rFactor 2’s AI receives an upgrade

One area that has been more than a little irksome within rFactor 2 has been the performance of your AI-controlled rivals.

Sure, as a simulation sandbox (just you and your car, tweaking settings), the tyre model is par excellence. Online, especially through Low Fuel Motorsport or, hopefully, whatever the current Alpha test turns into, some of the racing is spectacular.

But being able to fire up a race against some computer-aided rivals allows you to formulate your own narratives, pretending to overtake a real-world rival at the last minute, saving the reply or sharing a screenshot.

For those of you who, like myself, wanted to try the current British Touring Car Championship content within rFactor 2 could have found the AI’s propensity to roll of their own volition through the final Thruxton chicane or plough headfirst into one of Croft’s immovable tyre stacks was a little frustrating.

Thanks to this AI-focussed up, we hope these quirks have been smoothed over. Specifically, the changelog mentioned ‘Fixed cars rolling over’ and ‘AI won’t deliberately leave the track anymore to overtake’.

Their intelligence when it comes to overtaking, either being too timid or defying the laws of physics, is also said to have been improved.

Despite a relative lack of new DLC so far in 2023, it does appear that developer Studio 397 is working on improving the fundamentals still while it also works on the upcoming Le Mans Ultimate.

The full changelog is below which includes various smaller tweaks.

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rFactor 2 July 2023 hotfix changelog

• Fixed cars rolling over
• Introduced behaviour to deal with understeer and oversteer
• Fixed various issues related to AI limits: AI no longer ignore walls to attempt an overtake, AI won’t deliberately leave the track anymore to overtake, AI only leave the track if they get pushed off, rather than going into the grass to keep their safety distance to other cars

• Fixed AI attempting to overtake when the laws of physics would not allow them to leave their line without crashing

• Fixed an issue where cars would refuse to pit because other cars already requested a pit stop, causing them to run out of fuel in Qualifying
• Fixed AI randomly starting to shake and getting confused when overtaking another car, falling back or crashing
• Fixed cars running off the racing line and sometimes even into walls for a few seconds after spinning
• Fixed AI sometimes not braking enough for their pit boxes
• Added a warning to moddev when pit boxes don’t have waypoints, making them inaccessible to AI
• AI no longer move off the racing line into the middle of the track when shown blue flags, which caused traffic jams
• In addition to the previous fix, AI no longer lift off in corners when shown the blue flag – They will not fight back and stay predictable, following multiclass rules
• AI no longer incorrectly interpret player car’s deceleration and change of direction as acceleration – This fixes AI cars rear-ending the player
• Various fixes and improvements for AI pedal inputs, including improved draft behaviour
• Fixed waypoint lapdist inaccuracies completely disabling AI braking, causing cars to run flat out into walls especially in or near the pits
• Fixed various issues with obstacle evasion, improving AI behaviour around cars out of control. Known issue: AI still occasionally fail to move off the racing line if they encounter an obstacle on the racing line mid-corner
• Added emergency state for AI allowing them to overdrive the car if necessary to avoid hitting walls or obstacles
• Improved safety car physics in wet conditions
• Fixed AI moving off their lines instantly, causing them to spin frequently if other cars are around – This fixes their behaviour to change lines just enough to get to where they need to be as efficiently as possible
• Fixed “Finish Session” and “Next Session” to actually finish the session, simulating the rest of it. When the player chooses to skip Qualifying, this will still ensure a reasonable starting grid