Le Mans Ultimate Release Date Set For 2024

Le Mans Ultimate releasing 20 February 2024.jpg
Despite being initially announced for December 2023, Motorsport Games finally gave an exact Le Mans Ultimate release date. The game will hit stores on 20 February 2024.

Image credit: Motorsport Games

Yesterday, tickets for the 2024 edition of the Le Mans 24 Hours hit shelves for those holding ACO membership. Those not affiliated with the Automobile Club de l’Ouest will have to wait until next week to get their tickets.

However, rumours suggest that next week may be too late, with record sales. Not to fear if you cannot attend the great race however. Last night, Studio 397 and Motorsport Games finally gave their fans a release date for the much-anticipated Le Mans Ultimate. The game will release on 20 February 2024, despite and initial announcement for December 2023.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1721996294762180726

The announcement came alongside a trailer, featuring many more cars than previously spotted in screenshots. It seems that most cars and liveries are now ready to play in the game. One can spot the Toyota GR010 alongside the race cars previously seen in the game.

Le Mans Ultimate Delays​

The news that the game will release just a few weeks before the first round of the 2024 FIA WEC season, was also confirmed in the Q3 2023 earnings report of Motorsport Games. CEO Stephen Hood states: “We are excited to confirm the updated release date of our planned Le Mans Ultimate title, as we anticipate the game on February 20, 2024.” Hood also confirmed that LMU would feature the RaceControl online system recently introduced to rFactor 2 as well.

The news comes after announcements of major redundancies across the Motorsport Games organisation. The company originally looked to produce games for Indycar and the BTCC alongside the sportscar title. But the British Touring Car Championship’s organiser, TOCA released a statement on Monday announcing the end of said gaming partnership. Furthermore, rumours emerged yesterday of the laying off of the entire Indycar game development team.

Motorsport Games: BTCC Game Canceled – IndyCar Game Staff Laid Off?
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Motorsport Games Australia Closed​

These rumors proved to be true according to the earnings report. Hood listed “the recent closure of our Australian development studio, with corresponding global head count reductions, and the suspension of the development of our previously planned IndyCar game” as cost-cutting measures. Motorsport Games Australia was also behind the development of KartKraft.

While ‘suspension’ may imply development getting picked back up later on, it realistically seems more like the end of the line for the title. MSG also reported a net loss of $3.5 million in Q3 of 2023.

Despite this, Hood remains positive: “We believe the decisions needed to make this business create engaging, well-made games that fans enjoy, and that are profitable, are well underway. With renewed focus on products, production leadership and budgetary controls, we believe we are already seeing positive momentum for the company.“

Financially, however, the outlook appears to be similar to the one presented in the Q2 earnings report.

Based on the available cash on hand and the Company’s average monthly net cash burn from operations of approximately $1.1 million during the nine months ended September 30, 2023, the Company does not believe it has sufficient liquidity to fund its operations over the next year and that additional funding will be required in order to continue operations.
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Motorsport Games Q3 Earnings Report Liquidity Slide

Le Mans Ultimate: Make Or Break For MSG​

It seems then that Motorsport Games is now solely focused on putting together Le Mans Ultimate. With that in mind, the somewhat later than expected release date is potentially more promising than one might think.

In fact, Motorsport Games is now seemingly confident it can stay afloat at least until this new release plan. Therefore, there is hopefully less chance of a rushed, unpolished title, giving the development team more time to iron out the flaws.

To learn more about the official FIA World Endurance Championship game, check out this article with all the details.

Are you excited for Le Mans Ultimate? Tell us on Twitter at @OverTake_gg or in the comments down below!
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About author
Angus Martin
Angus Martin
Motorsport gets my blood pumping more than anything else. Be it physical or virtual, I'm down to bang doors.

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Comments

Foffy
I do not see this game saving them, given it's of a relatively "niche" brand when talking mainstream racing games. Feels like they're going to shut down everything that isn't directly linked to this game just to get it out of the door.

Motorsport Games will not exist a year from now, and all we can really say about it is just what a waste it's been. A NASCAR game so poor it can qualify as one of the worst games ever released, the purchasing of talented studios and the support for those projects to slowly and surely be shelved off (Kartkraft and rFactor 2), to the hoarding of whatever exclusive rights they can get onto, which themselves regularly bled the company money which has led to two outright cancellation of the major titles (BTCC and IndyCar).
 
B
roPe Gargamel said:
What this game contains? Only modern cars and tracks?
Since its "ultimate" will there be historic cars and historic track layouts?
Click to expand...
Last I saw anything, AMS2 had announced that they had a licence agreement for Le Mans, with classic version included, so not sure about a conflict with the official game then.
 
ScrolllockG27
F1Aussie said:
So MSG are significantly decreasing their potential sources of income to focus on one title that may be okay but I doubt will save their bacon, they are deluded. What have they done so far that has grown their revenues? What decisions have they made to this point in time that actually gives people confidence that the LMU will be their saviour?
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All hands on LMU is actually not that bad decision. They have limited resources (they are not like EA or Ubisoft) and being spread across different projects makes slower progress in all of them and higher costs. Focusing on only one project definetly cuts some costs and can speed up the project. Anyway it might be also risky - if LMU turn out to be a flop they might not recover from this financally.
 
R
F1Aussie said:
So MSG are significantly decreasing their potential sources of income to focus on one title that may be okay but I doubt will save their bacon, they are deluded. What have they done so far that has grown their revenues? What decisions have they made to this point in time that actually gives people confidence that the LMU will be their saviour?
Click to expand...
In fact currently MSG decisions are taken to save the company and to present a positive 2024 year to the shareholders. 2023 is a huge disappointment in terms of results, better to put all possible costs 9n this year to get a good start in 2024.

In terms of cash, there is most probably not enough to keep on financing projects and developments (even to pay the remaining team, maybe with the income from the Nascar license), which then would be shut down in 2024, generating losses. Because development costs of games before their launch are not in the results, they are assets ; to be clear, the losses announced there for Q3 do no include the costs of the BTCC and indycar games. Abandoning them in 2023 will generate pure additional losses in Q4 ; if the developments were stopped in 2024, that would generate costs from several years since their beginning, a very bad idea.

That way, MSG start 2024 with a clean sheet, a solid project, LMU, wirh all its initial sales in 2024. It was a very bad idea to launch it in December, most of the sales would have been in 2023 and "lost" in the awful results of this same year, and 2024 would have been a "meh" year ; most of these manoeuvers are financial communication driven towards the shareholders. At the moment they are more crucial for the future of the company (yes, hard decisions are made for accounting games...) than the confidence its potential customers have, because MSG can't do anything about that. The only way to get back confidence is to release a solid simracing title, LMU, to make forget all the drama.

The company is being resized as it should have been since the beginning, working with solid fundations and assets, rfactor2, on a promising game, LMU, which should be, if done right, the real GTR2 successor. The company is going to go step by step, as it should have been done at its beginning.

I'm quiet confident with LMU, S397 is a competent team. If there's one thing positive MSG has done is giving S397 the ressources to accelerate rfactor2's development and it's undeniable.

Let's forget the mistakes and the drama, it's better to hope for the best. If LMU is a hit, other projects will come.
 
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R
ScrolllockG27 said:
All hands on LMU is actually not that bad decision. They have limited resources (they are not like EA or Ubisoft) and being spread across different projects makes slower progress in all of them and higher costs. Focusing on only one project definetly cuts some costs and can speed up the project. Anyway it might be also risky - if LMU turn out to be a flop they might not recover from this financally.
Click to expand...
For sure, MSG's survival 100% depends on LMU.
 
vitorhs
(*WALL OF TEXT AHED*)

This game should be renamed as "Le Mans Hail Mary Ultimate " judging by the news..

Btw I don't think it will save the company.... yeah, yeah, I'm their hater #1 here, but looking into their reports, if was not by the Nascar license selling, they would be bankrupt right now and is not like much money is left, of course their burn rate will be smaller now, but they will reach February already in verge of being on red with no money for marketing or anything else.

But hear me, this is what I think will happen: They will launch this game, this will happen, but without any marketing or promotion, the company by February will be really exhausted money wise. The game will be well received and get a good reputation on Steam and will make money enough for FEW months more with doors open, but will not be all that much, is a PC exclusive and LeMans is not F1. With the good organic promotion this game will have, they will likely use it to try sell S397 and the complete package (LeMans license, the game, the rFactor engine) to someone else at a good value (not like the Nascar license which was given pretty much for free to iRacing, LOL) and them MSG will vanish from existence.

They also could try, I don't know, spin off the S397 as a new, independent and fully private company, push all their money left for it and let the MSGM die, a thing I really think they may are considering as they completaly removed any MSG brand from the LMU, even on Steam now the game is 100% "S397". Doing so probably will not leave their investors much happy, but will give them a company with some reputation and free from the stock market BS. But I'm not a specialist like their old CEO who makes millions running companies into the ground, not sure if this is fully possible now.

Extra notes:

- They also closed down Traxion.gg, don't see anyone talking about it yet.
- The IndyCar license would expire in February 2024 and even before the game comes out they would have to renew it, and as far as I know, they signed a very stupid 3M pear year deal with IndyCar (IC don't worth it, not even close), a money that MSG don't even have right now, the write was in the wall for this game soon the MSG pocket got empty.
 
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Damage Inc
I just hope it ends up a decent release, looking forward to it....but will wait for reviews and opinions before I get it.
 
T
Even hoping at the quality of this sim is delusional at this point. It's like taking back a spouse that has cheated on you multiple times, admitting that it probably won't turn out well, but you will wait and see and hope for the best.

The release date isn't set because that's when the Sim will be ready, it's set to that date because it's basically the latest it can come out before the season starts which from my understanding is in the contract.

As far as single player is concerned, rf2 is unplayable on single player and it is delusional to think that this game will be any different.
 
R00b_Driver
tpfitz said:
Even hoping at the quality of this sim is delusional at this point. It's like taking back a spouse that has cheated on you multiple times, admitting that it probably won't turn out well, but you will wait and see and hope for the best.

The release date isn't set because that's when the Sim will be ready, it's set to that date because it's basically the latest it can come out before the season starts which from my understanding is in the contract.

As far as single player is concerned, rf2 is unplayable on single player and it is delusional to think that this game will be any different.
Click to expand...
Unplayable?

So my 1000 hrs don't count?
 
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kart1
What's the latest game on the Le Mans edition?
I just remember playing a Le Mans dreamcast game!
 
P
tpfitz said:
Even hoping at the quality of this sim is delusional at this point. It's like taking back a spouse that has cheated on you multiple times, admitting that it probably won't turn out well, but you will wait and see and hope for the best.

The release date isn't set because that's when the Sim will be ready, it's set to that date because it's basically the latest it can come out before the season starts which from my understanding is in the contract.

As far as single player is concerned, rf2 is unplayable on single player and it is delusional to think that this game will be any different.
Click to expand...
It’s delusional to already conclude that the quality of this sim will be delusional not having played the game yet. And what’s wrong with single player in rF2 making it unplayable? Until recently I was playing rF2 single player only, for many years. It is not perfect, but unplayable? Come on!
 
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MarcG
tpfitz said:
As far as single player is concerned, rf2 is unplayable on single player and it is delusional to think that this game will be any different.
Click to expand...

hahahaha good one, I've been playing "single player" just fine with RF2 since 2012 and the AI has just recently been vastly improved to make it even better. Sure it misses the very basic Championship and certain features, but to say it's unplayable is an outright lie not to mention massively huge misinformation.
 
graphicaluserinterface
If they can stay afloat to release this, it should bring attention and sales. I doubt rFactor 2 will have improvements brought to LMU trickle down back to it for many months to preserve some form of competitive advantage.

It is a shame about the BTCC license being unilaterally revoked as besides Le Mans, a BTCC stand-alone title would have been the most readily attainable "rFactor 2 Lite" game given so much of the content already exists. For Indycar, they will still need to build many tracks currently absent from rF2 and bring forward updated liveries. The tracks would be an expensive job (~$100.000-200.000), the liveries can be sourced from the community for a much lesser fee than hiring an artists to do them from scratch, and it would take at least ~9 months to converge it all.

Hopefully Le Mans Ultimate gets released and is a solid game. Lack of modding will be annoying but if it can be circumvented, that's great. If it does well then it will buy some leeway to make/complete the Indycar game.
 
F
ScrolllockG27 said:
All hands on LMU is actually not that bad decision. They have limited resources (they are not like EA or Ubisoft) and being spread across different projects makes slower progress in all of them and higher costs. Focusing on only one project definetly cuts some costs and can speed up the project. Anyway it might be also risky - if LMU turn out to be a flop they might not recover from this financally.
Click to expand...
You have more faith in them than I do. I can't recall them releasing anything of significance since they have been around. I think they released a nascar game? All I recall from that is the ridicule they got for it being a bug fest.
 
F
roadyroad said:
In fact currently MSG decisions are taken to save the company and to present a positive 2024 year to the shareholders. 2023 is a huge disappointment in terms of results, better to put all possible costs 9n this year to get a good start in 2024.

In terms of cash, there is most probably not enough to keep on financing projects and developments (even to pay the remaining team, maybe with the income from the Nascar license), which then would be shut down in 2024, generating losses. Because development costs of games before their launch are not in the results, they are assets ; to be clear, the losses announced there for Q3 do no include the costs of the BTCC and indycar games. Abandoning them in 2023 will generate pure additional losses in Q4 ; if the developments were stopped in 2024, that would generate costs from several years since their beginning, a very bad idea.

That way, MSG start 2024 with a clean sheet, a solid project, LMU, wirh all its initial sales in 2024. It was a very bad idea to launch it in December, most of the sales would have been in 2023 and "lost" in the awful results of this same year, and 2024 would have been a "meh" year ; most of these manoeuvers are financial communication driven towards the shareholders. At the moment they are more crucial for the future of the company (yes, hard decisions are made for accounting games...) than the confidence its potential customers have, because MSG can't do anything about that. The only way to get back confidence is to release a solid simracing title, LMU, to make forget all the drama.

The company is being resized as it should have been since the beginning, working with solid fundations and assets, rfactor2, on a promising game, LMU, which should be, if done right, the real GTR2 successor. The company is going to go step by step, as it should have been done at its beginning.

I'm quiet confident with LMU, S397 is a competent team. If there's one thing positive MSG has done is giving S397 the ressources to accelerate rfactor2's development and it's undeniable.

Let's forget the mistakes and the drama, it's better to hope for the best. If LMU is a hit, other projects will come.
Click to expand...
We are already in the 2024 financial year, have been for quite a while, unless the financial year is different in various parts of the world? I know some places use the calendar year as their financial year. Anyway, I think putting all their eggs in one basket could be a recipe for disaster if they don't get it right with no other revenue options on the table. It sounds like the content is going to be quite limited so not sure how appealing it will be outside the absolute hardcore simmers.
 
R00b_Driver
F1Aussie said:
We are already in the 2024 financial year, have been for quite a while, unless the financial year is different in various parts of the world? I know some places use the calendar year as their financial year. Anyway, I think putting all their eggs in one basket could be a recipe for disaster if they don't get it right with no other revenue options on the table. It sounds like the content is going to be quite limited so not sure how appealing it will be outside the absolute hardcore simmers.
Click to expand...
This is indeed the issue!

Hard Core sim racing is a niche market. I have no idea if it will be enough to keep them afloat (especially with the mood of the community towards MSG - which is warranted - they have done many stupid things).

I hope it does well (I don't want rF2 and S397 to die :) )
 
F
R00b_Driver said:
This is indeed the issue!

Hard Core sim racing is a niche market. I have no idea if it will be enough to keep them afloat (especially with the mood of the community towards MSG - which is warranted - they have done many stupid things).

I hope it does well (I don't want rF2 and S397 to die :) )
Click to expand...
Yes it is, I was going to buy it as soon as it releases but after they have sacked staff and closed down locations I have no confidence they will be around enough or have the resources to polish it after release. So I probably won't buy until it is fully finished and there is no guarantee it will be.
 
Two Hands
Premium
vitorhs said:
(*WALL OF TEXT AHED*)

This game should be renamed as "Le Mans Hail Mary Ultimate " judging by the news..

Btw I don't think it will save the company.... yeah, yeah, I'm their hater #1 here, but looking into their reports, if was not by the Nascar license selling, they would be bankrupt right now and is not like much money is left, of course their burn rate will be smaller now, but they will reach February already in verge of being on red with no money for marketing or anything else.

But hear me, this is what I think will happen: They will launch this game, this will happen, but without any marketing or promotion, the company by February will be really exhausted money wise. The game will be well received and get a good reputation on Steam and will make money enough for FEW months more with doors open, but will not be all that much, is a PC exclusive and LeMans is not F1. With the good organic promotion this game will have, they will likely use it to try sell S397 and the complete package (LeMans license, the game, the rFactor engine) to someone else at a good value (not like the Nascar license which was given pretty much for free to iRacing, LOL) and them MSG will vanish from existence.

They also could try, I don't know, spin off the S397 as a new, independent and fully private company, push all their money left for it and let the MSGM die, a thing I really think they may are considering as they completaly removed any MSG brand from the LMU, even on Steam now the game is 100% "S397". Doing so probably will not leave their investors much happy, but will give them a company with some reputation and free from the stock market BS. But I'm not a specialist like their old CEO who makes millions running companies into the ground, not sure if this is fully possible now.

Extra notes:

- They also closed down Traxion.gg, don't see anyone talking about it yet.
- The IndyCar license would expire in February 2024 and even before the game comes out they would have to renew it, and as far as I know, they signed a very stupid 3M pear year deal with IndyCar (IC don't worth it, not even close), a money that MSG don't even have right now, the write was in the wall for this game soon the MSG pocket got empty.
Click to expand...
Traxion being shut down is a bummer. They produced some fantastic lap guides that I have really enjoyed.
 

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