PC1 Latest Build testing.

[Andy_J]

As you all know, Ian gave me a free pass to test the latest builds and that's what I have been doing for the last week. I will report here as and when I see fit to tell all about my findings.

But I will say that the latest build (296) is quite good. Now lets make some sense of my statement. I used a Lotus 98T in helmet cam using my antique MOMO red wheel and I can honestly report it is coming along much better than I anticipated. The actual feel and immersion is damn fine at this point. The handling is strange at first compared to say...RF2 and FVA, but it grows on you within minutes. At this point in time, this actual car feels good. I like it and I love the Milan circuit. The damage model has come on leaps and bounds.

I am doing some more testing all of next week using a G27 and I will also test some of the other cars that don't interest me as much (I am a F1 nut) and see how the feel in comparison to Shift 2, because that is what I was initially comparing PCars to.

I would like the replay function to have a directors mode though. Something that jumps from action to action and from car to car.

Aside from that, the replay's do crash my PC quite often but I understand that is being looked at.

Watch this space.

 

[William Levesque]

My brother got Build 834 so I tried it. Actually not bad at all, especially after tweaking some things here and there.

Mostly drove the GT4 cars (Boss 302R and M3 GT4), they feel really nice. And the career looks fun.

 

[Andrej Svajger]

My brother got Build 834 so I tried it. Actually not bad at all, especially after tweaking some things here and there.

Mostly drove the GT4 cars (Boss 302R and M3 GT4), they feel really nice. And the career looks fun.

And you and your brother will buy it when it comes out, right?

 

[William Levesque]

And you and your brother will buy it when it comes out, right?

I already bought the game a month ago, and my brother prolly will buy it soon. So don't worry, lol.

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

I mean, just a few years ago people were making up lies about how the project was progressing and a lot of bitter people who were kicked off the WMD forums raised a real ruckus here. Heck it got so far that as I remember it, the boss of SMS was ready to sue racedepartment.com.

Which, to be off topic, is the major reason why I will not buy the game. That whole thing left me with a bitter taste.

Oh, and of course pCars 2 - why bother getting the first, when many things are not in it atm.

 

[Msportdan]

I must admit coming from a new buyer , I was a bit disappointed to hear that pcars 2 is already in the works so to speak. They should of at least waited half a year. It seems like they wont put all their efforts into this version

 

[NLxAROSA]

Other developers do it exactly the same. As a matter of fact, most of them start even earlier. Knowing that Project CARS took 4 years to develop, SMS is already quite late if they want to have a sequel ready in 2 years after release date.

SMS committed to giving 2 years of support/additional content for Project CARS. It's commercial suicide for them not to honor that commitment, so I'm not worrying.

 

[Kyle Pearson]

I must admit coming from a new buyer , I was a bit disappointed to hear that pcars 2 is already in the works so to speak. They should of at least waited half a year. It seems like they wont put all their efforts into this version

Software development is about creating a vision, and then mapping a plan to that vision (called a roadmap). The old saying is the best time to plant a tree other than 20 years ago, is today. With that, to have a roadmap for a franchise, they have to plan it. That doesn't mean their "resources" are off working on it. Quite the opposite, they are still hard at work on the current release and will be doing so for the next few years.

Project CARS 2 is 5-6 years away.

 

[Kurupt CDN]

What would it matter if it was 1/2 a yr or the day after release? It's not like they stopped working on pcars after yesterday's announcement and started on pcars 2 lol
The focus is pcars 1 which will hopefully be successful enough to bring in the funds to finance new features and licenses to improve pcars 2. I don't know of many companies that aren't looking into the future while still working and supporting current projects.
I think one the biggest features added to pcars 2 will mostly be the benefits of windows 10 release....dx12 for better performance between gpu and cpu apparently it's easier to work with? And the possibility of cross platform compatibility between xbox 1 and pc which would be beneficial from a community standpoint as it would combine and increase the overall amount of users.

 

[SnappyDEe]

4 years of development is not enough of a commitment by SMS to create pCars?

What?

What is the hardware going to be like 2 years from now? Can we even imagine what GPUs and CPUs will be capable of by then?

I don't get it.

 

[Ole Marius Myrvold]

The focus is pcars 1 which will hopefully be successful enough to bring in the funds to finance new features and licenses to improve pcars 2.

Will continue being user-funded though. Remember, they are supposed to share some profits

4 years of development is not enough of a commitment by SMS to create pCars?

What?

What is the hardware going to be like 2 years from now? Can we even imagine what GPUs and CPUs will be capable of by then?

I don't get it.

No, you don't get it.
4 years of dev. is good commitment. But they've marketed it as a game that will get "unprecedented" support, with the amount of extra stuff being added also after the game have been released. That doesn't send out great signals for the people wanting to buy the game.

 

[Kurupt CDN]

SMS will make money regardless of sales numbers, if Iam correct the community will only receive profit shares if the game sells 1 million copies across all 4 platforms. Pcars 2 will not be community funded or have profit shares it will be 100€ cost to limit the overall numbers for those that wanna beta test again and will only be open for 60 days to register. You will receive the game in full, dlc I believe and a chance to partake in testing.
In all honesty pcars 2 was really no hidden secret it's been talked about on the forums for a few yrs now. If pcars was soley a pc game a big update could have been added down the road with what ever new features were to be added, but with the majority of sales more than likely coming from consoles an update would be too much and what about all those with no Internet? That's why there will be a pcars 2, alot people don't realize this project was only funded with $3 million dollars which really isn't a whole lot compared to other titles once you factor in the licenses, employees, tech, marketing etc. The money raised is done and probably was quit awhile ago that's why the game is being released to bring in money so they can continue support, content, features and pay staff.
What sms has done with $3 million compared to the GT & Forza title which have a $80 million + budget is pretty damn impressive if you ask me!

 

[SnappyDEe]

Yeah, you're right. I'm canceling my pre-order. How dare they tell me that they will be supporting a title I'm interested in by offering updates and new content!

(Sigh)

 

[NLxAROSA]

What sms has done with $3 million compared to the GT & Forza title which have a $80 million + budget is pretty damn impressive if you ask me!

To be completely correct, it's 3.75 million euros, not dollars. And the money that funded the delays (paid for by Ian himself) should also be added. (And this took place before the euro took a crash ) But still damn' impressive indeed!

 

[Andy_J]

I still hate the idea that sim enthusiasts are now expected to pay premium game prices for something not yet even started. What ever happened to paying for games after they were released? Wait and see if it's any good first. That's my motto.

 

[Coennos]

Well i must say,we almost know what we can expect from this game,with all the info from builds on youtube etc.
So for me the decision is not so hard to make.

 

[Andrej Svajger]

I still hate the idea that sim enthusiasts are now expected to pay premium game prices for something not yet even started. What ever happened to paying for games after they were released? Wait and see if it's any good first. That's my motto.

Well, for me it paid off in the first month to be part of the whole project. I mean, you get all details how the project grows, you take place in decisions making (as a community), you can beta test and you have everything at hand. There were times when i wasn't happy with direction, in which the game went and (how childish) gave it a half year break only to be so happy (yea, i'm using this word a lot) how the game progressed. Wake up the kid in you and you'll understand what i'm saying. Did the same with AC and will repeat that with every simracing game to come.

 

[Blkout]

Software development is about creating a vision, and then mapping a plan to that vision (called a roadmap). The old saying is the best time to plant a tree other than 20 years ago, is today. With that, to have a roadmap for a franchise, they have to plan it. That doesn't mean their "resources" are off working on it. Quite the opposite, they are still hard at work on the current release and will be doing so for the next few years.

Project CARS 2 is 5-6 years away.

I honestly don't believe it will take nearly 5-6 years to release PCARS 2. If PCARS is successful which it likely will be, SMS already has a solid foundation to build PCARS 2. It won't take nearly as long to develop as PCARS since most of the ground work has already been done. I seriously doubt they would radically modify the game engine and code to start all over again. I'd say a safe bet is PCARS 2 in less than 3 years and I'd personally bet on 2 years.

 

[Kyle Pearson]

I'd say a safe bet is PCARS 2 in less than 3 years and I'd personally bet on 2 years.

Nope. They have updates and DLC plans for Project CARS 1 for 2-3 years. Why 5-6 years? They want the hardware platforms to evolve. Without that, they can't really introduce too much other than more cars and tracks, which is the plan for Project CARS 1 DLC. They want the hardware to continue to mature so they can do things like increase the resolution of the SETA tire model. For Project CARS 1, they did have to dial back some of the tire resolution for performance reasons. If the tire calcs are taking up too much of the CPU, there isn't enough overhead for the rest of the processing (input, graphics, sound, AI, etc).

In short, Project CARS 2 is really so far out and unknown at this stage that it's pointless to even discuss. All Ian was attempting to do was share a little of SMS's vision to the WMD community. He felt that they were "part of SMS" and wanted them to be excited about the future now that pCARS 1 is being released. There are a lot people in the WMD community who care more about the journey than the destination so sharing that vision was a good thing on so many levels. It's just a shame it's been twisted and spun into something it's not by the interwebz....

 

[Blkout]

Nope. They have updates and DLC plans for Project CARS 1 for 2-3 years. Why 5-6 years? They want the hardware platforms to evolve. Without that, they can't really introduce too much other than more cars and tracks, which is the plan for Project CARS 1 DLC. They want the hardware to continue to mature so they can do things like increase the resolution of the SETA tire model. For Project CARS 1, they did have to dial back some of the tire resolution for performance reasons. If the tire calcs are taking up too much of the CPU, there isn't enough overhead for the rest of the processing (input, graphics, sound, AI, etc).

In short, Project CARS 2 is really so far out and unknown at this stage that it's pointless to even discuss. All Ian was attempting to do was share a little of SMS's vision to the WMD community. He felt that they were "part of SMS" and wanted them to be excited about the future now that pCARS 1 is being released. There are a lot people in the WMD community who care more about the journey than the destination so sharing that vision was a good thing on so many levels. It's just a shame it's been twisted and spun into something it's not by the interwebz....

Nope. I'm going with 2-3 years. We'll revisit this in 2017-2018 if you'd like.

 

[Kyle Pearson]

Nope. I'm going with 2-3 years. We'll revisit this in 2017-2018 if you'd like.

Sure.. I'll be part of pCARS 2 so I can fill you in on the details.