DiRT Rally Is DiRT Rally a sim?

Chris

Premium
I love rally, but I've never had time to get into RBR, the old DiRT series were abissmal as were the WRC games. So is DiRT Rally at least more realistic than its predecessors? certainly from the gameplay footage it looks really nice!

People who've played the game let me know your thoughts and opinions before I go giving out me hard earned dosh :) cheers!

P.s. I am aware that it's an early access, so I'm not expecting it to be a fully finished game ;)
 
Well Chris lets say it is much better than Dirt, physics and feedback aren't as good as RBR but much easier to install and visually much more pleasing (especially on triple screen setup). I just spent several hours playing and enjoyed it after I finally got the wheel set up properly. Long way to go but it seems like a good start. I liked driving on the tarmac and snow and ice much better than the gravel but I'm sure that is just personal preference for the feel. Still have a number of cars and setups to try but for me it is worth the money because I was starved for some rally fun even though I have RBR to play with. Early access is always a crap shoot but I'm sure it will get better with time. Hope that helps :)
 
Thanks Keith!
I'm not expecting it to be on RBR's level in terms of physics, FFB and car setup options, but hopefully as they develop it more it can be something quite enjoyable. Code masters have seemed to walk the tight rope of SimCade for a long time, so it's nice to see them starting to sway towards the sim side of things finally :)

F1 2015 seems to be going this way as well if the reports are to be believed.
 
No It isn't a sim, the force feedback is completely useless at the moment, It's better than the other dirt games though.

The FFB in Grid Autosport is way better than this, at this stage of development anyway, I think Codies are on to something though, I'm enjoying it but I bought it knowing it's going to be arcadey.

If your looking for something like RBR then this isn't it, but imo it has to potential to be a great simcade game.
 
the force feedback is completely useless at the moment

The FFB in Grid Autosport is way better than this

I would have to completely disagree and suggest that either your profiler or in game ffb settings are just not optimised.

Set up correctly the ffb is infact a real leap from previous titles and provides feel throughout a stage and replicates the movement of each car well over say crests and surface changes. You can feel it all and react properly. I've a thread up here on RD where I have given an idea of good in game settings, if those don't work let me know what your profiler settings are and we'll no doubt be able to optimize the ffb for different people.

It does seem that only your generic thrustmasters, logitechs etc... are supported for the time being with more "bespoke" wheels being tricky to get working well.

I think the game could do with a 5% grip reduction and tyre choices that make the changing surfaces a little more treacherous that they are at the moment. On top of that the ffb when sliding needs to become lighter and not heavier so as to let the car move out from underneath you more before it is collected up.

As a package I am interested to see how this pans out. With more rallies and a good online league system this could very easily top RBR as a whole package as, having driven both back to back yesterday, Dirt Rally is already coming surprisingly close to being top dog.

So, is it a sim? Depends on what you compare it to. It is very much a sim compared to Gran Turismo or Dirt 3. It's on the same kind of level as PCARS only with ffb settings being much harder to get right so some improvement could make them easy equals. Compared to say rF2, it still feels sim-cade.

Not that it matters. It's rival is RBR and it is mighty close to overcoming it. The sounds and visuals are astonishing as are the incredibly detailed and well put together pace notes. The cars DO feel very believable already even if there is an obvious room for improvement.

I would feel comfortable saying that with more content, functionality with leagues and online plus maybe a few tweaks in the right direction ffb-wise this would be the best rallying game of the past decade.
 
Yep I feel that my FFB needs optimizing to get the most out of it, I'm currently using the default settings for the G27. I'm just not feeling anything while driving straight, even going over jumps and slightly turning, I'm only feeling any force when I have the wheel turned at about ~180 degrees, and when the car oversteers the wheel does nothing, I'll play with the settings later and see what I can do to improve it! :)
 
one thing i like about DR, and something i did in RBR. Thats was that i end up just rerunning the a stage to perfect it. I would literally sit with one car and one stage, for hours until i was happy with my performance…. I did this last nite in DR, i think they says a lot for this sim.

Its not another dirt clone you can spend time with the stages they ar not just sprint stages to get further in the game.. Stages have personalities and so do the cars..

RBR has this and DR now has this…..

its great for a rally title..
 
You guys that say it is a sim already, is the car moving around for you?
When I see the small "driving to start clip". The car is pretty soft, and I expect to experience weight transfer. But that never happens. I never feel the car moving around on the dampers.
 
You guys that say it is a sim already, is the car moving around for you?
When I see the small "driving to start clip". The car is pretty soft, and I expect to experience weight transfer. But that never happens. I never feel the car moving around on the dampers.

You're right , there is a lack of "feel" compared to any other racing game I've played recently. Hopefully , as they make improvements, the FFB will improve. I've used the recommended settings that Oscar Hardwick posted and it does help a little bit. No co- driver sound is the most glaring omission for me. I think it's on it's way to possibly being what I would call a "sim" but right now I don't think it is. Just my opinion.:)
 
Yep I feel that my FFB needs optimizing to get the most out of it, I'm currently using the default settings for the G27. I'm just not feeling anything while driving straight, even going over jumps and slightly turning, I'm only feeling any force when I have the wheel turned at about ~180 degrees, and when the car oversteers the wheel does nothing, I'll play with the settings later and see what I can do to improve it! :)
For my G27 i've been using 100%/30%/20% so far, feels alright to me and close to something i had in RBR.
 
There is something to it but the cars lack a lot of dynamic. You can't play around much with the weight of the car like in RBR. It all feels dampened and somewhat easy.

Cars have a ton of grip and very little inertia in general, you can't have fine control of your oversteer with gentle pedal & steering inputs, it feels a bit ON/OFF.

Also the high grip makes the cars very very twitchy, the slightest input gives you plenty of turn in, regardless of the motion of your car. With my experience from RBR I have become used to anticipate turns a lot, especially tight ones such as hairpins or junctions, but in D:R it feels unnecessary and I always end up overanticipating.

I can't say it feels realistic.

The special stages are very nicely made and look very realistic and beautiful though, so there is a strong base that could potentially lead to a very nice simulator once the physics are worked out.
 
I find it amusing that when people ask "Is it a sim" the reply from many is nothing about the handling characteristics, grip, general vehicle dynamics or accuracy of the tracks or any other aspect involved in a simulation game, it's about the Force Feedback.

I understand the FFB is important, but it's hilarious to see a whole post that says nothing other than talking about the FFB when evaluating whether or not it is a sim. The FFB is just one small but important element, it's not the entire thing wrapped in a box.

It's not in my opinion a true to life accurate simulator (least not on Tarmac, but I'm not a rally driver so what do I know about gravel/dirt? not a lot), but it is trying hard to simulate a car accurately. You might love Richard Burns Rally and I do too, but to be quite frank the quality of stages there does not even begin to compare with what Codemasters have done with Dirt Rally, they are second to none in terms of quality and attention to detail in the driving experience. And the Force Feedback in RBR was actually quite poor before the modding scene got involved, even then it's not by any means a standout product... it's just the best of its class of one, since there are no other Rally sims with which to compare it.

This game for me sits in a similar place to Project Cars, it's trying to be a sim and it wants to be respected, but it faces an uphill struggle in doing so... In any case it will still be a damn good game that represents the best work the developer has done to date.
 
It's Codemasters so obviously NOT a sim, not even remotely close.
RBR is now 11 (Eleven) years old and still King of Rally Sims.

FFB is terrible just like the Road feel and this is not something Codemasters will fix with an update cause they are using the same (Arcade) game engine as the Dirt series.

Dirt Rally will probably have the same life span as the rest of Codemasters games so it will most likely be dated within a year of it's release.

Back to RBR :laugh:
 
It's Codemasters so obviously NOT a sim, not even remotely close.
RBR is now 11 (Eleven) years old and still King of Rally Sims.

FFB is terrible just like the Road feel and this is not something Codemasters will fix with an update cause they are using the same (Arcade) game engine as the Dirt series.

Dirt Rally will probably have the same life span as the rest of Codemasters games so it will most likely be dated within a year of it's release.

Back to RBR :laugh:
I read stuff like this and it's so full of rubbish I can't even begin. Richard Burns Rally is a great game and I've played it to death, but it's not "that" great and it doesn't belong on a pedestal in 2015, far from it. It has a physics engine that my phone could run happily, and the cars have a sense of "low gravity" that makes them over-eagre to flip. I don't disagree that RBR is fantastic because it is, it's the best rally sim out there, but it's the best rally sim out there because it's the only one out there, not some holy grail that people make it out to be.

If we look at the tarmac physics on RBR then they are quite frankly awful. If you had compared RBR tarmac in any forum thread to iRacing, Assetto Corsa or Rfactor 2 you'd have a bloody field day because RBR in this regard is not even in the same galaxy.

About "Codemasters" - You're writing them off before they have even had a chance to try, with such utter nonsense like "arcade game engine", what a load of rubbish. I agree that the FFB is not great, I also agree that the tarmac physics in the game are nothing remotely close to good. But the gravel stuff? How can you call that gameplay anything remotely close to "arcade"?

Arcade has come to be a term to mean "very easy" in difficulty, handling that allows the player to defy physics and remove any need for real skill in order to create an experience played by everyone... That is so far from what Codemasters have done, all of the internet Dirt players are fired up about how the game is too hard, the stages are too hard, the cars are too unforgiving.. There is nothing "arcade" about the experience they are making.

Is it 100% realistic? Of course it isnt, but that doesn't mean you write them off from trying, what they have created so far shows a level of dedication towards a rally sim that we haven't seen since RBR... If this doesn't work out, don't expect any other rally sims for the next 10 years.
 

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