PC1 Project CARS delayed to May

[Alex Franchini]

Slightly Mad Studios just sent us a press release announcing another delay for its racer, Project CARS.

This is just another one in a long string of delays: the latest release date, April 2, has been pushed back to "mid-May 2015".
Here's what Slightly Mad Studios' head Ian Bell had to say about it:

“Despite our long heritage and pedigree in making critically-acclaimed racing games, Project CARS is by far the grandest and most intricately detailed of them all. Despite therefore the game being 99.9% complete, the remaining 0.1% attending to small issues and bugs has been tricky to anticipate. We’re absolutely dedicated to delivering a ground-breaking experience and by targeting mid-May fans can be assured that’s what they’ll receive”

Furthermore, Bell added that all players are going to receive exclusive free content "as compensation for this short delay and as acknowledgement of how grateful we are. This gift, that we’re sure is going to excite fans, will be available from day one and revealed shortly".

What do you think of this? Are you disappointed or do you think that this delay will benefit SMS's crowdfunded simulator?

 

[Birddogg66]

this is why i havent preordered,im going to wait for reviews.

Sorry I cannot be of any help ATM because I have no idea where your tastes are. However if you are interested in buying a great racing game pCARS will deliver.

 

[Ryan Soucy]

Last night's PC patch was 65mb. Sounds so close on the PC side!! I wouldn't be surprised if the holdups are on the console side (that's what I'd LIKE to believe...).

My biggest pet peeves are Day 1 DLC (DLC on disk) and Day 1 patches that measure in the gigabytes. I personally would rather SMS send a v1.0 that is an actualy 1.0. I'm sure they had to put up a fight against Namco to hold it off. As we know, traditional publishers have no qualms sending out broken products.

(AC did the equivalent of day 1 DLC, basically charging for content when the game itself is still pretty bare. I get a giggle out of AC's slogan "Your Racing Simulator", should be "Greatest Driving Simulator", while pCars should be "Your Racing Simulator" since it was crowdfunded and tested and it simulates a RACING career better than any other... All that being said, I love AC and bought the DLC day it was announced.)

 

[Zytok]

Many people like you berate all the guys that put money into the project but don't contribute to the community in some way. Thay have all helped by putting the money in allowing the project to get started and get rolling. So despite what you say, they all have a right to say what they want and ask what they want wether they have paid 10 bucks or 1000 bucks.
They were also promised to be able to have Pcars on whichever platform they chose and now they are told they can only have it on PC. That is a kick in the never regions. Some of them literally don't have PC's.

Ah well, we can only hope the full released game is as good as you all say it will be. I am really looking forward to buying the full game and hopefully it will be this complete sim you say it will be.

I know we have our differences Andy and I don't want to get into another argument but imo, Project CARS was/is not just a Kickstarter game where people just shell out a few quid to help get (an indie) game financed. It is/was supposed to be more than that where people actually help to make the game as good as it can be by actually helping to make it. Now if people have just chucked in a few euros and not contributed then they have arguably not bought into the project at all and have just taken up a space of someone who could have been more useful?
Bear in mind that for the majority of the time the game was in development no-one owned an Xbox one or PS4. Whether there was ever a promise of a free copy to all on the format of your choice or whether this was just assumed/implied I'm not sure without digging back through hundreds of posts/threads but I find it hard to believe that people essentially bought into a beta process without having a way of testing the game. Whilst feedback was never mandatory, playing the builds was and therefore people saying they don't have a pc to play it on are in breach of T's and C's anyway.
I am not defending PCars blindly, certain things could have been done better but it's still a hell of an achievement to get a AAA title designed, built, beta tested and shipped by a community and a small dev team on a small budget.

 

[Giorgos Martiou]

after the last updates the only game that i can compare the pc is only the i racing.really great work from community.it doesnt matter if we have it 2 months before or after.we will play that game for 3 or 4 years at least.i download the asseto corsa too yesterday but kunos disapoint me for one more time.The game have many problems and i dont think that he will solve it.so i just play the pc from a friend acount and waiting the release as i have already bought it.xaxaxaxa im a lucky man with good friends

 

[Andrew Harper]

Oh well, gives me a bit more time to save for that dream PC....

 

[Andy_J]

I know we have our differences Andy and I don't want to get into another argument but imo, Project CARS was/is not just a Kickstarter game where people just shell out a few quid to help get (an indie) game financed. It is/was supposed to be more than that where people actually help to make the game as good as it can be by actually helping to make it. Now if people have just chucked in a few euros and not contributed then they have arguably not bought into the project at all and have just taken up a space of someone who could have been more useful?

No argument from me Zytok. Just an opinion. Differences were originated by personal attacks because of my sometimes negative opinion of the builds that investors did not like. Water off a ducks back to me.

I understand what you are saying but it is unfair. They all contributed, they paid money, actual real money to get it off the ground. That is what has allowed the game to get built. The input from all the others has just partly steered the result. I say partly because I feel the devs have still got what they roughly thought they would get at the end. Yes you have members who have contributed lots of feedback, but you also have pure investors whose only goal was to make money.

Back to the crunch though, whoever paid what, did so under the promise of a choice of discount or full game on the platform of their choice. They have now had that choice taken away from them. That can't be right can it? I mean to be told they can have a refund if they don't like it is a bit wrong from my point of view, as some of them will lose any profit dividend that they had also been promised too.

Back to the game. Lets hope it is good on release (PC version). I am hoping it will be.

 

[Zytok]

At times the customer service could have been better. A few peoples grumbles along the way could have been handled differently and as a result, some good people have been lost along the way along with a fair few who its difficult to feel sorry for. This is though still a unique venture and hopefully some lessons can be learned on all sides about protocol and decorum for pcars2. It is unfortunate that i don't think the devs will ever be as open and transparent as they have been due to frequent leaks which at times have threatened licenses. I don't know why they cant/wont issue ps/xbox codes but one would imagine its not just to intentionally piss off customers.

 

[SternLX]

~snip~
It is unfortunate that i don't think the devs will ever be as open and transparent as they have been due to frequent leaks which at times have threatened licenses.

That's pretty much already happened even at this late stage. The hidden sub-forum for Managers+ has way more detail that they share(they have an additional NDA from what I understand). Those members in there have a much larger investment to risk so they're least likely to leak licensing/new track/new car info before it's ready to be announced officially.

I don't know why they cant/wont issue ps/xbox codes but one would imagine its not just to intentionally piss off customers.

The one and only reason is the logistics and cost of generating Coupons for the other platforms. It's just not fiduciarily feasible for SMS. Even if it were for discount digital coupons on PSN/Live, Sony and MS would still want their cut of each unit sold for the full price agreed upon. Mfg Coupons are a retailers worst nightmare when it comes time to collecting the full value from the Mfg.(whom ultimately eats the cost).
I know they wanted to originally give the backers a choice of platform for their retail copy, but it was never put in contractually that it would happen. It was a wishlist item.

 

[nikh]

View attachment 84444 Slightly Mad Studios just sent us a press release announcing another delay for its racer, Project CARS.

This is just another one in a long string of delays: the latest release date, April 2, has been pushed back to "mid-May 2015".
Here's what Slightly Mad Studios' head Ian Bell had to say about it:

“Despite our long heritage and pedigree in making critically-acclaimed racing games, Project CARS is by far the grandest and most intricately detailed of them all. Despite therefore the game being 99.9% complete, the remaining 0.1% attending to small issues and bugs has been tricky to anticipate. We’re absolutely dedicated to delivering a ground-breaking experience and by targeting mid-May fans can be assured that’s what they’ll receive”

Furthermore, Bell added that all players are going to receive exclusive free content "as compensation for this short delay and as acknowledgement of how grateful we are. This gift, that we’re sure is going to excite fans, will be available from day one and revealed shortly".

What do you think of this? Are you disappointed or do you think that this delay will benefit SMS's crowdfunded simulator?

I`ve cancelled my pre-order. The constant delays have dented my confidence in this game.
Meantime, I`ve invested 500 hours in R3E since last September`s update and the game just keeps getting better and better.

 

[SnappyDEe]

I ask this question with complete sincerity:

Why cancel a pre-order? Is it specifically because of the latest delay? Is it because of some unknown "principle" which makes the developer look dishonest/shady? Is it because you have other things to do with your money? I don't understand.

It's your money so do what you wish. I am just trying to understand some of the different objections.

In the interest of full disclosure I will say this: I bought into the pCars project almost immediately upon finding out about it. For personal RL reasons I have not been a contributor to the project. I have only returned to pCars in the last few months. Family life and work schedules plus the lack of a sim racing specific PC kept me from helping. SMS have had to contend with ever improving/evolving technology and a monumental task of trying to create a SIM/game that would provide many gameplay options but at a new unprecedented level. Only recently have any of us seen games running at 1080p/4K resolution with a 60fps while still trying to appeal to the SIM racer and casual racer. What I'm saying is: it seems like it's never enough. I am guilty of it at times as well. I want X content and I want it now. etc

Like I said, I have access to daily builds so I can experience what is going on while satisfying my pCars cravings. For those who cannot and have to rely on word of mouth or YouTube clips and screen shots, well.. it must be extremely annoying. So to hear of yet another delay is . Even though I run it daily I am anxious to race with others here and share in the experience it will provide. Will it be the best sim racing experience? Who knows.

I believe the game is very good. Will it be the SIM racer of all SIM racers? Probably not. That's a totally subjective thing. I've seen people post things about other sims in these forums that put this or that particular sim on a pedestal. Then I try the thing and wonder why I don't see the same thing they do.

I don't claim to be a fast racer, know everything about sims and hardware or have tons of hours on each sim.

Oh, and while I am at it, here is a list of SIMS I currently have:

pCars
GSCX
Assetto Corsa
RaceRoom Racing Experience
iRacing
GT Legends
rFactor - DRM mod, HistorX mod
Race07 - and all of the various add-ons
Grid Autosport - I know, not a sim.
Forza 5 - terrible game, not a sim
F1 2014

Respectfully, SnappyDee

 

[BernL]

AC it is then. And now a word from our sponsor's.

Relaxes....Project cars is on my list of must have

 

[bmanic]

I always encourage people to enjoy all the other wonderful sims that we already have available. Especially Stock Car Extreme which is ridiculously good and doesn't cost an arm and a leg (I'm looking at you iRacing!! Damn you for making me shell out more than 600$ over the years!). AC is also quite good if you can cope with the quirks.. so there is no need to get "stuck" waiting for Project CARS. Just forget about it for a while and enjoy all the other fruits of the tree. There's never been a better time being a sim racer! So many awesome games available, at all budget levels.

 

[Michael Carver]

Even with the last DLC, AC still feels like beta to me. From what I read pC is closer to a finished product than AC.

 

[Andrej Svajger]

Even with the last DLC, AC still feels like beta to me. From what I read pC is closer to a finished product than AC.

Thank god not everyone is happy with every simracing title available. But i'm 110% sure that EVERYONE can find one he/she is more than happy with, so give yourself 3 more months, enjoy those one or two personal favorites and come back then and check how other titles have progressed. There might be a pleasent surprise waiting for you ....
Like @bmanic said :

There's never been a better time being a sim racer! So many awesome games available, at all budget levels.

 

[nikh]

I ask this question with complete sincerity:

Why cancel a pre-order? Is it specifically because of the latest delay? Is it because of some unknown "principle" which makes the developer look dishonest/shady? Is it because you have other things to do with your money? I don't understand.

It's your money so do what you wish. I am just trying to understand some of the different objections.

In the interest of full disclosure I will say this: I bought into the pCars project almost immediately upon finding out about it. For personal RL reasons I have not been a contributor to the project. I have only returned to pCars in the last few months. Family life and work schedules plus the lack of a sim racing specific PC kept me from helping. SMS have had to contend with ever improving/evolving technology and a monumental task of trying to create a SIM/game that would provide many gameplay options but at a new unprecedented level. Only recently have any of us seen games running at 1080p/4K resolution with a 60fps while still trying to appeal to the SIM racer and casual racer. What I'm saying is: it seems like it's never enough. I am guilty of it at times as well. I want X content and I want it now. etc

Like I said, I have access to daily builds so I can experience what is going on while satisfying my pCars cravings. For those who cannot and have to rely on word of mouth or YouTube clips and screen shots, well.. it must be extremely annoying. So to hear of yet another delay is . Even though I run it daily I am anxious to race with others here and share in the experience it will provide. Will it be the best sim racing experience? Who knows.

I believe the game is very good. Will it be the SIM racer of all SIM racers? Probably not. That's a totally subjective thing. I've seen people post things about other sims in these forums that put this or that particular sim on a pedestal. Then I try the thing and wonder why I don't see the same thing they do.

I don't claim to be a fast racer, know everything about sims and hardware or have tons of hours on each sim.

Oh, and while I am at it, here is a list of SIMS I currently have:

pCars
GSCX
Assetto Corsa
RaceRoom Racing Experience
iRacing
GT Legends
rFactor - DRM mod, HistorX mod
Race07 - and all of the various add-ons
Grid Autosport - I know, not a sim.
Forza 5 - terrible game, not a sim
F1 2014

Respectfully, SnappyDee

The simple answer is that with over 30 years experience of buying video games, continual delays tend to mean a sub-standard product.
So I`ve cancelled my pre-order and will wait for reviews.
P Cars could turn out to be a great sim, but I`m sceptical. I don`t have to own it on Day One as I`ve got enough to keep me occupied with R3E and the occasional run round The Green Hell in AC.

 

[SnappyDEe]

I respect that but I don't think it will be substandard. See you in May.

 

[nikh]

I respect that but I don't think it will be substandard. See you in May.

I really hope it turns out to be as good as promised. The career mode looks excellent.

 

[Birddogg66]

Even with the last DLC, AC still feels like beta to me. From what I read pC is closer to a finished product than AC.

Seems Kunos likes to break mods with updates. Other then that I FTMP enjoy it for car testing

 

[SnappyDEe]

I really hope it turns out to be as good as promised. The career mode looks excellent.

All I can say is that I like it. I'm liking it a lot. It DOES NOT have NFS Shift 2 physics or FFB. Nothing like it at all. It feels more like a proper sim except that I have to be ever conscious of the condition of the tires. You can feel that they are cold and you can also feel when they have got some heat and become stable. Add to that all the other elements like day/night transition, good looking weather effects, animated pit stops, very good selection of cars and tracks. I'm liking it a lot. Anyway, the best part is that if it is successful it will push more innovation from other devs. TBH, I support most racing sims at this point to varying degrees. So many good ones to enjoy.

 

[Luca Antinori]

By the way, I have received an email from Amazon in which they say they can't give me a delivery date for PCars, they are sorry but they will keep me informed.

I am wondering if we are going to have an estimated delivery date the next few weeks or there are more delays after May.

In any case I don't think at Amazon they are very pleased by this situation. For me I will be waiting for the time being but this is very unusual. Lots of people who keep saying how great this game is, that it is way better than any other available sim, lots of nice youtube clips but I am not in the driving seat at the moment, maybe a passenger...