Rain around the corner for iRacing?

iraining.jpg
While iRacing announced early in 2022 rain was being worked on, no ETA was given at the time, with the developer stating they wanted to "make sure it's right". But an accidental leak on their side during a maintenance period seems to indicate the feature's release is getting closer.

While the service was down, an UI box allowing you to select wet tyres was available in local practice sessions. It was however quickly removed through a hotfix right after. This is a positive sign showing progress is made, and backs up Anthony Gardner's declaration that the feature would be coming this year in an interview given to french paper magazine Les Légendes du Jeu Vidéo.

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While the perspective of rain in a sim that is known for being already quite sensitive to drive on dry surfaces might give the chills to some drivers, seeing how intense a race can turn out to be when the weather decides to damp the track should make the endurance events pretty exciting to race and watch, if the Gran Turismo World Finals are any indicator to go by.
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About author
GT-Alex
Alexandre Tonini
Global motorsports enjoyer, long time simracer, Gran Turismo veteran, I've been driving alongside top drivers since the dawn of online pro leagues on Gran Turismo, and qualified for the only cancelled FIA GTC World Tour. I've left aside competitive driving in 2020 to dedicate myself to IGTL, a simracing organisation hosting high quality events for pro racers and customers, to create with friends the kind of events we wished we could have had. We strive to provide the best events for drivers and the best content for viewers, and want to help the simracing scene grow and shine further in the global esports scene.

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Comments

DC WOLF
this little check box means nothing.
We all know that they are develping rain.
And to test that internal, you'll need this check box from the first day on.
So all you got was a not excluded develper option, that must be in the code since months.
 
R
Well well was about time... Considering that rain is present in race games since Grand Prix 3 times, this is quite a step forward
 
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T
ivanalesi said:
That's like the Russians celebrating the introduction of ABS in their cars...
Long, long overdue.
What is all this money used for really? I wonder bcs you got on one end a sim like AMS2 which is overdelivering and I bet their funding is quite small and on the other is iRacing with giant income introducing rain of all things!? Crazy...
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I think it's a bit unfair to draw a feature comparison like that. iRacing never had rain or wet weather racing to begin with and it's a huge project to make it work properly. You have lot's of different vehicles, tracks, tyres with specific characteristics, ambient effects connected to rain, AI that needs to work with different levels of track wetness and apply a strategy based on weather changes. The weather system in AMS2 was allready there and ready. It also shows, with sims like rF2 where the wet weather feature has seen some recent core updates with Real Road 2.0 that this isn't a five minute job, especialy when you have such a wide range of cars and tracks. How will the rain work with the dirt tracks for example? I think it'll be interesting to see how their implementation works and maybe it sets a new benchmark for our genre. Who knows?
 
R
Kurupt CDN said:
While the perspective of rain in a sim that is known for being already quite sensitive to drive on dry surfaces might give the chills to some drivers.

Quite sensitive to drive on dry surface?????

Several years ago, I would 100% have agreed with this statement, as it was one of the sims I found extremely difficult to get up to speed when jumping back in after a length break.

This past years updates to the physics and tire model, I find it the easiest to jump back into with all the cars I've driven.

As for rain, I'm somewhat excited for the option....it will give endurance races some interesting options, AI racing is where I'll enjoy it the most....ranked lobbies could be a nightmare.

All in all, great to see yet another feature added to the engine :)
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Yup, I agree. The tire model has vastly improved. I notice a huge difference in how the Porsche Cup car drives. You can sense the weight transfer and more grip. It's still a squirrely car to drive but slides are much easier to catch.
 
Badwheels
Let's see. You need a revenue stream increase. What to do? Ah.......... we make rain, then have the players rent the rain per minute for their events and they have to buy rain tires for each car they own. Then we net code rainy sessions so the rain stops half-way during the session, the rain tires go bad, everyone switches to softs, then we put the rain back on for the last 1/4 of the race and force them to buy another set of rain tires.

Winner, winner, chicken dinner.
 
Blair McConachie
I hope they do this properly and test with actual drivers for feedback. I dont think a sim has yet managed to implement wet weather accurately yet. As far as I know the rubbered line and having to feel for grip around it and avoid it still hasn't been implemented in a sim. Its such a glaring omission for real world motorsport (well at least in the UK where it rains a lot!).
 
GT-Alex
Blair McConachie said:
I hope they do this properly and test with actual drivers for feedback. I dont think a sim has yet managed to implement wet weather accurately yet. As far as I know the rubbered line and having to feel for grip around it and avoid it still hasn't been implemented in a sim. Its such a glaring omission for real world motorsport (well at least in the UK where it rains a lot!).
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Gran Turismo 7 does it, although the rubbered line and drying line are predetermined.
 
toncey
The same people crying about the addition of rain are the same people talking down on arcade games, when they should be playing them.
 
I
Kurupt CDN said:
Expanding World Wide servers, Licenses, Esport payouts and prizes, highering developers and purchasing dev teams to further improve the product.
Not to mention the expenses for staff and equipment to be flown around the world to scan tracks and vehicles.

I also can't think of any other sim racing developer that has added as much new code/features to there engine, along with new content every 3 months as iracing has the past few yrs.
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All the others have as much or more licensed content & developers. ACC sponsors tons of GT racing etc. A community managed to make a plugin for rain/fog & everything for AC!
Also, all sims are close code, not open source, so we can't know how many and what changes were made to the code. It's all PR talk that we can choose to believe. In fact, on a recent video from Heusinkveld it was shown how iRacing is using a 20+ yrs old engine simulation "algorithm".
So, adding rain in 2023 for iRacing is absolutely nothing short of laughable considering the amount of money is sent their way every single month.
 
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Metla
Premium
I love the visual aspect of rain, the darkening of the skies, the first few droplets on the visor, I look to the skies and see the storm building above me, The rain comes, track takes on a wet sheen, puddles form, traffic slows, spray is coming off the wheels of the cars around me, all in beautiful high resolution VR.

Then BANG, into the wall.
 
GT-Alex
BBRacing said:
I can’t quite fathom why racing in the rain appeals
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I enjoy it a lot. It is a whole different exercise though, with a lot more strategical implications. There's personal preference involved as well, different people like different grip levels. I myself like driving in the rain in real life and I'm better in low grip conditions where you need a bit more slip angle, comparatively to others.
 
Blair McConachie
BBRacing said:
I can’t quite fathom why racing in the rain appeals
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It helps for real life racers too as it's not been done very well to date. Mostly it's just the graphics of rain, with some puddles, and the grip turned to low. dry racing line is still the fastest in the wet in most sims which is silly. Chassis flex is a thing in some times but we still cant replicate wet weather very well.
 

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