PC2 'Spirit of Le Mans' Next DLC Coming to Project CARS 2

[Paul Jeffrey]

It has been reported via a leak on the Xbox Games Store that Project CARS 2 looks set to receive a new DLC - featuring some iconic Le Mans themed content.

Although it has not yet been officially confirmed by British developers Slightly Mad Studios, nor have any watertight details been revealed, thanks to a timely leak on the Xbox Games Store Project CARS 2 fans have a very welcome idea of what is next in line for the popular racing game - welcome to the world the 'Spirit of Le Mans' June DLC update!

Set to heavily focus on the iconic Le Mans 24 Hour event, the 'Spirt of Le Mans' DLC has a bumper offering of modern and historic racing content to enjoy, including a recreation of the legendary venue as it was in the very early 1970's, joining the simulation alongside the modern layout present with the vanilla install of the title.

As well as the attention grabbing historic layout of the track, the new DLC also looks set to include the period specific Ferrari 512 S and 512 M, alongside the best of German engineering in the form of the Porsche 917 LH. If modern cars are more your thing, the new DLC will also contain three heavyweight modern Prototype vehicles. Coming this June are the Audi R18 (both in high and low downforce configurations), the Porsche 919 Hybrid and the Toyota TS050 Hybrid, all of 2016 vintage.

Prices and release dates have yet to be revealed. More news as it becomes available...

Project CARS 2 is available now on Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC.

Check out the Project CARS 2 sub forum here at RaceDepartment for more news, discussion and features on this sequel release to the hugely popular Project CARS franchise of games.

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Looking forward to the 'Spirit of Le Mans' DLC for Project CARS 2? Which piece of content most appeals to you? Let us know in the comments section below!

 

[MarkR]

Well I'm looking forward to this DLC, we've had plenty of good close racing fun out of PCARS2 as a racing group both on PC and console - something that can be said for few other racing games.

Where PCARS2 leads the pack significantly is in VR quality and performance, nothing else gets close for recreating day, night, weather and shadows including changing sun position. There are many, many aspects to realism and the in cockpit feeling in VR, spatial awareness for racing and capturing that feeling of being in the car is where PCARS2 shines for me. The fact in game quality and playability is maintained in even the worst conditions is some achievement. Le Mans is one of the tracks that shows that ability off best even in a compressed 24x Le Mans race.

As a complete 'sim' on PC and console PCARS2 has no real competitors (DiRT Rally maybe?). AC, lovely steering feel aside, is a joke on console with low framerates, no weather or day/night cycle, awful multiplayer and no mods to fill in all the gaps most on PC have forgotten they use to fill in the blanks. AC on console does not include a leaderboard or even personal lap time recording. GT and Forza now aim for a much wider audience, though GT certainly has it's good points, it's a great crossover to more competitive online racing in my view with good racing line and online racing etiquette teaching tools built into the game.

The PCARS2 AI and for many cars steering feel and feedback have improved massively since launch and match and in some cases surpass the competition. Just like all the other sims/racing games, the right car and track combination can be stunning and so close to the real car it sometimes seems like magic. Each game also throws up some shockers that are nothing like the real world equivalent too, there is no game I've experienced that gets them all right.

As for the desire for realism and simulation it's worth checking the achievement stats. I love realism and above all clean and fair racing, and I doubt I'm alone on here, yet a look at the stats shows how limited an audience we just may be. On the PCARS Steam and Xbox achievements less than 2% of players on Steam and 1.6% on Xbox have achieved a B grade safety rating (basically the ability to follow others closely without causing chaos). B grade really isn't all that challenging to achieve even in the pub lobby's that all online racing games suffer. Those of us who really want the close, clean, fair racing have probably already sought out places like this to find it, the general gamer probably doesn't care much at all and the sales figures of GT and Forza etc bear that out.

It seems to me it all depends where our focus of attention is. The good news is there is almost certainly a racing game out there that meets whatever niche detail we each see as important and it is cheap enough to experiment with a few games to find that niche.

 

[Fanapryde]

AC on console does not include a leaderboard or even personal lap time recording.

AC on PC (and AMS e.g.) on the other hand keep track of best times per car/track (even in practice mode) in a UI database.
pCars on PC does not have that info unless the laps are recorded in TT mode (which is another one of my gripes).

 

[Hor-hay]

If your decision depends of comments you can't actually buy any sim. Comments on Pcars or PCars 2 are allways extreme negative….

Negative for a reason. I have PC1 and that's why I held of on 2.

 

[tlsmikey]

I appreciate that they’ve stayed true to their hard core motor sports theme with this release. Although not sure it’ll appeal enough to folks that don’t have the season pass. They may not get many buys here.

 

[Deleted member 241736]

I just wish SMS would fix the triple screen related monitor flickering PC2 has since day 1.
I just wish SMS would fix the broken (black screen) and inefficient antialiasing it has since day 1.
I just wish SMS could fix the horrible sounds some cars (many of them Porsche cars) produce.

I am reinstalling PC2 ever few weeks to check if anything has improved and every time so far it let me down reliably and off the hard drive it goes again.

It is such a shame, PC2 has had so much potential with many interesting features packed in one single software and an interesting selection of cars and tracks. It is such a shame it is still so bugged.

puhh, it's just like my lovley wife or your girlfriend: She isn't perfect, but fits so well to me. Also AC (ACC) isn't / won't be perfect - stay cool and pick-up your joy .... sunny greetings!

 

[Shad3R]

I love how PC2 has all its cars grouped so you can pretty much recreate a large number of different, but coherent, racing series. People should really try the 1998 GT1 category.

Every single car is good (my favorite is the epic-sounding Panoz GTR-1) and it's a blast to recreate those races with all the actual participants (plus the Ferrari F50 GT - which should've been there).

Agree with you, project cars 2 let me race with the cars i loved in Gran Turismo 4 as a kid.
Panoz GTR1, Nissan R390, Toyota TSONE..... its amazing.

 

[Dirk Steffen]

puhh, it's just like my lovley wife or your girlfriend: She isn't perfect, but fits so well to me. Also AC (ACC) isn't / won't be perfect - stay cool and pick-up your joy .... sunny greetings!

The thing is that particularly two issues I stated is just so extremely dominant (screen flickering and horrible looking aliasing) that I simply cannot run PC2 without getting aggravated about these bugs.

I know that people who don not experience these issues as they are not running triple screens or because they may run screens with higher resolutions will feel offended by this but on my system old games as Assetto Corsa simply outperforms PC2 in terms of graphics fidelity.

There is no flickering, there is no aliasing - just smooth, crispy sharp details, not to mention a less compromising physics model.
PC2 with these bugs still present since day of release is just not an experience I enjoy.
I would absolutely love to jump in and enjoy night racing in the rain with vintage Porsche cars around Nordschleife but I just can't the way PC2 has these bugs.

What use are all the nice new features if simple things as antialiasing and monitor flickering is not working right.

For people who don't experience this:
SMAA is broken in PC2 on certain systems as mine it will result in a black screen - you cannot use SMAA.
MSAA even at it's maximum setting will not resolve aliasing sufficiently.
There are no ways of improving upon maximum MSAA.

FXAA simply looks awful and does not present itself as a solution to the problem.

The flickering of the side screens in triple screen is also an effect that is simply not bearable during racing.

For anyone who might be tempted to give the standard answer "You got to get yourself a better computer".
I exceed the optimum hardware recommendations with this computer.

These are issues that were acknowledged by mods on the SMS forum but apparently have no priority with the developers at this point.
I could not run PC2 since I bought it.

I purchased at full pre-order price including season pass and could not enjoy the product I bought.

A few weeks after release the software was offered at substantial discounts, recently even as low as 50% off the price. This is just spitting in the face of people who bought at full price and were not able to use the product as it is so buggy.

THIS is the reason why PC2 and SMS products in general seem to be so highly debated and tend to be polarizing on internet forums.

Company promises great product with extensive marketing hyperbole, customers pre-purchase with good believe in companies performance in releasing at least a working product to market, company releases unfinished / buggy software, customer waits patiently for product to be fixed while helpless mods on companies official forum try to render aid and communicate between devs and customers, fixes don't materialize after long times of patiently waiting, company representatives start to play down issues on official forums and start to call certain issues "by design" while trying to silence critics (reasonable and trolls alike) by questioning their legitimacy, banning or even threatening with lawsuits (are you kidding ?).

THIS is why every single PC2 related thread is fraught to be a debate between people who have no issues with PC2 (there surely are many people who are lucky to have no issues), people who have legitimate unresolved issues with PC2 and found themselves thrown off the bus (after 9 months of waiting I believe that would be an appropriate term) and people who just enjoy seeing the world burn and feed those discussions with trolling.

I think it is important that any potential buyer of SMS product is aware of this situation.
SMS does NOT handle customer service and prioritizing product issue in a satisfactory manner.
People spending money should know this.

 

[David Wright]

A few weeks after release the software was offered at substantial discounts, recently even as low as 50% off the price.

While I agree its frustrating, this is not unusual on Steam. Kunos did exactly the same with AC, and Codies with F1-2017.

 

[Damage Inc]

Grid Autosport
Forza Motorsport
Gran Turismo

What are all those?
Why many put derogative meaning in the word, it's mostly used in context of describing racing game with low to medium simulation fidelity.

But if you look closer, yes, there is no 'arcade' aspect in any of those. Yet the term stick.
May be not-so-good-as-sim-but-fun is a better word.

But the first hit from google search yields this.
https://virtualracingschool.com/aca...-get-started/arcade-vs-simcade-vs-simulators/

If boots fit.

Actually Forza and GT do indeed have "arcade" elements especially in the gameplay.i.e. No practise or quali, start last in usually 3-5 lap races....pretty much some up an arcade mechanic for gameplay to me so yeah I would say those games could be classed as "simcade". I have no idea anout Grid Autosport as I stopped playing Codies game ages ago (until Dirt Rally that is).

But as Kenny says that "hardcore" crowd use it as an insult and it needs to die as a term.

 

[Damage Inc]

Funnily enough Stefano uses the term simcade to describe part of the audience Assetto Corsa was aimed at (around 7:15)

I know some previous posters will struggle with the concept, but he seems to be under the impression you can make a game which appeals to a broad audience from the simcade audience to the professional audience.

Actually that's what the term "simcade" should mean, the type of "player", one who likes sim elements but tones it down for whatever reason to an unrealistic simpler level. Just because a game has options to allow someone to tone down the realism doesn't mean it's ALL simcade!! It should not be used as an all encompassing descriptor of a game. Yeah PC2 has "simcade" elements but so does all the sims.

For me weather is an intregal part of reality (love to see someone (we all know who) disagree with that ) so a game without weather is making things easier and thus that is arguably simcade.

 

[Damage Inc]

Dirt 4 was trying to do both. We know how it all ended.

I thought from reviews that Dirt 4 went a bit too far in one direction got the balance wrong. Dirt Rally was fine IMO (apart from crap tarmac physics), but codies took 4 the wrong way.

 

[Damage Inc]

AC on PC (and AMS e.g.) on the other hand keep track of best times per car/track (even in practice mode) in a UI database.
pCars on PC does not have that info unless the laps are recorded in TT mode (which is another one of my gripes).

This I agree with!

 

[Damage Inc]

The thing is that particularly two issues I stated is just so extremely dominant (screen flickering and horrible looking aliasing) that I simply cannot run PC2 without getting aggravated about these bugs.

I know that people who don not experience these issues as they are not running triple screens or because they may run screens with higher resolutions will feel offended by this but on my system old games as Assetto Corsa simply outperforms PC2 in terms of graphics fidelity.

There is no flickering, there is no aliasing - just smooth, crispy sharp details, not to mention a less compromising physics model.
PC2 with these bugs still present since day of release is just not an experience I enjoy.
I would absolutely love to jump in and enjoy night racing in the rain with vintage Porsche cars around Nordschleife but I just can't the way PC2 has these bugs.

What use are all the nice new features if simple things as antialiasing and monitor flickering is not working right.

For people who don't experience this:
SMAA is broken in PC2 on certain systems as mine it will result in a black screen - you cannot use SMAA.
MSAA even at it's maximum setting will not resolve aliasing sufficiently.
There are no ways of improving upon maximum MSAA.

FXAA simply looks awful and does not present itself as a solution to the problem.

The flickering of the side screens in triple screen is also an effect that is simply not bearable during racing.

For anyone who might be tempted to give the standard answer "You got to get yourself a better computer".
I exceed the optimum hardware recommendations with this computer.

These are issues that were acknowledged by mods on the SMS forum but apparently have no priority with the developers at this point.
I could not run PC2 since I bought it.

I purchased at full pre-order price including season pass and could not enjoy the product I bought.

A few weeks after release the software was offered at substantial discounts, recently even as low as 50% off the price. This is just spitting in the face of people who bought at full price and were not able to use the product as it is so buggy.

THIS is the reason why PC2 and SMS products in general seem to be so highly debated and tend to be polarizing on internet forums.

Company promises great product with extensive marketing hyperbole, customers pre-purchase with good believe in companies performance in releasing at least a working product to market, company releases unfinished / buggy software, customer waits patiently for product to be fixed while helpless mods on companies official forum try to render aid and communicate between devs and customers, fixes don't materialize after long times of patiently waiting, company representatives start to play down issues on official forums and start to call certain issues "by design" while trying to silence critics (reasonable and trolls alike) by questioning their legitimacy, banning or even threatening with lawsuits (are you kidding ?).

THIS is why every single PC2 related thread is fraught to be a debate between people who have no issues with PC2 (there surely are many people who are lucky to have no issues), people who have legitimate unresolved issues with PC2 and found themselves thrown off the bus (after 9 months of waiting I believe that would be an appropriate term) and people who just enjoy seeing the world burn and feed those discussions with trolling.

I think it is important that any potential buyer of SMS product is aware of this situation.
SMS does NOT handle customer service and prioritizing product issue in a satisfactory manner.
People spending money should know this.

While it sucks you have issues, you have to understand you are in a small minority. A business ANY busness will not spend it's resources of man hours on something that only a small amount of the user base will benefit from. It makes NO business sense, so all this "potential buyers of SMS products is aware of this situation" just comes across as throwing toys out of a pram.

SMS have no real control over sales either so stop blaming them for that.

also....first world problems. The game doesn't cost that much. Want to moan about the cost of things then target food manufacture or pharmaceuticals.

ALL games websites ban people, not unique to SMS....I'm so sick of that "justification" for hatred of SMS, it's pathetic mate.

sorry but I have to say it "grow up".

 

[Damage Inc]

For what it's worth I have complaints about the game, career mode weather is the main one. Also no SP custom championships is another. They are other users with far worse problems that need the team working on those issues.

either way back on topic, can't wait for a blast around 70's LeMans!! Been watching the Motorsports TV "History of LeMans" shows and it's so cool to see the cars I'm using really race!! they all look so small in reality!!

 

[Kenny Paton]

can't wait for a blast around 70's LeMans!! Been watching the Motorsports TV "History of LeMans"

If memory serves me right, they did a very good historic Silverstone for Test Drive Ferrari Legends so this hopefully will be of a similar standard.

 

[Dirk Steffen]

While it sucks you have issues, you have to understand you are in a small minority. A business ANY busness will not spend it's resources of man hours on something that only a small amount of the user base will benefit from. It makes NO business sense

This I full heartedly disagree with.

If I would run our business with this attitude, the company would be in shambles within a few months.

EVERY customer matters.
EVERY customer who has issues that prevent them from using the product or service you have sold them as a business has priority to get their issue sorted.

Lesser issues such as weather glitches, multi player glitches, issues with tires, setups, etc are secondary.

First and foremost you are OBLIGED to make sure the customers who have paid for the product are able to use the product.
Having black screens, antiquated anti-aliasing performance and flickering screens, how small your group of customers with those issues may be is an issue that is unacceptable and needs sorting fastest way with a priority.

9 months is NOT an adequate time to sort out a quality issue clearly agreed to be an issue with your product.

I have learned my lesson. I consider SMS as a supplier that is not up to the quality standards I came to expect in this industry. I will not purchase a product or service by this supplier again - it is that simple.
Customers whom I would upset with a performance like this would do exactly the same.
The gaming industry is a much more forgiving industry where shoddy workmanship and inadequate customer support seems to be forgotten about very quickly as there always is a large, eager potential customer base that will offset the lost customers.

In the end though your performance as a company, selling product or services does matter.
You can see this very clearly just looking at the active user base of SMS products and comparable products in Steam statistics. The numbers communicate clearly.

I wish the people who try to do good within the SMS company and especially some of the clearly hard working moderators at the SMS forum best of luck and good success with their future endeavors I truly do.

 

[Fanapryde]

If memory serves me right, they did a very good historic Silverstone for Test Drive Ferrari Legends so this hopefully will be of a similar standard.

Yeah, let's hope that.
And let us also hope they did not use their classic Spa as standard, because that one is so bad...

 

[RobertGracie]

My guess its gonna be released on the 16th June 2018 in time with the 2018 Le Mans 24 hours!

 

[Gevatter]

Lesser issues such as weather glitches, multi player glitches, issues with tires, setups, etc are secondary.

So, what if I can't progress my carrer because of a glitchy snow race that prevents me from completing a race, or if I play multiplayer only and have a good number of my races spoiled by several issues that affect online racing but I don't have your screen flickering? How are my (hypothetical) issues lesser than yours? Everybody will have a primary problem that he wants to have fixed.

Does your business' customer count run in the tens of thousands? If your customer base is large enough like SMS' is, you simply cannot tend to every customer individually, you have to look where the problems lie that most of your customers experience, as to make the biggest possible number of customers happy with a given bugfix.

That may be disappointing to you personally, but it's simply the reality of dealing with a large number of people who have many diverse complaints. For example, I'd really really like to have the kerb rattle in rFactor2 fixed that happens to my wheel, but as only four or five people ever brought that problem up, I'm not demanding a quick fix for it, and rF2's playerbase is way smaller tham pC2's is.

 

[Haiden773]

That's because most people don't bother with the clutch, whether you like it or not the "hardcore simmers" are an extremely tiny minority within a tiny niche market.

Not a likable minority either as you all seem to think anyone less hardcore is an arcade loving "casual".

A games (because they are ALL games, yes even Asseto and Iracing) sim level is NOWHERE near reality, ANY of them, they all miss off something, concentrate on some areas and don't put as much effort in others. This is normal, but the hardcores have their hissy fits and proclaim one game sim nirvana and another simcade.

I don't think you have to be a "hardcore simmer" to think that not using a clutch in an H-shift car is absurd. And please don't confuse casual racers with arcade racers. Even casual racers use a clutch. If you have a three pedal deck and are shifting an H-shift without the clutch, why did you even buy the three pedal setup?