Assetto Corsa Competizione Update v 1.8 Patch Notes

Sim racers, it’s almost time to get those race boots and race gloves on and head on track once again!

Update v 1.8 launches September 29th on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S! Today, we have those all-important patch notes. We know many of you have been keen to see them!

As a quick reminder, v1.8 brings an array of new updates to Assetto Corsa Competizione but most notably: An Improved Tyre Model, a New 400hz Physics Engine and Extended Gameplay!

The new model causes the tyres to be more sensitive over the course of a race which can change a number of things with your possible driving style. Scrubbing the tyres can lead to increased wear and loss of grip, this will reduce the longevity of the rubber and could result in a drop-off in lap times. Scrubbing and sliding are not the only things that can further impact wear. Set-up plays an even more important role and adjusting the camber can greatly alter the grip of the outside, middle and inside of the tyre. We’ve also made changes to the tyre temperature window, improvements to traction control, improvements in tyre flex and much more

The new 400hz physics engine allows for a much smoother gameplay experience. While this doesn’t fully impact your FPS, it allows for a 20% improvement from v1.7 in how the car performs on the track. At 250kmh the car moves 69 metres every second, meaning with the new physics engine, tyre ground detection occurs every 17cm at such high speeds. Results are an improved and more detailed tyre to kerb simulation, improved springs and dampers interaction at higher rates, improved and more precise FFB refresh etc. etc.

Adding Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe 2021 season as bonus content with all entries, liveries and drivers and championship season, including an updated BOP for participant tracks. – as with every season update, this adds a whopping number of new entries, liveries, drivers to choose from and a dedicated championship season.
As the largest gameplay-related addition, we are adding an “Open season” in Single Player, merging all game content into a “sandbox” season featuring grid customization, with opponent grid mixing option to Custom Race Weekend and Quick Race game modes.

Aristotelis, explained what all of this means for racers here

… but that’s not all racers, we can officially confirm both the American Track and Challengers Packs will be available to purchase on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S from the 10th Nov.
The American Track pack includes 3 iconic tracks. Circuit of the Americas, Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Watkins Glen International.

Challengers pack introduces 5 new cars, the Audi R8 LMS GT3 EVO II, BMW M2 CS Racing, Ferrari 488 GT3 Challenge Evo, Lamborghini Huracan Super Trofeo EVO 2, and the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup (Type 992)

We hope you enjoy the new update and improvements we have made to Assetto Corsa Competizione and want to thank all of those who have given us useful feedback.

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PATCH NOTES

1.8.0
GENERAL:
– Added Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe 2021 season as bonus content with all entries, liveries and drivers and championship season.
NOTE: certain entries are subject to DLC ownership.
– Added all-new BMW M4 GT3 as bonus content as part of the 2021 season.

GRAPHICS:
– Updated global lighting and exposure on all tracks.
– Revision of various track-related shaders.
– Revision of various car-related shaders.
– Skybox revision.
– Improved blurred wheel rim shader.
– Improved car spray effect, especially in light/medium wetness situations.
– Improved raindrop effect rendering logic to follow the updated spray effect.
– Improved rainfall shader appearance in external cameras.
– Car headlight shadow bias tweaks to prevent lights from penetrating walls at close distance.
– Updated track HLODs.

GAMEPLAY:
– Added Open season, merging all game content into a “sandbox” season featuring grid customization.
NOTE: individual official seasons remain playable with no change to their earlier functionalities.
– Added opponent grid mixing option to Custom Race Weekend and Quick Race game modes in the Open season.
Use the grid mixing sliders to set car group prevalence in the grid.
GT3 car group has an additional setting for the preferred generation of opponent cars (all, pre-2019 or new-gen).
– Added Open series championship mode with grid (car groups) and track lineup customization.
– Automatically generated custom cars are now grouped into teams both in single-make custom mode and Open series championship.
– Reworked driver assignment system to support custom-generated grids and various driver count requirements.
– Removed entry duplication between the 2019 GTWCH and IGT seasons.
– Tweaked AI logic for strategic decisions reacting to weather changes.
– Improved AI genome at Bathurst, Barcelona, Laguna Seca and Kyalami to reduce the chance of unforced driving errors.
– Improved weather model: variability (=randomness in MP) now affects the variation and frequency of weather cycles:
Higher variability will now produce larger variation and less predictability in the length of individual weather cycles (time between peaks).
High variability might produce both fast changes or prolonged weather spells (or both combined) within the same weekend simulation.
Low variability will produce more even weather cycles, akin to the pre-update model.
– Revised pit speeding thresholds that were often too permissive, both on pit entry and pit exit.
– Fixed invalid lap being eligible for personal and session fastest (purple) lap in race sessions (also in Multiplayer results).
– Added measures against irregular driving before the green light in Hotlap and Hotstint game modes.
– Replay: revised replay tyre rotation matrix calculation to avoid misalignment between tyres and rim (and reduce disk space).
The improvement is backwards-compatible, while newly saved replays should occupy less disk space than before.

UI:
– Revised season selector header in Single Player menu.
– Added GTWCHEU 2021 season selection in Single Player.
– Added Open series selection in Single Player.
– Added coloured session labels in the Replay menu.
– Added session fastest (purple) lap holder indicator in standings, leaderboard and timer widgets.
– Added pitstop indicator and session fastest lap on the leaderboard HUD overlay.

PHYSICS:
– Physics engine optimizations: variable component tick frequency, optimized multithreading.
It results in smoother single-player performance with a high number of AI and fewer spikes due to overloading single cores on heavy calculations (such as simultaneous collisions).
Might not result in outright maximum fps gain, but a significantly lower single-thread occupancy and late steps can be expected, particularly with larger grids.
– 400hz physics refresh rate.
– Improved tyre flex.
– Improved camber simulation, especially on high positive camber values.
– Improved Outside, Mid, and Inside tyre heating relative to camber.
– Improved Outside, Mid, and Inside tyre wear relative to camber.
– Improved camber gain simulation, affecting slip angles and forces. Evident with high camber values over kerbs and longitudinal bumps.
– Improved surface flash temperature tyre simulation. A wider range of heat generation.
– Improved heat generation in extreme conditions (burnouts, doughnuts).
– Improved heat generation relative to tyre pressure.
– Improved core temperature retaining. Tyres dissipate heat significantly slower now, no need to wait right until the last moment to go to the grid.
– Completely revised and improved combined grip simulation.
– Completely revised and improved tyre vibrations at high speed and high slip angles.
– Improved slip angle/ratio simulation relative to cold and overheating tyres.
– New viscoelastic rubber friction model.
– Improved dynamic tyre characteristics in various temperature conditions.
– New rubber bump stops damping simulation.
– Implemented bump stops damping values for all cars.
– Improved engine throttle simulation.
– Improved launch control.
– Improved rev limiter behaviour (soft limiters on some cars).
– Improved traction control simulation.
– Improved brake ducts heating influence simulation.
– Improved rain tyres behaviour (note: not necessarily easier).
– Improved the simulation of brake efficiency and power.
– Improved track grip simulation on and off the racing line.
– Improved ambient vs. track temperature delta.
– Added a condition that simulates mist and dew during the night in certain temperatures.
– Improved certain track condition simulation, including the speed of puddle formation.

MULTIPLAYER:
– Revised car groups, merging the CUP and ST groups into a single GTC group for matchmaking and server filtering.
Note that CUP and ST remain represented as separate subgroups on the track map, leaderboards and results.
– Stats: revised and merged grouping of statistics per race track.
Note that tracks are only separated per season whereas an older season might produce faster lap times due to higher track grip (such as the fresh asphalt on Silverstone 2018).
– Multiplayer track seasons are now deprecated and all track configurations point to the Open series (currently matching the latest, 2021 season, see Physics notes).
Note for admins: the old season suffixes in the server configuration will remain there for legacy functionality, but they will no longer create a difference in the track/BOP version!
Server track configuration (event.json) should use the non-suffix version in continuation, e.g. “Misano” instead of “misano_20XX”.
Note for users: no matter the server config, Multiplayer will always use the latest Open series configuration from Single Player.
– Further revised final corner penalty thresholds with the widget formation type when the back of the field is likely to receive the green light inside or coming out of the final turn.
– Ratings: fixed an issue that could erroneously produce 100 (or 00) CC ratings at Spa.
– Protocol change – old server versions are obsolete and will not register on the backend.