Iracing vs Project Cars vs Assetto Corsa

Hey guys

Ive played Iracing briefly last year and enjoyed it however cost isn't cheap with subscription and then basically DLC all ontop with most tracks and cars costing extra however I was interested to find what game most people preferred in the motion sim forums here

Based on current game really for each as of today

Perhaps just which game and why really

I don't get Project Cars at the moment. Is it hardcore simulation in the same frame as Iracing and Assetto etc? I guess the fact its on consoles too led me to think it may be more like a forza or gran turismo which isn't that realistic at all

@Boomslangnz - I have both AC and pCars and I enjoy them both.

AC seems to get more positive reviews from the purist racers. To be honest I have no idea how an F1 car or a Ferrari 458 Italia would "feel" around a racetrack in real life, so I can't comment, but I lean more towards pCars when using my Sim.

Purely because of the depth and breadth of cars and tracks. As I said, the physics might not be what people expect coming from the AC camp, but unless you have driven any of these cars at upwards of 150kph, how would you possibly know??

I enjoy both games for different reasons, but pCars is certainly the one I keep going back to more often than not.

For what I have read pCars is way behind AC as regards FFB and physics. I have bought pCars but couldn't test the game yet because my rig is disassembled at the moment.

Project CARS - Cheap copy...

For the AU$ market, cheapest I can find this game is via thebluedroid.com. It's AU$52.00 for the Digital Edition including the 3 Pre-release cars and the special edition pack.
(Trust me, I've been checking various sites all day, and these buys are the cheapest)

Digital Edition + Modified Pack


I just bought it now and it's downloading from Steam so will give you my feedback if I get chance to play it tonight.

For all who dot not own AC I c&p from the AC forum the following comment. Of course written by an AC fan, but it seems very reliable to me.
- - - - - - - - - - -
http://www.assettocorsa.net/forum/i...ad-for-project-cars.23683/page-29#post-462915

My personal pCars experience – a story of frustration

To me It’s really frustrating that it ended up being just a fun racer with some sim sprinkled on it. Why? Because I was told otherwise! The whole wmd community was told otherwise. It was supposed to be THE sim with focus clearly on the driving experience. This was clearly stated in the vision statement and marketing material. It has been repeated in the forum by Ian Bell (SMS president), Andy Garton (head of production), Casey Ringley and Andrew Weber (both physics devs) as members raised concerns about the focus drifting away into the bling-bling zone.

Back in mid 2013 to mid 2014 pCars felt really promising. The new tyre model was there, the physics and the FFB were excellent, tyres would heat up, overheat – it was all in there. So I tried to generate usable data for the devs by making camber/tyre pressure tests and posting the resulting times, tyre temps and what not (camber did not work back then...dunno about today). After the third test or so there was still no response from the devs which got my suspicious. Since my efforts to make that sim better did not generate any feedback, I stopped.

I also got involved in a debate about burnout possibility in pCars’ GT3 cars. No matter which tyre or weather – they just wouldn’t do number 11s even when they were stone cold and high on pressure. I thought this must be some sort of temporary bug but as I kept asking about it the devs said that it’s ok because of the long gearing and the slicks being so very sticky. Andrew Weber chimed in with an anecdote of a GT3 car snapping it’s drive shaft on launch in the pit lane due to the sticky tyres. And that was it – no further discussion, no evaluation if this might affect higher-speed handling.

In the meantime I was not sure anymore which tyre to choose, how to ACTUALLY choose it (bugs, bugs, bugs), what FFB to set, which session type to run and I got tired of re-assigning the whole control scheme and all settings each day (SMS did not (care to) find a way to make pCars remember simple numeric values entered by the user without possible physics-cock-ups). Also, all cars, even the ones that were good before had turned into something worse and I thought “Ok, they have proven that they can do it and they claim that they’re still aiming at simulation. It’s gonna be really, really good in the end.”. I stopped following pCars and bought AC even though I hadn’t liked the tech demo before. I was immediately relieved about how good a driving simulation with customer equipment can work! I still considered playing pCars, again once it’s out.
So now it’s out, my expectations that have been raised and well maintained by the devs themselves are sky-high and then I drive it and my jaw just drops. The physics are, given what they were once and compared to what the devs claim they are, horrible.

I don’t care about the 50 bucks I once spent on this. That’s ok. It’s just the vast difference between what was promised by the devs and what came out in the end that causes the frustration. There were people in the WMD forums that literally spent their lifes there, providing calculation spreadsheets, manufacturer data en masse and answering each forum request within minutes. I really feel sorry for them when I see now what pCars has become.

One thing is for sure: pCars 2, which has already been announced by Ian Bell will be community-funded, again will definitely take place without my time and money.

Cheers
Chris

P.s.: I’m not a super conspirative guy but the idea that the vast number of FFB sliders spread generously in different sub-menus of pCars is there to spread the message: “This sim can do it all. If it doesn’t suit you then it’s your fault for not tweaking it right.” Sounds very plausible. You can already see it works by the people in this thread stating “Yeah, it’s not that good but then again there’s so much to fiddle with…”.

I've only had AC, which I really like and get around quite well................great sim.
I've had pCars since the Tuesday release...........and it took me two days to just get the T500RS wheel AND pedals to work properly.................
At this point, I'm be "open-minded" and realize there will be a learning curve to endure, but gee whiz, it's just a bitch to maneuver around the options and then they do not make much sense
to me...................TIME will tell.........

Tom

Wisely said. I am very happy with AC (driving AC on my rig is like downhill biking IMO), so I can wait for better times.

so no love for iracing at all? It is merely the cost or have the others just got so much better

Interesting reads ... I've had a busy weekend so I've not had chance to test pCars yet. I had a play in the menu's etc and got things set up but didn't get time to go for a spin.

pCars was certainly my "go to" racer over AC, so will be interesting to see if anything has changed, and if so, what (in terms of handling / gameplay etc)

I'll report back once I have a good play with it.

@Boomslangnz - Similar to @noorbeast - I just could not justify the subscription and ongoing fees for iracing. People rave about it, but unless you are a hard core "want to rise through the ranks" racer, you will likely find another title will slake your thirst for racing (AC/pCars/Dirt Rally)

yeah I know what you mean. I only played iracing for a month or so and loved it, even joining a newbie v8 supercar series for my one and only real race excluding the mx5 license races. However the cost to be part of a series continuously is large and I would be surprised if you can't find similar series running in Project Cars and Assetto Corsa anyway, if not then perhaps we could start a xsimulator series sometime

When your freetime is limited and is sometimes just a half hour, or when you would like to play a full season with the ai rfactor2 is the best option imo. Assetto Corsa is also nice but still lacks features. I`ll hope the will focus on that rather then bringing out new dlc.

Pcars is ported to consoles, so it has to be easy to play on a controller.
Hence the simplicity

I'm an iRacer. I voted it the best but I haven't used the others so maybe a different option was needed!

It costs about £60 a year if you buy a year when the discount is on so not so bad really. It is one evil hardcore game though so if you get frustrated easily move along

Once out of the rookie races then the multiplayer side is immense, we also rent servers by the hour to host friends head to heads. All good fun.

Personally I prefer assetto intensified for the driving sounds and the graphics.

In my experience, iRacing is the most demanding when it comes to driving. People take racing relatively serious there from I have seen (which is a good thing). I guess the subscription model keeps mostly people really interested in fair racing there.
My 'go to' racing game is Assetto Corsa. It seems easier to drive the cars and I often just use AC to go for a few laps. There are also many people in multiplayer trying to race fair. I also really like the graphics and sounds.
PCars hasn't gotten a good run on my rig yet because of the lack of proper triple screen support. I know it runs quite good on 3 monitors but for my setup, the stretched image takes the immersion away. But the one thing I was really impressed with in pCars is the amount of content.
Personally, I'm not gonna say one is better than the other, they are just different. But that is just my opinion.

PCars did get a decent update to version 2.0 the other day which apparently has made the game a lot better now (back to how it used to be basically)

Sounds like the final release had issues with physics and handling etc

anyway ive got all 3 games and had a bit of a go on them all, my favourite is still Iracing.

Iracing has the worst graphics but I find it the most demanding and just feels to me like im driving a real race car as close to the real thing as possible. Im not any good at it but I love the challenge all the same and hope to improve over time, Im gutted when I go off track or do minor mistakes and nothing feels cooler then overtaking someone in this game.

I just don't get that same feeling with Assetto or Project Cars, I still really enjoy them both but I just feel like im playing a video game, instead of a simulation (if that makes sense). I turned off all the assists in Assetto, manual w/ clutch etc etc but I still basically have no issue drivng a GT3 around Bathurst first lap going hard, it just seems much easier to me and less of a challenge. Project Cars ive only played for an hour so far but I would rate it similar to Assetto from what ive played so far (this is since the 2.0 update). I haven't played any online for Pcars yet and only just raced with a mate in Assetto around Nordschleife Tourist which was pretty fun, I hated the online menu system but we got in a race none the less and it worked fine.

Ill be playing all three myself and my opinion may change over time as new patches get released etc

Hello
Iracing is nymber one for the feel and realism . AC is not even number 2 as it is almost ate the same level as iracing (to me anyway).

i d say it is just a question of subtile difference . actually they are both at the same league

Iracing is a bit too costly buy worth it (yet debatable) in the long run . You can get good rebates if you watch for them .

in iracing, cars and tracks end up by being expensive and it might feel like a rip off . I stopped for years iracing and came back later . Now i simply cant live without iracing.
AC is simply a beauty but still , iracing remains my top favorite.

I dont know about Pcars . I beliece it is codemasters . I was reticent to try it because of their habits to make arcady games (correct me if i am wrong)