Background
Got my start in GT1-2 then moved on to Forza 1-4. Spent a good 3 years or so doing two race series a week in Forza 4. Also raced GTR and Nascar PC sims years ago. Then made the jump to PC and iRacing. Been doing iRacing semi serious for about 18 months. with a few othes on the side for fun (Dirt rally etc)
Intro
well since the begining ive had a love/hate with iRacing. the lack of grip is so unrealistic and i hate the tip toe way you have to go around the tracks. the V6 tire model was a huge improvement in the right direction, but still has a way to go.
Ive been looking into Assetto Corsa(AC) and Project Cars(PC) the last 6 months and finally pulled the trigger on PC.
AC had the better car list, along with new car packs every few months. It also had the C7R which was HUGE for me. also had better ambient sounds like tranny wine etc. AC also had the bigger following. however PC had the visuals i was looking and richer sound tones in all the comparisons id watched.
Ive jotted down a few notes from my first few hours on PC.
General
One thing that worried me was PC was known to have poorer performance on AMD GPUs and in Windows 7. I have both. That held me off a few weeks, but ended up not being a problem for my setup(i7/8gb GPU).
I also liked the Rain/Night/Beauty of PC vs AC.
I set it up in Pro mode, no assists and 80% AI difficulty.
I dont care for the automated driving when you enter the pits.
Tons of options, and options for the options, you can customize everything in the game.
I found the driving a tad too easy, but also very satisfying. that being said i finished dead last in every single race. twice i got second to last.
Fast load times. Typically 6-7 seconds
Tracks not laser scanned. i did notice a few tiny differences in a couple tracks. were a straight would be a tiny bit shorter, or a corner slightly tighter. but 99% of the time i couldnt tell the difference.
Gearing seems really tall. 2nd gear would do 100mph in most cars. also a weird thing when stoped and trying to move in 1st or Reverse. the rpms would go straight to red line and the car would barely move. then after a couple times of this it would only do like super slow accelleration like a massive TCS system or something. but this only happened after a spin from a stop or something.
I have not go into tuning, or FFB tweaks or anything yet. basically driven as default.
One of the big things that drew me to PC is the Helmet view. WOW! turn all the HUD off and the Immersion is absolutly insane! The high pitched sounds are muffled just like wearing a real helmet, and the driver turns his head into the apex and also tilts his head into the corner too!(both with adjustable levels) also the focus blur is really cool. love this effect. It does make it a tad hard to tell how much steering input you have in the car/need at first, but you get the hang of it after a bit. worth it. I think you can also adjust how much head movement there is, bumps, speed etc.
And the video that single handedly got me so stoked about PC was this video. This is the **** i signed up for when i got into sim racing. Ive watched this many times and it gets me so amped. just awesome.
Physics
Id say it has a hair too much grip and a bit too easy at times. this changes weither your in a GT VS street car, but the Race cars are probly a tad too easy at times.
The Braking also is a bit too strong/easy most of the times as well. i found myself braking way too early most of the time, as the brakes were more effective than they probly should be. also even at the limits of threshold braking its uneventful. the car is not moving around trying to kill you like it should be at that limit, its just planted and calm.
There is kind of a lack of feel. there is no road feel on half the cars/tracks and this kinda leads to a lack of connectedness with the car at times.
For now im gonna rate the physics some where between a Forza/Turismo and Dirt Rally.
Cars
Most of them seemed too tough in crashes.
my first few combos i tried the game on:
I am very familiar with the RUF GT3 @ Laguna seca from iRacing so i wanted to try that combo first. Cornering Grip seemed almost unlimited at first compared to iRacing. but a rear engine RUF GT3 car should almost feel that way. im sure driving a real one wed say the same. Accell and braking had slightly less grip, than corning, but still a TON. I tried same car at Brands hatch and noticed less grip than Laguna. but still good.
Next up BMW 1 series street car @ Catalunya. definatly grip limited. unsteered and slide and lower performance like a street car should. seemed slow compared to the RUF of course, but had a good sense of speed at the same time.
BMW Z4 GT3 less grip than RUF, about right.
Then i went for the holy grail from above video. been waiting for this. BMW 320 Turbo Group 5 @ Nordschleife. Wow! orgasmic
. had a huge sense of speed, but things didnt come at me too fast that you felt you could react or handle them. plenty of time to setup and take corner, but felt like you were flying too. first thought it had too much grip, but then i over cooked a few corners and it would understeer and go offtrack. I could really FEEL the turbo and power in the car. cool feeling. i later tried this combo again and while not quite as big of an impession as the first time it was still sweet.
Mustang Boss 302 @ Road Atlanta in the rain. Obviously lower grip in wet. noticable big time. upper RPM sounds need work. good FFB/road feel. Fun but lots of work/driving.
Ariel Atom V8 @ Monza. just right grip. had to slow and counter steer in corners on the street tires. had to be really carefull on the gas.
Ford MK @ Brands Hatch. Impossible to drive. looped every corner no matter how careful.
Mustang Cobra Trans Am Racer. Lively and a blast
Sauber C9 @ Catalunya. Awesome car! slow shifts though.
Force Feedback
Mostly just resistance
no road feel on most cars. some cars and tracks do have it though
the wheel moves appropriatly when you lock up the rears and slide, or let go and let the wheel self center at the exit of a drift.
you can feel the curbs and rumble strips when you drive over them.
no braking FFB
no traction FFB
seems like you almost have to go offtrack to get much FFB of any kind.
Sound
richer (deep tones) than AC, but lacks some of the smaller effects of AC such as tranny wine.
the Tire sounds at the edge of limit sound great and realistic. Over the limit the squeels are bad and cheesy.
Sounds change with view! chase cam has more exhaust note, helmet cam is muffled, etc. all different tones to each.
gravel sounds like maracas at times
Engine sounds sound a bit digital and cheesy at times, especially higher rpms.
AI
respectful
will go out of there way not to hit you, including going off course. for both passing, and if you wreck in front of them.
Weather
Rain and thunderstorms are awesome
wet track effects grip for sure
Great effects
colors and outside are grey and dull like real life outside cabin in rain. inside cabin still vibrant contrast. pretty real.
Graphics
no contest its pretty. all the lighting effects and little particles. damn nice visually.
love the focus blur on the helmet cam
im running with everything maxed out. no Frame rate issue. no clue what FR is but not glitchy at all. smooth. Im running a single 1080 monitor.
brake lights are too bright
the one thing that was set to low default, was the active grass or something like that. i tried this set to high and i had floating grass up at eye level and hgue bug. i have it just set to off now.
had a few lighting artifacts (windsheild reflections) that would get stuck on the screen when you first started on a few tracks, but go away as soon as a new reflection hits the windsheild.
the live marbles are badass. move and get kicked up when you drive over them. also the small ones even roll when the air of your car goes by them. awesome touch. same goes with leaves on tracks with trees.
smoke is very real. this is tough to do. it appears, drifts, and dissappears very realistically.
Online
only spent a few minutes online so far.
1st lobby i entered i got booted
2nd lobby my car appeared to have been dropped from an airplane. just tubbling way up in the air.
3rd lobby worked. appeared to be a practice or something. joined mid session.
lets you create your own lobby, as well as do private lobbys. choose your own cars/tracks/weather etc.
didnt appear to be many online only 2 lobbys with people in them.
Closing
Ill anxious to get more time to see if PC gets the thumbs up or down.
Curious how often new cars would come.
they appear to do updates every month even with PC2 coming. every 2-3 updates appear to have new cars/tracks.
also not sure if it will hold up long term as a sim ill run.
definatly enjoying it for now.
Got my start in GT1-2 then moved on to Forza 1-4. Spent a good 3 years or so doing two race series a week in Forza 4. Also raced GTR and Nascar PC sims years ago. Then made the jump to PC and iRacing. Been doing iRacing semi serious for about 18 months. with a few othes on the side for fun (Dirt rally etc)
Intro
well since the begining ive had a love/hate with iRacing. the lack of grip is so unrealistic and i hate the tip toe way you have to go around the tracks. the V6 tire model was a huge improvement in the right direction, but still has a way to go.
Ive been looking into Assetto Corsa(AC) and Project Cars(PC) the last 6 months and finally pulled the trigger on PC.
AC had the better car list, along with new car packs every few months. It also had the C7R which was HUGE for me. also had better ambient sounds like tranny wine etc. AC also had the bigger following. however PC had the visuals i was looking and richer sound tones in all the comparisons id watched.
Ive jotted down a few notes from my first few hours on PC.
General
One thing that worried me was PC was known to have poorer performance on AMD GPUs and in Windows 7. I have both. That held me off a few weeks, but ended up not being a problem for my setup(i7/8gb GPU).
I also liked the Rain/Night/Beauty of PC vs AC.
I set it up in Pro mode, no assists and 80% AI difficulty.
I dont care for the automated driving when you enter the pits.
Tons of options, and options for the options, you can customize everything in the game.
I found the driving a tad too easy, but also very satisfying. that being said i finished dead last in every single race. twice i got second to last.
Fast load times. Typically 6-7 seconds
Tracks not laser scanned. i did notice a few tiny differences in a couple tracks. were a straight would be a tiny bit shorter, or a corner slightly tighter. but 99% of the time i couldnt tell the difference.
Gearing seems really tall. 2nd gear would do 100mph in most cars. also a weird thing when stoped and trying to move in 1st or Reverse. the rpms would go straight to red line and the car would barely move. then after a couple times of this it would only do like super slow accelleration like a massive TCS system or something. but this only happened after a spin from a stop or something.
I have not go into tuning, or FFB tweaks or anything yet. basically driven as default.
One of the big things that drew me to PC is the Helmet view. WOW! turn all the HUD off and the Immersion is absolutly insane! The high pitched sounds are muffled just like wearing a real helmet, and the driver turns his head into the apex and also tilts his head into the corner too!(both with adjustable levels) also the focus blur is really cool. love this effect. It does make it a tad hard to tell how much steering input you have in the car/need at first, but you get the hang of it after a bit. worth it. I think you can also adjust how much head movement there is, bumps, speed etc.
And the video that single handedly got me so stoked about PC was this video. This is the **** i signed up for when i got into sim racing. Ive watched this many times and it gets me so amped. just awesome.
Physics
Id say it has a hair too much grip and a bit too easy at times. this changes weither your in a GT VS street car, but the Race cars are probly a tad too easy at times.
The Braking also is a bit too strong/easy most of the times as well. i found myself braking way too early most of the time, as the brakes were more effective than they probly should be. also even at the limits of threshold braking its uneventful. the car is not moving around trying to kill you like it should be at that limit, its just planted and calm.
There is kind of a lack of feel. there is no road feel on half the cars/tracks and this kinda leads to a lack of connectedness with the car at times.
For now im gonna rate the physics some where between a Forza/Turismo and Dirt Rally.
Cars
Most of them seemed too tough in crashes.
my first few combos i tried the game on:
I am very familiar with the RUF GT3 @ Laguna seca from iRacing so i wanted to try that combo first. Cornering Grip seemed almost unlimited at first compared to iRacing. but a rear engine RUF GT3 car should almost feel that way. im sure driving a real one wed say the same. Accell and braking had slightly less grip, than corning, but still a TON. I tried same car at Brands hatch and noticed less grip than Laguna. but still good.
Next up BMW 1 series street car @ Catalunya. definatly grip limited. unsteered and slide and lower performance like a street car should. seemed slow compared to the RUF of course, but had a good sense of speed at the same time.
BMW Z4 GT3 less grip than RUF, about right.
Then i went for the holy grail from above video. been waiting for this. BMW 320 Turbo Group 5 @ Nordschleife. Wow! orgasmic
Mustang Boss 302 @ Road Atlanta in the rain. Obviously lower grip in wet. noticable big time. upper RPM sounds need work. good FFB/road feel. Fun but lots of work/driving.
Ariel Atom V8 @ Monza. just right grip. had to slow and counter steer in corners on the street tires. had to be really carefull on the gas.
Ford MK @ Brands Hatch. Impossible to drive. looped every corner no matter how careful.
Mustang Cobra Trans Am Racer. Lively and a blast
Sauber C9 @ Catalunya. Awesome car! slow shifts though.
Force Feedback
Mostly just resistance
no road feel on most cars. some cars and tracks do have it though
the wheel moves appropriatly when you lock up the rears and slide, or let go and let the wheel self center at the exit of a drift.
you can feel the curbs and rumble strips when you drive over them.
no braking FFB
no traction FFB
seems like you almost have to go offtrack to get much FFB of any kind.
Sound
richer (deep tones) than AC, but lacks some of the smaller effects of AC such as tranny wine.
the Tire sounds at the edge of limit sound great and realistic. Over the limit the squeels are bad and cheesy.
Sounds change with view! chase cam has more exhaust note, helmet cam is muffled, etc. all different tones to each.
gravel sounds like maracas at times
Engine sounds sound a bit digital and cheesy at times, especially higher rpms.
AI
respectful
will go out of there way not to hit you, including going off course. for both passing, and if you wreck in front of them.
Weather
Rain and thunderstorms are awesome
wet track effects grip for sure
Great effects
colors and outside are grey and dull like real life outside cabin in rain. inside cabin still vibrant contrast. pretty real.
Graphics
no contest its pretty. all the lighting effects and little particles. damn nice visually.
love the focus blur on the helmet cam
im running with everything maxed out. no Frame rate issue. no clue what FR is but not glitchy at all. smooth. Im running a single 1080 monitor.
brake lights are too bright
the one thing that was set to low default, was the active grass or something like that. i tried this set to high and i had floating grass up at eye level and hgue bug. i have it just set to off now.
had a few lighting artifacts (windsheild reflections) that would get stuck on the screen when you first started on a few tracks, but go away as soon as a new reflection hits the windsheild.
the live marbles are badass. move and get kicked up when you drive over them. also the small ones even roll when the air of your car goes by them. awesome touch. same goes with leaves on tracks with trees.
smoke is very real. this is tough to do. it appears, drifts, and dissappears very realistically.
Online
only spent a few minutes online so far.
1st lobby i entered i got booted
2nd lobby my car appeared to have been dropped from an airplane. just tubbling way up in the air.
3rd lobby worked. appeared to be a practice or something. joined mid session.
lets you create your own lobby, as well as do private lobbys. choose your own cars/tracks/weather etc.
didnt appear to be many online only 2 lobbys with people in them.
Closing
Ill anxious to get more time to see if PC gets the thumbs up or down.
Curious how often new cars would come.
they appear to do updates every month even with PC2 coming. every 2-3 updates appear to have new cars/tracks.
also not sure if it will hold up long term as a sim ill run.
definatly enjoying it for now.
