Out of nowhere, Dirt Rally

Have you all seen this? Seems this morning they surprise-released on early access (steam) the next Dirt game.

I'm a rally fan, and was just playing Dirt 3 last night so I picked it up without even really looking at it, and I've got to say I'm shocked at how good it is. Like, This could be a contender. An RBR contender.

It's still a bit arcade, but the immersion is uncanny. Cold brakes squeal. Throwing the bias to the rear means the squeals change too... the trans in the Fulvia is slow and notchy, I feel like I know what the shifter is like Other details stick out too, like catching a camera drone in the side mirror while going by a spectator area. I love immersive games, and they are going in the right direction.

The physics don't feel like anything in this generation, which is a -good- thing. It's similar to McRae 2005, but harder to keep on the road. Honestly, it's like RBR when you have an ok tune with a slower car. LFB works, which it hasn't in anything called Dirt as of yet.

There are some negatives... it is early access, and the game did crash once. The navigator has settings for speed and stuff, but I haven't heard anything on stages other than the start countdown yet, probably a bug.

But overall, Definitely worth a look!

Cool. I liked the 3rd (or was it 2nd) one when I played it. The current racing game offerings have me rethinking the lack of video games in my life. This might be a "tipping point"

I'm going to download this when I get home. Been waiting for a next-gen game that can contend with RBR.

OOoohhh. I need to pick up a wheel setup.

Man, I got all excited about this, then I started to look into getting a computer that would run it and realized I can't devote that kind of money to this. One day...

Oh come on, just $600 will get you a nice machine :) Plus, you can do more than just game with a PC.

They are saying that once its out of early access it'll be on consoles.

Makes me wonder if the Dell-erific desktop will run this. (I bought it more for GoPro video editing.)

I still have CMR 2003 and 2004 on my shelf with the original Xbox, along w/ Rallisport Challenge 2 (which wasn't nearly as good). Ex-SWMBO had a 360 and I bought Dirt3 for it, less than impressed. Now I hear this new one might be more sim oriented, less arcade-y.

Alright, I'm going to buy this tonight. Period. I was on the fence after reading their forum a bit, but you sold me on it :)

Jerry wrote: Makes me wonder if the Dell-erific desktop will run this. (I bought it more for GoPro video editing.) I still have CMR 2003 and 2004 on my shelf with the original Xbox, along w/ Rallisport Challenge 2 (which wasn't nearly as good). Ex-SWMBO had a 360 and I bought Dirt3 for it, less than impressed. Now I hear this new one might be more sim oriented, less arcade-y.

I'm usually able to max out any game I put on my PC, this one suffers from framerate issues sometimes. I'd guess its a optimization thing on their end, but who knows. It does have a benchmarking mode, if that helps.

Wonko, Should I contact them for my cut?

I went ahead and got it. It's in my laptop that can run iRacing, poorly, but it runs it.

Issues so far.

The game constantly doesn't recognize the controller. Some times it comes back, sometimes I have to go into the settings menu and turn the wheel back on.

I have no co driver or pace notes.

The steering setting change from stage to stage. I have to pause the game, move one of the sliders around, put it back then it's all good until the next stage.

The FFB is terrible to start with, but add in the aggravation of the settings changing and it's very not good to play right now.

All of this are issues known to the developers after reading the forums.

The game runs decent for me in ultra low. Above that it's unplayable. I'm ok with it because it's my machine that's holding it back, but it looks like a PS1 game.

So, I just unlocked the Stratos... lots of games have this car and stuff that's even better. Why doesn't everything sound this good?!

Funny story, I finished the whales event in that Stratos, and one of the cars down the pack it said they had a worn wheel bearing. I said to myself 'That sucks...' thinking it must blow to have your event ruined by something like that.

Then I, you know, remembered it's a video game. Guess I got into it!

BobOfTheFuture wrote: Wonko, Should I contact them for my cut?

Unfortunately, not yet.. I got busy in the garage and working, so I haven't actually gotten it yet :)

Anyone still playing this? i picked it up on Steam's thanksgiving sale, there are leagues you can set up, too kinda like the GRM Gran Turismo series (only you don't have to all meet at a specific time/day). could be fun!

BTW just got an update with new location- Sweden, with snowbanks and everything. also 2 new cars (modern ones). it's also on sale now for 15% off i think because it's no longer early access, all the cars have the V2 physics now, too i think. worth trying out.

In reply to Rufledt:

Does it work good with a wheel yet?

Yeah about a month ago I think they posted an update with more advanced force feedback settings that you can play with, and the most recent update openned up steam workshop support for sharing force feedback settings. Depending on your wheel there should already be a setup to use as a baseline on there. Some people also go into Logitech settings and crank up the force a bit but I havent done that. Its probably not perfect but I hear it's vastly improved from earlier this year. For me it has been 100% error free as well, but I just got the game at the recent update.

Also they have added more cars/stages, Finland and sweden most recently.

I want this game, too bad it doesn't play on any of my computers

My codriver and I have been playing this with a controller. So far, I'm the only one to crash out a car 100% (44 G impact, wooooo!).

We restart a lot.

I play with a wheel and Im SO terrible, but its extremely fun. Going turn tomturn holding a slide is extremely rewarding. I can only imagine how much more rewarding it'll be if I can do more than 3 in a row without crashing.

Would there be enough interest to try a spot race kind of thing? like just do a few stages? I think you get to pick the stages, the class, and whether to allow restarts and so on. I think you have to have a racenet account with codemasters and link it to your steam, though.

I have absolutely no kind consistent skill with this game. More so play it to laugh and try to do a little better each time.

While I've been playing for a while, I'm terrible with the controller. Usually, this would lead to frustration and rage quit, but I really can't. This game blew me away from the cheesy arcade crap I've been used to the last few years. After my car, I may actually need to get a wheel and pedal for this game. It's almost too realistic, but that could be a good thing for teaching a bit.

Console version comes out in less than a month (April 5th). I'll be interested in comparing times with y'all when that happens.

I'd be up for some racing, but I'm not very consistent, I don't get to play very often.

The sim is EXCELLENT though! I have a race seat setup with Logitech g25, and it's amazing.