Automobilista - March 2017 Development Update

Hello everyone - as another month wraps, it´s time for our regular Development Update with all the latest news on AMS development. Here ´s what we´ve got to share with you from this past month

V1.3.5 Release

Just yesterday we´ve deployed our latest v1.3.5 update, packing several fixes and general improvements to the sim.

On the graphics front, @Alex Sawczuk has developed a series of all new SweetFX profiles, including a new default setting - these can be previewed and set from AMS Config. These new profiles have been overhauled and use a much better tone mapping layout, a nice improvement over the previous offerings.

We have two categories of profiles. The 'A*' category offers a progression in terms of amount of saturation, the digit in the identifier indicates how much saturation there is. Vivid profiles have roughly same lighting as none vivid profiles. but with extra contrast in them. There is then a 'B*' category. These offer a variety of fun post-FX settings for you to try out, the higher the number the generally the more strange the effect.

The new default profile is 'A3 Natural Vivid'. Older profiles remains available in the "Legacy" category.

We expect different monitors to show up the differences in different amounts - hopefully from one of these new configurations you can find one that you like best.

Below are some album previews of the new SFX profiles:



Another important new feature in v1.3.5 is the option to fetch setups from other users as ran in their fastest lap in Time Trial mode. To do that, click on the name of the driver you wish to fetch the setup from, and click the "Fetch Setup" button:



The setup will then be available for you to load from the Garage Files menu, in the respective track folder:


Keep in mind only laps set from this release onwards will have a setup available for fetching.


Virtual Xperience TT Rank & Official TT Challenge

We have recently introduced a new TT Rank via VX for users participating in the TT leaderboards. This is basically how that works:

• Rank Points are calculated using the position of each driver´s best lap in every series irrespective of track user - the important thing is to register at least one lap with each individual series in the sim.
• If driver has not registered a lap in any one given vehicle, they are attributed a penalty position (one place higher than the current largest leaderboard in VX)
• The higher the driver´s points tally, the better his ranking.
• Full details of laps counted towards a drivers ranking (and penalties applied) are listed on the driver´s profiles.

We strongly recommend users to work on putting together their complete TT Rank - we´ll be offering a few things in the coming months which will surely make it worth your while, and not only for the top guys!

Further news on the VX front is that our regular "Time Trial of the Week" fun challenge will be evolving into a full-blown official prize-awarding competition covering 12 weeks, starting April 9th - keep an eye out for the official announcement sometime next week!


V1.4 Development

Work is already ongoing on v1.4 development - we´re pushing hard to release it before the end of april.

Focus currently is on concluding the much anticipated Custom Season Tool for single player championships. We are working on some interesting new options which should hopefully add some extra dimensions not only to championship mode but to the race weekend in general.

Another area receiving attention for v1.4 is AI - we have compiled a number of AI issues and general areas for improvements and have allocated a few weeks over the remaining months of AMS development to be dedicated towards addressing as many of those issues as we can. While it´s uncertain how much ground we´ll cover already for v1.4 and subsequently for v1.5, we´re hoping to see some substantial improvements before AMS development wraps.

The long overdue support for Steam Achievements is also in progress and scheduled to make it in for v1.4.

There have been many enquiries about improving support for the Fanatec CSL and Logitech G29 / G920 - we´re working on those and hope to have news in time for the next release.

Major developments also coming in the audio front for v1.4, as @Domagoj Lovric is making some great gains introducing new filters which should hopefully greatly enhance the aural experience in AMS.

One of the results from these changes is that we´ll be able to reduce audio samples from the currently huge 16bit / 96kHz WAVs to much smaller 44.1kHz rates. This yields a number of benefits, including smaller RAM usage due to audio samples being considerably smaller size, smaller game footprint on disk and potentially fixing some audio related stutters and glitches.

As a visual reference, the images below show a comparison with the introduction of the new filters. First image the filter is OFF - notice these dotted sweeping lines (almost looks like fireworks of noise) above thick line in the bottom:


Now with filter ON, there is much less dotted lines or "noise":


The real proof of course is in the pudding - below you can check a preview of how all these developments sound in-game:



New 2017-spec Formula

Work is also progressing on the yet-to-be-named 2017-spec Formula - it´s a looker!

The new 2017 car will be added as a free base content to AMS. Along with bundles of extra grip, the big news with this car will be the introduction of new physics models as Turbo & ERS are being developed and will be added not only to this car but to others in the sim which feature either or both. This however is unlikely to be completed in time for v1.4 release - we´ll expand on the topic of these new features in our next Dev Update.


Legendary Tracks Pt 3 - Hockenheimring

Development of our next DLC is also coming together nicely as the legendary Hockenheim circuit is taking shape, with meshes for both modern 2016 & 2001 versions pretty far along. Here are some early previews:




These 2 versions are expected to be ready in time for release of v1.4 towards the end of april, with 1972 & 1988 version to be added soon after.

We are looking to confirm the full release schedule for the remaining DLCs as well as some new free base content in the works for Automobilista in time for our next Dev Update, so stay tuned!

Worth reminding that the AMS Season Pass which secure all currently available DLCs along with the ones still to be released is currently on sale with 35% off - if you haven´t grabbed that yet make sure to do it now

That covers it for our March update - look forward to catching up with you all again around this time next month!