Well, clearly the Studio 397 team is not busy enough! After yesterday’s big announcement that Motorsport Games intends to purchase the Dutch developers, the very next day we’ve got some news about the simulation’s new build and the release of a new Formula E track for the simulation – Saudi Arabia’s Diriyah street circuit.
Formula E Diriyah Release
The Formula E Diriyah track release on rFactor 2 comes just a few days following the real race there. The whole race weekend was pretty eventful throughout with a lot of entertainment for Formula E fans. There were a couple of big incidents, the biggest of which resulting in checkups in the hospital for Mahindra’s Alex Lynn – fortunately, he is now described as being “100% fit“.
The new track is pretty fast for a street circuit. Whereas normally you’ll find a lot of 90 degree turns and hairpins, Diriyah is a lot more open and fast-flowing. Should be a lot of fun to turn some laps on!
Previous updates to the Formula E Gen2 car bought us attack mode for Formula E cars – the good news is that is fully supported in this new track as well.
We’re currently in-between the Formula E Accelerate championship rounds so we can likely it’ll show up in the esports competition when it returns next week (11th March). Check out James Kirk’s brilliant round-up of round 3 here.
You can purchase the new track directly from the steam store immediately and see some additional information on Studio 397’s announcement post.
March release candidate
As previously mentioned back in January, new rFactor 2 builds now go into the “release candidate” that is hidden in the Steam beta menu. This means last month’s build is the one released to the public by default and this new one can be assessed by the community for feedback. Got that? I certainly hope so!
So what’s all the fuss about then? What does this new build give you? Well… it’s mainly a big list of bug fixes. If you want to see them all then have a look through the list below or visit the rFactor 2 website.
Release Candidate (4th March 2021) Patch Notes / Changelog
General
- Fixed an issue enforcing physics upgrades
- Fixed an issue where custom skins would be allowed even when the server does not allow them.
- Fixed an issue where a custom skin would glow white after changing session if skin transfers are disabled. Also ensures other players see you with the default skin of your car.
- Fixed an issue where a series does not initialize correctly on first-time use. This would manifest in not being able to select upgrades when joining a competition.
- Fixed an issue where FFB changes would not register until you go to the track for the second time.
- Fixed a crash to desktop during game load when the current selected series was uninstalled, however the install file remains in packages folder.
- Removed a setting that exited the game after leaving a server
- Added extra logging during the loading of content for debugging purposes
HUD
- Fixed an issue where the time remaining in a race session would not be shown.
- Message centre now displays same name/value as show in the garage screen when changing vehicle settings
Graphics
- Fixed an issue where secondary wet weather reflections would not show on roads. (The reflections from a damp road surface, rather than puddles)
- Fixed some issues which could cause graphical glitches in the skies.
- Fixed VR UI boundaries showing a faint black line when in game
UI
- Added driver and car info displays to full screen replay; steering, throttle, brake, clutch, speed, rpm, gear and g-force traction circle. This information will also be shown live for a driver.
- Fixed an issue where Wheel Loads were not shown in the UI
- Fixed an issue where the UI would run at uncapped FPS
- Fixed an issue where the refresh button in package management would not detect newly copied in files in the packages folder
- Fixed an issue where real road settings weren’t reset in the session settings screen if the user changes track.
- Fixed an issue where session settings would remain from a previously selected series
- Now automatically update the favourite server list on race screen after adding or removing a favourite.
- Fixed an issue where Tracks, Cars and other components would inherit the uninstall status of the last series.
- Fixed wrong driver name displaying in replay when there was a driver swap
- Fixed an issue where disqualified drivers could still go to track
- Fixed an issue when joining a server the ui would display invalid cars
- Fixed an issue where a server client mismatch was reported the wrong way around
- Removed language toggle from player profile
Modding
- Added reporting for driveable surfaces which are not defined in the TDF file in ModDev
- Fixed issues with using Vertex Colour in the Standard Blend Shader
If you want to see the new public build information, have a look at our last post as that “release candidate” is now live.
