Assetto corsa coming to PS4 and Xbox one

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Think of it this way. I was insanely happy with Assetto Corsa back during Early Access, using only non mod content. I had never experienced a physics model like it, I had never experienced visuals like it (and back then I was only on a single monitor too, like the console users will have) and I couldn't believe the sounds - I mean the engines were good but what did it for me was the little clangs inside the cabin from belts etc when going over kerbs, the transmission whine, the backfires. I couldn't get over the detail of the circuits and how you could feel all the bumps. I could just get lost in driving until I ran out of fuel.

That was before Spa, Catalunya, Zandvoort, Brands Hatch and the Nordshleife. It was before the McLaren F1 GTR, Ford Escort, Ford GT40, Ruf RT12R and all the other cars that have come in the Dream Packs.

It was also before the numerous updates that have made the experience even better.

So while these days I make the most out of PC only features like Triple Screen and mods, I don't think console guys are going to be disappointed with the content Assetto Corsa provides, at least not for a while, but then more DLC will come anyway.

I have never used it with a pad so maybe some of that immersion and driving magic will be lost when not using a wheel, I'm not sure, but I know the wheel users are going to have a great time.
 
I couldn't believe the sounds - I mean the engines were good but what did it for me was the little clangs inside the cabin from belts etc when going over kerbs, the transmission whine, the backfires.
I was in awe when I accidentally drove off track in Monza and the sound of pebbles hitting bottom of the car. Coming from GT6, those little things really did add a great amount of realism. (please don't start another GT6 sound bashing here lol)
 
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i had a feeling that AC on consoles will not be as good as on PC..

In the sense that the console version won't have any mod cars/tracks/apps and some of the fine details won't be as customizable, no, it won't be as good as on a PC. But as far as the base content and features go I haven't seen anything to suggest it will be any different (better or worse) than the PC version.
 
In the sense that the console version won't have any mod cars/tracks/apps and some of the fine details won't be as customizable, no, it won't be as good as on a PC. But as far as the base content and features go I haven't seen anything to suggest it will be any different (better or worse) than the PC version.
Except for smaller grids
 
Except for smaller grids

And that. But in reality 16 cars is enough to feel like you're in a proper race and ideally you would only ever see the top half of the grid anyway. :sly: IIRC GT6 only allowed, what, 12 in an offline race? And even then they had to spread them out because if you had too many on screen at once your FPS would plummet. So, that's not really too bad of a downgrade IMO, but it is a downgrade.
 
IIRC GT6 only allowed, what, 12 in an offline race?
In GT6 some career races have 16 cars with catch-up rolling starts, RB races have 12 cars with standing starts, arcade races have 10 cars at the most with catch-up rolling starts.
16 cars with standing starts in AC isn't bad but it can feel like a downgrade for people who've been playing PCars with 30 cars on track.
 
And that. But in reality 16 cars is enough to feel like you're in a proper race and ideally you would only ever see the top half of the grid anyway. :sly: IIRC GT6 only allowed, what, 12 in an offline race? And even then they had to spread them out because if you had too many on screen at once your FPS would plummet. So, that's not really too bad of a downgrade IMO, but it is a downgrade.
I agree totally, I think 16 offline is very acceptable. I just thought it worthwhile to point out the grid size difference :)
 
I disagree, I know it's petty, but I'd like the grids to hold at least 22 cars, which is like a standard "small championship" grid. That puts me off actually that it's just 16 when PCARS managed have 45. Yes it could be considered pointless after 20 cars, but it's the feeling of driving amongst a huge grid. I can understand fully most being happy with a 16 car grid, GT5 and GT6 both had those ("career mode" had 12 sometimes because...I'm not sure), however with a game of this nature, it's about racing. Racing amongst a large grid and in the middle of a big pack can be fun and challenging, and on smaller circuits it can be either bad or good. To only have 16 cars is, frankly, pitiful. It's not impressive. Driveclub, has 12. I'd expect a non-arcade (well it's more like a "arsimcade" than an arcade) racer to at least hold double that.

This also makes me kinda sad that it's as Team VVV said, it's more about "driving" and less about "racing".
 
Wait wait wait wait a second...there are only going to be 16 cars on track in AC?
Offline yes. Online I read 24 but a forum member or two have mentioned reading about 12 online.
The 16/24 numbers come from a review of an alpha version of the PS4 title and does say that those numbers could change for the retail version, hopefully not downwards! Watch this space I guess, but you don't sound too pleased.
 
Offline yes. Online I read 24 but a forum member or two have mentioned reading about 12 online.
The 16/24 numbers come from a review of an alpha version of the PS4 title and does say that those numbers could change for the retail version, hopefully not downwards! Watch this space I guess, but you don't sound too pleased.
Hopefully it does change. And no frankly it's not impressive, to me at least. To many people it's probably fine, and that's great, the game itself otherwise looks brilliant. But as an experience, driving in a race I mean, it's looking sub-par. First it was a no on the mixed classes, which didn't bother me too much since PCARS only does it in career mode and multi-class can be achieved online with a club. And now this small grid size. The game has only 3 lines of code for FFB, and visuals which could be compared roughly to PCARS...yet they only managed 16 cars (the F1 games get 22 for crying out loud). If this was the PS3, I'd understand, but the PS4 isn't a total slouch. This has made the mood from "I'm very excited for this", to "Well I'll see how it is at release".

My next question would be, are there pitstops, and are there modeled pitcrews? If yes then some hope is regained. If not, this is rather pointless to an extent.
 
I disagree, I know it's petty, but I'd like the grids to hold at least 22 cars, which is like a standard "small championship" grid. That puts me off actually that it's just 16 when PCARS managed have 45. Yes it could be considered pointless after 20 cars, but it's the feeling of driving amongst a huge grid. I can understand fully most being happy with a 16 car grid, GT5 and GT6 both had those ("career mode" had 12 sometimes because...I'm not sure), however with a game of this nature, it's about racing. Racing amongst a large grid and in the middle of a big pack can be fun and challenging, and on smaller circuits it can be either bad or good. To only have 16 cars is, frankly, pitiful. It's not impressive. Driveclub, has 12. I'd expect a non-arcade (well it's more like a "arsimcade" than an arcade) racer to at least hold double that.

This also makes me kinda sad that it's as Team VVV said, it's more about "driving" and less about "racing".
PCars was able to do it because the AI aren't operating under the same physics engine as you are. It might also have something to do with polycount on the cars. PCars went with 80k and AC might well be higher than that although that's just speculation at this point.
 
I disagree, I know it's petty, but I'd like the grids to hold at least 22 cars, which is like a standard "small championship" grid. That puts me off actually that it's just 16 when PCARS managed have 45. Yes it could be considered pointless after 20 cars, but it's the feeling of driving amongst a huge grid. I can understand fully most being happy with a 16 car grid, GT5 and GT6 both had those ("career mode" had 12 sometimes because...I'm not sure), however with a game of this nature, it's about racing. Racing amongst a large grid and in the middle of a big pack can be fun and challenging, and on smaller circuits it can be either bad or good. To only have 16 cars is, frankly, pitiful. It's not impressive. Driveclub, has 12. I'd expect a non-arcade (well it's more like a "arsimcade" than an arcade) racer to at least hold double that.

This also makes me kinda sad that it's as Team VVV said, it's more about "driving" and less about "racing".

I don't disagree, making the move to PC's about a year ago it was pretty epic seeing 30-40+ cars on the grid. But unfortunately they do have limitations they have to work with in on the console. Physics and AI are some of the most resource-hungry parts of a racing sim and AC's AI uses the same physics as the player so it puts far more demand on the system. But the result is good, they could stand to be a bit more aggressive but they've really improved over the last couple updates and they pretty much drive like a human would and don't make many weird mistakes.

PCars AI uses simplified physics and as a result they often drive like simpletons. But, you can have a lot of simpletons on the grid as a result. And since the player's physics are simpler than AC it allows even more room. So I guess on a console with a finite amount of resources you can either have excellent player physics and a medium number of AI players using the same good physics, or you can have slightly simpler player physics and a large number of AI using even more simplified physics.

The comment about AC being more about driving than racing isn't totally off the mark, but it manages to do both well and the racing part has improved over the last year and should continue to improve.
 
PCars AI uses simplified physics and as a result they often drive like simpletons. But, you can have a lot of simpletons on the grid as a result. And since the player's physics are simpler than AC it allows even more room. So I guess on a console with a finite amount of resources you can either have excellent player physics and a medium number of AI players using the same good physics, or you can have slightly simpler player physics and a large number of AI using even more simplified physics.

The most unfortunate part about this in my opinion, is that the AI can sometimes do things that are physically impossible for the player. The AI in PCARS can brake significantly later than the player. I also remember the devs saying that if they made the AI use the same physics as the player, they wouldn't be able to get more than 2 AI cars on the track.
 
The PC version of AC is quite heavily CPU limited by high AI grid sizes. Kunos AI is still relatively "young" (netkar pro had no AI) and you saw during Early Access on Steam that it took them a while on PC to give us 20+ car grids without CPU warnings.

Maybe in another 6 months they can optimize code further and grids go up, we shall see...
 
The most unfortunate part about this in my opinion, is that the AI can sometimes do things that are physically impossible for the player. The AI in PCARS can brake significantly later than the player. I also remember the devs saying that if they made the AI use the same physics as the player, they wouldn't be able to get more than 2 AI cars on the track.

Right. And AC AI isn't perfect by any means but I don't ever really see them doing stuff like that. They used to be similar to GT's AI (rolling chicanes) but now they're actually pretty good most of the time.
 
The only real issue with the AI is that if you get to close to them they will give up position. As long as you give them plenty of room they will fight all the way through the corners and down the straight. If you crowd them though they give up even on a straight.
 
The limitations of the number of cars on the grid I'm sure is 100% to do with the PS4 architecture and Kunos's desire to make sure the game runs perfectly. They could probably bump it up by a few cars, and perhaps they will by release in April, but I hope they keep it at a number that produces zero lag/FPS drop. Fortunately for me, I will not be playing Assetto Corsa on the PS4/XBone because I play on my PC. I don't know if you've all seen the @Lewis_Hamilton_ video he put on YouTube with him and 49 AI cars racing on La Sarthe, but it shows that Assetto Corsa is very capable - these damn consoles aren't. :grumpy:
 
You should point out that the CPU chip alone which let's him run 50 AI cars probably costs more by itself than a complete PS4. So the criticism is slightly unfair....


Can't remember how much the CPU was, but it came as a deal with the Mobo, RAM and Cooler for around the £400-500 area, back in Christmas 2008! Its an i7 920.
 
Yeah that's kinda out of a lot of people's budgets...by a long way. Either way the hype is not there anymore personally. :indiff:
 
You should point out that the CPU chip alone which let's him run 50 AI cars probably costs more by itself than a complete PS4. So the criticism is slightly unfair....
It also has a lot to do with being able to turn the detail down, something that may not be available on console.
 
Yeah that's kinda out of a lot of people's budgets...by a long way. Either way the hype is not there anymore personally. :indiff:

Your mind seems pretty made up, but allow me to offer a slight bit of balance. Big grids are all well and good and also in real life, but it looks good on paper and at the start only.
You could have a race with 30 AI but if the difficulty is duff then you could spend the race out the front on your own anyway, also even if AI is correct you wont be racing 29 drivers for 1st place, at best maybe a group of 5 at the front, but in reality you might be racing 1 other car.
Lewis knows after quali that he looks at screen sees Nico in 2nd and the rest behind and is like "well i'm racing Nico this weekend" (in fact Lewis knows that before the 1st Practice pretty much) hes really racing one guy. This happens in ALL motorsport bar a few.
Rally cross has small grids but great action as an example.

I do get that big grids look great and seem proper but in real life I've seen races of 8 cars but the race has been amazing as all 8 were pretty even (BTCC Ginetta juniors spring to mind and Clio CUP) i have also seen grids of 30 cars and the race was dire as only 2 or 3 cars were any good compared to the rest (F1), i mean F1 is a great example of watching Lewis v's Nico and then the rest.
Trust me grids of 16 in a game can be as good as the game allows it to be.
I am enjoying forza 6 but really racing against 24 AI means nothing after first corner, may as well be 8 AI.
Having said all of that i think its a mistake and AI count in AC will be towards 20 maybe 24.

Don't lose faith just yet buddy.

If i run PCars with 15 AI once I've qualified up front it matters not in the race if there's 30 AI as i will never see the back 20 odd cars unless i crash out or lap them... I can see why any good sim developer would risk going for less AI but better AI..

Sorry edit to add i'm pretty sure that a game should do this and i like to think they do:
So if i pick 30 AI in PCars the game works out a percentage of 'best AI' good AI down to the back markers, so if i choose say 10 AI the game picks say same percentages so you have more of the best AI in the group of 10?
So in theory i pick 1 AI and that is the games best AI for my chosen difficulty level?
Would it work like that? If so low AI count still gets you the cream of the crop, high AI grids gives you cream plus also rans.
 
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