'm quite happy.

 

[Matheus Machado]

Updated Tyres V5 for GT2 and GT3 cars, should give less understeer.

REALLY KUNOS?

 

[Yeschristopher]

Very disappointed in the update. The performance is really poor. I run a triple screen setup with 2x gtx980 in sli, 16GB ram and an I7 - 2600k at 4GHz on Windows 10 64-bit. If I scale shadows, and AA down then the performance gets even worse. If I gave a look at the version 1.2 fps average vs version 1.3, the performance is down by 22fps!!! And this is on an I7 running 2x GTX 980 in SLI. WTF!!!

64-bit Fps: Min: 35, Max: 59, Avg: 48.535
32-bit Fps: Min: 40, Max: 85, Avg: 70.626

I have a single 980 that runs my surround setup with over 100 fps at all times. You have to turn some post processing effects down and it still looks pretty nice. I don't know why you would play with those frame rates!

 

[Jim Liak]

REALLY KUNOS?

You have to heat them. If you do it properly and not destroy them in procedure with graining ( dev app " Car physics " will help you ), the tyres bite the asphalt.

If overdrive, the tyres will overheat and then understeer. So improve your method of driving. Not like a maniac ( overheat) but not like a grannie ( loss of heat = understeer) .

V5 tyre model is excellent. Top notch.

 

[Tripokaridos]

Calm down fanboy

Another one , if we don't know what to say, just saying that. Nuff said from me to . You are the god you know best , RF2 is the best .

 

[Richard Eriksson]

There's a new setting in assetto_corsa.ini
[TIMER]
FORCE_TGT=0 ; 0 = Use High Resolution Timer until a drift in time happens, 1 = use 1ms resolution timer

Change 0 to 1, and use the frames app on screen when you're on the track. And try to understand if it solves your problem.

Hmm... Any explanation on what his does exactly? Haven't tried it yet, but i will. What else would this affect? Is it the physics timer?

 

[e345spd]

Hmm... Any explanation on what his does exactly? Haven't tried it yet, but i will. What else would this affect? Is it the physics timer?

Something like that. If it's buffering the output a little then perhaps it could appear more smooth.

I read your other reply. It is a frame, likely being delivered far too quickly. That's what I get on my amd mgpu setup, I can see a frame basically getting discarded from the frame buffer at 6 or less MS, so this is the behavior we need to stop. The fix for me (and for a surprisingly large number of titles, works with rf2 in single gpu for instance) in AC is setting vsync AND an ideal frame limit. I think the ideal number varies on different systems, they don't all refresh at their exact listed rates. Anyways, if your vsync target is 120hz, try setting limits at 119-125, or at least within that range. It really doesn't make a great deal of sense to me, I resisted even trying it for a long time, yet it keeps working. I'm running 2160p native at max settings (aside from PP and reflections, both between medium and high, though I think pp on low scales better), including 4x AA. Flawlessly smooth when at vsync (and drops below aren't as bad with the frame limiter), 60 absolute minimum fps with 10+ AI. Replays are also very, very smooth.

Also, the frame limiter cuts down on input latency for me very noticeably.

Several profiles seem to work, but I'm not sure which is best yet. AFR of some sort should work for NVidia, but you'll still need to adjust exposure (page up/down) and remember that 2 or 3 of the GUI applications kill MGPU scaling completely, so you need to keep those hidden.

Also try adjusting your flip queue or frame buffer through radeonpro or NVidia inspector.

 

[Richard Eriksson]

Something like that. If it's buffering the output a little then perhaps it could appear more smooth.

I read your other reply. It is a frame, likely being delivered far too quickly. That's what I get on my amd mgpu setup, I can see a frame basically getting discarded from the frame buffer at 6 or less MS, so this is the behavior we need to stop. The fix for me (and for a surprisingly large number of titles, works with rf2 in single gpu for instance) in AC is setting vsync AND an ideal frame limit. I think the ideal number varies on different systems, they don't all refresh at their exact listed rates. Anyways, if your vsync target is 120hz, try setting limits at 119-125, or at least within that range. It really doesn't make a great deal of sense to me, I resisted even trying it for a long time, yet it keeps working. I'm running 2160p native at max settings (aside from PP and reflections, both between medium and high, though I think pp on low scales better), including 4x AA. Flawlessly smooth when at vsync (and drops below aren't as bad with the frame limiter), 60 absolute minimum fps with 10+ AI. Replays are also very, very smooth.

Also, the frame limiter cuts down on input latency for me very noticeably.

Several profiles seem to work, but I'm not sure which is best yet. AFR of some sort should work for NVidia, but you'll still need to adjust exposure (page up/down) and remember that 2 or 3 of the GUI applications kill MGPU scaling completely, so you need to keep those hidden.

Also try adjusting your flip queue or frame buffer through radeonpro or NVidia inspector.

Tried all kinds of stuff in the past, including frame limiter. Never had any luck. But now however, it struck me that when me and my friends used to try that we used the ingame framerate limiter. Also an older build. So just for the heck of it i gave it a try again after reading your post, using the new build and an EXTERNAL framerate limiter (Riva OSD in my case). And yes. It is not 100% smooth still but it's damn close!

Now frame time variance output by PXm hooking on DX render calls, shows only +/- 0.2 variances in flip time, as opposed to always before having 5th or 6th frame flipped at 20+ ms, being more than 4ms variance.

So it does really smoothen it out. Tried again with only in-game framerate limiter also, but that still doesn't work.

But external limiter @ 60fps + in-game vsync on seems to smooth it out quite a bit on this new build.

It is now playable without annoying me, even when turning actually

But still, there are frametime variances, it's just that limiting seems to take away that odd 5/6th frame drop issue.

That and the in-game limiter does not work apperantly, on NVidia hardware at least (me and all my friends who helped me test before are on green team stuff)...

But i still like to thank you for inspiring my brain to think of trying with external limiter... Apperantly that is the way to level out the problems quite a lot.

I still hold fast to the notion that Kunos have some technical stuff to sort out in the game engine though. Apart from the odd looking shadows, over-saturation and the horrible jaggedness on details (due to deferred renderer), the AI is still a bit hit or miss, with some rampant cheating going on as well (note the AIs straightline speed at Monza compared to yours...)

For the moment however i am going to enjoy the fact that it seems stable enough to play with now. And hopefully it is not a fluke, but actually a viable option.

 

[Stereo]

(note the AIs straightline speed at Monza compared to yours...)

Someone posted about that in the GTA on '66 Monza so I went and tried, the car's just very sensitive to bodywork damage - light tap on the side (pale yellow on the damage meter) from brushing the barrier in the Lesmos and it was losing 5km/h top speed, rear ended an AI and light yellow front damage was nearer to 20km/h off the top speed, big deal on a track where 95% of the time is spent throttle to the floor. With a fresh car & appropriate amount of fuel for the race I was going as fast as the AIs everywhere. Actually quite a bit faster in the Lesmos since they don't seem to be good with the tightening radius of the first one.

All the AI really does setup-wise is set a decent fuel load & tires to suit the length of the session, it does speed them up vs. the baseline but not by a whole lot.

 

[Leonardo Chaves]

Snip

I don't know if you tried already, but setting pre-rendered frames to 1 plus adaptable Vsync(in game Vsync turned off) did the trick for me.

About 1.3, love the FFB, no performance issues whatsoever, the gear protection thingy... kinda of annoying.

I've seen that it can be annoying on road cars in real life, but i didn't expect so much interference on race cars honestly.

 

[Birddogg66]

The GT40 is simply wonderful

 

[Birddogg66]

Very disappointed in the update. The performance is really poor. I run a triple screen setup with 2x gtx980 in sli, 16GB ram and an I7 - 2600k at 4GHz on Windows 10 64-bit. If I scale shadows, and AA down then the performance gets even worse. If I gave a look at the version 1.2 fps average vs version 1.3, the performance is down by 22fps!!! And this is on an I7 running 2x GTX 980 in SLI. WTF!!!

64-bit Fps: Min: 35, Max: 59, Avg: 48.535
32-bit Fps: Min: 40, Max: 85, Avg: 70.626

I just updated to the most recent NVidia Driver which improved performance very noticeably maybe try that as it was released Oct. 7th

 

[e345spd]

.

Glad to hear it's helping! Do try reducing the flip queue/frame buffer/pre-rendered frames. Sounds like you're still suffering from 'over-rendering' or whatever this is called. I do use the kunos frame limiter (at 61) because radeonpro is having issues hooking into games with launchers on my old windows 10 build. Saves a lot of time when you can toggle adaptive vsync target (sometimes better than normal vsync) and adjust frame limiter on the fly.

As for other applications, I've seen it work with about 10 different titles now. Basically, any time you are pushing significantly above vsync target (which is a good portion of the time in most games if you don't want to drop vsync) and the frames aren't stacking in a way that hides the over-rendering, limiting should help. RF2, gsce, project cars, il-2 titles, basically everything I try it with.

Definitely more for Kunos to keep working on, though the 'jaggedness' is really due to some pretty decent specular detail imo. If you can sample it out without trashing your FPS, it starts to resolve and make sense. As you say, this is the nature of the engine design and pretty common these days. I will say at least Kunos seems to know how to use specular maps, unlike certain others (ahem ISI and your highly reflective track...go generate some maps). I would like to see mgpu app performance fixed with the 3 weird ones, x64 head tracking (I know they will get to that soon) and whatever weirdness goes on with post processing exposure and mgpu.

A bit of 10+ player MP qualifying and then the race, lotus at Magione. You can see when I open the apps and it looks like I dipped below vsync once or twice, but I was working on setups and pitting, so who knows. I think I'm also still running too high of a flip queue based on the frametime graph, but the output and input latency (very even and fast, feels much better than non-vsync) feel like perfect vsync. The frames must be stacking up and down in a relatively smooth fashion, otherwise you would feel the frame latency. The graph is also highly compressed on the x-axis (at least 30 min I would say), so it looks much more jagged than it does on a real-time scale. I'll try to get some video or something I suppose.

I don't know if you tried already, but setting pre-rendered frames to 1 plus adaptable Vsync(in game Vsync turned off) did the trick for me.

About 1.3, love the FFB, no performance issues whatsoever, the gear protection thingy... kinda of annoying.

I've seen that it can be annoying on road cars in real life, but i didn't expect so much interference on race cars honestly.

I'm thinking the gear protection needs more per-car adjustment. Some of them seem to not behave correctly yet.

 

[Robin]

Just curious here: what is the reason for enabling the framerate limiter and VSync together?
Isn't the idea of the limiter to restrict frames for keeping VSync off so that input lag doesn't become an issue?

In other words: enabling VSync already limits the framerate to your refreshrate . So in itself it makes the limiter obsolete?

 

[e345spd]

Just curious here: what is the reason for enabling the framerate limiter and VSync together?
Isn't the idea of the limiter to restrict frames for keeping VSync off so that input lag doesn't become an issue?

In other words: enabling VSync already limits the framerate to your refreshrate . So in itself it makes the limiter obsolete?

This is why I didn't explore the idea more for a long time. I really don't understand why it works, somehow it's managing to both reduce input lag, while maintaing vsync stability and lack of tearing. Maybe it's just discarding unneeded frames more evenly. If it was just AC, I wouldn't think too much of it. Now, I do this with most games, as it's it almost always improves the output even with vsync already on.