What to expect from EA SPORTS WRC’s 2024 season expansion

Eschewing a popular convention for an official motorsport game, EA SPORTS WRC will not be an annualised release.

The first official World Rally Championship game developed by Codemasters was released in October last year and predominately utilised content replicating that season’s competition. Little has been said since about future content plans.

It was unclear if an ‘EA SPORTS WRC 24’ would be published or if DLC for the existing platform would be created.

In the end, it will be the latter. The Southam-based studio’s first foray into a licenced WRC title will have, for this year at least, a paid-for 2024 season expansion launching in October.

At the same time, the game will be re-released, with the new content bundled together with the existing base experience.

What exactly the pack will look like is set to be confirmed closer to launch. For now, however, is every significant new element from the real-world 2024 competition, possibly hinting at what to expect from the virtual add-on.

New locations

There have been two fresh additions to the WRC’s calendar for this season, and both happened in the past two months.

The stages from these events are not present in the game presently, and with the 2024 season expansion listed as having ‘new locations’ (plural), this hints at their inclusion.

Rally Poland

The Polish event returned to the WRC schedule at the end of June, with its fast, narrow, gravel roads. It marked the reappearance of the Eastern European event on the world stage for the first time since 2017.

This season’s event witnessed a Toyota one-two result, with Kalle Rovanperä and co-driver Jonne Halttunen winning. Norwegian Hyundai driver Andreas Mikkelsen had been in contention, before picking up a puncture early on the final day.

The Masurian stages are high-speed, with small dry stones covering the surface and often tall grass lining the track edges.

We hope to see these stages represented within EA SPORTS WRC. Of potential intrigue, the development team’s prior title – DiRT Rally 2.0 – featured routes in this region. These could be re-used (or revised) for the upcoming expansion of its current game, but equally jettisoned for all-new stage recreations.

Rally Lativa

The second new calendar entry, and therefore another 2024-season rally not currently replicated within EA SPORTS WRC, is the recent Latvian round.

Held one week ago in Liepāja, it was yet another dry gravel event with fast stages. With similar topography to the Polish round, Rally Lativa had a seemingly higher level of loose gravel atop its road surface and more obvious stage-side ditches.

Kalle Rovanperä and co-driver Jonne Halttunen won yet again, but it was home heroes Mārtiņš Sesks and Renārs Francis who stole the limelight – setting impressive stage times and on for a podium result before a mechanical failure on the final test.

Strangely, while both Poland and Latvia were new for 2024, they are not set to return in 2025 with Paraguay, Saudi Arabia and Rally Islas Canarias making their debuts, and Estonia returning, instead.

New cosmetics

While the roster of the three premier Rally1 category hybrid-powered cars remains the same this season compared to last, each team has fresh livery designs and car upgrades.

Perhaps previewing the EA SPORTS WRC 2024-season expansion, publisher Electronic Arts’ mobile driving title Real Racing 3 recently added the current specification Toyota GR Yaris Rally1, replete in its black livery design.

This is something we expect to be replicated in the PC and console rally game expansion, especially considering the official roadmap image features a picture of Takamoto Katsuta and Aaron Johnston’s ‘24-spec example.

Alongside Toyota, the M-Sport Ford squad has also introduced a new look, with a white base moving away from the prior season’s predominately blue design. Meanwhile, Hyundai used a new scheme for the season-opening Rallye Monte-Carlo, only to change again from the second event onwards.

There have been some personnel changes too. Perhaps most notably Ott Tänak and Martin Järveoja moved from M-Sport to Hyundai. Adrien Fourmaux and Coria Alexandre, Grégoire Munster and Louis Louka plus the aforementioned Mikkelsen (with co-driver Torstein Eriksen) all moved up a category from WRC2 to WRC.

In short, expect a roster update including the latest looks. However, to complete the field, some new cars are also required…

New cars

While the top-class Rally1 cars should carry across with minimal changes, some all-new cars are making their rally debut this season.

In WRC2, which uses Rally2 rules, Toyota created its first entrant with the GR Yaris. Yes, it’s the same base car that the Rally1 model uses, but with the lower power, less aero and no hybrid kit the secondary category requires.

Making its debut at Rallye Monte Carlo, and so far absent from EA SPORTS WRC, Jan Solans and Rodrigo Sanjuan took the car’s first class victory on the world stage during May’s Rally de Portugal.

One category further down, Joosep Ralf Nõgene and Aleks Lesk took the WRC3 victory on last week’s Rally Latvia in their Renault Clio Rally3 – a category that is not represented in the game’s vehicle classes yet.

Another car that competes in WRC3 is the Ford Fiesta Rally3, a car that is in the game already as it is also used in the Junior WRC. However, in 2024, this car was heavily updated, with a new facelifted front-end design.

If the WRC3 class is not represented in EA SPORTS WRC, and therefore omitting the Renault, it would not be a surprise. It is by far the least notable category. But, at the very least, there could be an updated Ford Fiesta within the JWRC subsection.

Anticipated content for EA SPORTS WRC’s 2024-season expansion

This is far from confirmed, but we’d like to see:

• New event location – Rally Poland
• New event location – Rally Latvia
• 2024-season car liveries, driver and co-driver roster updates
• New car Toyota GR Yaris Rally2 WRC
• New car Ford Fiesta Rally3 JWRC (facelift)
• Outside bet – new car Renault Clio Rally3

Those are the most significant changes this season in the pinnacle rallying championship – next we’ll check back to see if any of these are added to EA SPORTS WRC in October.