PC2 Project CARS Release Confirmed for September 22nd, New Trailer and Porsche

[Paul Jeffrey]

Project CARS 2 will release this September 22nd it has finally been confirmed, plus Slightly Mad Studios reveal the first batch of Porsche cars coming to the game and a new trailer!

With the game widely promoted by Slightly Mad Studios over the past few weeks, excitement has continued to build amongst the sim racing community as fans eagerly await evidence that SMS have taken on-board the often justified criticism of the original game.

Expected to be bigger and better than its older brother Project CARS 1, the new title will continue the tradition of incorporating a wide and diverse selection of both road and racing cars from a number of different eras of automotive history. Coupled with the expected class leading graphics and a bunch of new features either expanded from the original title or brought to the franchise for the first time, on paper at least the new Project CARS 2 game does look to contain all the individual elements required for an instant classic release. However despite the overwhelmingly positive (admittedly self generated) hype around the game, many fans who perceived the original title to fall below expectations will continue to remain cautious until getting their hands on the game for themselves later this year.

As part of the upcoming E3 event Slightly Mad Studios have at least kept to the first promise made for the new game, with September 22nd now revealed as the official release date on both consoles and PC confirmed and in the bag, Initially teased by SMS Studio Head Ian Bell several weeks ago, September is officially confirmed alongside the list of Porsche cars scheduled to be included in the vanilla version of the title (see full list below).

Project CARS 2 Porsche Release List:

• 911 GT1-98
• 911 GT3 R (991)
• 911 GT3 R Endurance (991)
• 911 GT3 RS
• 918 Spyder
• 935/77
• 935/80
• 936 Spyder
• 962C
• 962C Langheck
• Cayman GT4 Clubsport

Project CARS 2 is very much shaping up to be one of the most potentially interesting releases of 2017 in the sim racing world, and with big budgets, big name drivers, big manufacturers and plenty of content and features to try out this September it will be interesting to see how the game stacks up to its immediate rivals September 22nd!

Project CARS 2 will be available for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC 22nd September 2017.

The Project CARS 2 sub forum here at RaceDepartment is the place to go for all the latest news and discussion around this exciting new game from Slightly Mad Studios. Check out the sub forum, get involved in the discussion and join our community as we await release later this year!

Looking forward to the new game? Excited to see Porsche coming to the sim? What new cars and tracks have you noticed in the latest trailer? Let us know in the comments section below!

 

[Kurupt CDN]

Personally I thought the physics model in Pcars1 was quite good. I did a lot of work to get the sim to drive to my liking by spending lots of time tweaking everything. I feel the handling was very realistic. I am an old school racer, started racing in the early 70's and road raced different classes for over 25 years. While not having driven F1 or prototype cars, I got the opportunity to drive many different class cars on track and have a really good expectation of what each should feel like when driving them in anger. It is why I believe many of the complaints I hear about the handling in Pcars1 are coming from guys that did not get their settings tweaked to their liking, or simply have no idea what some of these cars handle like on a real world track. Perhaps lacking real world experience racing many of these cars, or experience on vintage tires.
When you see drivers like Chris Goodwin, and Patrick Long working on the in game handling you need to consider the effort that is going into this to make it as good as technology will allow. There will always be guys that will like one sim over another. Personally I don't really like the handling in Iracing even though I loved the Papyrus titles. As sim racers we perceive what we feel is real but in reality most time you will find no two drivers want the car setup exactly the same. So different styles favor different approaches. As great as Shumacher was with Ferrari and Benetton, he was not well suited to the handling characteristics of the new tires when he came back with Mercedes. Does that mean the car sucked??? Why was Nico able to drive it so well then?
I think SMS can and has delivered a world class sim, but it may not be for everyone, GPL was way too hard for a lot of people to enjoy but for those of us that made it a challenge it was an epic journey. I think there will always be doubters and mockers that feel they elevate themselves by attempting to downgrade others. I hope people will spend time tweaking in the handling characteristics of Pcars2 to get the full benefit of it when released. I spent many hours tweaking Sim commander settings after purchasing my Accuforce and have been rewarded with a polished product for putting in the extra effort. I have no worries or doubt Pcars2 can deliver. As sim racers we should unite and get behind these companies that supply our hobby with software rather than constantly complain and whine about what we don't like. Let's all be proactive and make suggestions and specific references that can push these titles forward, rather than mock and berate the guys who strive to make our hobby better by supplying new technologies and pushing current technologies to the limits. I can remember playing World circuit and Indianapolis 500 and having fun, but those were no sims. What we have today is better than ever because of the efforts of dedicated individuals who have made a career out of supplying our hobby. Please let's all try to work with them and not against them to continuously improve the breed.

I fully agree with what your saying.......tho you said it yourself. It took many hrs of tweaking....I've spent many hrs over the last few yrs wanting to like this title and constantly tweaking hoping to find the sweet spot some speak of but have yet to find it. That's, where the issue is, too much tweaking with less playing is gonna turn the majority off!
I really hope they address this in pc2, the game needs to have a good feel out of the box without spending countless hrs tweaking and spending $$$ just to make it feel decent. I've always believed a sim is only as good as the wheel your using and after hearing your feedback with an accuforce and watching "as close as it gets with Chris Goodwin" using a Vesaro motion rig, accuforce, 4k triple screen setup etc I finally realized what I was missing to get the feel I was looking for........a $$72k + setup!
https://www.vesaro.com/store/pc/viewPrd.asp?idproduct=477&idcategory=338
I wonder if his feedback would be the same using my trusty Thrustmaster tx, static rig and single ultra-wide monitor or a basic setup like what the majority will be using?
Jokes aside, Pc1 overall was a good game, but feel what left a bad taste in many was the missing features/content, endless tweaking and how fast they moved onto pc2 before completing pc1, there's still bugs and issues and the last time they released a non vr update for the game was in jan 2016.
Releasing a final patch for pc1 with a with an updated base ffb settings prior to pc2 might win back some of the naysayers, until then its just the same promotional hype we saw prior to the first release.

 

[Shaun Clarke]

there's still bugs and issues and the last time they released a non vr update for the game was in jan 2016.
Releasing a final patch for pc1 with a with an updated base ffb settings prior to pc2 might win back some of the naysayers, until then its just the same promotional hype we saw prior to the first release.

@Ian Bell read the above, and this is from a harden PC driver, and I pin point in bold what I was saying.

So you say the bugs have been removed for PC2.....I say this without being rude or abusive, but

Prove it

 

[Kyle Pearson]

Simple truth is ALL software has bugs.. There is no such thing as bug free software. The question is more of showstopping (or usage stopping) bugs.

 

[Shaun Clarke]

Simple truth is ALL software has bugs.. There is no such thing as bug free software. The question is more of showstopping (or usage stopping) bugs.

Agree, but Bugs can be fixed, not just left after x amount of years, and just move on to the next version hoping they have gone?

@Kurupt CDN has a very valid point. He has spend money and hours trying to perfect PC1, but like he posted and I pointed out, there is still bugs?

What's to say these bugs are NOT fixed in PC2. @Ian Bell say so, well of course he would, what owner wouldn't, all I asked in a very friendly manor and I know a lot of people agree with me on this....prove it

What's the harm in releasing a Demo version with stripped down content for all of us to test / play with?

To me, there is no harm, unless.....

Now I know I work on AC (as a hobby) and I am no mean a perfectionist and yeah I really enjoy AC for reasons of my own, but I am open minded and honest, even if AC is wrong (you would of seen some of my comments ) but if @Ian Bell would like to provide me with a test version, stripped down, I will, as always be open minded and provide positive and neg feedback.

What give me the right to say this, well nothing, but people have loved the Seat Leon Cup I did and the Ginetta, as in handling, so why not put the question out there?

 

[Kyle Pearson]

Agree, but Bugs can be fixed, not just left after x amount of years, and just move on to the next version hoping they have gone?

There is a limit from a business perspective on how much time you can spend on product. I'm not talking PC1 or any software release specifically, but just the general principle of running a software company. At some point, it's not financially smart to continue spending on a revenue stream that is drying up. That's how you kill a company. Keep in mind that SMS (as well as other developers) have real people working who expect paychecks to feed their families and keep roofs over their head. They have to business decisions that consumers may not always agree with, but there are people depending on these businesses to make the right choices.

What's to say these bugs are NOT fixed in PC2. Ian Ball say so, well of course he would, what owner wouldn't, all I asked in a very friendly manor and I know a lot of people agree with me on this....prove it

There is nothing to say "these bugs are NOT fixed in PC2". I'm not sure what "these bugs" are specifically referring to but I'm not sure what you expect Ian to answer. He either answers positivity in which you don't believe him, or he answers negatively and which people will think he's being sarcastic and wants to dodge the question. There is really no other answer he can provide so I'm not sure what you expect to get with questions like that....

What's the harm in releasing a Demo version with stripped down content for all of us to test / play with?

To me, there is no harm, unless.....

The harm is in costs... There is a reason most devs no longer do demos and mostly rely on early access and gameplay videos for potential users to see what they have to offer..

Each minute that a developer spends doing something for work, is a cost. What companies balance is how to get the most of what they are paying for.. Also, having a developer spend time creating a demo means they are not working towards their deadlines for their main release. That takes away resources which can in turn, create bugs (i.e. lower resources for the main project increases workloads on the rest which creates bugs and suboptimal work).

 

[Shaun Clarke]

Sorry totally disagree with all of your comments here, and I will explain why.

1) If product A has flaws and never fixed, why would people buy / invest in product B? No business sense
2) They have full product A, create a smaller version, doesn't cost any more
3) Videos looks nice, they don't give the end user any feedback what so ever, just some very nice visuals
4) Bugs, you only have to search YT and there is ,0000's of videos showing them, and some are shocking
5) Even EA release a demo of Fifa and others....??
6) You have hardened PC1 drivers posting here, that have spend hrs trying to make PC1 feel good and failed

It should work straight out of the box, any decent sim does this, and then to perfect it, you tweak it, you should never never have to tweak it to make it work!!

 

[Shadowoff]

Sorry totally disagree with all of your comments here, and I will explain why.

1) If product A has flaws and never fixed, why would people buy / invest in product B? No business sense
2) They have full product A, create a smaller version, doesn't cost any more
3) Videos looks nice, they don't give the end user any feedback what so ever, just some very nice visuals
4) Bugs, you only have to search YT and there is ,0000's of videos showing them, and some are shocking
5) Even EA release a demo of Fifa and others....??
6) You have hardened PC1 drivers posting here, that have spend hrs trying to make PC1 feel good and failed

It should work straight out of the box, any decent sim does this, and then to perfect it, you tweak it, you should never never have to tweak it to make it work!!

I totally agree with you! I have almost 1000 hours in pCars and I found and reported quite a few bugs and it felt like no one ever saw/realised them and even tried to solve them. I will buy pCars2 for the reason that pCars1 was my first "sim" and because I give this series a 2nd chance (which everyone should get!). But after I bought AC ´cause I wanted to play something new and watched a lot of YouTube videos comparing AC and pCars I started realising that AC was the proper racing sim. Those are two great videos which show the differences between AC and pCars:

Maybe AC doesnt feel realistic. I can´t know it as I never drove a proper race car (even though pCars1 felt literally like the FFB would just be a spring returning to the center of the wheel, sometimes more, sometimes less) but the physics and especially the tire model are way closer to reality.

Anyways, looking forward to pCars2! Will buy it for sure and lets hope I will enjoy it for another 1000 hours

 

[Shaun Clarke]

Please don't get me wrong. At the end of the day I am a sim racer, and any sim that tickles me and makes me smile when I drive it, I love it, but all I am saying, with all the hickups and problems with PC1, I don't think I am wrong in asking, if PC2 is that good, just prove it, and not with videos.

I mean look at my history. I stuck with LFS for what, 11yrs, it was fantastic, amazing, but it now like a bag of out of date fruit, past it's sell by date. It's not a case of I dip in, don't like it and bugger off, I do like to fiddle, try and make it better, but I also look at public feedback, and when I see more negative than positive, I do step back (I didn't know about he refund on steam)

So with PC2, atm I see more neg than pos, from PC1 drivers, so why would I part with hard cash?

Shaun

 

[Kyle Pearson]

2) They have full product A, create a smaller version, doesn't cost any more

This is totally incorrect. You don't understand managing resources and budgets. Nor do you understand divergent code paths and the management of multiple code lines. To be honest, most people who have never been in software development do not understand these concepts so I don't expect you to either. However, there is always a cost.

5) Even EA release a demo of Fifa and others....??

EA employs a ton of staff. They have over 8500 employees. SMS and most other smaller developers are not even 1/10 of that size. With resources, more things can be accomplished in a given time. I don't know how much you have done with project management, but you only have three things to play with for a project: time, features and resources (which include people, money, etc). If time and resources are staying level, you cannot increase features. If you want to increase features, you either need to increase time or resources (or both). It's the way things work.

It should work straight out of the box, any decent sim does this, and then to perfect it, you tweak it, you should never never have to tweak it to make it work!!

I'm not sure what you are referring to with this comment. I'm not sure if you are referring to FFB or something else. If you are referring to FFB, SMS agrees and have stated they are simplifying the approach for PC2. However, FFB will always be subjective so what one person thinks is great, others might not.

I actually admire iRacing in this aspect. Their FFB was terrible and still is. However, what they didn't do was a knee-jerk reaction when iRacing first hit the market and everyone was complaining. They just basically said "this is what you get" and eventually (most) everyone quit complaining and just moved on.

 

[Kyle Pearson]

Those are two great videos which show the differences between AC and pCars

AC is a good sim, however the person making those videos has never driven a real race car. I'm not saying PC1 is perfect. I'm not saying AC is terrible (as it's not). I am saying that Youtuber is showing differences but has no basis for what "should" be happening.

(and yes I do drive race cars)

http://mahjik.homestead.com/files/hosting/Honda/2017_04_Gateway/312A2998.jpg

 

[Kurupt CDN]

For the record i havent had any game breaking bugs the only major issue is for some reason the game crashes upon launching but always works on the second launch. Other than that its just some spastic shadow flickering here and there and some audio glitches.
Ex. When your in the pits some of the cars audio...believe its the ariel atom goes....pew,pew,pew,pew as it passes by.
Other than that my biggest gripe is the over complex base ffb and missing individual audio sliders.
Ex: opponent volume, tires, skidding etc.
From what ive heard most of these have been addressed in pc2.

 

[Kyle Pearson]

For the record i havent had any game breaking bugs the only major issue is for some reason the game crashes upon launching but always works on the second launch. Other than that its just some spastic shadow flickering here and there and some audio glitches.
Ex. When your in the pits some of the cars audio...believe its the ariel atom goes....pew,pew,pew,pew as it passes by.
Other than that my biggest gripe is the over complex base ffb and missing individual audio sliders.
Ex: opponent volume, tires, skidding etc.
From what ive heard most of these have been addressed in pc2.

I can reiterate some of what Ian and the other SMS members have mentioned already (mostly on GTP). The sound engine has undergone a re-write as to how it uses the car samples. The FFB configuration is being simplified from what was offered in PC1.

I can't say FFB will be fantastic out of the box as everyone will have their own preferences. I will say that the goal is to have a good experience out of the box with easy to navigate/understand options for tuning.

 

[Shaun Clarke]

@Kyle Pearson I will just enlighten you, for one second.

I am actually an IT Project Manager in his 40's, family man, Grandad, who works for a multi BILLION pound company based in the UK but also international, so I know about budgets, cost spreading, Capexing, cost effectiveness, SLA's KPI's, I could go on, but I won't bore you any more.

A company is a company, software, LGA (Local Government Authority), private sector it doesn't matter, costs are costs, and people have to off set these, with the potential loss of not producing the forth coming products (i.e PC2)

Now by giving the customer (us) a demo product of the new product, this would:

a) ease some nerves
b) increase productivity
c) Increase sales
d) increase revenue
e) Future Proof any additions
f) Option for DLC, increase sales, increase revenue

If you have have a full product in production already, then you CAN ( as it's software ) not hardware, slim this down for testing purposes, and it will cost you NOTHING, NADDA!! as you have the product already, it's not like you making a major change.

It's like giving somebody mobile phone and you want them to test the OS, they don't need to make calls, they don't need to text, you want them to test the functionality of the OS, so you supply no sim card

And I refer to "should work straight out of the box" as in you should be able to load the game / sim and at least have a little bit of fun without having to have a degree in physics and mathematical equations or be a motorsports setup expert and know the difference between camber, caster and Toe in, which to what I have been told and read, you need to for PC1 to even come close to any other sim, feeling wise?

So please, don't quote to me about business case, cost, spend, time, as I do it as a day job, and there is no excuse for excuses

Shaun

 

[Shaun Clarke]

I would love to see their "lessons learnt" or even the "Risk Log", because if they had a real project Manager, PC2 would not of even been mentioned, before the both above had been addressed

 

[Kyle Pearson]

If you have have a full product in production already, then you CAN ( as it's software ) not hardware, slim this down for testing purposes, and it will cost you NOTHING, NADDA!! as you have the product already, it's not like you making a major change.

I will say, that is spoken like a PJM and not a technical person (or technical PJM) as no software developer will tell you "it cost nothing". Again, resources are a cost as already explained. If you really have been doing that job for that long, you should know this already. I'm sure you have done calcs in the past using FTE's.

Your bullet points are interesting... I would agree with those maybe 10 years ago, but not with today's markets. Ian even comment that data today suggests demos actually hurts sales (i.e. for some people, they get their fix from only running the demo). I actually know some in that group... I don't have the data, so don't say "show it to me as I don't believe it". Again, there are reasons demos are less and less over the years.

In the end, SMS and Bandai have already said there will be no demo. It doesn't matter to keep arguing on it as it's not happening. For the PC folks, they will have 2 hours from Steam in which to get a refund so that in itself will have to serve as a demo.

 

[Kyle Pearson]

I would love to see their "lessons learnt" or even the "Risk Log", because if they had a real project Manager, PC2 would not of even been mentioned, before the both above had been addressed

The changes I've seen solely from how WMD2 is organized suggests they did do a retrospective of WMD1/PC1. They never made their notes public but it's clear they took their lessons learned to heart. Will it be enough? Only time will tell.

 

[Shaun Clarke]

The changes I've seen solely from how WMD2 is organized suggests they did do a retrospective of WMD1/PC1. They never made their notes public but it's clear they took their lessons learned to heart. Will it be enough? Only time will tell.

Interestin. I would not expect them to make them public, but to at least beta testers, but hay ho.

And I agree, no point in arguing, but my model, what I do now, is not 10yrs old, worked yesterday, works today and will work tomorrow and also works International.

Demos never hurt the market and sales ( come on) you seen Dragons Den, Sir Allen Surgar, demos never hurt unless you have something to hide. Demo's no matter what, if it's a game, a calendar, a business card, they HELP sales and production

Heard of the phrase..."sow the seed, and let it grow"?, well that seed needs planting first, otherwise it wont grow?

Sorry but SMS, WMD, what ever you call them, have no business model, no business plan, not risk register, and they certainly don't have learnt from lesson log, learnt in the past, and if you scroll back, people even mention Shift2...how long ago was that?

So in this post alone, they have a history of sending stuff out, not finished, not complete, bugs all over the place, and just move on.

Where is the Lesson's Learnt / Risk Log there?

If a company fecks up once, ok, but twice, hmm, 3 times, WHAT, and potentially a 4th time ( we don't know yet I know) but come on?

 

[Shadowoff]

For the record i havent had any game breaking bugs the only major issue is for some reason the game crashes upon launching but always works on the second launch. Other than that its just some spastic shadow flickering here and there and some audio glitches.
Ex. When your in the pits some of the cars audio...believe its the ariel atom goes....pew,pew,pew,pew as it passes by.
Other than that my biggest gripe is the over complex base ffb and missing individual audio sliders.
Ex: opponent volume, tires, skidding etc.
From what ive heard most of these have been addressed in pc2.

For the record, I had kind of game braking bugs which still arent fixed.

1.) When you run over some curbs it can happen that your car takes a huge flight
2.) Getting 105 seconds slow down penalties
3.) FFB just going crazy and being unable to turn in any kind

Those are 3 bugs I reported in the early days of pCars1 and I can still show you them in the current version of pCars. They were really uncommon but happened. Also I had once a loading screen from an upcoming update and all the new cars from the DLC which is for me also kind of game braking (if you want to read all of it and the reaction from the community: http://forum.projectcarsgame.com/sh...tion-(Spoilers)/page663&p=1218977#post1218977 ). I'm not saying that, after I played AC, pCars is total garbage. I enjoyed and still enjoy is quite a lot. Just saying that it has/had kind of a rough time

 

[Kyle Pearson]

Sorry but SMS, WMD, what ever you call them, have no business model, no business plan, not risk register, and they certainly don't have learnt from lesson log, learnt in the past, and if you scroll back, people even mention Shift2...how long ago was that?

WMD is the community (i.e. your normal every day users who are participating in development air-chair designing). I say it that way as SMS is fully in charge regardless of WMD. However, they do listen to what the community (WMD) is requesting/saying.

WMD = Community (not SMS or Bandai employees)
SMS = Development team
Bandai Namco = Publisher (responsible for marketing)

As far as SMS and the lack of business model; I can't say that I agree with that. Ian has been making sims since 2005 (technically before since GTR didn't just materialize out of thin air). Many studios have come and gone over that time... Saying they have no business plan is truly a tasteless shot that I'm shocked you would even make. You seem like a very intelligent person but throwing stones on the internet for the sake of doing it to get a rise is definitely discourteous.

 

[Andy_J]

@Shaun Clarke
Your requests are quite valid and the demo model used to be used quite frequently by Games companies in the past as you probably know. But there are two defining reasons why they(SMS) wont do one or infact need to do one.
A) The Demo will (maybe) put people off, or
B) Steam allows you to try it for 2 hours and then get a refund.

As for console users, well they can just resell the disk or whatever at a loss.