English summary of Marco Massarutto interview about ACC

Interview in Italian: https://www.spreaker.com/user/motorsportrepublic/lintervista-a-marco-massarutto-per-parla

Based on summaries by Italian speaking RD users Matteo Pagin and BhZ. All credit to them, I just organized it a bit and removed duplicates

Source 1: http://www.racedepartment.com/threa...es-game-announced.147549/page-14#post-2692478
Source 2: http://www.racedepartment.com/threa...es-game-announced.147549/page-14#post-2692351

Second interview: http://www.eurogamer.it/articles/2018-03-03-assetto-corsa-competizione-intervista

Included key points from that too, provided in thread by user DM2zzion.

Features & content

- Driver swaps confirmed (for both SP and MP, Eurogamer)
- They will use the 2018 season for the content (all cars, teams, official liveries)
- There will be 10 circuits (you can find them on the Blancpain calendar: https://www.blancpain-gt-series.com/calendar)
- All circuits will be laserscanned (Eurogamer)
- Official leaderboards (basically RSR inside the game)
- Ranking system for both skill and safety similar to iRacing (he mentions the latest GranTurismo's one). They hired the guy behind Minorating for this
- They will follow their philosophy, so the handling will be realistic (as it was in AC)
- Tyre model, aero and suspension geometry will be improved thanks to new developers that have been hired in the last year (one of them is also a mechanical engineer)
- ACC will be more versatile and easier to use for people with less experience (which doesn't mean less realism)
- Trees, vegetation and public will be animated and in 3D (Eurogamer)

Pricing & release

- Early Access (beta version) at a lower price than the release one
- No release date announced, not even approximately
- There will be detailed roadmap later, to allow the public to clearly understand what they can expect and in what timescale
- Kunos has several ideas on how ACC will evolve from EA to 1.0, will be revealed later (Eurogamer)
- On iRacing style MP subscription fees: "We consider multiplayer as something that is part of the experience, it is the very essence of the "Competition": therefore, at the moment we have not considered paying for it, and personally I would tend to exclude it from happening." (Eurogamer)

On Unreal Engine 4

- Choice of UE4 was driven by desire of focusing on the features that were lacking in AC1, basically "gameplay features" like implementing the various RL regulations, better career mode, better AI etc. (He supports this decision by saying that Kunos' competitors, even though with a way bigger workforce, have decided to avoid writing an Engine by themselves)
- They have worked 8 months during 2017 on R&D testing the Unreal Engine, Marco says that it has been an huge risk because they still didn't know if UE4 was the right choice. He mentions as an example the need to do separate renders for the mirrors, which they had trouble to implement initially as UE4 engine is "general" and not geared towards sim use. This required weeks of telemetry of how it works, how it uses CPU/GPU etc.
- The assets needed some rework as well, in order to be optimized for the different engine (as a result of the aforementioned analysis)
- They will also probably use UE4 for their future projects
- He praises the photorealism of the Unreal Engine, even though some months were needed before both the eye candy and the framerate started to get to the desired level
- They took some inspiration on how to solve some issues they had from videos of other games made with the Unreal Engine, mainly the ones made by Milestone
- The UE4 particle system allows you to efficiently simulate a large number of effects: from drops to rain spray, to sparks, and more (Eurogamer)

On collaboration between real racing teams & Blancpain

- With this license they are going to have an even stronger collaboration between Kunos and drivers/racing teams
- They will be at many racing weekends in order to gather data from the teams
- Many teams use AC for the training of their pilots. Some of the teams also asked them some advice to build their own simulator
- Many drivers asked Kunos help to setup simulators in order to train for new tracks, for example
- They received numerous eSports contacts, but for the moment they are focusing on the development of the game. (Based on the way he talked about this, I believe esports will come)
- Kunos is working on a connection between virtual and real Blancpain (for example ideal time laps vs real ones, plus something similar to RSR with invitations to the races for the fastest guys, he mentions GranTurismo's Academy)

About AC1

- Expected AC sales : 100 thousand copies, results about 1.4 million users
- He mentions comments of people on Facebook that were saying to him that the training/playing time in AC proved useful to catch the car in RL critical situations

 

That seems a bit odd. I'd have thought more realistic mirror rendering would've been one of the obvious wins with UE4 given the many examples I've seen. What about AAC's mirrors might make them sim-specific?

 

No clue. I know rendering mirrors (image inside image) is always demanding. Maybe related to how they work in VR? Being perhaps real 3D mirros that react to VR users position, not just TV screens backwards like in AC. Would be nice to get mirros that are actually useful in triple screen (adjustable angles)

 

from what I understood , it seems it will be officially released in 2019 as final version

 

Based on what or where from? My guess is that Early Access will be available around the time of 24h of Spa in July.

 

Early access obviously arrives before official release.

 

Now I might start watching the Blancpain so the Blancpain guys are also getting something out of this - more fans.

 

So, ACC is what i though in the first place. Nothing more or less than offical game of Blancpain GT series and if all goes fine with game we can expect proper sequel for AC in coming years.

Thats fine and smart move from Kunos. They don’t need to convert all tracks and cars to new game engine straight away.

 

I still don't see a clear exclusion of future DLCs, adding further series or even track day car packs to ACC. Surely Kunos and 505 want to earn a buck or 2 with DLC, no?!? Look at everybody craving for extra cars, already. Unless Blancpain insists on no other cars EVER in this game I honestly can't see why Kunos wouldn't do it. Can someone name good reasons to NOT offer car DLCs once the base content runs smoothly?!? So far I haven't seen any.

In fact, for me ACC is "AC2". The huge list of feature additions is well worth that title.

 

Didn't one of the Race games (Race '07 ?!) also have different cars to the WTCC grid?

It could be possible that future series might be added, but the focus may stay on Blancpain.

 

I don't see it working that way.
My guess is that this ACC will be known as ACC; Blancpain. Further iterations will be ACC; WTCC, ACC; F1, ACC; "insert racing series here", with full regulations as per series. Aris has alluded to the BTCC in the past as a dream, personally I'd love to see that dream come true.
They might somewhere inbetween give us an updated AC, with current road/super cars, night/rain etc in the new engine but it'll depend on the success/money gained from ACC, and demand at the time of course. At this stage I wouldn't blame them for going where the money is. They've proved themselves with AC, now it's time to expand.
If they can become a big enough studio employing hundreds then the sky is the limit, but even current big studios take years to create games.
My hope is that they will still be turning out sim racing titles in some form or another for decades to come. They've set the benchmark and certainly deserve it.

Sent from my SM-G930F using Tapatalk

 

No chit, Sherlock.

 

Well, the subtitle is "The official Blancpain GT Series" so anything other than that wouldn't fit imo. Maybe something else from the SRO Motorsport Group Blancpain is part of but even that seems unlikely to me.

 

sounds very promising

i was kinda hoping for a subscription based racing to ensure longevity though

 

GT4 cars have some relationship to Blancpain, no? Like a support series? Would be cool to see some of those appear.

 

"Get Out of Here, Stalker!"

 

i hope im wrong but a single buy game will not have online longevity, without longevity theres little reason to invest in structuring and organising online play, especially if they end up releasing a bi-yearly game

 

I just hope Chris Goodwin is on the roster for the 24 again and a few others too, would be nice to also edit driver names in ACC we shall see

 

For the most realism, we have to have the risk of getting belted in the back of the head by a rogue F3 front wing whilst in the pitlane. Only then will it have the appropriate build up to a 24 race at Spa.

For reference: (warning, blood ) https://twitter.com/harrismonkey/status/891258825776541696

Me and my friends met him on his way back from the medical centre about 45mins before the start of the race - needless to say he looked a little stressed Apart from the bandage on the back of his head, we were unaware of the reason at the time!

 

This Shred...is why I like the AC community