DiRT Rally 2.0 Codemasters Tease New Happenings In DiRT Franchise

[Paul Jeffrey]

Codemasters have published a cryptic teaser about something interesting upcoming within the DiRT franchise...

Taking to Twitter earlier today, the British development studio have been busy teasing about the future of the DiRT franchise - but does it relate to DiRT Rally, or the more arcade offering of the DiRT series...

Interesting times ahead it sounds like, couple it be a new game, a substantial update to an existing release, the first fruits of the collaboration with Slightly Mad Studios or something entirely different... only time will tell.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1257218432464039937

The community letter in full can be read below:

From a simple ‘2.0’ in late 2018, to the game’s launch in early 2019, through four Seasons of epic content, and onto the Colin McRae: FLAT OUT Pack and Game of the Year Edition, DiRT Rally 2.0 has been an incredible journey that we’ve been on with you, our passionate rally and rallycross community. ​

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As a team, we set out to create the definitive rally and rallycross experience for you, both in terms of what you can experience, and how you experience it. None of that would be possible without the support of you, the players, not just by playing DiRT Rally 2.0, but having the passion and willingness to be part of a true gaming community. You work with us to keep the game moving forward with patches, updates and improvements built around your feedback.​

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From everyone who has contributed to DiRT Rally 2.0 here at Codemasters, we simply say: thank you for driving with us. ​

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Whilst there are no plans for additional Seasons for DiRT Rally 2.0, some minor updates and surprises are planned. At this stage, the Rally team is now focusing on the future. By no means are we saying this is “the end” for DiRT Rally 2.0. Daily/Weekly/Monthly Challenges live on, Clubs are stronger than ever and you have plenty of esports action to look forward to. ​

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Nothing’s moving in terms of your usual hangout spaces (the Forums, the fan-made Discord, Reddit, YouTube, Twitter) and your support team for DiRT Rally 2.0 are still very much here to help.​

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Prepare to see something new roar to life in the world of DiRT, very soon. Developed by a separate Codemasters studio to the DiRT Rally team, we’re incredibly excited about what’s around the corner. We invite you to be part of a brand new experience, while also continuing to enjoy our definitive Rally offering. ​

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As for the future of DiRT Rally? Well… we have a few things in mind. We have big plans, driven by a passionate development team, solely tasked with taking the Rally series to even greater heights. You won’t hear about that for a while, but when you do... oh boy, will you be excited for what’s coming. ​

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Whether it’s our latest game soon to be revealed, or what comes next for Rally, we are incredibly excited to continue making DiRT the franchise for everything we all love about off-road racing. ​

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“If in doubt... FLAT OUT” ​

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-the team at Codemasters​

Original Source: Codemasters

DiRT Rally 2.0 is available now on both console and PC.

Having issues with the game? No worries - start a thread in the Dirt Rally 2.0 sub forum here at RaceDepartment and let our super knowledgeable community help you out.

 

[miercat]

Dirt is not a sim, purely a simcade at the best.. Ill give it 7/10 for feeling of rally but lets face it …. its not that good … Clunky chunky and leaves you with a feeling of where's my money gone.. Hopefully to pay some one to optimise the shocking VR .. at best 144hz on 3440 x 1440 its still got a lot to be desired … best served up on a PS as this is what its written for. Just my view …

 

[Stuntman Daz]

My guess: A rallycross game.

As a joyless boomer, i'm not going to hold my breath

 

[Adrian Herrera]

Wow.. an announcement is made of a new game being worked on and people get mad? Come on now... if you don’t like a new game just don’t buy it and move on, no?

 

[Kevin Vanit]

Just got a 19.2 GB Dirt Rally 2 update...any relation?

Yeah me too, I'm really wondering what's in this update

 

[Slapped]

You're making the big mistake of only looking at the PC player numbers.

No, I'm not making a mistake, I'm simply acquiring data from the most readily available source, and the source that is most pertinent for this forum which if I'm not mistaken is mostly PC based.

It obviously looks wildly different on consoles.

Does it? I'd be interested in a link as to this information. Getting hold of sales figures for consoles is difficult and finding numbers on the amount of people playing a title even more so.

One thing I can say though is that the most popular driving games on the respective consoles are Gran Turismo Sport and Forza, which in the eyes of people here are not simulations. However they are marketed as such, and people do believe that they are.

 

[anton_Chez]

To be blunt about it: Codies is an arcade/simcade studio mainly. Basically everything they've ever made besides Rally and 2.0 has been some kind of simcade at the very most. Colin Mcrae was arcade, Dirt was arcade, Grid was arcade, Onrush was extremely arcade, F1 is simcade, TOCA was the lower end of simcade. If anything, Rally and its sequel are bizarre aberrations on that front they made because the rally sim market was so utterly starved for content that the premier rally sim is a 2004 game that sold so godawfully it shuttered its studio and which has to be almost completely overhauled (to the point where a completely bespoke physics engine mods is all but essential) to actually be acceptable by modern standards.

I'm glad they did, but Codies is never going to make nothing but turbonerd rally sims. They aren't betraying the holy church of sim racing by making arcade/simcade titles, that's what they normally make. They will make an arcade dirt game, all of you will bitch and moan about it daring to exist, then they'll make Rally 3.0 and you'll bitch and moan about it and saying it's still not as good as RBR (a game you don't appear to actually play).

And then you'll buy it anyway.

This has happened like three times over and y'all still keep doing this lmao like when will you learn

Perhaps finding a way to express your opinions without trashing the entire forum, of whom are on Race Department forums because of their interest in sim racing, might be something you could work on.

I for one don't feel the need to justify myself to you or anyone else why I'd all day every day prefer to spend my time in a proper simulation of motorsport rather than a controller bound arcade racing title.

Don't sit there and pretend to know what other members do or do not do in their leisure time. This attack on 'boomers' is disrespectful, unacceptable and completely uncalled for.

Maybe you could learn a thing or two from them before shooting your mouth off with nothing of value coming out of it.

Leave if you don't like what you hear.

 

[Dobermann92]

I don't have problem with what Codemasters chooses to produce. It's my decision to buy or not to buy after all, but I do have a problem with their approach which currently appears to be to produce a content limited "demo" costing AAA money, and then force their customers to spend more money in order to buy the complete game via DLC. The F1 series is admittedly an exception to this.

That aside it's also true that the more the Codies veer towards arcade the less popular the titles are. In fact I dug up some Steam stats on relatively recent Codemasters games to demonstrate this:-

All charts indicate number of concurrent players, not copies sold. Also due to COVID-19 the numbers after February are likely to be skewed from the norm.

Most popular, as expected is F1 2019, and I will personally commit heresy on this forum by stating that I really enjoy the game. The scale of the chart is difficult to see, but it's in 2.5K increments, Black bars indicate times when free access was given

View attachment 369607

So a pretty healthy average of around 3000 concurrent players at any given time.

Next up DR 2.0

View attachment 369617

Around 1000 concurrent players on average, so not bad.

Now let's take a look at GRID

View attachment 369618

Oh dear. This game peaked at DR 2.0's long term average, and since then has struggled to get 200 concurrent players. Not even a free weekend could do much for this title.

Now let's take a look at the most popular pure sim title which is Assetto Corsa over it's 6-7 year lifetime.

View attachment 369619

Yeah, a pure simulation game is has a higher number of concurrent players than Codemasters most popular title - F1. Not only that, it's also still showing an overall upward trend after 6 years.

So I think I can pretty safely say that people are generally no longer interested in pure arcade racers, and much prefer something leaning towards simulation.

This is bollocks. The Forza Horizon franchise is more and more popular with each title released and that is a purely arcade series.

 

[Rob Every]

It's all just garbage hype. It wil be the latest in the Colin, Block stuff, that are good fun, but that's about it. Dirt Rally 2 was and is a disappointment to me, could ahve been great but the way they tried to make it uber difficult lazily was pathetic in my view, the usual suspect will disagree with me, but he would say white was black, no shock there

But I ust felt that the promise of DR1 was poorly sold, the DLC model was borderline robbery, the physics were improved in some areas, lost in others, the graphics were made to make the game harder, the stage design was made with deliberate areas included to catch you out, not actually reality, the way you navigate the menus etc is still hopelessly out of date, Racenetis the biggest plague to hit gaming for decades.

They got a lot of things right too, as I say some physics are better, the stages are well designed, if falsely difficult (bumps, boards made of titanium not wood, false notes etc), the rallycross is much improved, the cars included are excellent mostly, and the choice of locaitons as a non DR1 patyer are good.

But that is the main point, the DLC model stank from day one.

Remember who they bought people ,the kings of hype making average games based on old console engines.

 

[RCHeliguy]

This is all about scratching an itch.

I saw an interesting video about the best sim to race F1 and the bottom line was that none of the more realistic sims out there had an F1 career path, had enough current F1 cars, or had enough F1 tracks to make a go of it, period.

At the end of the video, the guy said that F1 2019 is the only game in town. On top of that driving F1 is extraordinarily challenging compared to many other types of racing and there is not even remotely enough of an audience to support that level of realism, so a more arcade feel brings this experience to the people who want to play and pretend they are awesome F1 drivers. It scratches that itch for that experience.

If Code Masters ever added VR support to their F1 game, I would have to give it a go, just to get a taste of that experience. It would scratch an itch.

Project Cars 2 has some Rally Cross, and iRacing has some Rally Cross, etc..

For Rally time trials that support VR, Dirt Rally and Dirt Rally 2 are all there is.

So if Code Masters decides that a more arcade Rally game has an audience, so be it. They are creating something to help someone scratch an itch.

As it is I have Dirt Rally and Dirt Rally 2.0 and that has scratched my itch pretty well. They added quite a bit of new content to DR2 and I'm pretty well set. Why would they double down on this niche? Especially when all people do is complain...

 

[David Mann]

I'm eagerly awaiting the release of "RD Troll Rally 1.0," designed and coded by the naysayers in this thread. I'm sure it will have perfect VR support, amazingly realistic physics for all surface types and weather conditions (good luck with that), well-balanced difficulty (does the concept of difficulty even apply to a proper simulation, versus a game?), and a boatload of content, all at a very reasonable price.

Still waiting...

DR2.0 is the first and only rally game that I play. I tried RBR a few times, but I don't get what all the fuss is about. My senses must not be elite enough to feel how terrible DR2.0 is. Having recently driven my daily driver on local dirt roads at a high rate of speed out of quarantine boredom, the DR2.0 physics are realistic enough for me. In the precious little time I have for gaming these days, I find DR2.0 to be fun and rewarding. I assume that WRC8 is fine as well.

Most of the games that Codemasters produces don't interest me much. DR2.0 was the exception to that, as a rally sim. I'm mildly interested in whatever comes of this announcement, but I'll most likely pass on it. My "career mode" is SRS, or at least it was until DR2.0 sucked up all my sim racing time recently.

So, I'll go back to minding my own business now...

 

[jamman39]

>19GB update? For a company called Codemasters they aren’t the best at optimizing

I’m rooting for them this time, but I don’t think I’m gonna be signing up to get burned for another $60. Dirt 4 was one of the worst $60 I ever spent. Wasn’t thrilled with Rally 2.0 either.
I like their F1 offering, but will hold off from buying it until they start supporting VR as a day one feature.

 

[MirNet]

Not sure I understand the criticism of DR2 and it's VR. If you only experienced it on release then it's understandable, but to their credit Codemasters fixed it. That's not something they're well known for, let alone fixing the VR in DR2 which they hadn't been involved with themselves as it was outsourced.

Hopefully going forward Codemasters consider VR users as part of the mass consumer audience they aim their products at. We've only been treated so far because they've been gifted additional funds to bring it.

 

[Wolfzz]

Lets just wait its early, and we can all make a decision then?

 

[ShredatorFIN]

DiRT 4 and its track generator was mainly dropped as a game because it was not the DLC generator that DiRT Rally 2 became.

Indeed, was about to say that actually. A great stage generator with lot of tiles/variation would be possible. By building on the groundwork laid with Dirt 4. Just more tiles, way more. Would be beneficial to players. But not beneficial to Codemasters.

I love the idea of "procedural generation" overall. Gotta give credit to games that do that well. But it's not perhaps the most lucrative strategy, so perhaps it's not getting as much focus/development effort as it could, overall. In other game genres too.

Maybe procedural generation would be much further than we have now, (studios like Rockstar putting all their talent into developing procedural systems) if it was lucrative for developers. But they focus on DLC plans instead

Just imagine Dirt 4, where they would have (instead of abandoning a leaking ship) fixed the physics, then keep adding tiles (for free) with the same enthusiasm they have for releasing re-warmed DLC. The indie sim developer approach. Wanting to perfect your product year after year (like Assetto Corsa etc), and then hope it sells even more... simply because it ends up being so good. Sadly we don't have anything like that for Rally genre

 

[Omer Said]

Seeing Wreckfest's success and the fact that they capitalise FLAT OUT like that feels like they might be working on some sort of a demolition derby game?

 

[Ruy Horta]

Indeed, was about to say that actually. A great stage generator with lot of tiles/variation would be possible. By building on the groundwork laid with Dirt 4. Just more tiles, way more. Would be beneficial to players. But not beneficial to Codemasters.

I love the idea of "procedural generation" overall. Gotta give credit to games that do that well. But it's not perhaps the most lucrative strategy, so perhaps it's not getting as much focus/development effort as it could, overall. In other game genres too.

Maybe procedural generation would be much further than we have now, (studios like Rockstar putting all their talent into developing procedural systems) if it was lucrative for developers. But they focus on DLC plans instead

Just imagine Dirt 4, where they would have (instead of abandoning a leaking ship) fixed the physics, then keep adding tiles (for free) with the same enthusiasm they have for releasing re-warmed DLC. The indie sim developer approach. Wanting to perfect your product year after year (like Assetto Corsa etc), and then hope it sells even more... simply because it ends up being so good. Sadly we don't have anything like that for Rally genre

Absolutely, and furthermore they could still sell those extra tile sets together with or as part of prepared DLC tracks.

However if your primary aim is delivering as little as you can get away with and sell everything separately as dlc content, clearly procedurally generated content is counter productive.

OTOH, I still believe that the negative response many hardcore players gave to the system was also a big discouragement, or at least the excuse to drop the attempt instead of refining the feature. An easy 1-1=0 situations. No income - No interest = No feature.

 

[Ruy Horta]

Not sure I understand the criticism of DR2 and it's VR. If you only experienced it on release then it's understandable, but to their credit Codemasters fixed it. That's not something they're well known for, let alone fixing the VR in DR2 which they hadn't been involved with themselves as it was outsourced.

Hopefully going forward Codemasters consider VR users as part of the mass consumer audience they aim their products at. We've only been treated so far because they've been gifted additional funds to bring it.

Indeed to their credit, not only did they add VR, they also fixed their initial native support debacle and continue to refine performance. They indeed did a lot to make up for their mistakes. Also to be realistic, their own DLC strategy probably depended on continued interest of players AND the income could be used for the continued support.

Part of DLCs sales does go back into continued support for games, at least with some developers and that’s how it can be a positive model for business and players alike.

 

[dwightyone]

"Colin McRae was arcade" - quite liked the first myself but the 2nd one was awesome. And remember these two sims were released back in the late 90s and year 2000 - considering what was available at the time in terms of technology the 2nd one gave a very good account of itself imo.

 

[theravenousbeast]

Always love the manchildren on this forum popping up from the woodwork.

"No VR waaaah, no ultrasuperduper tyre model waaaaah, Codemasters DLC expensive even though I spend 1200$ on gear built by some twat in a shed WAAAAAAH"

Imagine how better the world would be if this COVID 19 virus targeted elitist simracers

 

[Trebor901]

Just had a thought. Xbox Series X has gameplay footage being released May 7th......already been said it will be non microsoft titles as they will be shown at a later date....could this be something that will be a release title with the new Xbox?