Pacific Coast Free Roam for Assetto Corsa Released

Assetto Corsa PCH 01.jpg
RD member Phoenix77 has released his latest free roam, Pacific Coast for Assetto Corsa, in dedication to his late brother Jeremy.

Thanks to mods, Assetto Corsa has a nearly inexhaustible amount of racing circuits to enjoy. And recently, more of the talented community modders have turned their attention to free roams and open world areas to explore. The latest such free roam is Pacific Coast, available now in version 1.0 for free here at RaceDepartment thanks to the work of Phoenix77.

Pacific Coast features 23 kilometers of winding highway in California, set between the rolling desert hills and the Pacific Ocean. Phoenix has meticulously recreated countless details of the US west coast area roads, including road surface patches, accurate flora, lookout stops, and a lot more.

Phoenix77 is perhaps best known for his LA Canyons free roam, which is also available here at RaceDepartment. The LA Canyons course was another impressive track and has become a favourite hangout and cruise location for online racing in Assetto Corsa. For both tracks, free versions can be downloaded now, and additional layouts can be purchased.

Assetto Corsa PCH 02.jpg


Among the paid versions is a two-way traffic layout, allowing you to set AI cars to drive on one side of the road only, effectively creating traffic for you to drive the highway with. Even without traffic, Pacific Coast creates a perfect chance to see what fun could be had if you had the keys to an exotic performance car and miles of highway to test its performance on.

Phoenix77’s two major releases are a great way to spend time while sim racing. They join several other excellent free roam and open world tracks available here at RD. Be sure to check out the AC Tracks download section to find these and other racing circuits from the past and present.

Be sure to let us know your favourite car to take to the highways of central California on this stretch of the Pacific Coast highway in the comments below.
About author
Mike Smith
I have been obsessed with sim racing and racing games since the 1980's. My first taste of live auto racing was in 1988, and I couldn't get enough ever since. Lead writer for RaceDepartment, and owner of SimRacing604 and its YouTube channel. Favourite sims include Assetto Corsa Competizione, Assetto Corsa, rFactor 2, Automobilista 2, DiRT Rally 2 - On Twitter as @simracing604

Comments

I remember when you changed your focus to LA Canyons after it started as some "experimenting project" for Pacific Coast.

Very awesome to see PC getting to 1.0 now after you've learnt so freaking much over the past years!

My csl DD arrived today. Gonna take it for a spin around pc 1.0! :geek::geek::inlove:
Same here, my CSL DD arrived just a few days ago and after a few months away from sims I just had to download Pacific Coast and Union Island immediately for a test drive. I was not disappointed! Especially the quality of the road itself is amazing, the road crown, the camber, the worn-out tarmac, it all feels very realistic. Waiting for the extra content to buy you a beer @Phoenix77 kudos!
 
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Premium
I had yesterday a lot of fun on PCH the level of detail is absolutely crazy and its beautiful modeled. As someone who drove this road in real life its an absolute blast to have this Road now as Mod in AC. Thank you @Phoenix77 for PCH and of course also for LAC.
Thanks Don, glad you're having a blast! Drive safe :)
I remember when you changed your focus to LA Canyons after it started as some "experimenting project" for Pacific Coast.

Very awesome to see PC getting to 1.0 now after you've learnt so freaking much over the past years!

My csl DD arrived today. Gonna take it for a spin around pc 1.0! :geek::geek::inlove:
Hi mate, yeah was only supposed to be a small area, then I saw Matt Farah's 488 GTB video... and knew it had to be in Assetto!
I hope you enjoy the 5 million polys of the PCH road surface. (to put that in context, LAC uses 4.5 million for 75 miles)
Have fun mate, and I hope Luke and Obi-Wan approve of the bushes :D
Simply amazing! Thank you very much for your work and specially for not forgetting the optimization. I had little hope when I first loaded the track but no drama at all: solid framerate in VR all the time.
Glad you're getting solid frames in VR.. Thanks!
Commuting Simulator 2021.
If PCH was the road I used to commute... I'd accidentally forget where I worked, get fired and have all the free time to drive PCH! Job done!
Thanks! :)
Absolutely amazing what privateers like Phoenix77 can do...that Kunos couldn't (or hasn't).

P.S. Drag racing is point-to-point, so why not a 23-km. drag race?
Thanks man... Well to be fair, I don't think Kunos could invest the amount of time involved on one road.
But the core engine, is awesome, and a massive thanks to Kunos for making AC moddable... Bravo!

Plenty of racing is occuring in the servers at the moment... Allegedly!

Anyone going in any servers, keep your trackmap on, cars are coming at speed... from everywhere!
A lot of drivers do seem to be staying in the Right Hand Lane, which is really really cool.
Wow! What a beautiful and enjoyable driving spot you've created @Phoenix77 :thumbsup:

I've never thought of AC as a sim for just cruising about, but this is majestic! :laugh:
I will enjoy every minute driving up and down the Pacific Coast. Thank you sir!
Thanks, awesome Dzul... I hope you're driving up and down PCH online. After driving online with some real quick drivers, the AI just don't cut it any more! It's not all racing though... sometimes a 20+ car train forms, with everyone cruising. The rear driver overtaking every now and then, to take turns leading. So cool!
These roads by @Phoenix77 are such a welcome change of pace. Best for me to savor the experience and enjoy the views driving cars I might not want to race. It's a great reminder to just relax and have fun sometimes without all the competing. Since I live 15 mins off of PCH in "So-Cal" I'm also amazed how well the area is captured (minus the surfers - haha). Great work again!
Thanks! Glad I capture the area well... Seeing as I'm thousands of miles away, that's awesome to hear!
If you just want to relax, you'll love the cruises that develop online.

You might want to opt out of the racing, it can get pretty dangerous! I think there may one day be a need for a moderate police presence! Too many Cannonballers! :D

Surfers.... Noted! :D
Same here, my CSL DD arrived just a few days ago and after a few months away from sims I just had to download Pacific Coast and Union Island immediately for a test drive. I was not disappointed! Especially the quality of the road itself is amazing, the road crown, the camber, the worn-out tarmac, it all feels very realistic. Waiting for the extra content to buy you a beer @Phoenix77 kudos!
Awesome Guido, glad you're loving the road surface. I just thought as AC has a great Tyre / Physics model.... Why not give it ALL the polys (5m). Thanks for all the support over the years.. Finally Pacific Coast has the sound of Waves and Seagulls! :)

Awesome that you're driving Ben's island as well... An absolute masterpiece of an environment! (track doesn't do it justice!)
 
Is it just me or is there more "road noise" on the shorter layouts compared to the freeroam/online one? Admittedly I did switch from E46 to NSX but the 46 shouldn't have any powersteering simulation. :p
 
Premium
Hi mate, the physical roads are the same no matter which layout... Maybe you got more road noise near the ends of the roads, I went around 1km further from the maps 0,0,0 origin than I should have. Not really just noise as I used 25, 800m to 1km long, displacement maps, for never the same bump pattern over the whole length of the main hwy.

These 25 displacement maps, have very slight differences in their bump / dip / groove / rut / crack serverity.

If you stay correctly in the lane, where the constant weight of traffic volume compresses the asphalt smoother, you'll get a slightly smoother ride, so those cruising won't spill their coffee quite as much :D

Start using both lanes, crossing the double yellows, things will get a bit bumpier!
 
Hi mate, the physical roads are the same no matter which layout... Maybe you got more road noise near the ends of the roads, I went around 1km further from the maps 0,0,0 origin than I should have. Not really just noise as I used 25, 800m to 1km long, displacement maps, for never the same bump pattern over the whole length of the main hwy.

These 25 displacement maps, have very slight differences in their bump / dip / groove / rut / crack serverity.

If you stay correctly in the lane, where the constant weight of traffic volume compresses the asphalt smoother, you'll get a slightly smoother ride, so those cruising won't spill their coffee quite as much :D

Start using both lanes, crossing the double yellows, things will get a bit bumpier!
I think it must be either the car (steering geometry) or more likely because I don't have the bit precision fix active. If they're the same then I'll take your word.
 
Premium
I think it must be either the car (steering geometry) or more likely because I don't have the bit precision fix active. If they're the same then I'll take your word.
The physical roads use 5 million polys (156mb) I wouldn't be able to have different versions... and still be able to upload to RD :D

As reference Kunos Nords, 2km's shorter than PCH, uses 750k polys. My reasoning, if you're going to recreate an iconic road, why not give it all the polys!
 
The physical roads use 5 million polys (156mb) I wouldn't be able to have different versions... and still be able to upload to RD :D

As reference Kunos Nords, 2km's shorter than PCH, uses 750k polys. My reasoning, if you're going to recreate an iconic road, why not give it all the polys!
I wonder if more is better in this case. If it means more noise, it might not be necessarily more accurate. The reason KS Nords is so flat comparatively is because laserscan results don't really provide that much fully usable output and you need to kind of flatten it to get a better result.

You are just doing it from maps, right, and not scan data.
 
Premium
I believe in this case... more is more, much smoother transition in height (we're talking a cm or two... millimetres in places)
so the 'ramp' between those are smoother, with more polys.

IIRC USGS data... so likely some form of scan (cant remember the format)... Not as much precision as I would have liked.
And yes the data did give... 'spikey' areas that needed smoothing. Quite a lot of smoothing over 23kms of rugged coastline.

Anyway this iteration of the roads isn't the finished road anyway.... Just an intermediate stand in :)
 
I believe in this case... more is more, much smoother transition in height (we're talking a cm or two... millimetres in places)
so the 'ramp' between those are smoother, with more polys.

IIRC USGS data... so likely some form of scan (cant remember the format)... Not as much precision as I would have liked.
And yes the data did give... 'spikey' areas that needed smoothing. Quite a lot of smoothing over 23kms of rugged coastline.

Anyway this iteration of the roads isn't the finished road anyway.... Just an intermediate stand in :)
I'll just take your word on it, but it was my .02. If all it does is make it smoother, then why not if it runs fine.
 
@Phoenix77

Although part of the bump severity WAS indeed higher FFMULT, it's mostly due to the lack of "double precision" in CM. Ticking it on significantly reduces the vibrations. It feels alright with it ticked.

Without it ticked, the tracks with origin shifted vibrate quite harshly. Now if the alignment errors from ticking it would get fixed...
 
These roads by @Phoenix77 are such a welcome change of pace. Best for me to savor the experience and enjoy the views driving cars I might not want to race. It's a great reminder to just relax and have fun sometimes without all the competing. Since I live 15 mins off of PCH in "So-Cal" I'm also amazed how well the area is captured (minus the surfers - haha). Great work again!
 
These roads by @Phoenix77 are such a welcome change of pace. Best for me to savor the experience and enjoy the views driving cars I might not want to race. It's a great reminder to just relax and have fun sometimes without all the competing. Since I live 15 mins off of PCH in "So-Cal" I'm also amazed how well the area is captured (minus the surfers - haha). Great work again!
Sounds very very familiar ;)
 

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