DiRT 4 Road Book - 17/02/17

[ChristinaMc 784]

Original post here: http://blog.codemasters.com/dirt/02/dirt-4-road-book-170217/

Well hello there! It’s been a couple of weeks since our last Road Book, so welcome back to our DiRTy little corner of the internet. We’ve (just about) calmed down following the awesome high of announcing DiRT 4, and we’re back in the office and ready to crack on with making the game.

However, we’re not done with DiRT Rally just yet – and today we’re utterly delighted to be launching DiRT Rally PS VR. In case you haven’t seen our brand new launch trailer for PS VR, here it is for your viewing pleasure. If you look closely, you might spot a few familiar faces in there... After all, we needed a hand testing the brand new co-driver mode. ;)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cUaDfvT2fdI

Shout out to our awesome community guys who tested the upgrade and provided their feedback on the PlayStation VR experience. We’ve poured a lot of love into Dirt Rally PS VR and we’re super proud of the final product, so we can’t wait for all of you PlayStation VR people to get stuck into it. It brings a whole new dimension of fun to the game – especially when you’ve got a Player 2 responsible for the co-driver calls. If you’ve ever given Paul Coleman’s co-driver some backchat when you’ve been playing DiRT Rally, then you’re going to love the opportunity to actually heckle the person with the second DualShock cocking up the calls.

If you want to know more about DiRT Rally PS VR, then head over to the PlayStation Blog to read a little more about what it offers:

https://blog.eu.playstation.com/2017/02/17/try-out-the-new-co-driver-mode-in-dirt-rallys-ps-vr-upgrade-out-on-ps4-today/

And if you’d just prefer to dive in and experience it for yourself, then get yourself over to the PlayStation Store and pick it up now.

For those of you in Europe: https://store.playstation.com/#!/cid=EP4001-CUSA03648_00-DIRTRALLY0000040

For those of you in the US: https://store.playstation.com/#!/cid=UP4001-CUSA03766_00-DIRTRALLY0000040

Oh, one last thing – while you wait for the reviews to come in, we’ve compiled some of the best tweets from those of you who downloaded it on the store as soon as you could. The verdict looks pretty good so far...

https://twitter.com/SmiithMaxx/status/832567258660618243

https://twitter.com/BrainsBush/status/832566459113037824

https://twitter.com/thode_andrea/status/832557296458817537

https://twitter.com/Ste_F1/status/832547625513709568

https://twitter.com/ConnorTheButler/status/832539512773320704

https://twitter.com/MrMontyBurnsDog/status/832578148155863041

And this reddit thread’s also worth a look too:

https://www.reddit.com/r/PSVR/comments/5uj42x/dirt_rally_vr_early_impressions/

The DiRT Show returns

If you managed to miss the long-awaited return of the DiRT Show, do not fear! Here is the DiRT Show ready for your viewing pleasure. It’s a long one, featuring awesome interviews with Kris Meeke and Petter Solberg, and a cheeky Q&A with Chief Games Designer Paul and Senior Games Designer Darren – plus it’s also got some sneaky exclusive footage of the Your Stage track generator tool in action. Get yourself a cup of tea/a beer/whatever makes you happy, and stick it on:

https://youtu.be/cREEx-6zX_s

 It might not surprise you that we’ve also got a few more videos in the works for you guys at the moment. Subscribe to our YouTube channel for the good stuff – there’s plenty of fun stuff for you to set your eyes on over the next few months.

All of the videos

Even though we’ve got all of the exciting PS VR stuff going on, there are a lot of people talking about DiRT 4 at the moment. If you want to see more of the announcement event and some in-game footage, then we’ve compiled a round-up of the best DiRTy videos going:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8mPD3BoCT0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VUsbbjzjE0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIyDdeZfPH0

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

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4HiKCvVwlRI

Over to you

Finally, we want to know what you want to know about DiRT 4. Are you curious about how we’ve tweaked the handling, or how gamer handling works, or how we’ve worked to add more elements of realism to DiRT 4? Or is there something else you have a burning question about? Drop us a line in the various Road Book threads of the internet and we’ll add as much of them as we can the list of Road Book topics, as we want to make sure we’re giving you the info you want! There’s a lot we want to tell you more about, and there’s probably a lot of cross-over – but we can only be sure if you ask us. :)

Anyway, that’s all from us this week – but we will definitely be back and looking at DiRT 4 in far more depth.

Enjoy your weekends everyone!

[Porkhammer 78]

Thanks for all of your continued hard work, Dirt team! <3

[bogani 756]

We wanna know all about how you tweaked the handling/realism ;)

[BadD0g 0]

I won't rest easy until I know whether the motion blur option is independent from the shader quality option!  ;)

I'd like to know the nitty-gritty details about how Your Stage works (how the road surface is manipulated by the generator, how much of the background can change, etc), but I imagine you can't say much about that in order to keep the tech secret. If there's anything specific you can share, please do!

[Scyy 0]

BadD0g said:

I won't rest easy until I know whether the motion blur option is independent from the shader quality option!  ;)

I'd like to know the nitty-gritty details about how Your Stage works (how the road surface is manipulated by the generator, how much of the background can change, etc), but I imagine you can't say much about that in order to keep the tech secret. If there's anything specific you can share, please do!

I would be extremely interested in some of this information as well.

[ChristinaMc 784]

Scyy said:

BadD0g said:

I won't rest easy until I know whether the motion blur option is independent from the shader quality option!  ;)

I'd like to know the nitty-gritty details about how Your Stage works (how the road surface is manipulated by the generator, how much of the background can change, etc), but I imagine you can't say much about that in order to keep the tech secret. If there's anything specific you can share, please do!

I would be extremely interested in some of this information as well.

We can probably share a little, but not too much as it's all very bespoke and top secret. Will see what we can get away with sharing. :)

[ChristinaMc 784]

bogani said:

We wanna know all about how you tweaked the handling/realism ;)

Now that, we can do. :D

[sqdstr 107]

Any other cars that can be confirmed that will make the final game?
Any screenshots or footage from the new Quattro u could show us?

[BadD0g 0]

sqdstr said:

Any other cars that can be confirmed that will make the final game?
Any screenshots or footage from the new Quattro u could show us?

Oh yeah, I forgot about that! I want to know if they got the right turbo sound.  ;)

[KevM 44]

BadD0g said:

sqdstr said:

Any other cars that can be confirmed that will make the final game?
Any screenshots or footage from the new Quattro u could show us?

Oh yeah, I forgot about that! I want to know if they got the right turbo sound.  ;)

They have the sound, they just need to apply it to the rally version!

[BadD0g 0]

That's right, I think it needs to be a bit louder though. Watching old Group B clips on YouTube, that chirp is way loud, it's one of the first things you hear as the car approaches. It's not quite as loud on the Pikes car in-game, even in replays.

[RogerRamjet77 16]

Really I am just waiting for the day I read the words " Dirt 4 ~ VR Now Confirmed ! "  o:) 
Until then I just cannot get myself excited to know much more about what will be an epic Rally experience.
  
I watched ISRTV, Beyond the Gloves, episode 3 and heard Paul Coleman talking about the Your Stage feature and it does sound incredible and truly groundbreaking for the genre. However without VR inclusion it will be just another Racing title that I cannot buy into... sorry. :'(

I should add that hearing Paul talk about VR was interesting but it sounds like it is the suits in the boardroom holding the purse strings who ultimately will greenlight VR or not so I hope in the end the numbers stack up and it does happen.

[Scyy 0]

RogerRamjet77 said:

Really I am just waiting for the day I read the words " Dirt 4 ~ VR Now Confirmed ! "  o:) 
Until then I just cannot get myself excited to know much more about what will be an epic Rally experience.
  
I watched ISRTV, Beyond the Gloves, episode 3 and heard Paul Coleman talking about the Your Stage feature and it does sound incredible and truly groundbreaking for the genre. However without VR inclusion it will be just another Racing title that I cannot buy into... sorry. :'(

I should add that hearing Paul talk about VR was interesting but it sounds like it is the suits in the boardroom holding the purse strings who ultimately will greenlight VR or not so I hope in the end the numbers stack up and it does happen.

While I wouldn't go quite to that extreme and still plan to get D4 on release I definitely will be disappointed if we don't get VR support. Honestly at this point I'm going to find it hard going back to a monitor as the level of immersion from VR is just unparalleled.

Plus I mean a single person modded VR support into Richard Burns Rally so I really can't buy the resources thing to much especially when they already have the ground work from Dirt Rally.  I kinda assume they are testing the waters with the DLC VR for PSVR and seeing if they want to go that route with a paid DLC a bit after release for D4.(Which yes I will buy, just give me VR CM!)

[LOSTVENGENCE96 0]

Yes would definitely like to know how the physics are being update. 

Things im also curious to know:

Will the your stage be able to be searched by gamertag? Say I get a really great stage created, and I save it, and want people here to see it will they be able to search my GT to see it? Or friends only? What about cross platform searches?

Can we PLEASE get the option to sell no longer used cars? Sure money may be easy to get for some but not all, selling old car is logical for many reasons. 

Next, can we do away with "upgrading" a rally car? Doesnt make sense to me for a team to enter into a rally race and not have their car up to the max specs allowed for a class. 

Something else along the upgrading, can we have an option to stay at a particular difficulty instead of being forced into a higher class even though we may not be ready to race higher difficulty ai?

Can something be done about cheating so we don't have concrete advert signs along the route? 

How about smart spectators? Maybe not to the level where the run across the track for photo shoots but at least have them back off when they see a 2000lb car hurling at them doing 80mph. If the layers car goes WAY off track into a field of spectators fine, penalize them. But for a minor infraction the crowd should and would realistically move back well before they'd get hit

Another thing that's been bugging me about dirt rally is auto transmissions. Sorry my hands just don't allow me to do full manual. So the issues I would like addressed is when we have semi auto selected, sometimes the transmission double shift up and you loose torque and boost. And with auto you have to come to complete stop for a second or two to grab reverse. Not everyone is amazing at this game and mistakes happen. Please don't penalize people who use auto transmissions. 

Next more car set up areas please. Tire pressure, diff split front to rear, front and rear diff lock up on acceleration and deceleration, and one thing else that would be great is to have your crew suggest a set up for a track and be able to apply it automatically. The better your crew, the better the set up would be suggested. It's one of those things not everyone is great at tuning a car, and I think it makes sense for a seasoned crew to know how the car should be set up for a particular track to get the most out of it. 

And on that note, be able to save and share car set ups for tracks. Although that may not do well depending how your stage works. 

That said, will everyone's championships be the exact same tracks? Or will everyone's tracks be mostly unique to them throughout the entire game? 

Sorry we're almost to the end now. 

Will there be staggered starts in championships where we could either pass or be passed by other cars? What about in PvP mode? 

Car list: will we see all of dirt rallys cars come back in dirt 4? How many new cars total do you guys have planned? Specifics at this time are OK to ignore. 

Lastly (for now) can we expect dlc (for free or charged) at any point in dirt 4? Dlc can keep game fresh for a long time. Especially in a season pass or something similar where you can get a few expansions together at a discounted prices where the expansions are released x time apart. 

Thanks for reading all of this. Looking forward to upcoming news and seeing if any of my questions can be answered.

[bogani 756]

The PSVR version of DR has been very well received. I think VR will come to D4, sooner or later :)

[LOSTVENGENCE96 0]

Here's another question I forgot about last night, with the dirt fish rally school, will there be different levels of completions for each task? Like bronze, silver, gold, platinum? And I would really like it if we could use the school as a play ground to free roam to hone our skills or just take a brake from the seriousness of racing. 

Another question I just thought of, will rally be rally and land rush be land rush? Ie, will each championship be separate from other aspects of game play?

[maxx69683 0]

I've only got the game because of psvr inclusion and I'm hooked ,  it works flawlessly and my god is the immersion intense .
I've always been a project cars , Assetto , GT guy.  
The idea of driving down  lonely dark lanes with another man has never floated my boat  :# but in VR ....wow and with the added bonus of rally cross , being able to race mates who don't have VR is awesome.
Totally hooked , but won't buy dirt 4 if it doesn't include psvr .
VR , t300 and shifter.... all racing Sims need to implement it in coming games , it's the only way forward .
A big thanks to the developers for getting this sorted 

[RogerRamjet77 16]

@SCYY ... yeah mate I didn't want to say it but really it does sound like the truth is taking a hit here as the doubt cast on VR by Codemasters made it sound like there was a huge amount of work to do.  My understanding is that when you include VR from the get-go it is not a huge ask for a team who has already actually developed the tech on the title, Dirt Rally, which is the basis of the new title Dirt 4  ~ and it was a stellar implementation of VR to boot !  

Other thing is that with Steam OpenVR, as used by RaceRoom just recently, there is no duplication of work required because the VR works on both Oculus and HTC HMD's.

VR has totally ruined flatscreen racing for me, it is just dull & lifeless compared to feeling like you are actually in the game driving the car, so no matter how good the game I will pass - Forza Horizon 3 taught me that, great racing game but ended up wasted money for me.  

I do not mind at all paying for VR as DLC but simply tell us that is the game Codies,  no B.S. required. ;)  

[Scyy 0]

And I just wanted to say I understand that the vr decision is likely coming from the bean counters so I don't want what I was saying to come off as dissing the people actually making the game. I have no doubt they want it implemented as well.

[ChristinaMc 784]

sqdstr said:

Any other cars that can be confirmed that will make the final game?
Any screenshots or footage from the new Quattro u could show us?

Car list will be a little longer, as it's all to do with licensing/approvals and whatnot. As soon as we can though, we will! 

[warpengage 177]

@ChristinaMc Hi! When do you estimate the cars will be properly revealed? Two months from now, 3?

[ChristinaMc 784]

warpengage said:

@ChristinaMc Hi! When do you estimate the cars will be properly revealed? Two months from now, 3?

It'll most likely be next month (towards the end of the month though!), or even the start of April. Keen to confirm it though, so will keep pushing. :) 

[ChristinaMc 784]

Hi all,

There's no Road Book this week, but we do have a couple of interviews for you!

Interview with DiRT 4 co-driver and rally tutor Jen Horsey: http://blog.codemasters.com/dirt/02/a-dirty-debrief-interview-with-dirt-4-rally-school-tutor-and-co-driver-voice-jen-horsey/ 

Interview with Codemasters' very own Dialogue Producer Olly Johnson: http://blog.codemasters.com/dirt/02/dirty-dialogue-interview-with-codemasters-dialogue-producer-olly-johnson/  

Both are awesome, so I'd recommend reading them :)

Thankks,
Christina 

[ALF 8]

ChristinaMc said:

Hi all,

There's no Road Book this week, but we do have a couple of interviews for you!

Interview with DiRT 4 co-driver and rally tutor Jen Horsey: http://blog.codemasters.com/dirt/02/a-dirty-debrief-interview-with-dirt-4-rally-school-tutor-and-co-driver-voice-jen-horsey/ 

Interview with Codemasters' very own Dialogue Producer Olly Johnson: http://blog.codemasters.com/dirt/02/dirty-dialogue-interview-with-codemasters-dialogue-producer-olly-johnson/  

Both are awesome, so I'd recommend reading them :)

Thankks,
Christina 

I like these " meet the DiRT Team " interviews, thanks Christina <3  

[StephanSRT 0]

Since the last Roadbook, I have the problem to load the blog.codemasters.com Site :(