New Codemasters Rally Title is DiRT Rally 2.0: Releases 26 February 2019

[Pfei]

Phil Mills posted on Facebook today "Back in the co driver seat again today.. in a studio though!! A full day of recording getting a new rally game ready for launch early next year... good fun and the closest to the real thing I have ever experienced! Full details in about 6 weeks."

So, DiRT 5, DiRT Rally 2 or even possibly WRC 8 will be announced by Codemasters before October. Just in case anyone is still on the fence, this is Paul Coleman recording the pace notes for DiRT Rally in the same room:

Source:

[EDIT]Phil's post has been removed. Luckily I got a screen shot:

 

[FT-1]

Very nice, hoping more for another DiRT title rather than WRC, especially with the greater licensing flexibility. Plus I'm hoping Codies make more use of that FIA Rallycross license.

 

[cjr3559]

My initial hunch it’s a WRC game. But who knows. We’ll see!

 

[Theiceman1]

Who has the wrc liscense now...?

 

[Pfei]

Who has the wrc liscense now...?

Wouldn't we all like to know!

 

[MXH]

Don't disappoint me, CM. I'm crossing my fingers for an official WRC game and WRX mixed with DR's brilliance.

 

[MagpieRacer]

Dirt rally 2 sounds most likely as it has been hinted at many times in the past.

That said the first dirt rally did have licensed WRC machinery so I wouldn't necessarily rule out a WRC game. I think the world has cried out long enough for a codemasters developed WRC title.

Who says it has to be one or the other anyway. Could easily be both.

 

[er185es]

DiRT Rally 2 domains registered at the end of June 2018 ...

https://viewdns.info/reversewhois/?q=EBRAND+Services+AG

 

[Pfei]

DiRT Rally 2 domains registered at the end of June 2018 ...

https://viewdns.info/reversewhois/?q=EBRAND+Services+AG

They look like domain speculators. They don't own any of the domains Codies uses, including codemasters.com, dirtgame.com and dirt4game.com, nor do they own older domains that redirect to something else Codies like dirt3game.com, dirt2game.com...

 

[GOTMAXPOWER]

Who has the wrc liscense now...?

Hopefully nobody. Individual game companies doing deals with the manufacturers would be best. Then we can have a bit of WRC in GT, Dirt, V-Rally and whatever Milestone slap together on their lunch break.

 

[Pfei]

Hopefully nobody. Individual game companies doing deals with the manufacturers would be best. Then we can have a bit of WRC in GT, Dirt, V-Rally and whatever Milestone slap together on their lunch break.

V-Rally 4 and The Crew 2 have WRC cars. GTS has an F1 car. What you cannot do when there is an official license tied to one publisher is use multiple cars in a competing game. Kaz could put the Yaris WRC into GTS if he wanted to, but none of the other three WRC cars.

No one knows if Bigben still holds the license or not and there has been lots of speculation that Codemasters could be the new holders, or even Milestone making a WRC comeback. Then again the license could just be dead.

I agree free licensing is ideal in order to have games with tons of cars like DR and SLRE, but official licensing comes with strict terms that force the dev to at least release a pretty complete game. Unfortunately we haven't had a good WRC game since the Evolution days, although Milestone's WRC 4 and Kylotonn's WRC 7 were decent.

 

[cjr3559]

Hopefully nobody. Individual game companies doing deals with the manufacturers would be best. Then we can have a bit of WRC in GT, Dirt, V-Rally and whatever Milestone slap together on their lunch break.

I don’t know, I would rather a game focus on a certain discipline rather than be ‘jack of all trades master of none’. GTS Rally comes to mind.

 

[Pfei]

I don’t know, I would rather a game focus on a certain discipline rather than be ‘jack of all trades master of none’. GTS Rally comes to mind.

That's why I am applauding Kunos for going monoseries with AC Competizione. Stick to one class, put in the weather, the time, the physics, the environmental influence on track conditions, and make sure it's working. Once you have a base add 1000 cars if you want, but things have become so complex I think it's ideal to limit racing games to certain categories for consistency and to make it easier to launch a game that "works out of the box" without one year of updates, which is what too many over ambitious games are doing these days, and they end up being buggy messes on launch day and usually never get everything fixed.

 

[Wolfe]

I don’t know, I would rather a game focus on a certain discipline rather than be ‘jack of all trades master of none’. GTS Rally comes to mind.

It's rare for rally(cross) to be treated to a genuinely good game, though. Other disciplines also come to mind, like various vintage classes, or roadcars mated to a legitimately realistic physics engine for once. Things that aren't as popular kind of need to ride the coattails of popular disciplines to be represented in a quality game that will sell.

 

[VXR]

Rather than focus on a current series, I'd much prefer a Group N and A approach and have as wide a field of cars from the last 30 years as possible. Plenty of games have featured these modern WRC spec cars, lets have some more honest-to-goodness rallying from the golden era of production based regs.

 

[warp9engage]

Plenty of games have featured these modern WRC spec cars (...)

Can you name a game, outside the official WRC title, that features more than one of the new-spec machines?

I like the classics too, but the new cars are just insane. I'd love to see them in their new game, even if they are not in the most up-to-date spec.

 

[VXR]

If not strictly WRC spec, games such as GT Sport and Forza have high power, high cost rally cars in them that are so far removed from their production version they barely resemble them.

 

[RedRockValley]

Honestly I just want more Group A cars from the late 90s and early 2000s, such as the Peugeot 206 and the Hyundai Accent.

Rally games I find focus too much on Group B and present rally cars nowadays.

 

[MrCrynox]

Honestly I just want more Group A cars from the late 90s and early 2000s, such as the Peugeot 206 and the Hyundai Accent.

Rally games I find focus too much on Group B and present rally cars nowadays.

That era of cars would be nice, but can you name a game, outside the official WRC title, that features more than one of the new-spec machines?

 

[jake2013guy]

I'd definitely like to see how CM would do a modern Rally game. They do a good job of the F1 games but they're probably a different kettle of fish in a number of different ways.

 

[Mr Satay]

Nice! Evolution Studios made the first WRC games on PS2 and that studio is now with Codemasters, things are coming full circle

 

[Pfei]

Nice! Evolution Studios made the first WRC games on PS2 and that studio is now with Codemasters, things are coming full circle

Not anymore. Most of the Evo team was fired a couple weeks ago.

 

[RedRockValley]

Not anymore. Most of the Evo team was fired a couple weeks ago.

Aw, why'd they do that for?

 

[Pfei]

Aw, why'd they do that for?

https://www.gtplanet.net/onrush-development-team-members-laid-off-amidst-poor-sales/

 

[Mr Satay]

Ahhh yes thats right =( What luck

 

[Pfei]

So, I was watching Rallye Deutschland on WRC+ All Live and after SS6 they went to the eSports WRC semifinals and are showing it live. The announcer said that WRC 8 will be released at the end of 2019 and will be based on the 2019 season.

 

[MrCrynox]

So, I was watching Rallye Deutschland on WRC+ All Live and after SS6 they went to the eSports WRC semifinals and are showing it live. The announcer said that WRC 8 will be released at the end of 2019 and will be based on the 2019 season.

I'm going to stick my neck out, I reckon Kylotonn have still got it. I'm ready to go down in flames...

 

[Pfei]

I'm going to stick my neck out, I reckon Kylotonn have still got it. I'm ready to go down in flames...

Can't understand who would flame you for stating a fact. But this announcement pretty much confirms what @warp9engage has been saying for months: Bigben still has the license and V-Rally 4 means Kylotonn are taking a year sabbatical on WRC. Perhaps the contract negotiations were not finished in time to make a game this year so all interested parties would not have had time, anyway. And there is always the possibility that the contract was for five games, which was originally suspected, and maybe the break is to make a better game in 2019 and give users a break from the yearly buying schedule, give the ¿fact? that WRC 7 sold fewer copies than 5 & 6.

EDIT: This probably also confirms that Codies' new game will most likely be DiRT Rally 2.0.

 

[MrCrynox]

Can't understand who would flame you for stating a fact. But this announcement pretty much confirms what @warp9engage has been saying for months: Bigben still has the license and V-Rally 4 means Kylotonn are taking a year sabbatical on WRC. Perhaps the contract negotiations were not finished in time to make a game this year so all interested parties would not have had time, anyway. And there is always the possibility that the contract was for five games, which was originally suspected, and maybe the break is to make a better game in 2019 and give users a break from the yearly buying schedule, give the ¿fact? that WRC 7 sold fewer copies than 5 & 6.

EDIT: This probably also confirms that Codies' new game will most likely be DiRT Rally 2.0.

Yes, it all seems obvious to me. I hadn't read what @warp9engage had said, any links ? I read somewhere a few months back that they were taking a break to make V Rally 4 so if right this is great news to me as any improvements they can make to WRC7 will be welcome. Shame about the sales figures as 7 deserved better.
Im glad about the break, I need time to try and catch up with all these awesome games.

 

[Pfei]

Yes, it all seems obvious to me. I hadn't read what @warp9engage had said, any links ? I read somewhere a few months back that they were taking a break to make V Rally 4 so if right this is great news to me as any improvements they can make to WRC7 will be welcome. Shame about the sales figures as 7 deserved better.
Im glad about the break, I need time to try and catch up with all these awesome games.

He was active back when the V-Rally 4 announcement thread was twisted into the "who has the WRC license?" thread: https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/thre...te-september-2018.376174/page-2#post-12242418

He has also been active in the DiRTY Gossip thread and a WRC 8 thread on the Codies forum.