Rate the Sims: Community Edition | rFactor 2

Paul Jeffrey · Dec 23, 2019

We are looking to crown the 'RaceDepartment Community Favourite' racing game - get your votes in now for our next game on the list... rFactor 2!

Our dear RaceDepartment community. You folks are the most mighty fans of sim racing, often displaying an immense amount of understanding and depth of knowledge when it comes to our favourite hobby.

With sim racing and eSports in such a wonderful boom period of late. Gamers looking to have some fun with their virtual racing machines have never before had such a wide and robust variety of software to enjoy.

Now occasionally I've been in a position to rate new racing titles that have come my way, and almost every time I've received a wide variety of folks agreeing, or strongly disagreeing with my own opinions.

Opinions are great, but sometimes the opinion of one person, with their own likes and dislikes taken into account, can often give a bit of a skewed picture (intentional or not) to the greater cause in which said person is trying to explain.

As such, rather than doing one myself, and in the spirit of engaging some interesting community discussion, I thought it could be fun to let our own community rate each of the key sim racing / racing games available today.

As always with these things, please do try and respect each other and their opinions, and let's try to see if we can give a fun, but fair shake of the stick to each of the games included in this poll.

For transparency, I'm going to be featuring the following racing games over the next weeks:

I'm going to launch the article each Monday evening, and keep the poll running for a full week until the next new article is pushed live. So get your votes in quick!

Once I've completed the full list of games, I'll publish a final results feature, and we can award the winning developer the lofty title of 'RaceDepartment Community Favourite'!

Have fun, stay sensible and let the voting commence!

Richard H · Dec 23, 2019

RF2 is my most played sim since I started sim racing about a year ago. I love the feel of driving in this game, the graphics are a little dated but it runs well and looks acceptable in VR. FFB feels awesome. I don't know enough about tyres to be able to comment on the much vaunted tyre model, but I can definitely feel the difference in cold/hot tyres and brakes, and fresh/worn tyres. Their content has been generally great IMO (particularly love the recent Tatuus pack, and absolutely love the new NZ tracks, wish they'd do the same for some Aussie tracks).

As so many others have said, this game has so much potential, but it still needs a lot of work, and seems to progress at an absolutely glacial pace. I play mostly offline, so I don't give a toss about the competition system they keep going on about, but in the meantime, I'm having to edit .ini files, duplicate skins, use the MAS utility, and utilise 3rd party apps to make offline championships? Get your **** together S397.

7/10

Vasilis Katerinakis · Dec 23, 2019

Rfactor 2 was my very first ever sim ever since i made the switch from consoles to pc and that was 2-3 years ago, so i came around when S397 was handed over the keys to development. Up until the gt3 challenger pack release, never had it crossed my mind to switch to another sim despite the questionable quality of the already released paid content. After that everything just snowball out of control. Paid cars were hit and miss quality (If sb told me that the aston gt3 and the fe gen1 were released by the same dev, i would think they were lying), physics were left behind (Temperatures shouldn't be a cosmetic item), the communication started to lack between devs and players (I mean who in their right mind thought it was a good idea to do a bop with radical handling changes 3 days before a 24h race that teams were preparing for weeks!) and of course the never ending list of bugs which god knows if they will be ever fixed.

Sure rf2 does have the best ffb, the best feel and in some areas the best physics but that isn't enough. A new ui and competition system will not hide the true issues with this sim and sooner rather than later they will come back and bite hard. Jumping on any new piece of content, buying it reagardless of quality and "supporting" S397, will not solve these issues. In the few time that is left in 2019, S397 and community as a whole (including me) need to sit down and reconsider their priorities and beliefs about rf2. Only then will the issues be resolved and until they are resolved, rf2 gets a 5 from me.

randomcallsign · Dec 23, 2019

As a sim it's great. But not as much more.

David Wright · Dec 23, 2019

RF2 - the difficult follow up to a smash hit. In theory it had everything we asked for. GTR2 had dynamic track and weather which rFactor1 lacked so naturally that's what we asked for. We felt the ISI slip curve tyre model was obsolete and demanded a brand new tyre model. And throw in chassis flex please while you are at it. ISI rightly IMO recognised that just because a game is a mod platform doesn't mean it shouldn't come with licensed content so out went Toban and the Rhez and in came more real cars and tracks.

But it failed. The large rF1 modding community didn't make the switch. The standard content was too thin and disjointed. Some of the new features such as rain were broken. The decision to stick with DX9, probably made in 2008, was looking like a mistake when the game actually came out in 2012.

They say you learn more from your failures than your successes. If you compare ISI and Kunos this does seem to be true. Although loved by its fans, Netcar Pro was never remotely as popular as rFactor. But Kunos learned their lessons and produced Assetto Corsa. The game wasn't perfect by any means but did feature state of the art graphics, a very solid list of licensed cars including novelties like Ferrari and later Porsche. The track roster was perhaps a bit on the thin side but included favourites like Spa, Monza, Nurburgring, and Imola, and went on to add tracks like Brands Hatch and the Nordschliefe - all tracks missing from rF2. And Kunos got on the laser scanned band wagon very promptly and didn't charge a premium. Finally they made the game modder friendly and although they had no existing modding community, AC quickly established itself as the mod platform of choice, the successor to rF1.

You have to admire S397 for taking on this mess. In theory they are doing the right things. Fix the rain, New graphics engine. Use Steam workshop to download mods. New car content which is much more coherent and focused on the popular GT3 class. Big name laser scanned tracks are now appearing as dlc. But I'm not convinced they have the resources to catch up with rivals.

Perhaps if you spend several times the cost of the base game and get all the dlc tracks and the car packs you will judge the game more favourably, but as someone who has the base game and the first GT3 pack the game is IMO the weakest of the current generation of sims. I can only give it a 5.

TrumpetReich · Dec 23, 2019

When it gets it rights, it's unbeatable. Certain car/track combos are awesome. Unfortunately it's severely lacking in so many things that make for a complete game.

Durge Driven · Dec 23, 2019

Physics ?

What other sim can do any of this

Swap cars and skins in garage means you never have to reload every time you do in any other sim multiply that load time and it will end up more then rF2's once

Climb stairs and other objects

Hang by the roll bar from other objects, even trees

Explore off track

Jump over the railway line at Belgium, drive on railway line

Park inside a shed other then pits
Dynamics hitting objects other sims have nothing in this regard

Why rF2 is only sim that cars feels light jumping while others sims feel like bricks
(I am sure they coded in a smidgen less gravity it is only explanation I can think of
That is why car feels so alive over bumps and you can do a 360 flip
ISI physics always had this back in F1-2002 you could smash off front wing and do 360s at Lemans hump
we used to do online and watch each others attempts

That is just tip of the iceberg, Sandbox++

I never rated any sim on principal
4/5 or 8/10 tells you nothing
Separate scores by category would give a better indication which sim is better or worse for that particular feature

FlashQld · Dec 23, 2019

For me rF2 is a 9 - sure it lacks some polish but it's the only one left that can be modded. It is a true hobbyist sim where we can excercise our inner creator. I can't say I have driven it fully for many years. I appreciate what Marcel and the crew are doing and this reminds me of the early years when we wanted something we learnt how to do it and we created the addon. NR2003, GTR 1 and 2, rF1 and Automobilista. This is it.

I understand we have to move forward with our sims but I would like to see features that were a godsend to us in rF1 and the others come back, like where we could do an addon pack by just dropping a folder in rather than packing it up and changing the mod. If servers can't cope with an update - remove the feature. The new shaders and the packing system put paid to that unfortunately. Changing some features at the detriment of others and forgetting to let the modders know. Awfully frustrating however we keep doing what we do because it is rewarding no matter how good or bad we do, we can enjoy our own form of creation.

Jeremy - Have a Merry Christmas all.

Oh yeah and the damage model has sucked for a thousand years. Just sayin'

MarkR · Dec 23, 2019

Bought it a long time ago, tried it several times after various updates. I still don't get it. A generous 5/10. Apologies to those who love the game I don't mean to offend but the truth is this is how I've found the game.

The zombie driver arms in VR are without a doubt the weirdest feature of all in a racing game.

For me, the half the cars in races don't render in fully, they either drive around as a chassis with no body or as a weird disembodied chassis with no wheels. Then there is the AI which so many people praise yet I seem to find they can't make their way consistently through the chicanes at Oulton Park without causing a massive pile up. The DLC packs also look expensive to me.

Jack of all trades master of one is the best description I can come up with, everything this game does in a mediocre way is exceed by some other game.

Durge Driven · Dec 23, 2019

>>> lol

Where to start

Bwana · Dec 23, 2019

Sim =10 / game = 6 results In a 8 from me . Only have to spend time in any of the others then follow up in a good combo in rf2 and you soon realise the blaring difference between a sim and a game.

Durge Driven · Dec 23, 2019

Terry Rock · Dec 23, 2019

Nobody....in my book anyway, ever gets a ten. That's just the way it is.
That'd effectively be saying it is perfect with no room for improvement.
That said, RF2 gets an 8...since we can't give 7 3/4.
It has come a long way under Studio 397. I have to give credit where credit is due.
They took it from a disjointed 'basket-case' full of potential, to what we currently have....and in a relatively short time-span.
There is still lots of work yet to be accomplished.
I don't run RF2 as much as I should, simply because I'm not in any league. All attempts at multiplayer are met with a level of frustration to that end.
It goes something like this....
Click to join a multiplayer session....it attempts to download some component it states I don't have...download starts but fails after time....move on to another server only to have the exact thing happen again and again.
Quit the game and go run something else with easier access.
I'd always hoped they could get that aspect sorted.
I waited a very long time and then I moved on.
It is now used infrequently for hot-lapping and the very occasional multiplayer when I do get 'lucky' enough to score one.

Germain Entete · Dec 23, 2019

I play online only, and don't do Leagues.
Every time I launch RF2, the multi is dead, like you don't see in a lot of games.
When I try to connect to the few password-free servers, there is always stuff to download. Always, even after having downloaded many items from the workshop.

So why rate it?
I'll never play it online, and S397 doesn't seem to care....so be it.
Sure, when I try some SP, I can have some fun and I like a lot of things about it, but as I do in other titles. However in the other titles I can race online.

Good luck to them, I'll check again when they announce RF3 if ever, once they finish to milk the cow because RF2 can't be here to stay, it's more like some life support extension rather than anything durable.
ACC, AMS2, Future AC2, IR moving forward...

Mark Brunner · Dec 23, 2019

I am going to give it a high mark, although maybe would have marked it 7/8 realistically. The VR to me (base content and dlc) is one of the better experiences for me. Top being iracing (for VR only...) and then R3E also on my list.

The studio shows good effort to fix and deliver a more well rounded sim but a lot of the success of this game is riding on many unknowns (UI/DLC/Competition system).

There is actually a lot of 3rd party content added since the move to steam workshop but the quality of the content has been very mixed and most of it runs bad in VR. Keep to the base content and DLC the game runs really good now but it wasn't always this way.

NoseyGuyy · Dec 24, 2019

I personally think rF2 is the most overrated simulator there is. The physics are made out to be god-tier, when in reality they're far too complex which just results in the cars being inaccurate, the multiplayer is completely dead, the UI is by far the worst in any modern simulator, and the graphics are pretty crap. It does do sounds very well, and it can be very fun, but it just doesn't do anything better than any other simulator in my opinion, and so it falls below games like AC/ACC, iR and R3E.

Bonehead · Dec 24, 2019

With 9,500+ hours driving this Sim/ Game, here are my two cents.

Good: 1/ Great Force Feedback and the physics are fantastic in my opinion. 2/ Sebring and Green Hell are superb in my opinion, and a joy to run laps on. In fact I instruct drivers at Sebring and with 3,000+ laps on the real track, the rFactor2 version is by far superior to any other release including iRacing. 3/ The graphics I have tweaked make both the cars and tracks look absoulutely great on my Nvidia 1070. 4/ The fact that the developing owner really cares about his product and is open to constructive criticism.

Bad: I enjoy third party mods, and it seems like every time their is a new update, some mods refuse to load. The extremely talented and generous people that make these mods, then have reconfigure their structure to fit the new boundaries that rFactor2 has introduced with their update/ upgrade. It is not fair for me to ask the modders to spent time and effort to reconfigure their mod to work in the new release. Those modders that do, thank you very much, and your effort is appreciated! I will also add that even editing a car, helmet, or even simply renaming a driver in rFactor2 is a chore for those that even understand how to do it. I detest .MAS files, and have yet after all these years figured out how to do even the basics of changes with that format. Automobilista and Assetto Corsa are great examples of easy editing for a pud such as myself.

So with all these hours spent on this sim I gave it a 9. I actually was on the fence but hopped the ranking up a notch. I really enjoy rFactor2 and look forward to the future and will support it.

EDIT: One last thing. Why does rFactor2 release a mod with such few skins, and some with and some without car numbers? How hard is it to paint twenty cars or thereabouts with numbers, or even hire the many talented painters that can produce quality skins generic or not, and have a full grid?

Merry Christmas everyone, and a Happy 2020!

Deleted member 197115 · Dec 24, 2019

- Still feels more like alpha Early Access but with overpriced DLCs.
- Content is way too inconsistent, Frankenstein's monster mix of things.
- Dated UI (new one is even a bigger disaster)
- Hard to manage content, Steam Workshop items instead of traditional DLCs, with duplicate purchases allowed.
- Not user friendly, still requiring messing with config files to do trivial things like turning off inverted by default FFB
- Visually the worst looking sim at the moment
- FFB can be good on some content but that's it, not enough to recommend as the whole package

6 from me

Beef36 · Dec 24, 2019

smasha · Dec 24, 2019

With old UI 9 out of 10,with beta UI,1 out of10 which rounds my score to 4 out of 10.

DLC model is crap as the fundamental game needs to be fixed first.

P.S. I want to change to 9 out of 10 now I have the beta working lolz.

Is there a sheepface smiley?

racer68 · Dec 24, 2019

madhopz said:
All sims have something to offer. I like to drive. I want that driving to feel as close to a real car as possible. RF2 has no peer as far as I am concerned when it comes to driving. The graphics could be more modern, but if I want knock em dead graphics, I go to PC2. Everyone complains about the UI, but for me it's a non issue. It has a lot of flexibility and I don't need a Windows-like experience in everything I do.

The recent additions of tracks and cars is much appreciated. Nurburgring feels more real in RF2 than any other sim that I have. I like the feel of the ring in ACC and it comes close. AC and PC2 doesn't even compare. The sounds of the cars in RF2 sound really nice to me to.

I hope they continue to improve the product and not weird out and try to make it something for everyone that seems to be the trend. I believe that is why ACC is very good. They concentrated on one thing and hammered it.

I like the FFB & the AI (the way it reacts, almost real) - yes all sims have something to offer - you, the user, decide - like it = buy it * don't like it = don't buy it - the choice is yours (suggestion: read a couple of critics before you take a decision)