Project CARS 2 Initial thoughts (1 Viewer)

[Invincible]

Hi guys,

I'm really eager to hear your initial thoughts on project CARS 2 (of those who weren't in WMD)
As you might know, we're officially supported by Slightly Mad and have played a major role in MP-testing.

Since we are here at RSR and not in the public forum, I'd like to hear some qualified feedback and your honest thoughts on our new racing platform.
So please leave any unqualified posts like "Pcars 2 sucks balls, aC/R3E/iRacing/rF2 is da best!" to the users of any sites with an overly negative attitude towards anything which does conflict with their mind-boggling sim-elitism.

 

[Dutchtastic]

With a licence attached to the online races, I instantly notice a lot of people respecting each other more.
The formation lap remains a struggle with that 1 guy tapping a few people and the other giving others penalties for not / barely following the rest of the pack. Something could be improved there, but in general I've not come across any major issues yet.
besides the fact that I have to regain a licence like on iRacing

 

[Gopher04]

So please leave any unqualified posts like "Pcars 2 sucks balls, aC/R3E/iRacing/rF2 is da best!" to the users of Racedepartment etc.

Sounds like you have been brain washed by Bell, he hates R&D as well due to the fact they refused to sell the site to him just to shut them up, you will always get honest opinions everywhere, I don't think highlighting one site is very fair..or are you Bell in disguise..

 

[Invincible]

Sounds like you have been brain washed by Bell, he hates R&D as well due to the fact they refused to sell the site to him just to shut them up, you will always get honest opinions everywhere, I don't think highlighting one site is very fair..or are you Bell in disguise..

I wish I was Ian... I'd be rich then. And in Singapore, which would suck.
No, honestly, I was just picking a random site with a generally negative attitude towards project CARS. This doesn't mean I hate them. But I agree that picking any site in particular was maybe a bit inappropriate.

 

[Gopher04]

Good to here bud..Personally I wouldn't want to be him, I've learnt so much more about him since PC1..Anyway back on subject..

My first initial thought's are not actually that good, but I'll start with Pro's, UI looks so much better, but still suffer's with thing's dodgy mouse clicks and random ones as well, doesn't always save things on 1st attempts neither, configuring pedals was a real hit and miss.
Audio is improved as well, but it sounds like it was recorded inside of a tin can sometimes, and the tyre squeal is just horrible.
FFB, wow I've never felt a FFB so numb, considering the setting ingame I held high hopes for this, but was truly disappointed.
Graphic are good to a certain extent, but the amount of jaggies is quite unreal, even running at full settings you can't rid of them, abit of a Codemasters effect there, but even in F12017 you can turn them out.

Being 100% honest right now, I purchased the Delux so I had the season pass as well, and at 1hr 50mins, got a refund, could not warrant that purchase, now I might reconsider the standard version if I think it's possible to improve the FFB tenfold, and tune the jaggies out then maybe, as I serious want to race again with the old team, but I just don't see it right now.

 

[Stitch]

In the few hours I've played this morning, honestly, it's mostly positive. The game is much better looking than the first, and performance wise, at least on the Oculus Rift, it's a huge improvement. The menu is cleaner, much easier to navigate and oh, the little voice recordings of commentators and drivers talking about Senna is a very nice touch that adds a lot to the fine details.

Physics are a huge improvement. I still have issues with the force feedback which I'm trying to work out to get it to feel weighty enough, but I instantly notice that there's more, how to put it, technicality? I suppose, to the driving. Locking up now is a huge no no, where as in the first it wasn't so bad. Your car now spins when downshifting too early, or being too aggressive, which is nice and you can feel the pressure being applied to the wheels, which is also nice. This is especially apparent when driving through puddles - you can feel the entire car fighting the force, which is a challenge in it's own right.

And thank god we know have the option to change options, controls and settings on track rather than having to go to the main menu. That's like first experiencing freedom in your life. So much more to go on about, but I like it a lot.

Though there are some bad things and annoyances I've found. The AI drivers seem to have learnt from online drivers in that it's all about crashing on the first corner. Doesn't matter what track, car or difficulty, I've not once had a race where they didn't crash. On the Oculus, I've found that flashing headlights, whilst it turns on the lights in the car, it doesn't project any light from the headlights at all. You can go right up behind a car and turn on your lights and, nothing. I don't know if this is a bug but it's very annoying.

The UI editor, in Oculus, is a pain to say the least. You can't change angles of the HUD or place it around the cockpit like they said, it's on a fixed screen in front of you, meaning for the most part, it's just in the way. Not to mention that when you click half the UI options to move or edit them they don't respond or refuse to move. That needs a lot of work. Another thing is flickering shadows - I've noticed this a lot, especially in cockpit and it creates the illusion cars behind are flashing lights at you, when in fact they're not, it's just wonky rendering. I've seen a few Youtubers pick up on this too and it needs addressing.

The penalty system seems a bit broken too. I've tested driving around, skipping corners and you get a warning telling you to slow down to avoid a penalty by race control, but even when I refuse to do it, it doesn't give any penalties. However, speeding in pit lanes and other areas seem absolutely fine, with the exception of track limits seeming a little too forgiving.

I like the game a lot though. I'd say it's something like 90% improvements, 10% annoyances and problems, so for the most part, it's great. Haven't tried the online yet, don't think I will either, just hate online public racing - but all in all, seems good.

P.S - The in-car sounds like shifting, turbo whining, tyres etc. Amazing!

 

[Ranjanado]

I was half asleep when I tried game at 05:00 this morning. Took the Nissan Skyline R32 Group A car for a spin around Silverstone Classic. I thought it was great. I was getting some oversteer, but in 7 out of 10 I could recover the car without a spinnout. Requires a lot of concentration. FFB was fine. Lots of options.
So far I only have positives and no negatives.
I will need to boot the good lady so I can explore the game fully and give an educated and experienced opinion!!! lol

 

[Dama_The_Crow]

I just did installing the game and put on Oculus, wheel, pedals and enter the game. And after 30 minutes all I can say is that this game looks absolutely awesome on Oculus Rift.... and that sound, just wow......... I agree a bit with Gopher that tyres squeal is a bit too much....

First car I tried was a Mclaren (first default car in quick race) and I felt good driving it....


I have to point put that I didn't touch any settings and game out of the box runs smooth as butter. No FPS drops and picture is superb, way better that PC1.

Can't wait to see you all online....

 

[m4nu]

You can turn down the volume of the tire squeal in the audio options.

 

[The Wayfaerer]

i have now also played several hours in Single Player and in my opinion the game is awesome except for a few things.
The only 2 things that really grind my gears are that somehow i always have the resave my HUD settings to get the virtual mirror in cockpit perspective (maybe i'm just to dumb to find a way to enable it withouth having to do this), the other thing i noticed was when i restarted a quick race, somehow the GT3 cars didn't have any ABS or TC although the settings were to authentic.

Other than that i really like the game and will have lots of hours of fun with it.

 

[SBart_uk]

I played a few hours last night then some more today. In general its a massive improvement over the first game. Tyres are a huge improvement...much better feel. VR runs great, i'm all ultra'd on a 1070 which seems pretty good. Out of what i've driven so far i was most impressed with how much better the Formula Ford(rookie) is this year (it actually turns and has some power). But was a bit disappointed to drive the Lotus 49C and find the steering only seems to work after you're half way round your lock which is just weird. It handled terribly in the first game and is only slightly improved this time (its my favorite all time car so i care a lot about that one ). I wasn't a fan of the GT3's before but they seem a lot more lively and fun this time around plus there's a Lambo to drive

Really looking forward to getting into some of the upcoming races!

Edit: my steering is fixed now for some reason it had set everything to 30%. The biggest problem now is this ridiculous downshift thing. Its ruining the game in my opinion far to extreme, just trying to blip stops it shifting and now 50% of the time you're in the wrong gear unless you waste a second not pressing any pedals. This has created a much bigger problem than the one it tried to solve i think.

 

[Bassetts]

I'm not sold yet, I'm trying to be objective yet so i'll give it some time. Lots of crashes to desktop and in game bugs have really surprised me today and to be fair ruined a good chunk of the first day of play.

Biggest issue for me is driving feeling, I'm struggling today with getting the feel of the SIM. honestly the best way to describe is if i'm driving around with the E-Stop on the DD engaged (all forces disabled) 95% of the time. Every car just feels sloppy, dull and lifeless.

I even cracked the strength on the large mige to 60% when I normally only run it at 30% as normally anything above 40% and I struggle to turn the wheel and it like to rip limbs out of sockets at that point. Even then it still felt the same. I'm hoping over time this can be dial-ed in to bring the game to life but at the moment I don't have a very good feeling about it and that for me is a real shame I was really looking forward to title, maybe I need to give it time but not a good first day at the office.

Lets hope we have a better second day.

 

[m4nu]

For @Bassetts and @Gopher04 who had both troubles with FFB. Jack Spades is back and I have been told that it is really good (once again ). Try out "standard mid comp".

http://forum.projectcarsgame.com/showthread.php?51628-Jack-Spade-Custom-FFB-Files

 

[Jonno]

well this morning the game was great couldn't fault it really but as the day progressed bugs started to appear and my day went down the pan.... 1st bug we couldn't join a lobby thanks to hobbs we sorted that.. next id decided id had enough and closed the game after an hour away i decided i was going to play some more only to be struck with
Failed to start game (app already running)
i had closed the game an hour ago it was most certainly not running wasn't in task manager so closed steam that got it working only for me to have another break and come back and.....yep you guessed it i had the same message again reboot steam back on i go.... now finally in game in a lobby i thought great lets do some racing.... the lights went green i hit the throttle and off i pulled like Mrs ruddy daisy my foot was to the floor the game registered full acc but only gave me half the power so after another hour of trying to sort this out i closed the game using the x in the top right like you should and guess what happend when i came back to play again..... ohhhh thats it guessed right failed to start game app running.... i thought enough was enough i have logged all my issues over on the pcars2 forum and uninstalled the game to see if a fresh install will work... my fingers are crossed as it started out really well and just slid down hill from the evening...

 

[m4nu]

Sounds more of a steam issue than a game related issue.

 

[Gxbbs]

App already running is a problem with steam, not pcars...

 

[Jonno]

i think youll find your mistaken it was a problem with pcars not steam.... as iv just done a fresh install and it works fine now...and i had it confirmed it was a known issue they are looking at..

 

[Darksi]

I have to say all in all after I have spent some time fine tuning the settings and tweaking the ffb and getting the graphics all sorted ( rather than just jumping in to a race) I am really happy with this game, the way it handles, I feel is great, you actually stand a better chance to catch the spins as the car oversteers, the responsiveness of the cars and the feedback through the wheel is great, the information through the rift is great and the graphics are far better and smoother.

I have heard a lot of of people have experienced bugs/ problems and I am glad to say I haven't experienced many, mostly mine has been issues with joining servers.

Needless to say I am looking forward to playing some more of this tomorrow when I am a bit more awake.

 

[FuBii]

Having played it for 4 hours now, I kinda have a semi decent setting for the controller, not 100% content with it, still feels ridiculously light on the front end, but managed to dial in the brake & throttle to match my inputs. Being able to reduce certain audio effects in the car is extremely handy to tell when you're locking, sliding, off track just etc. Probably one of the most powerful tools you can play with is the audio.
I've now clocked over 2 hours just running the ferrari 488gte & have the game semi figured out. adjusting the car settings is a bit of a pain, seems to freeze for 4s each time I want to change something & saving it... could just be me.
Some of the on track options are not exactly easy to operate on my ps3 controller, daresay it's more for the wheel users amongst us (majority). It'll take a bit of getting used to either way.
I have noticed though that regardless of the fuel settings I save, it just fills the car for any online race... kinda annoying but it'll probably be getting patched rather soon.
Major gripe is that all the damn car settings are always set to symmetrical when you want to change something.. such a pain when you want to tweak a tyre pressure & it screws the other side. Think that one is actually my only hate so far. Not found any game breaking bugs or such yet which is always a happy bonus.

 

[Stitch]

One thing I've found that I absolutely hate is pit lane exits need to be better marked. Played with the group last night and more than half the lobby was getting caught out by pit lane exits, not knowing which lines were the actual exit. Even when told, you can still get penalised for crossing them when you didn't. There's issues with your lap times being deleted randomly - some corners are more forgiving than others, meaning you can run a little wide on some and no penalty, then other times you can just touch an apex and get asked to slow down.

There's issues with the track-side cameras in VR not automatically cycling, meaning you can to do it manually, which just doesn't work well at all. The protection on downshifting I think needs to be less strict - the amount of times I'm missing gears because it's not registering is beyond frustrating. It's got to the point where rather than counting the amount of shifts I need, I'm just endlessly tapping it like someone with the shakes until the number gets to what I want. The UI editor in VR doesn't register mouse clicks half the time, making it incredibly awkward and difficult to use it at all and there's bugs in which your engine and oil temps don't reset when you go into the pit, meaning on exit, people were blowing their engines without any input.

Don't get me wrong though. I love the game and none of these, I would consider game-breaking, besides the pit issue. But these are definite annoyances that I've encountered and hope get resolved.