Kunos Simulazioni has provided another peek into what players can expect from Assetto Corsa EVO’s Early Access period which begins in three weeks’ time.
The very strangely timed video — given that press offices and media will be away celebrating Christmas, rather than writing about this — went live shortly before 1100 UTC this morning, and revealed the tracks and some of the cars players will be able to get to grips with in the first version of the Early Access.
As we’d expected, it’s a pretty limited offering on day one, sporting five courses and only a handful of vehicles — which look to be predominantly road and road-legal track cars — although KS has sprung a little surprise on what circuits will be available.
Despite what’s been a lot of focus on the Nurburgring in all the teasers so far, and of course its place at the center of the highly anticipated Eifel Open-World map, it’s not one of the five tracks coming in the first Early Access launch. Those five will in fact be:
- Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari (Imola)
- Brands Hatch
- Laguna Seca
- Mount Panorama
- Suzuka
Each circuit will feature animated crowds, marshals, and “race elements” for improved immersion, as well as the previously mentioned dynamic surfaces and gravity-based water simulations.
As well as revealing the five Early Access launch circuits, the planned 15-course target for the v1.0 launch was reaffirmed, along with the announcement that others would be coming after launch as free updates. That’s our favorite kind of update.
The tracks will feature in the “Driving Academy” mode, which seems similar to the Circuit Experiences of Gran Turismo. Each course will be divided up into sections for you to take on, a piece at a time, in what’s called a “new, A-to-B time attack game mode”.
You’ll driving these sections in different cars appropriate to what racing licence you want to get in order to gain access to higher-performance vehicles. We’ll note in the screenshot below that one of these licences — we’d assume the very first — is called “Entry”.
Driving Academy, along with Practice Sessions and Quick Races, will comprise the first part of Assetto Corsa EVO’s single-player mode and be included in the Early Access launch.
As for the cars, the video doesn’t specifically name any vehicles in particular, but several are shown and KS co-founder Marco Massarutto states that there’ll be 20 vehicles from a range of brands, car classes, and performance levels.
Curiously there’s 22 marques shown in the game’s “dealership” section, and we’ve already had two cars confirmed for one brand — the Alfa Romeo Guilia GTAM and the Alfa Romeo Junior Veloce Electric — along with a third featuring prominently in teasers, so we’re going to assume some of the listed marques won’t make the cut for the very first version.
The video features a total of 22 different vehicles, from 17 of the brands shown, so as of yet we’re still not wholly sure what vehicles will be available in the day one Early Access launch. Again, the plan for 100 cars at the v1.0 launch was also reaffirmed.
More details on the physics simulation underpinning these cars was also mentioned, with Massarutto commenting on a new multibody dynamic simulation which models different, connected parts of a vehicle individually to create an overall simulation of car behavior.
There’s also a new suspension modeling system which allows AC to reproduce different types of suspension systems — including torsion beam and swing-arm, which should help with that Morgan Super 3 — for the first time.
We’re still waiting to hear on a price for the Early Access launch, although it’s worth noting again that the cost to join in will increase with each update while the updates will be provided for free to existing players.
