DiRT 4 Check Out the DiRT 4 Live Show

Paul Jeffrey · Jun 9, 2017

With DiRT 4 releasing on all platforms today, the team over at Codemasters have released a special DiRT Show live broadcast, showing of plenty of in game footage of the new title.

Playing through opening portion of the new career mode within DiRT 4, the latest Codemasters DiRT Show gives players an interesting look in detail at the most recent of the long running DiRT franchise of games - released today for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC.

Featuring Chief Games Designer Paul Coleman, Senior Games Designer Darren Hayward and Senior Community Manager Christina, the live show focusses mainly on the career side of the new release and shows off plenty of in game action from several of the traditional rally stages, the Dirtfish driving school and a variety of weather conditions.

You can check out the video below:

Having seemingly been received favourably by the gaming press already, DiRT 4 has a lot of hype to live up to following the exceptional DiRT Rally release and recent promotional activities undertaken by Codemasters themselves. With official licence to recreate the FIA World Rallycross championship and several exciting new features such as the stage generation tool, Codemasters will be keen to continue the recent upward momentum of the studio and secure a place high up the list of best rally games in the last 20 years.

DiRT 4 is available today for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC.

Check out the DiRT 4 sub forum for mods, discussions and news about this new Codemasters rally game.

Have you purchased the new game yet? What do you think about the title? Let us know in the comments section below!

Marc Collins · Jun 9, 2017

Looks great--as in visuals. Given Codies appalling history of missed attempts at anything even remotely approaching realism (with DiRT Rally coming closest so far, but still a miss), I can't buy this until I see reviews of the FFB and controller situation, and physics on the simulation side of the game, from trusted reviewers that say it is not a continuation of the past crap.

exbagboy · Jun 9, 2017

All the steam reviews are saying gravel is even higher in grip than Dirt Rally, even on Sim. Tarmac is better but overall seems like a step back from Dirt Rally.

Joseph Wright · Jun 9, 2017

I enjoy it. Been playing for an hour now and I love it. Can't complain. Only my opinion though.

Stnry · Jun 9, 2017

Joseph Wright said:
I enjoy it. Been playing for an hour now and I love it. Can't complain. Only my opinion though.

Same for me, it really feels thrilling and exciting imho. I don't know if it's a 100 % accurate and I don't care either. I have fun playing dirt 4 and I like it.

Bozian · Jun 9, 2017

Stnry said:
Same for me, it really feels thrilling and exciting imho. I don't know if it's a 100 % accurate and I don't care either. I have fun playing dirt 4 and I like it.

Same here, great overall rally experience with a lot of love for the details. Your stage is awesome and I love the R2 cars with a little less negative camber on the rear

jimortality · Jun 10, 2017

Watch the vid from 30.23 mins and they explain about physics

Andrew T Fearby · Jun 10, 2017

Anyone know where to see racenet results for the daily events on the net? And the crest software, for comparing data to others? Ive gone on racenet, but can't find anything. It is mentioned on dirt4 website as a feature?

MarkR · Jun 10, 2017

I'm also greatly enjoying DiRT 4, exciting, challenging and truly fun.

Where the game comes alive is in multiplayer with similarly minded and skilled friends. The 8 player Xbox One MP is rock solid from day 1. We played a 3-hour session of rally stages, rally cross and stadium events without any issues. This was all at full simulation settings.

The physics of the cars is superb the difference between the rally cars, crosskarts, rally cross cars and stadium buggies and trucks is distinct. After a few hours of furious wheel twirling action and a lot more than a dab of oppo here's what we found:

Rally stages - surprisingly tense affairs as everyone runs the stage at the same time and the splits reveal how nip and tuck the competition is. The final stage is a real risk vs reward challenge knowing there are just a few 10ths in it. The ability to select the length and complexity of the stage and then generate the stage works brilliantly and means everyone has an equal chance on an unseen stage. So much better than the same few stages in DRally where people have effectively memorised the stage. Yes there is some minor deja vu on some corners but it doesn't make much difference. I've just got to reiterate how much fun this unseen stage stuff is. On a stage with fog patches, there was a huge jump followed by a steep downhill off camber 3 right, only 2 cars even close to made the corner, the other 6 in the trees and field beyond

CrossKarts - truly insane little RWD karts that take a smooth hand and throttle to tame. If you want a challenge especially on wet tracks these are the cars you are looking for. In a pack of 8 cars it is even more intense. Brake and even slightly turn the wheel and you need the reactions of a cat to recover. Get greedy on the throttle and you'll be facing the other way wondering how that happened. The lack of inertia is marked compared to the buggies and trucks.

Stadium Trucks - 700bhp RWD in mud has never been so much fun. These trucks have real weight to them and are much easier to recover in a slide than the CrossKarts. If you more than tickle the throttle with any steering lock on you find yourself at some unusual angles of dangle, holding a full 90-degree slide with opposite lock is possible though. The trucks also seem to work best in wet conditions, it seems like they dig in for grip a bit more than on the dry surfaces. The wet Nevada track saw the most entertaining races for us. If you like cars with a feeling of weight that slide and can be largely driven on the throttle these trucks fit the bill.

Buggies - sublime handling, a balance between the crosskarts and the trucks. Easy to pick a line and stick to it or use the power to slide the buggy around. They are much more controllable on brake and throttle. If you like racing inches apart from similarly skilled friends these are the cars that best provide that kind of action. Fast enough to be challenging but also controllable enough to allow some good quality close racing. Attempting to race with the dust, rain and mud being fired at your face is the trickiest part.

Rally Cross - same excellent racing as Dirt Rally, most cars are easy enough to control but get greedy on the brakes or throttle on the wrong surface and they bite. It all gets exciting when up close. Only 4 cars allowed on track at any time and run in heats is the only drawback here, the choice to have all 8 cars on track would be good.

I've gone on here but it's been a much more exciting game than I and our little race group expected. I see people concerned about the physics and that the cars are Forzaish but I haven't seen any cars on Forza that behave like this. Half the fun is taming these wayward cars on tricky surfaces.

If they eventually add VR I'll also buy DiRT 4 on PC but for now the Xbox One version is good enough.

Leynad777 · Jun 10, 2017

My expectations were rather low on this title, but after 8 hours of career-mode (mostly Rally) i can say: thumbs up in nearly all aspects

and it´s much better than DR

Controls: All my stuff works flawlessly and with SimVibe it´s the pure awesomeness

You can map functions like shifting to different devices now and i can shift with paddles or sequential shifter as i like. Doesn´t loose the mappings after a restart anymore. This was annoying as

in DR.
Graphics: I can run 4k@60 fps with a bit higher settings (high with some ultra-details, GTX 1070) and no fps-drops in the rain like in DR

Much more beautiful lightening and the crowd have more polygons. Can´t see any downgrade here like some people were saying.
FFB: Can´t really tell, because running full Sim Commander FFB like always. Some issue with the self-centering between stages, but can live with that.
Physics: Wales, Sweden and the tarmac-physics are IMO the same or better. No more (only) fluffy snow-banks in Sweden anymore and better avoid them. The grip on the other gravel-stages are more like Finland than Greece, but watching onboards this seems more accurate and they have lots of grip for real

. The cars have more weight and not flying anymore over every crest. It´s a bit easier to drive in a positive, IMO more realistic way.
Stage-Design: The career-stages are fixed and looking like hand-crafted. Would like to see a bit more tarmac-variations at Spain. I will miss the handbrake-corners at Baumholder or this tarmac to ice stages at Monte and hope for DLCs.
Career: Much more opportunities to spend money for and more motivating so far. The AI on the hardest level is way to weak so far and hope this will change in higher levels.
EDIT: I put the AI-difficulty one click down for Land Rush and seems to be a global setting. On the highest level it´s getting now "tough" like in DR

.
Land Rush: Great physics and action. Really tough to handle this buggy. AI seems tough as well.
Rally Cross: Just tried a few laps and seems like the same than DR, but wasn´t driving it that much.

Paul Blythe · Jun 10, 2017

Bit the bullet last night and purchased, with just over eight hours played there's no regrets... Was a little bit tense after reading a post saying the standalone G27 pedals with Leo Bodnar adaptor wasn't working. Can gladly report my G27 pedals with Richmotec LCv2 w/Bodnar adaptor, G27 h-shifter w/Bodnar adaptor and 3D printed sequential shifter w/Bodnar BBI are all recognised and working.

Anyhow, after a few hours trying Rally, WRX, Buggies and just being a hooligan in Free Play. I felt the FFB through the T500RS wasn't being very communicative of the cars attitude. Took a look at my DR settings, mirrored them with D4 and tweaked them a little. Now getting more feel for the cars behaviour, though there's still something a touch off with the FFB.

The apparent level of grip has certainly increased from DR. With D4, I get an good sense of how the cars inertia/weight is affecting the car. I'm driving at a point where I can tell I'm at the edge of available grip, the car gets squirmy but is still going where it's pointed (just). A step to far, and all that misguided inertia hits home hard...

Only problem... that FFB feeling (rally predominately)... On that fine raged edge of relative grip, I'm not able tell if that was a slide or just a shift in the cars weight. Most slides are accompanied by a nice tyre screech or crunch of gravel. I've been getting what felt like weight transfer (no tyre sounds), only to loose control because I've not countered a tail-end slide... What ever's going on, the feeling of a slide isn't being communicated very well.

For me, the change in the D4's physics (surface contact, tyre modelling, chassis, aero etc) now makes the cars handle(feel) more like they would in Assetto Corsa or rF2... If your good at drifting a car there, you'll have no problems in D4. The WRX cars are almost identical to DR, and are well dialled in by default. There's a touch more grip, but this makes being a complete hooligan easier IMO. Landsrush... oh my.. high power, low weight and rear wheel drive... my nemesis in so many ways, but hugely fun

Think over all, I'm quite happy with D4, it does need some minor tweaking here and there. It isn't a successor to DR, but it is a massive step up from D3. It's a more cohesive whole than D3 ever was, and has non of that Monster / Red Bull sugar rush induced buzz that permeated through the experience. I like the career mode better than DR's, with sponsors, team liveries etc. More RX tracks and Landrush too... not to shabby a show, CodeMasters.

Leynad777 · Jun 10, 2017

Paul Blythe said:
The apparent level of grip has certainly increased from DR.

IMO that´s just the first impression driving this slow but modern FWD-cars in the beginning instead of the old cars in DR. With Group A and 2000´s AWD it´s the same grip at Sweden, Wales and on tarmac and i did over 100 hours with this cars in DR and two days ago the last time.
Australia has more grip than Greece in DR, but that´s okay:

You double the speed, you quadruple break-distance and kinetic energy. D4 seems doing well in this regards.

Ole Marius Myrvold · Jun 10, 2017

I'll add this as a video to show how the fastest FWD driver in Norway drives in his R2. There is a lot of grip. (video is mainly onboard, even though the thumbnail doesn't show it)