PC2 Slightly Mad Studios to Announce New IP?

Paul Jeffrey · Apr 19, 2017

Slightly Mad Studios head man Ian Bell has teased fans about an upcoming announcement.. a new game IP from the developers that brought you Project CARS and Need for Speed..

With Project CARS already out and taking on established PC and console racing rivals, plus with Project CARS 2 development well underway and the upcoming free to play Red Bull Air Race game also picking up pace one would be forgiven for thinking SMS already have enough on their plate, not so says Slightly Mad Studios Head Ian Bell!

Speaking with fans over on the GTP forum, Bell admitted Slightly Mad Studios have "massive news" unrelated to the Project CARS franchise, stating they intend to announce "a new franchise (that's) very VERY exciting".

So with previous titles Project CARS, Test Drive Ferrari Racing, Shift 2 Unleashed and Need for Speed Shift under its belt, what could the new IP mean for SMS?

When pushed on if the announcement relates to a racing title, Bell was cagey in his reply, responding "Yes, sort of", which only heightens the curiosity around the future reveal.

Stay tuned to RaceDepartment for more news on what Slightly Mad Studios have up their sleeve as and when it becomes available....

kondor999 · Apr 19, 2017

Maybe they should focus all their energies on this thing called Quality Assurance for PC2 before taking on anything else.

SMS is a company that seems obsessed with viral marketing, splashy announcements and big promises - rather than delivering finished, working products.

c172fccc · Apr 19, 2017

Brownninja97 said:
Im pretty sure they said something about that being cancelled

Ian said nearly a year ago that they already had delivered to the "owner" of the game (MY.com I think) what their contract asked them to do. What the "owner" of the game does after that(or did) isn't in SMS hands. In other words, SMS stopped working on WOS a while ago.

Celestiale · Apr 19, 2017

Paul Jeffrey said:
Aye fair point Missed the fact it came out already, will have to have a little look at that one, could be good for a little light distraction

Shame that it is an arcade game. Coming from flight sim, i would have loved an actual Red Bull air race simulation, would have been a nice change from the combat stuff. But i guess regarding marketing and selling numbers that's a no-go, while racing simmers already think they are a niche, flight simmers are a niche within another niche

kondor999 said:
Maybe they should focus all their energies on this thing called Quality Assurance for PC2 before taking on anything else.

SMS is a company that seems obsessed with viral marketing, splashy announcements and big promises - rather than delivering finished, working products.

It's called the Silicon Valley marketing. Release products at Beta stage, let the customers make the quality management/assessment/assurance, and adjust the products accordingly. This is by far not only the case in the gaming industry btw, this covers most commercial sectors, even (more so) B2B products. It is currently seen as the holy grail in today's economy, the "way to go" for up-and-coming companies, and even the big traditional companies are slowly moving towards that strategy. And while it may have some disadvantages compared to the former "release perfectly finished product"-strategy, the advantages definitely prevail (including a better "finished" product and faster development cycles). I could further evaluate now, but this would go beyond the scope of this thread

kondor999 · Apr 20, 2017

Celestiale said:
It's called the Silicon Valley marketing. Release products at Beta stage, let the customers make the quality management/assessment/assurance, and adjust the products accordingly. This is by far not only the case in the gaming industry btw, this covers most commercial sectors, even (more so) B2B products. It is currently seen as the holy grail in today's economy, the "way to go" for up-and-coming companies, and even the big traditional companies are slowly moving towards that strategy. And while it may have some disadvantages compared to the former "release perfectly finished product"-strategy, the advantages definitely prevail (including a better "finished" product and faster development cycles). I could further evaluate now, but this would go beyond the scope of this thread

No one is asking for "perfect". But certain studios seem to be vastly better at developing working products and fulfilling promises than others. This "strategy" of intentionally shipping broken, half-finished software is likely to run afoul of the greatest Quality Assurance mechanism yet devised:

The Steam Refund.

Ryan Soucy · Apr 20, 2017

DaVeX↯ said:
Not from SMS...please not...

I have to admit, the front drive cars in PC1 are a blast. I normally can't stand them anytime, but I started my career in Clios and loved it. I would love a full BTCC slate of cars and you have to work your way up. Everything from Legends to Historics to stuff like the FFord weekend at Brands and the Walter Hayes Trophy.

Nick Gregory · Apr 20, 2017

How secret is it? They won't even tell WMD members.

Karl S. · Apr 20, 2017

kondor999 said:
Maybe they should focus all their energies on this thing called Quality Assurance for PC2 before taking on anything else.

SMS is a company that seems obsessed with viral marketing, splashy announcements and big promises - rather than delivering finished, working products.

Exactly! Just imagine if all (or at least part of) the effort and money SMS put into marketing and PR would go into quality assurance.

One can always dream...

felippekiss · Apr 20, 2017

Redbull air race

DND · Apr 20, 2017

I nominate Drag Racing as the next sim not to buy.

Radu Oros · Apr 20, 2017

Why are the comments in this thread around shaming a video game company? Even with admins taking part in the "fun".
@Bram
So much for respecting users and companies that use this forum or which have their games with a dedicated place in this website.

BoogerMac · Apr 20, 2017

Most likely: The air racing game they mentioned a year or so ago

My dream: Project Trucks: Welcome to the Redneck Riviera

Will Mazeo · Apr 20, 2017

My dream: NFS Porsche remake + till current era, that's an arcade race game I'd play

St3fan · Apr 20, 2017

c172fccc said:
And who said that this new IP is a sim?

Errr... Nobody?

Hash_V8 · Apr 20, 2017

Radu Oros said:
Why are the comments in this thread around shaming a video game company? Even with admins taking part in the "fun".
@Bram
So much for respecting users and companies that use this forum or which have their games with a dedicated place in this website.

Yeah you tell em QUF, we shouldn't judge or dare joke about Businesses that have a shady history regarding poor product releases, overly aggressive and misleading marketing, unnecessary hype, terrible customer relations and a extremely obvious policy of "buying" all sim racing media, did SMS buy you a car too QUF?

My guess? monster trucks or some such thing.

Karl S. · Apr 20, 2017

Radu Oros said:
Why are the comments in this thread around shaming a video game company? Even with admins taking part in the "fun".
@Bram
So much for respecting users and companies that use this forum or which have their games with a dedicated place in this website.

Shaming???

But let’s use the good ol’ search function:

Project CARS forum - May 9, 2015

Radu Oros said:
(...) But SMS should have put a disclaimer that what you saw hyped in screenshots and carefully selected videos (go wonder, even with triple screen setup since a long time ago, but not available to the public).
They should have put a disclaimer about Ben Collins, Rene Rast, and Nicolas Hamilton that their advice on how to make a serious sim racing game wasn't going to be taken into account. They should have put a disclaimer that they were going to name the game shift3 but went instead with project cars (community of monetary investors who get to say how the game is gonna be, and the rest of the community will work in the social media marketing hype team).
(...)

schlitty · Apr 20, 2017

Guessing they got the NASCAR license.

james · Apr 20, 2017

What ever it is, it'll suck.

Radu Oros · Apr 20, 2017

Karl S. said:
Shaming???

But let’s use the good ol’ search function:

Project CARS forum - May 9, 2015

From your logic, if what I said a long time ago wasn't appropriate why do you agree with what is being said now in this thread to being appropriate for a forum such as RD? Therefore if you don't agree with what I said back then, you shouldn't also agree with some of the comments in this thread.

If SMS are so bad and their games are so bad and morally or ethically bad, why do they have a dedicated space in RD? If they can be shamed so openly in this forum because "you have true reasons for it", then just remove their existence from this website, am I not right?