Automobilista 2 October 2022 Development Update

This is not why Iracing focused on ovals at first. It's because Iracing is built off of the code for Nr2003 which was bought by FIRST.net LLC after Papyrus shut down. And funnily enough, co-founder for FIRST.net LLC Dave Kaemmer was also the co-founder for Papyrus! Ever since it was released Iracing has been the only viable option for oval racing, so it makes sense they would expand upon that.

Because while the world isn't just America, it includes America and it isn't uniquely American either. Millions of people all over the world love oval racing, and right now if they want to simrace on a decent variety of ovals they only have one choice. I want that to change as that's not good for the simracing landscape as a whole.

First off the logic you used before can be applied to this. Not that many people outside of Brazil care about Chevy Montana, Brazilian Stockcars, etc. Infact I'd bet a decent chunk of change that more people in Europe care about NASCAR than Brazilian Stockcars just because NASCAR has had much more exposure.

Secondly I AGREE!!!!!!! historic content is why I have AMS 2. The main thing I suggested for AMS 2 is just what you said, an expansion of historical content. Iracing has zero historic content when it comes to tracks, that is a gap in their oval-plated armor. I want AMS 2 to aim for that gap.

Historically ovals are important. 1/3rd of the motorsports triple crown is on an oval. It may be a mainly American thing but this does not mean there is anything unique about ovals that makes them appealing to Americans. The difference in global popularity has more to do with time zones and very few international races more than anything else. Without oval racing the story of motorsports wouldn't be the same. The first ever purpose built racetrack in the world (Aspendale Racecourse) was an oval. Ovals have earned the right to be more than just a gimmick in modern racing sims

 

I've to agree.

AMS2 doesn't do well AI neither MP, so there isn't really much racing to do.

I found those iRacing stats on a random MMO site tracker, since Steam Charts do not represent iRacing population at all. I've no idea if those numbers are close to the real figure or not. But lets just take 1/5 of it as being real, it is still above the rest.

With that said, it still baffles me that you think iRacing doesn't thrive over rF2, AMS2, ACC... The game is definitely the most popular sim out there, and all the revenue they get from their (****ty) paywall must be a only a distant dream for all other sim makers.

I believe this forum is too biased towards AMS2, which is natural given it is the official forum for the game, but we should always try to be as neutral as possible.

Finally, I think Steam Charts counts users running the game and not only if they are racing online... so unless you cut off the internet from your rig, even if you are racing against the AI in AMS2 you are being accounted for in those AMS2 stats.

The question is, how do other sims take a bite off of that market share? Differentiation of the other sims do not seem to bite too much. Direct competition is almost impossible without huge upfront costs. iRacing is a cash cow that no other sim in the market seem to know how to "take down".

 

(EU guy here) IMO Ovals aren’t the best for racing and are boring to drive. Most of my friends don’t watch oval racing due to those reasons. There is a European NASCAR series, but I don’t know how many watch it.
People I know only know of IMS due to the triple crown and the Indy 500. Ovals are an American thing and to appeal to EU, Reiza should add more small European tracks.

 

Just because they aren't for you doesn't mean they should be excluded, and you shouldn't have brought up Euro NASCAR because they don't run on ANY ovals and thus are irrelevant to this discussion.

I only know one person decently enough who cares about F1 IRL. And know zero people who care about Indycar and IMSA IRL. All that is saying is that it isn't widely popular, which is 100% true and something I've never denied. It's about exposure and keeping good faith, I thought all circuit racing was boring until one fateful day in 2019 which made me realize that F1 could be entertaining. I feel like a lot of Europeans (not including you of course) could use this approach to oval racing.

 

I was just like you. "Oval racing is boring af". Then I joined a league and found that IndyCar is a hell lot of fun on ovals.

I still do prefer road racing, but ovals definitely can provide loads of fun.

 

I’m not saying can’t bring good moments, but the reputation of oval racing, from my experience, isn’t the best here

 

I’m not saying it should be excludes, but other types of racing could bring in a bigger player base

 

let's look at some stats, we're going to compare the average viewership of the BTCC's season closer in 2017 vs the average viewership of NASCAR's that same year. The BTCC on average had 189K viewers while NASCAR had an average of 4.7M viewers. Important context to add is that NASCAR's popularity was nosediving in 2017 (and since has stabilized and started to recover) and the BTCC's viewership was up from the previous years race. Let's add the final oval race for indycar, which averaged at 359K viewers. It seems very obvious that NASCAR and INDYCAR on ovals have a larger audience than the most well known touring car championship in the world.

This doesn't mean I'm against adding more smaller tracks in Europe, but when it comes to potential playerbase judging by these numbers it just doesn't seem like what you're saying would pan out

 

Technically the biggest rise in AMS2 popularity subsequently came when ovals were introduced to the sim. Obviously it was coincided with 1.4, but adding ovals was one of the major draws for the update.

 

First of all, I agree with a lot of things all of you said. AMS2’s big strength compared to other sims is the historic content not only in cars but tracks as well, because driving a 70s F1 car at a modern Spielberg, Silverstone, Nordschleife and so on is not the same as doing that on proper historic versions of those tracks. For now that almost only applies to Formula One cars and tracks and I agree that it would be a big chance for AMS2 to expand on that and give us classic American (oval) content as well. Though, there was a lot of Racing USA lately so I am also happy if we first get some different content (not just European but more Japanese or Australian cars and tracks would be great as well. Oh and us not having a French track yet is almost a crime. So many great (historic) tracks and none of them are in the game yet. But Renato already teased that this might change soon.

I just wanted to add here that the comparison between the BTCC and Nascar doesn’t work for me. Nascar and Indycar while still mostly being a national series are way more unique than the BTCC. The BTCC has more competition with other Touring Car series so that naturally they have to share their viewership with WTCR, DTM (now sadly yet another GT3 series…) and I think they even have to compete against all of the thousand different GT racing series in Europe alone. And let’s not forget that the UK is a little bit smaller than the US/North America.

 

Yes its true, just look whats happened to Rfcator 2 since LFM took the sim onboard, its the biggest thing to happen to it since relasing the Nords!

 

You sure? Was way more in the beginning of 2022.
rFactor 2 - Steam Charts

 

Is anyone else having problems with the Chevrolet Omega Stock Car? In the latest build the game crashes to desktop (with a bugsplat report) everytime I try to load the car (on any track). I've tried verifying local files in Steam but still getting the problem. All of the other car and track combos are okay.

 

Welcome to this forum, ChrisP
There is an official bug report thread: Bug Reports - Automobilista 2 (Read the Opening Post), and the bug has already been reported there:

 

It was reported several times and it is a known bug. Will be fixed with next update.
Right now, these cars unfortunately only work on oval tracks.

 

True, but look at the jump in numbers when LFM started using RF2 around October in terms of peak players, plus LFM is'nt known to everyone. I think once that site becomes synonymous with RF2 (like it is with ACC), its only gunna grow

 

LFM gave it a bump, which has not been sustained. This is the same as when other games get content or feature updates like the UI update for RF2 earlier this year. The only games that significantly grew their player bases and maintained that level were the Kunos ones and Beam NG. ACC had a bad start, which many have forgotten.

I don´t expect AMS2 to ever be more than a niche game because there are too many niche games cannibalising the market and we can´t play all of them at the same time, but provided it is profitable for Reiza and the game is supported and has a minimal online player base, it doesn´t matter.

In 2024 we get Rennsport and AC2, so that will further divide the player base and may make AC and ACC players migrate, provided the modding element is kept.

 

I cannot think of anything making AC users massively migrate, as they immensely enjoy their obscure and ghetto mods only available there. AC is the bane of other sims (including upcoming AC2) and it will keep that way for a while, maybe until the end of this century. A bit like simrally people still massively playing RBR, a sim from 2006, considering nothing will ever top it.

 

Steam charts are not counting players running the beta, although it would probably not add that much to the count. When there is a beta, I only run the beta (since I do not do MP). And I believe some beta users always run the beta because of disk space constraints.

 

I am European and I will say ovals produce the closest racing. I am a track/circuit racer mainly, but ovals do actually provide closer racing than any circuit will.
I race a GT league on ACC and myself and my league buddies have on occasion jumped into a AMS2 indycar/oval race for fun. Ovals, tracks, squares, triangles....if it has wheels and an engine, it shall be raced.