GeneRally 2 News

This is our major Early Access update for July. It includes a variety of new game features, including support for importing tracks from GeneRally 1.

PLEASE NOTE: The quality of imported GeneRally 1 tracks varies depending on a variety of factors including object count and usage, track design, land-map style, etc. In many cases, importing the track into the Track Editor and making suitable upgrades will be the best path forward!

• Added support for loading GeneRally 1 tracks directly in-game, for play with 1-6 players (please note, tracks imported from GR1 will vary in quality, depending on a variety of factors).
  
• Adjusted the friction of soft walls to make them more friendly.
  
• Improved how the AI navigate to pit boxes.
  
• Updated all default tracks to make use of the new objects and camera settings.
  
• Implemented a zoomed "follow camera", with customisable distance, to assist users with vision problems.
  
• Improved the steering behaviour of the Formula.
  
• FIXED: Cars should no longer bounce weirdly when landing.

• Reworked the visual appearance of the in-game UI - offering two themes ("Light" and "Dark", selectable in the Options menu).
  
• Added a "finished" flag to each driver that has crossed the line for the final time.
  
• Added last lap, and fastest lap to each driver block.
  
• Driver blocks now only show for players, not AI.
  
• Improved the performance of the in-race UI in general.
  
• When adding a driver to a race, it will use the same car type as the previous driver in the list.
  
• Added localisation support, initially supporting: English, Finnish, Spanish, Portuguese and Turkish.
  
• FIXED: Lapped cars crossing the finish line at the end of the race no longer have an incorrect position.

• Added support for importing GeneRally 1 tracks into the Editor.
  
• Added a new "object variant" system, which allows for objects to have various, selectable appearances.
  
• Reworked the object selection menu to be more compact and easy-to-navigate.
  
• Updated the model for the Gate (and renamed it to Gantry).
  
• Updated the model for the House (base colour adjustment).
  
• Updated the models for the Flat Bridge and Humped Bridge.
  
• Added a new object, "Gate".
  
• Added a new object, "Ramp".
  
• Added a new object, "Hay Bale (Round)" in two orientations.
  
• Added variants for the following objects: all office blocks; sunk tyre; pedestrian bridge; road cone; soft wall; traffic sign; house; flat bridge; humped bridge; hay bale (round).
  
• Added a new track property: "camera height".
  
• FIXED: The person object no longer has a large selection radius that makes it difficult to select nearby objects.

• The main menu sometimes experiences distortions or other rendering issues - changing resolution, or restarting the game may rectify the issue.
  
• Shadows may flicker on certain systems when using the follow camera mode. This will be rectified in a future patch.
  
• Some text in some places may not be localised.
  
• Occasionally, when in Windowed mode, changing the language multiple times in quick succession can shrink the game window.

The team has been hard at work on our July update. As part of launching into Early Access,
we said we'd be making one major update per month and this post is to tell you a bit
about what you can expect from July.



Please keep in mind that everything in this post is subject to change - we may find
a bug or problem that prevents us from including certain features - but this is the broad
set of things we're hoping to include.


The in-game UI has been completely overhauled to provide a solid base for in-game UI updates
going forward. There is now a live-updated leaderboard, as well as laptime and car condition
information for each player in the race. Oh, and you can change between "dark mode" (default)
and "light mode" in the options menu!



We'll be making further improvements and additions to the in-game UI as we go forward.


You read right - GR1 track importing is coming to GeneRally 2 with the July Update. Here you
can see a couple of examples of GR1 tracks being played directly (with no modifications) in
GeneRally 2.

Thanks to Crowella and TuomoH for providing these tracks!

Obviously, importing tracks is far from perfect - and there will be some tracks that don't
import as well as others - but this should give users the basis for updating and upgrading
tracks from GR1 to GR2!


One of the features we're excited to introduce is the "Object Variant" system. This is,
to put it simply, a quick way for you to change the appearance of an object. We'll be adding
variants to many of the current in-game objects - and we'll start by adding some in the July
update already!

Typically, an "object variant" is a version of an object that differs mostly only visually.
In the most basic case, this could be different colour versions of an object (for example the
soft wall) - or it could be something more comprehensive, like a different building style.

Just some of the upcoming object variants.


It's not news to current players that the AI drivers have some gaps in their skill-set.
At the moment they are most obviously challenged by the concept of the pit area, including both
entering the pitlane and navigating around pit area without crashing into the other cars.

The July update will include some improvements to the way AI drivers route to the pitlane and
to individual pitboxes, to help with these issues.


Along with the update, we'll be implementing localisation support. At launch, this will
be limited to only one or two additional languages (as translating all the game's text
to other languages takes time) - but more will be added in smaller patches over the coming
weeks and months.

We hope that this will allow more people to enjoy GeneRally 2. If you want to help us in
translating GeneRally 2 into your native language, please get in touch with us!


Of course, as with any update, we'll be fixing some bugs and implementing some small new
features as we go along - expect to find out more about them when the update goes live.


At the start of Early Access, we said that our intention was to bring new tracks and cars
with each major update. Due to the huge amount of feedback we've been receiving about the
AI and car physics, we've chosen to focus on getting the current cars and AI to a stable
state before adding more into the mix. The planned cars and tracks will arrive in a future
update instead.


We're planning to get the July Update into your hands in the first couple of weeks of July.
Stay tuned for a more specific release date!

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If you want to support us and the game's ongoing development, and purchase GeneRally 2 in Early Access, you can find our Steam Store page here.

If you've already purchased and would like to help us out, please consider leaving a review for GeneRally 2 on Steam!

This update is aimed at fixing a few of the issues present with the previous update - as well as adding a few minor improvements to AI pitting logic.

Changes:

• Made a small optimisation change to (hopefully) improve performance on older machines.
  
• Made a change to how the AI slow down to handle pit-lane and pit-box entry.
  
• FIXED: Invisible walls no longer show in races.
  
• FIXED: AI will no longer try to find pit-crews themselves, if a pit AI line is present.
  
• FIXED: Hedges no longer render incorrectly.
  

This update is primarily aimed at addressing performance issues, but also includes a variety of smaller feature updates. Please let us know if you encounter issues!

Please note: this update is not our monthly major update, that will be coming at the start of July. We'll have a blog post about what's coming in the update, soon!

• Improved the visualisation of slopes and height changes - height differences should be easier to "read" now.
  
• Optimised many aspects of the track loading procedure to improve load times.
  
• Optimised mesh-generation in-game to improve performance.
  
• Optimised how the people dodge cars, to improve performance.
  
• Added more details to the Formula car's textures to bring it in line with the other cars.
  
• Multiple physics tweaks to all cars to improve handling feeling.
  
• Improved how cars behave when tyres lose contact with the road surface.
  
• Adjusted gravity :)
  
• Added a slipstreaming effect.
  
• Pitcrews will now attempt to avoid vehicles!
  
• Improved the AI logic relating to pitstops (in multiple ways - more improvements coming).
  
• Slightly randomised the AI skill when adding a new AI driver.
  
• Small updates to Beachville track to improve driveability.
  
• 200% render scale no longer available, due to an underlying Unity engine issue.
  
• FIXED: Ghost car no longer remains visible after a race restart.
  
• FIXED: Reversing is no longer broken when coasting backwards.
  
• FIXED: A crowd of people can no longer throw a car into the air.
  
• FIXED: AI should no longer ignore the first AI node at the start of a race.
  

• Silenced engine sounds when the game is paused.
  
• Silenced engine sounds when loading/restarting a track.
  

• FIXED: Damage and tyre wear bars can no longer exceed the maximum value.
  
• FIXED: Pressing "refresh" in the Workshop list, no longer resets your tag selection.
  

• FIXED: Objects no longer float when importing a height map from file.
  
• FIXED: The colour map on exported land maps no longer references "Oil".
  
• FIXED: StreetCircuit type tracks can now be saved and uploaded correctly.
  

• Performance optimizations for AI and physics.
  
• Added landmap and heightmap import/export.
  
• Added Ctrl+S shortcut for the track editor.
  

Note: Because the heightmap resolution in the editor is higher
than the PNG image format can support, some detail will be lost during export.
See this page in the manual