DiRT Rally Dirt Rally: 'Tarmac Terrors' update released

[Howard]

Codemasters have released the latest update for Dirt Rally: Tarmac Terrors. The update brings 12 new stages, 5 new rally cars and a number of other updates and fixes.

"Month three of DiRT Rally and our next big update is now live. Version v.0.5 - more commonly known as the Tarmac Terrors update - has now been added to DiRT Rally; it’s fast paced, technical and is going to require all your focus. Here’s the full run down of what you can expect in this month’s update."

The update adds a number of new cars, and tarmac stages set in Germany:

• 12 new rally stages based at Baumholder in Germany
• Owners Club Online Events – A second DiRT Daily where you compete in your own car
• A second weekly event where we’ll be experimenting and throwing new challenges at you
• 5 new rally cars featuring new Group B RWD & Kit Car Classes
• Opel Kadett GT/E 16v
• Opel Manta 400
• Lancia 037 Evo 2
• Seat Ibiza Kitcar
• Peugeot 306 Maxi
• New calibration and options screens in “Advanced Wheel Settings” (added in v.0.4.5)

Along with new features, Codies have been busy fixing a number of bugs.

• Error 41 – Fixed instances of the game not booting when there is less than 2GB of free space on C:\ drive. This was one of the causes of the dreaded error 41.
• Achievement – “Going up in the world” will now pop if you had previously purchased a Hillclimb car but not received the achievement.
• Stability – Driving the Peugeot 405 T16 would sometimes cause stability issues, we’ve fixed those now.
• Graphics – Quite a few changes for users running Nvidia SLI. That weird black and orange screen bug is fixed and we’ve solved the graphical corruption when using SLI and anti-aliasing on high/ultra graphical presets.
• Audio – The engine audio level in cockpit view can now be properly controlled by the slider.
• Gameplay – The reset button should appear sooner during those awkward moments when you beach your car at the side of the road. Though we advise not beaching your car.
• Gameplay – Sometimes you could rev the engine so hard on the Audi Sport Quattro the “Recover vehicle” prompt would pop up, it won’t do that anymore.
• Gameplay – We’ve planted some trees and shrubs in areas of Greece and Wales where we spotted that some of you were taking shortcuts. Taking some cuts in rally is cool but these cuts were definitely not cool.
• Gameplay – Fixed a loophole which would let you continually repair your car in Online Hillclimb events.
• Gameplay – Online Hillclimb events will now factor in slower times from Run 2 and they won’t overwrite faster times from Run 1.
• Message box – Stopped the Promotion message box from incorrectly displaying when you have completed the Masters Championship and finished in the top 3 positions.
• Save – Your advanced set ups should now save as expected
• Oculus – Sometimes the background on the main menu would vanish, we’ve fixed that now.
• Online Events – You’ll now be disqualified if you don’t start moving within a minute
• Leagues – Made the text on the league screens easier to read on lower resolutions.
• Audio – Pre-update your co-driver may have become a little disinterested if you left the centre of the track from time to time, we’ve spoken to him about his attitude.
• Audio – Ever had two sets of music play over a replay? That’s not a remix version and it should stop happening from now on.
• Controller Fix – Fixed an issue which meant players couldn’t change the stage conditions when using the Microsoft Sidewinder Wheel.

"To get the latest update you don’t need to do anything, simply fire up Steam and the full update should automatically download to your PC."

Are you excited for the new update? We sure are. Tell us your thoughts below.

 

[Patrik Marek]

some really cool cars added! awesome!

 

[Goatboy]

If you haven't got anything constructive to say just STFU.

Say hello to the ignore list

I think you completely missed his point, and stuck your fingers in your ears like a kid.

Well played.

 

[function9]

Pacenotes are on the same level as the Greece notes. They're missing a square left completely on one stage. And still no manual lights, or the option to use them before the start of the stage at least. The last section of Waldabstieg (I know the section is included in other stages) with the hairpins is just silly with how dark it is.

Edit: Also, how do you do Germany as a location and not include ANY vineyard stages? That would be like creating Finland stages with no jumps.

 

[Sk3ptik0n]

You missed the point completely !
For us who drive real cars and knows the difference between arcade physics and real life it's pretty obvious.
I totally love the look and feel of DR but the thing that will make it a total awesome and long lived package is the physics/ffb.
RBR is a good example of that

Do you really have access to rally cars in their environment? Of course, each car and each patch of dirt is different from the next., but you could probably get a buddy and start taking down some measurements as to grip and braking distance on various surfaces.
Wouldn't need to be good enough for a university level dissertation but just enough to illustrate your point with some data.

I also think there is too much grip in some situations. My take on it is that it would be best to have some sort of slider that adjusted overall grip so that newbies would not spend their first hour with the game going in circles and retrieving their car from a ditch. That would also allow us to race under equal conditions rather than make it up as we go.

I know somebody built such a thing for DIRT3 and I enjoyed using it. It made it easier to do Scandinavian flicks and such. Maybe Codis could do something like it in game, but if you had the time to provide them with actual data I think that would be more likely.

All that said, I didn't think this patch addressed physics.,

 

[Richard Eriksson]

@Mikaela Andersson, i've actually driven plenty of real life rally cars and i disagree with you. I think the physics is quite nice actually, it feels real, depending on what car you are using (the RWD cars are best for now).

To me this approach feels better than RBR. RBR has problems with the car physics in that it is too rigid, and has too little grip.

What i do miss still however is for Codemasters to add more feel to the leaning of the road, something that is very important in rallying. Sometimes i wonder why on earth i would understeer into the ditch but then looking at the outside angle i see that the turn is actually a negative camber sweeper

 

[Tobbe Bergman]

Do you really have access to rally cars in their environment? Of course, each car and each patch of dirt is different from the next., but you could probably get a buddy and start taking down some measurements as to grip and braking distance on various surfaces.
Wouldn't need to be good enough for a university level dissertation but just enough to illustrate your point with some data.

I also think there is too much grip in some situations. My take on it is that it would be best to have some sort of slider that adjusted overall grip so that newbies would not spend their first hour with the game going in circles and retrieving their car from a ditch. That would also allow us to race under equal conditions rather than make it up as we go.

I know somebody built such a thing for DIRT3 and I enjoyed using it. It made it easier to do Scandinavian flicks and such. Maybe Codis could do something like it in game, but if you had the time to provide them with actual data I think that would be more likely.

All that said, I didn't think this patch addressed physics.,

Let's leave all the Arcade elements in the past

 

[Arne Dopudja]

The Kitcars are beastly. Feel and look is so familiar with me as I grew up with RC2000 and there are not many awd and even less rwd cars rallying over here.

 

[CC]

Update is very welcome. But any chance of proper replays from trackside without codemasters arcade view switching? I absolutely detest the replay system right now. But that's my personal gripe. Other than that, bring it on CM.

Yeah its a nightmare if F1 2015 is like that I will be shocked , its terrible .

 

[Tobbe Bergman]

@Mikaela Andersson, i've actually driven plenty of real life rally cars and i disagree with you. I think the physics is quite nice actually, it feels real, depending on what car you are using (the RWD cars are best for now).

To me this approach feels better than RBR. RBR has problems with the car physics in that it is too rigid, and has too little grip.

What i do miss still however is for Codemasters to add more feel to the leaning of the road, something that is very important in rallying. Sometimes i wonder why on earth i would understeer into the ditch but then looking at the outside angle i see that the turn is actually a negative camber sweeper

I can only quote Stefano Casillo ( Lead Programmer for Assetto Corsa ) regarding DR.
"The FFB/Physics aren't as awesome as the rest of the game"

Apart from that I disagree with you and stating that you have actually driven plenty of real life rally cars doesn't make your comments more believable , rather the opposite.

 

[Richard Eriksson]

I can only quote Stefano Casillo ( Lead Programmer for Assetto Corsa ) regarding DR.
"The FFB/Physics aren't as awesome as the rest of the game"

Apart from that I disagree with you and stating that you have actually driven plenty of real life rally cars doesn't make your comments more believable , rather the opposite.

Why would it make it less believable? It was in contrast to YOU stating that YOU had experience of real life racing as well... It feels good to me, with the experience i do have. For instance, the Escort feels very much like my real life Escort back in the day... Especially on gravel.

Stefano is partially right however... The FFB needs a lot of work. The physics in my view are quite good, but many times you lack the road feel. I would advise Codemasters to get more forces from the steering rack, rather than applying "ghost forces" as i believe they are now.

That would give you more feel for the roads, given that there is a fully simulated suspension/rack model, which i don't know.

But the cars behave real enough to me, so as i said, i think Stefano is onto the same thing as me here... FFB needs to improve.

On the other hand there are some problems with AC physics as well, especially the tire models. So lets not hold that up as some sort of pinnacle here.

There are issues with every sim approach, aimed for the consumer market, due to compromise.

 

[Leynad777]

Stefano is partially right however... The FFB needs a lot of work. The physics in my view are quite good, but many times you lack the road feel. I would advise Codemasters to get more forces from the steering rack, rather than applying "ghost forces" as i believe they are now.

Didn´t you tried this FFB-Tweak? The FFB is really great with that

 

[Andy Oakley]

Well, I really like it and had great fun so far in the 306, Manta and the Kadett. That's what it's all about at the end of the day. Looking forward to having a go at the club rallies on here.

 

[Frank]

Thread cleaned, keep it on topic. Open a new topic if you want to discuss AC vs PC or how good you are at making a game easier.

 

[Richard Eriksson]

I would like to higlight the fantastic look of this title now as well. Especially the german environments. With a good rig it looks awesome. The light and shadow work, as well as the dense foliage is really natural looking. It easily rivals the best DX11 titles in this regard, and surpases AC for instance.

Looks is only one thing of course, but it is tasty

Offering some unedited screenshots from my german adventures

 

[Richard Eriksson]

Didn´t you tried this FFB-Tweak? The FFB is really great with that

Tried it, and it was a good improvement earlier, but now i feel the updates have brought the default FFB profiles closer to what i like, so i dismissed it for now. But yeah, the tweak makes it better, but still no steering rack feel. A LOT better now than on release though.

 

[CC]

I would like to higlight the fantastic look of this title now as well. Especially the german environments. With a good rig it looks awesome. The light and shadow work, as well as the dense foliage is really natural looking. It easily rivals the best DX11 titles in this regard, and surpases AC for instance.

Looks is only one thing of course, but it is tasty

Offering some unedited screenshots from my german adventures

Still not convinced them bottom 3 are not too clever but the top one yes looks unreal quality probably the best screenshot I have seen so far to be honest with it , but its the only game from codemasters I never bothered buying has the last 4 games I have purchased have been total garbage! You can paint a horse to look like a zebra but it will never be one sadly

 

[Andy_J]

Yes great screen shots. But the replay sucks. I am absolutely fed up up of the silly codemasters arcade replay system.

 

[CC]

Yes great screen shots. But the replay sucks. I am absolutely fed up up of the silly codemasters arcade replay system.

Yeah its always bn the same , same style from PS1 from colin mcrae rally , like 20 years with garbage replays , thats why AC and pcars looks so good because the replays UI and settings are really generous in giving nice lighting and effects , if this game is still the same then probably f1 2015 has well which will be a shocker , and probably want ever change has its bn this long the way they create stuff ,
I used to play with the cameras a lot the settings annd created some really nice views and angles but there not supported in the higher LOD that they create so ended up with the best views I had seen in there games but with no display and low poly parts

 

[CC]

I would like to higlight the fantastic look of this title now as well. Especially the german environments. With a good rig it looks awesome. The light and shadow work, as well as the dense foliage is really natural looking. It easily rivals the best DX11 titles in this regard, and surpases AC for instance.

Looks is only one thing of course, but it is tasty

Offering some unedited screenshots from my german adventures

Although you look at first glance , these are the issues with all codemasters games ,its the lighting and effects , they tend to always really saturate the games with loads of color and still makes it look arcade ish , but look at the same picture with less saturation and bloom , it looks more natural to the eyes , and I take notice of everything when playing games and saturation is the key killer to any game or screens taken , in reality you will never see a fully saturated photo not to that extent

Saturation is mind blowing!

 

[Richard Eriksson]

Still not convinced them bottom 3 are not too clever but the top one yes looks unreal quality probably the best screenshot I have seen so far to be honest with it , but its the only game from codemasters I never bothered buying has the last 4 games I have purchased have been total garbage! You can paint a horse to look like a zebra but it will never be one sadly

Trust me when i say that despite previous DIRT titles being crap, this is a different beast. This is the one you should get for sure. For me it is likely to surpass RBR when ready, and we get to control the development somewhat now, which is refreshing for a codies title.