Dirt Rally "Online"

[KingOfCoins 286]

gaski said:

TonyRickard said:

Rather than a simple rehash of DiRT 3, DiRT Rally has taken a new direction as a more hardcore rally sim and many of us are really happy with that decision and judging by the reviews it is meeting a great reception. A lot of us have been waiting a long time for a successor to RBR and the older CM titles.

Nobody is denying they've done great with this game in terms of handling etc, but most people seem blinded by the nice graphics and lovely community interaction which makes CM think its OK to leave proper online rallying out of their titles.  It's not a step I like if future rally titles are going the same way it'll be the last CM game I pay for.

Just to add, I bought the game during first week of EA when there was no mention of online play, I just kind of expected it, as would most gamers who've played online racers for the last decade or so.

I dont think anyone thinks it's okay for Codemasters to leave out Online multiplayer. It's more like that they have accepted that the game does not have online multiplayer because of engine limitations

[ccvampyre 0]

TonyRickard said:

ccvampyre said:

when you consider seb loeb has all the tracks gps mapped and has a playable online mode i really think codemasters have completely missed the point of a 2016 rally sim, 

It depends what you want from a rally sim, a feature list or something that makes you feel like driving a rally car?

In spite of what we thought a decade or so ago, single player remains far and away the mainstream market. Doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see a decent online rally option but I don't think Codemasters missed the point with their target market.

got to agree with the post above re every other racing game for the last decade...
  the target audience :)

not to overlook the gps tho, all the tracks for circuit racing games on current gen are so accurate, mostly laser scanned. 
having played alot of rally games over the years, this is an addition i have been waiting for.  just imagine driving spa on pcars and the corners are all just generic like most of dirt...  a few of the tracks are right but mostly not. 
i am hugely disappointed that there is very little to play for an online user like myself, so of course i'm opinionated about this, but as a current gen racer, for me it falls way short in every aspect other than graphics.

[ccvampyre 0]

they need to add ghost cars and an online mode for it, if it is possible.

[KingOfCoins 286]

ccvampyre said:

TonyRickard said:

ccvampyre said:

when you consider seb loeb has all the tracks gps mapped and has a playable online mode i really think codemasters have completely missed the point of a 2016 rally sim, 

It depends what you want from a rally sim, a feature list or something that makes you feel like driving a rally car?

In spite of what we thought a decade or so ago, single player remains far and away the mainstream market. Doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see a decent online rally option but I don't think Codemasters missed the point with their target market.

got to agree with the post above re every other racing game for the last decade...
  the target audience :)

not to overlook the gps tho, all the tracks for circuit racing games on current gen are so accurate, mostly laser scanned. 
having played alot of rally games over the years, this is an addition i have been waiting for.  just imagine driving spa on pcars and the corners are all just generic like most of dirt...  a few of the tracks are right but mostly not. 
i am hugely disappointed that there is very little to play for an online user like myself, so of course i'm opinionated about this, but as a current gen racer, for me it falls way short in every aspect other than graphics.

Umm. All the tracks in dirt rally are made from real stages.

[SkiddyMcCrash 311]

KingOfCoins said:

Umm. All the tracks in dirt rally are made from real stages.

https://youtu.be/vByLmmLqEZE

[dirt3joe 0]

ccvampyre said:

TonyRickard said:

ccvampyre said:

when you consider seb loeb has all the tracks gps mapped and has a playable online mode i really think codemasters have completely missed the point of a 2016 rally sim, 

It depends what you want from a rally sim, a feature list or something that makes you feel like driving a rally car?

In spite of what we thought a decade or so ago, single player remains far and away the mainstream market. Doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see a decent online rally option but I don't think Codemasters missed the point with their target market.

got to agree with the post above re every other racing game for the last decade...
  the target audience :)

not to overlook the gps tho, all the tracks for circuit racing games on current gen are so accurate, mostly laser scanned. 
having played alot of rally games over the years, this is an addition i have been waiting for.  just imagine driving spa on pcars and the corners are all just generic like most of dirt...  a few of the tracks are right but mostly not. 
i am hugely disappointed that there is very little to play for an online user like myself, so of course i'm opinionated about this, but as a current gen racer, for me it falls way short in every aspect other than graphics.

What circuit racing games on current gen console are laser scanned ?

PCars : Only 4 tracks are laser scanned I believe. Driveclub - not real. FH2 - not real. Dirt rally, no. F1 series, no. The only game with laser scanned tracks on console is probably Forza (and I don't know that for sure).

[RyuMakkuro 6]

dirt3joe said:
What circuit racing games on current gen console are laser scanned ?

World doesn't revolve only around consoles. Current gen racing games means games that are made on the current generation of hardware and software. This includes PC as well. Just saying.
And to be honest, currently there are quite literally only three racing games that can be called current gen (not including early access). DriveClub, newest Need For Sales and Forza 6. Only those are running on a PBR engine which has become the current gen software when it comes to game engines.

Also, for the firm DiRT 3 believers, here are two interesting links for you:
https://steamdb.info/app/310560/graphs/
https://steamdb.info/app/321040/graphs/

At the time of writing this post, there are more people playing DiRT Rally now than the peak amount of players in DiRT 3 at the same time... ever. So it's not as rosey as some people can claim.

[dirt3joe 0]

RyuMakkuro said:

dirt3joe said:
What circuit racing games on current gen console are laser scanned ?

World doesn't revolve only around consoles. Current gen racing games means games that are made on the current generation of hardware and software. This includes PC as well. Just saying.
And to be honest, currently there are quite literally only three racing games that can be called current gen (not including early access). DriveClub, newest Need For Sales and Forza 6. Only those are running on a PBR engine which has become the current gen software when it comes to game engines.

Also, for the firm DiRT 3 believers, here are two interesting links for you:
https://steamdb.info/app/310560/graphs/
https://steamdb.info/app/321040/graphs/

At the time of writing this post, there are more people playing DiRT Rally now than the peak amount of players in DiRT 3 at the same time... ever. So it's not as rosey as some people can claim.

For me the word generation makes no sense in terms of PC tech because it is constantly evolving and there is no clear definition of what a last gen or this gen PC is.

Your graphs don't show much because the Dirt 3 figures are from when Dirt 3 became available on steam, which if I read the figures correctly was April 1 2015 - far after the game was first released on PC.

[BrySkye 14]

Draconian666 said:
 I just don't see how you couldn't make a separate game mode, they have FIA rallycross which has 4 cars on the screen at the same time why couldn't you make the mode where there's one Car vs one car on a track if you lose your eliminated win you advance like the older versions?  the it cant handle more cars make zero sense why do they have fia with 4 cars on a short track so why not 1v1 This game lacks modes  but a great game.

Time. Money.

The engine can't handle multiple cars on the actual rally stages.
Making new, smaller  tracks needs time and money and in a game that's admittedly hurting for content, focusing resources into such a multiplayer mode that could have provided new rally stages would be controversial.
Rally Cross itself hasn't been universally loved by all players, some of whom feel it was a waste of the games limited budget.
Rally Cross with multiple cars is possible because it takes place on very small circuits.
Instead of rendering 8+ miles of road and scenery with massive draw distances, it's rendering some extra cars and processing their AI.

Remember that a console port, while always a possibility, was not a part of the games development that was set in stone.
It only happened because Early Access on PC was so successful and the critical reception so positive.
DR exceeded it's lifetime sales expectation before it was even fully released on PC.

Though that does also give you an idea of how low the expectations were from within certain parts of Codemasters.

DR is a throwback in many ways, and one of them is the lack of emphasis on online multiplayer.
That said, I'm fine with that. I'm kinda sick of games crippling their single player content for the sake of online which, by the very nature of the market, is only truly active for the first couple of months, unless you have something very very very special on your hands with no equivalent (talking GTA and such)

[AirBiscuit 0]

BrySkye said:

The engine can't handle multiple cars on the actual rally stages.
...
Instead of rendering 8+ miles of road and scenery with massive draw distances, it's rendering some extra cars and processing their AI.

Unless you have an innate familiarity with the engine, then you aren't qualified to lecture others. Because you conflate graphics and AI I'm going to go ahead and assume you don't, and give you a little lesson.

Though the courses are indeed sometimes 8 miles long, the whole 8 miles aren't rendered all at once, all the time (Assuming Codemasters aren't rookies when it comes to rendering, which they aren't as the game would be unplayable otherwise). Only what you can see in the rectangle that represents your view is drawn, if it's not being drawn then it simply resides in memory as a gameobject, and modern consoles have ample memory to hold an entire stage's worth of gameobjects. The course could be a million miles long, but as long as the assets are streamed properly as you move along it would still be fine.

So on to the rendering extra cars bit: The only times you will see 7 other cars during a rally will be if you are in last position on the starting grid (by the time you start they'll all be gone anyways so your rendering will be unaffected by then), or if there's some unholy crash during the stage. In all likelihood, you're probably only going to see one other car as you drive, maybe even 2. Should even one car be a problem to render, all that's needed is a workaround. Off the top of my head, I suggest having a simple hovering marker to represent another players' car.

And AI processing? The only AI in the game are the crowds, the only real simulations that might pose a problem are car damage calculations. However, all it takes is for one console to calculate the damage, there's probably no reason the damage calculations can't be sent to the other players via the network once one console has worked them out, and on top of all that they'll only be needed if the damaged car comes into another players' view.

But you said the cars' AI so assuming you mean each individual car's own AI, there is none. Car location, car rotation, wheel rotation, car damage and stage time are all the information from each other player that the game needs for simple multiplayer. None of that is "calculated AI", it's merely received and applied/counted

[ccvampyre 0]

SkiddyMcCrash said:

KingOfCoins said:

Umm. All the tracks in dirt rally are made from real stages.

https://youtu.be/vByLmmLqEZE

only a few, i think only a cppl of wales tracks..

definitely not all like slre.

the tracks are made like dirt3 where there is one long track divided up into 3 or 4 courses, not like slre where every stretch of road is different.

[ccvampyre 0]

dirt3joe said:

ccvampyre said:

TonyRickard said:

ccvampyre said:

when you consider seb loeb has all the tracks gps mapped and has a playable online mode i really think codemasters have completely missed the point of a 2016 rally sim, 

It depends what you want from a rally sim, a feature list or something that makes you feel like driving a rally car?

In spite of what we thought a decade or so ago, single player remains far and away the mainstream market. Doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see a decent online rally option but I don't think Codemasters missed the point with their target market.

got to agree with the post above re every other racing game for the last decade...
  the target audience :)

not to overlook the gps tho, all the tracks for circuit racing games on current gen are so accurate, mostly laser scanned. 
having played alot of rally games over the years, this is an addition i have been waiting for.  just imagine driving spa on pcars and the corners are all just generic like most of dirt...  a few of the tracks are right but mostly not. 
i am hugely disappointed that there is very little to play for an online user like myself, so of course i'm opinionated about this, but as a current gen racer, for me it falls way short in every aspect other than graphics.

What circuit racing games on current gen console are laser scanned ?

PCars : Only 4 tracks are laser scanned I believe. Driveclub - not real. FH2 - not real. Dirt rally, no. F1 series, no. The only game with laser scanned tracks on console is probably Forza (and I don't know that for sure).

asseto corsa and project cars.

driveclub is barely a game lol

and f1 has correct tracks.

but you miss the point that is the circuits are correct. the corners and cambers are as close as possible.
again..  imagine if even gt5 had 'made up' corners lol. if in project cars hockemheim was generic...

[Draconian666 0]

The original dirt had rally, hillclimb, trophy truck racing and truck hillclimb\rally off the top of my head. How come dirtrally couldnt add 1vs1 head to head racing a filler for career mode and another race choice/multiplayer. The gamemodes- hillclimb barebones, rallycross barebones, so why not add head to head barebones? You can say money i say greedy you can say time i say lazy. Im not for multiplayer obession im for racing and they could build a good head to head racemode on simple tracks. they dont even have to be filled with design simple little tracks. Im not talking about multiple cars on a rally stage race that be chaos and dumb im talking about the gamemode head to head. If they can render 4 cars on a screen why not 2 on a short little race... https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4JCl0OWzUg

[RyuMakkuro 6]

dirt3joe said:
For me the word generation makes no sense in terms of PC tech because it is constantly evolving and there is no clear definition of what a last gen or this gen PC is.

Your graphs don't show much because the Dirt 3 figures are from when Dirt 3 became available on steam, which if I read the figures correctly was April 1 2015 - far after the game was first released on PC.

And consoles are what? Degrading? They are also evolving, just at a slower pace (more like they could evolve at a slower pace since they were way more powerful than PCs at that time). There are more than obvious jumps in quality when it comes to PC anyway. New DirectX versions, new engine versions (check games made on Unreal Engine 3 and then Unreal Engine 4). Then you have GPU generations. First Kepler and then Maxwell generation of nVidia gpu's. New generation in PC is as simple as things that the previous generation can't utilise or utilise them properly. PBR engines and DirectX 12 and Vulkan are the current gen step right now. Also, the PC games are classified more by their graphics, rather than hardware. There will always be a jump in graphical quality, that's a fact. Just someone has to take it first.
In any case. it seems that it makes no sense to you because you don't even follow it.

And I was hoping you'll ask about that. Here you have a graph from Steam before DiRT 3 got the steamworks patch: https://steamdb.info/app/44320/graphs/

Given that you didn't had to have Steam to play DiRT 3 then, it still shows that DiRT Rally regardless of the lack of multiplayer is definitely bringing in a lot of crowd. Naturally a better multiplayer would've been great, but engine limitations are engine limitations. I personally take better game with worse multiplayer over a crappy game with great multiplayer all day, every day.

DiRT 2 and DiRT 3 were great games, make no mistake about that. Just that DiRT Rally is something that actual rally fans always wanted, while the previous two were more for people who just wanted to race with their friends in a more off-road showy style.

[KingOfCoins 286]

Draconian666 said:

The original dirt had rally, hillclimb, trophy truck racing and truck hillclimb\rally off the top of my head. How come dirtrally couldnt add 1vs1 head to head racing a filler for career mode and another race choice/multiplayer. The gamemodes- hillclimb barebones, rallycross barebones, so why not add head to head barebones? You can say money i say greedy you can say time i say lazy. Im not for multiplayer obession im for racing and they could build a good head to head racemode on simple tracks. they dont even have to be filled with design simple little tracks. Im not talking about multiple cars on a rally stage race that be chaos and dumb im talking about the gamemode head to head. If they can render 4 cars on a screen why not 2 on a short little race... https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4JCl0OWzUg

http://forums.codemasters.com/discussion/27678/game-mode-super-special-stages-online-and-race-of-champions-mode
Here read the post by Kickup he's the games chief designer. Hopefully it will answer your questions

[CAMELCARP 0]

You say Dirt Rally is bringing in a lot of crowd........sadly that crowd will dwindle pretty fast. I'll still get my rally fix in as I can but without the competition being around I'll have to go somewhere else to find it.

[shadow118 18]

ccvampyre said:

SkiddyMcCrash said:

KingOfCoins said:

Umm. All the tracks in dirt rally are made from real stages.

https://youtu.be/vByLmmLqEZE

only a few, i think only a cppl of wales tracks..

definitely not all like slre.

the tracks are made like dirt3 where there is one long track divided up into 3 or 4 courses, not like slre where every stretch of road is different.

All of the tracks are real, you can find the routes on Google Maps. I made these a while ago - https://imgur.com/a/nvrHv

[Subiesauce 0]

ccvampyre said:

SkiddyMcCrash said:

KingOfCoins said:

Umm. All the tracks in dirt rally are made from real stages.

https://youtu.be/vByLmmLqEZE

only a few, i think only a cppl of wales tracks..

definitely not all like slre.

the tracks are made like dirt3 where there is one long track divided up into 3 or 4 courses, not like slre where every stretch of road is different.

No, all stages are made up from real life stages only that codemasters actually went there in real life to then replicate the stages in the game. That's why there are only 2 stages per location. It costs money to go to every location, and it takes time. Unlike milestone who probably just took footage from onboard vid and claimed that the stages are "laser scanned"..

[RyuMakkuro 6]

CAMELCARP said:

You say Dirt Rally is bringing in a lot of crowd........sadly that crowd will dwindle pretty fast. I'll still get my rally fix in as I can but without the competition being around I'll have to go somewhere else to find it.

Hmmm... so that's why after a year the game still has insane amount of users on the PC end? 2,3k people playing it right now. The numbers will go down, obviously, but not dwindle fast like you think. It's going to be the opposite. The game is gonna have a long life, or at least a DiRT Rally 2/DiRT 4 comes out.

[BrySkye 14]

AirBiscuit said:

Because you conflate graphics and AI I'm going to go ahead and assume you don't

Assume away.
The error in my wording was actually in bringing a slightly different topic into the conversation, which is the lack of AI on rally stages.
The limitations of the engine have been freely admitted by the devs. This is their reasoning as to why there is no AI staggered starts on rallies, but AI does exist in Rally Cross.
That's what I was explaining in regards to resources and engine limitations.
The two topics have traditionally been very intertwined here, but not entirely relevant to this particular thread which is 100% multiplayer focused discussion, so I'll hold my hand up to my mistake in bringing the wrong topic into it.
That said, you don't have to be so arrogant in trying to make a point.

The discussion related to having online multiplayer using ghosts or staggered starts has been discussed at length, but was controversial.
Whether or not we as users agree, there was a certain feeling that despite people claiming to want it, staggered starts were ultimately unpopular with people having to wait their turn.
With priorities being rather tight in this game, everything was a balancing act between how requested a feature was, what resources were required to implement it and how many people would actually use it once it was made available. 

Ghosts were also considered perhaps too much of a compromise with some being very much against it.
Personally, I'm absolutely fine with ghosts, but the more hardcore crowd can be fairly venomous about them being a distraction.
So we are left with leagues and delta times, even if it's not to everyones tastes.

The core of my answer, which you've glossed over, remains true.

Time and money, with this being a game which always had a limited development budget compared to other Codies games or even previous DiRT titles.

Perhaps the biggest problem of all is that the game has been released as a full price 8th Gen Console game to quite a bit of PR fanfare, leaving the games difficult origins increasingly unknown to those that weren't part of early access at the beginning and also those that haven't been privileged to have private conversations with the devs behind closed doors.
It's a great game, but releasing it as a full price 8th gen game when it didn't have the development budget of one makes its shortcomings more apparent.

[dirt3joe 0]

RyuMakkuro said:

dirt3joe said:
For me the word generation makes no sense in terms of PC tech because it is constantly evolving and there is no clear definition of what a last gen or this gen PC is.

Your graphs don't show much because the Dirt 3 figures are from when Dirt 3 became available on steam, which if I read the figures correctly was April 1 2015 - far after the game was first released on PC.

And consoles are what? Degrading? They are also evolving, just at a slower pace (more like they could evolve at a slower pace since they were way more powerful than PCs at that time). There are more than obvious jumps in quality when it comes to PC anyway. New DirectX versions, new engine versions (check games made on Unreal Engine 3 and then Unreal Engine 4). Then you have GPU generations. First Kepler and then Maxwell generation of nVidia gpu's. New generation in PC is as simple as things that the previous generation can't utilise or utilise them properly. PBR engines and DirectX 12 and Vulkan are the current gen step right now. Also, the PC games are classified more by their graphics, rather than hardware. There will always be a jump in graphical quality, that's a fact. Just someone has to take it first.
In any case. it seems that it makes no sense to you because you don't even follow it.

And I was hoping you'll ask about that. Here you have a graph from Steam before DiRT 3 got the steamworks patch: https://steamdb.info/app/44320/graphs/

Given that you didn't had to have Steam to play DiRT 3 then, it still shows that DiRT Rally regardless of the lack of multiplayer is definitely bringing in a lot of crowd. Naturally a better multiplayer would've been great, but engine limitations are engine limitations. I personally take better game with worse multiplayer over a crappy game with great multiplayer all day, every day.

DiRT 2 and DiRT 3 were great games, make no mistake about that. Just that DiRT Rally is something that actual rally fans always wanted, while the previous two were more for people who just wanted to race with their friends in a more off-road showy style.

You can talk about PC "Gens" as much as you want, but its pointless, because there is no agreement on what a PC gen is.

Dirt Rally is a very different game from Dirt 2/Dirt 3. I can kind of have a tiny bit of sympathy for people who bought it hoping it was going to be Dirt 4, but not much given the level of coverage. That said, people who want Dirt 4 have got their opportunity to tell codies that's what they want, and if it was me I would shout loudly too. That's what the forum is here for so they can get feedback from the entire userbase, not just the people who are here all the time. 

The phrase "engine limitations" makes no sense. It would be better replaced by "we didn't have the dev budget to implement the feature", or "we believe the dev budget was better spent somewhere else in the game". Don't let "engine limitations" make you believe they didn't have a choice - they did and chose not to (rightly in my opinion).

My guess is that Dirt Rally will be less popular (in terms of sales volume and online play), more long lasting and more commercially successful (profitable) than Dirt 3, which probably cost a small fortune to produce. For anyone on here interested in a Dirt 4 style game, you're probably best looking to Forza Horizon series and the consolation is that there will be in all probability a new one announced soon.

[Kakkela 3]

ccvampyre said:

SkiddyMcCrash said:

KingOfCoins said:

Umm. All the tracks in dirt rally are made from real stages.

https://youtu.be/vByLmmLqEZE

only a few, i think only a cppl of wales tracks..

definitely not all like slre.

the tracks are made like dirt3 where there is one long track divided up into 3 or 4 courses, not like slre where every stretch of road is different.

All DiRT Rally stages are based on real world roads.
Of course laser-scanning would make them even better but they are currently best rally stages that ship with the game, only modded stages for RBR and AC are more accurate.

[KingOfCoins 286]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8ZLkK4WHFU

To everyone who wants PvP Rally, Go to 48:30 for an answer from the Codemasters themselves

[CAMELCARP 0]

Thanks for the video King of coins.  I guess as my final post here i will say that sucks.  This is a very realistic and fun rally game. I love driving these rally courses. I picked the game up on release date and I'm already bored with having no competition. The rallycross is great with the super cars just not enough tracks and not enough different modes.  I really do hope they come out with a Dirt 4 sometime soon. I would be very happy with a Dirt 3 on the PS4. As for now I still have Project Cars for the competition factor and I hope Gamestop will give me a good trade in on this for Uncharted 4 . 

[TRLKarthikeyan 0]

KingOfCoins said:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i8ZLkK4WHFU

To everyone who wants PvP Rally, Go to 48:30 for an answer from the Codemasters themselves

thats no excuse for not even implementing a dirt 1 system (just a leaderboard in lobby no multiple cars on stage). All we want is to get people to do a stage at the same time and see whos fastest without having to setup a league.