rFactor 2 | February Development Roadmap

[Paul Jeffrey]

Studio 397 have released their latest development roadmap update post - keeping the community informed about the latest happenings in the world of rFactor 2.

From the February 'Development Roadmap' post:

Broadcast Overlays
Over the last couple of months we have been building, prototyping and testing various iterations of our broadcast overlays. We’ve involved various leagues in this process, collaborating with them, and now we’re getting to a point where we feel we have a solid base that we can publicly release as part of rFactor 2. There are still a few things to finish and test, so an actual release date will probably be announced next month, but we wanted to show you what we were up to anyway.

There will be a couple of different ways to use these overlays. The most straightforward way is directly in-game, where these overlays are available when you are spectating a race. This makes it easy for anybody to start broadcasting races, with no need for extra software except something to stream to your service of choice. The other way is to use them as a layer in your favorite broadcasting software like OBS or XSplit or any other tool that can integrate HTML based elements. In both cases we also provide a control panel that can be used to blend in and out the various elements of the overlay like the scoring tower or the battle box. This itself is also an HTML page, and you can use it in-game or in an external browser.

We’ve gone through a lot of effort to provide a solution that is easy to customize. Leagues can add their own logo, styling, sponsors and colors, all without having to program, and such customizations are easy to share and install, so everybody should be able to use these new broadcast overlays!

Development Update
Since our previous roadmap, we have done three more releases containing fixes and improvements to the code, as well as existing content. We’ve increased the release frequency because first of all you, the community, asked for more updates and fixes, but also because we want to keep the momentum going on the new user interface, addressing issues and providing you with quick updates so we can move towards our goal of making this new UI the default. We’re not done yet, we’re still working on some fixes for problems that were reported and features that went missing so you can expect us to keep up this pace in the weeks to come.

There are also still quite a few bigger things we are working on in the background. There’s not always much news to report on regarding these, but as a small recap we’ll go over some of them anyway. First of all our graphics team are still doing an extensive review of our rendering pipeline, evaluating the different stages of that pipeline against reference images generated by ray tracing algorithms as well as real photos. Then there are a lot of improvements that are building on that, as well as things that make the lives of content developers easier. A lot of these developments are getting closer to completion. Our core development team is obviously focusing a lot on the new UI at the moment, but as soon as that has reached maturity the focus will go back to finishing the competition system. We’ve used the last couple of months to look at a few long standing feature requests, such as “offline championships” so we are now looking at modelling those into this system as well.

Content
In the content department, this month we have a couple of minor bug fixes to some classic rFactor 2 cars, some fine tuning of Le Mans and even another track to announce! Additionally our partner KartSim has a whole set of updates and some new content ready.

Circuit des 24 Heures du Mans 2018 v2.05

• Adjusted grass saturation.
• Adjusted specular profile on roads to make rubber build up less blue.
• Configured sky haze settings.

Historic Challenge Spark 1968 v2.05

• Fixed LOD in showroom.
• Added new icons for the new UI.

Historic Challenge EVE 1968 v2.04

• Fixed missing cockpit in the F2.
• Added new icons for the new UI.

McLaren MP4/8 v1.30

• Flipped wet texture treads so it ‘mirrors’.
• Tyre damage texture fix.

McLaren MP4/13 V1.30

• Tyre smoothing.
• Tyre damage texture fix.

Portland International Raceway
Announced a little while back, and now back by popular demand! We give you our latest development shots of Portland International Raceway. This original collaboration started with community member Alex Coutie’s scratch built track creation. We then built on it, with the intention to use it as a platform to showcase our new materials, and what can be achieved. In the future this track will serve as a basis for modders to learn all about our new materials system for tracks. We’ll release more details on that after the track becomes available. Portland will be a free track for all owners of rFactor 2 and available in the Studio 397 Steam workshop.

KartSim
By now, KartSim is a well known name in the karting industry, known for high quality professional karts and tracks. They will be releasing a big update to all of their content. For consumers the next release will include updates to most of the existing karts and tracks with improvements to shaders, models, AI and more. Professional customers can look forward to even more updates as well as some brand new tracks like “Le Mans” and a few others. More details will be revealed when this update is released next week.

Original Source: Studio 397

rFactor 2 is available now exclusively for PC.

Got questions you about the sim and need help? No worries, post a thread in the rFactor 2 sub forum here at RaceDepartment and let the community help you out!

 

[leclettico]

Progressions in rF2 are too slow compared to the DLC needed to stay alive. I love rF2, but I need more progressions in its core to drive it regularly, especially offline.

 

[tr1v1um]

Circuit D´Azur AI Crash

The ai constantly crashes at that track, no matter what speed or aggression level and it really makes me mad. Anyone with the same problem or a solution?

forum.studio-397.com

S397 work very hard, that now it's the customers who fix the game.
Excited with Kartsim cause I have the pro version, finally they update to the new shaders !
rF2 is the best, when it's not made by s397.

There is an easy fix for you: go back and download the last non steam ISI build and play that instead. You will be surprised how far this sim has come with the help from Marcel the rest of the team. There is so much stuff that people complain about that they totaly forget, that there has been done alot to keep this product alive. Sure, there is allways room for improvements but the guys from S397 don't have their heads in the sand.

 

[muzikant]

U

There is an easy fix for you: go back and download the last non steam ISI build and play that instead. You will be surprised how far this sim has come with the help from Marcel the rest of the team. There is so much stuff that people complain about that they totaly forget, that there has been done alot to keep this product alive. Sure, there is allways room for improvements but the guys from S397 don't have their heads in the sand.

1000 % agree!!

 

[MrMadlo]

There is an easy fix for you: go back and download the last non steam ISI build and play that instead. You will be surprised how far this sim has come with the help from Marcel the rest of the team. There is so much stuff that people complain about that they totaly forget, that there has been done alot to keep this product alive. Sure, there is allways room for improvements but the guys from S397 don't have their heads in the sand.

Excactly! Agree totally.

 

[Ciccina2016]

I have always said that rF2 lacks in graphics department and I forgive it because the devs focus on physics, but look at those screenshots, it looks awesome.

It is like when they advertise food on telly that does not look at all to what you buy!

 

[Romandevison]

Looks like it's time to give up modding, just leave the opportunity to change skins.

Firstly, there are almost no normal mods for RF2, secondly the user base is small and thirdly S397 has already made enough of its content, which in my opinion is very good.

I have all the content from S397(except karting) installed and I like it in almost everything. But I honestly tried to install the mods - almost all of them with bugs or mistakes or just old and lost their relevance.

On the whole, I wish good luck S397. Without mods, RF2 becomes pretty nice game, not a hotlap crutch.

 

[tr1v1um]

Looks like it's time to give up modding, just leave the opportunity to change skins.

Firstly, there are almost no normal mods for RF2, secondly the user base is small and thirdly S397 has already made enough of its content, which in my opinion is very good.

I have all the content from S397(except karting) installed and I like it in almost everything. But I honestly tried to install the mods - almost all of them with bugs or mistakes or just old and lost their relevance.

On the whole, I wish good luck S397. Without mods, RF2 becomes pretty nice game, not a hotlap crutch.

Why are people seeing everything as black and white? If you don't like modded content then don't use it, but please respect the people who like to enhance their experience or who like to be creative and create new content. There is allways the way of giving people an option. This whole genre is built up on modding and I see no reason why this has to change. There is so much good content, but people seem to look at it as a burden that holds everything back. What if I want to have a go in an Nissan Skyline 2000 GTR at Bridgehampton?

 

[muzikant]

Yesterday I try this F3 mod.... it is beta. But very nice handling and graphics in VR. I must tpo try it.

[REL] - SMMG Formula 3 Series (2019-2020-2021) 1.51

SMMG Formula 3 Series (2019-2020-2021) Terms of Use: This mod is not to be used in public or corporate events held by public or private companies...

forum.studio-397.com

 

[Durge Driven]

Update Lemans and still no layouts in Mod Manager, yes it works anyway , not the point

 

[Alex Townsend]

First of all our graphics team are still doing an extensive review of our rendering pipeline, evaluating the different stages of that pipeline against reference images generated by ray tracing algorithms as well as real photos.

I may have missed the point of the above paragraph but does this mean Ray Tracing could be coming?

 

[Marcel Offermans]

I may have missed the point of the above paragraph but does this mean Ray Tracing could be coming?

That was indeed not the point I was trying to make when I wrote that.

We have really been doing a lot of validations of our lighting calculations, making sure they are all "physically correct", but one aspect if that was to take tracks and cars from the game and loading them into software that can use ray tracking to create an accurate rendering of a specific scene with the same lighting we have in game (time of day, weather conditions, etc.). These renders are not at all done in "real time" but they do represent probably the closest you can get to a real photo (which, incidentally, is another part of the validations we're doing, comparing to those). We then take such renders to compare them to our in-simulation, real-time lighting and rendering and try to find and fix discrepancies.

So long story short, in this process we are using ray tracing as a comparison tool, not as a rendering method inside the simulation itself.

That is not to say we won't use ray tracing in our engine going forward. In fact we've found one specific area where it will be extremely useful to improve our output, but it's still a bit too early to go into detail on that. This is a long process (we started over a year ago) and it's not something we want to rush, so our goal in the roadmaps is to keep you up to date as good as possible, without trying to set expectations that we are not certain we can make.

 

[Alex Townsend]

That was indeed not the point I was trying to make when I wrote that.

We have really been doing a lot of validations of our lighting calculations, making sure they are all "physically correct", but one aspect if that was to take tracks and cars from the game and loading them into software that can use ray tracking to create an accurate rendering of a specific scene with the same lighting we have in game (time of day, weather conditions, etc.). These renders are not at all done in "real time" but they do represent probably the closest you can get to a real photo (which, incidentally, is another part of the validations we're doing, comparing to those). We then take such renders to compare them to our in-simulation, real-time lighting and rendering and try to find and fix discrepancies.

So long story short, in this process we are using ray tracing as a comparison tool, not as a rendering method inside the simulation itself.

That is not to say we won't use ray tracing in our engine going forward. In fact we've found one specific area where it will be extremely useful to improve our output, but it's still a bit too early to go into detail on that. This is a long process (we started over a year ago) and it's not something we want to rush, so our goal in the roadmaps is to keep you up to date as good as possible, without trying to set expectations that we are not certain we can make.

Thanks for the clarification on that.
All about improvements so all good!

 

[avenger82]

I'd guess with realtime ray tracing rF2 would run pretty slow with anything less than 2080ti anyway. I hope upcoming GPU generation will make ray tracing in modern games more feasible.
But I hope the plans for physics engine enhancements are still valid. I mean i.e. drivetrain improvements and better H pattern shifter support. Currently you don't need to use clutch for shifting.

This sim strong point have always been physics engine, but now other major sims have caught up in many aspects. For instance Raceroom has now very good suspension simulation and definitely better drivetrain implementation, despite it's physics derive from older (gMotor 2) engine.
Many pro drivers now say now ACC has most realistic GT3 cars' handling (which is not a surprise since it's focused only on GT3). Even those who played iRacing regularly (and it has good handling GT cars).

 

[CreamyCornCob]

PIR for AC, almost done Best of luck 397, love to see your final verion!

 

[Emery]

PIR for AC, almost done Best of luck 397, love to see your final verion!

Polite critique: Ballons can't be there because that's flight path for Portland Airport; helicopters okay. Your pavement color seems way too light. Are there animated MAX trains (hoping Coutie's are kept for S397's version)?

 

[CreamyCornCob]

Polite critique: Ballons can't be there because that's flight path for Portland Airport; helicopters okay. Your pavement color seems way too light. Are there animated MAX trains (hoping Coutie's are kept for S397's version)?

Balloons were removed, save for a separate dl / add on.
Yes, the shader brghtness is being turned down a touch and I dont think this is the final pavement version

Yes, there will be animated TriMet, they travel right by the track, in their real life path's. They are beeing finished now.

 

[sentry87]

Gets a bit annoying every month a new update breaks a mod I was using

 

[Marlonracer]

Gets a bit annoying every month a new update breaks a mod I was using

Sad but, I think it's the only way to make the online multiplayer work.

 

[Adsta]

Sad but, I think it's the only way to make the online multiplayer work.

Multiplayer works, always has.

 

[Tony 93]

Looking good for RF2