2022 Q2 Release Candidate rFactor 2 Update Includes New Sound Engine, Weather Re-Work And Lots More

Studio 397 switched to a quarterly update schedule at the beginning of the year. This release candidate will be their second major update of the year, and includes a whole new sound engine, new Shift Protection, Engine and Brake Cooling features, a complete wet weather re-work and more. You can read more at their Web site, watch the update trailer (below), or read the changelog below that.

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Here is the very nice looking changelog:

Client 8551968
Dedi 8551974
General

Updated Safety Car added to Retail and ModDev. Old Safety Car removed.
Added a visual driving line feature, this can be toggled from settings
Removed texture cache to simplify loading a bit
Added an option to set the amount of water on roads at the start of a session.
Increased the rate of RealRoad calculations by approximately x4.
Added a server option to disable faster real road calculations, as this adds approximately an extra 4KBps per client to server overheads.
Minor update to default weather conditions for different profiles (Rainy/Overcast/Sunny etc)
Updated how road and rain conditions are reported. Old percentage values now snap to a set percent for each tyre of condition, masking the true absolute condition in the game. The Default HUD has been updated to show a text description.
Corrected Rear Flap System default wet weather disable point to work with new weather ranges.
Fixed an issue where Cameras constrained to specific paths would not work correctly in replays.
Extended Freelook mode to allow control via joypads as well as adjustments of exposure, aperture, sensor size and focus.

Graphics

Decreased interval of Static Mapper updates from 5 minutes to 10 seconds. This should result in smoother lighting changes at dawn / dusk and as weather conditions change.
Corrected Sky Colour to remove Cyan Effect
Slight adjustments to exposure for sky colour adjustments when sun at it’s highest.
Minor Atmospheric Corrections, including linking AirMass to AirPollution,
Reducing Fog Brightness Slightly
Reduced Exposure a touch when the sun is around 10 degrees of altitude.
Improved cloud selection at different weather settings
Minor cloud texture improvements
Fixed an issue where Clouds would disappear at really high altitudes
Fixed issues with lighting interpolation in sky rendering at Dusk/Sunrise, which would result in jumps in lighting values.
Fixed puddle splashes not setting when rain drops are not used (set to off or scene viewer)
Fixed lighting on spray during wet conditions, and tweaked particle profile
Updated reflections on PBR Road and Curb Shaders
Updated Rain Particle settings and fixed rendering on ultrawide screens
Passed through particle settings refining Spray, Dust, Smoke and more.
Fixed an issue in VR where the scene would over exposure
Fixed an issue in VR where replay mode would not render correctly
Driver labels now work in VR
Sparks!
New behaviour archetype concept in the rF2Particles.pcd file.
New sparks archetype that brings:
Particle movement and camera movement based motion blur that can be clamped to a target camera refresh rate (shutter speed)
Movement behaviour based on airflow estimations around the car.
Terrain and car underbody collisions.
Additional light emission from particle.
New sparks particle effect that gets activated when undertray points of the car scrapes on the ground.
Backwards compatibility with existing cars and tracks.

Physics

Implemented enhanced cooling system for oil & water with new parameters in the .hdv file The new model includes:
Direct heat transfer between water and oil
Oil radiator
Switchover Thermostat
Separated front and rear brake ducts
Added configurable gear shift protection
New algorithm for wet road calculations effecting how quickly surfaces get wet and dry, taking into account drainage, humidity, ambient temperature and sky weather conditions.
Updated tyre grip calculations on rubbered in areas when surfaces are wet

AI

Added AI Dry Tyre strategy (Random Dry Tyre in Practice, Softs in Qualifying and try to pick an appropriate tyre for race strategy in race)
AI now check if to change Tyre Type just before the pit road entry rather than at the start of the lap
Fixed various issues around AI Tyre Selection when session changes and weather changes – such as not switching to wet tyres when it was dry before but now is wet.
Fixed an issue with calculating road conditions when changing session where they would not fully compute.
Fixed an issue where cars that don’t allow pit stop refuelling would run a full tank in practice and qualifying
Prevent AI from leaving pits in closed session
Fixed an issue where if there was a set of valid wet tyres, intermediate tyres would default to dry tyres.

UI

Always show official sticky servers in the server list even if filters are active.
Enabled “Restart warmup” button also when event is in race session.
Updated button layout in session controls and setup summary.
Added fading out of screen when leaving event or replay.
Added condensing of tire name when too long to fit in event standings table.
Added help text when hovering over various settings
Added music to showroom
Changed breaking of long chat lines so they only break on full words
Fixed getting stuck in assign control pop-up after assigning tab key
Disabled user text selection everywhere except in text fields
Added highlighting of assigned control key values when hovering over with mouse
Improved transition between different profiles in graphics and gameplay settings menus
Refined styling of car classes in event screen
Refined styling of car classes in fullscreen standings ticker
Disabled “Default max wheel angle” setting when “Max wheel angle mode” is set to automatic
Disabled “Steering wheel range” setting when “Range set by vehicle” setting is enabled
Hid the car selection list when the drive/spectate pop-up is showing when joining a server directly with a join link
Changed searching for cars and tracks so that the list scroll position is kept at the top after search (clearing the search text will scroll to the selected item)
Enabled car selection on server during a practice session
Made it possible to add multiple custom graphics profiles
Made it possible to add multiple custom gameplay difficulty profiles
Always sort “All Tracks & Cars” to the top of the list in singleplayer series selection
Added fallback image for showcase tile in case the actual image cannot be loaded
Updated showcase, news and store tiles background image positioning and scaling
Added option to expand server chat window to full height
Setup notes for the highlighted setup (the one you clicked on in the setup list but not yet loaded) are now shown on the setup summary page
Setup notes can now be typed in the setup summary page (the setup still has to be saved to save the changes)
When saving a setup, the folder for the current track will be selected by default (instead of the folder of the loaded setup)
Removed automatically expanding all found items in car and track selection after search
Added highlighting of selected opponent filters
Fixed multiplayer screen with drive/spectate pop-up showing too soon when using +connect to join a server, and if and when content install is still in progress
You can now select car upgrades directly from the car selection screen without going to the showroom (both in singleplayer and multiplayer)
Disabled singleplayer grid position setting if qualifying is enabled
Added two new gearbox graphs:
Top speed per gear
RPM after upshift
The existing graph, gear spacing, is kept as a third option
Fixed occasional blank page in the first launch wizard when going to the exit screen and back
Reordered difficulty settings and sliders
Singleplayer RealRoad settings are now enabled only when the weather preset is set to “Scripted”
Renamed “Steering effects strength” setting to “Force feedback direction”
Singleplayer “Race Laps” and “Race Time” settings are now disabled/enabled based on the “Finish Criteria” setting
A singleplayer session can now also be enabled by clicking on the disabled session button in quick event

Modding

Added IBL Visualizer Debug tool to Scene Viewer (already present in ModDev)
Added Texture UV Mip Debug tool to Scene Viewer (already present in ModDev)
Added AI Vocal Strategy Player File debug option for Mod Dev (Pit Strategies, Tyre Changes and when selected what they are doing – can be expanded in future).
Fixed overcast preview mode (note: this is not exactly the same as in game)
Updated sample wet masks at Loch Drummond

Sound

New 3D Sound Engine
Increased amount of simultaneous effects to 256
Environmental effects and filtering system
Proper cockpit filtering
Autodetection of open and closed cockpits for environment effects and filtering
Sound effects such as skid, kerbs, gravel, wind, suspension and many more now work online and in replays
Support for full surround sound setups
HRTF support (Binaural headphone experience)
Improved VR experience
Backwards compatible
Many new sound effects
Support for trackside broadcast microphones
Every car now causes audible ambient noise around the whole track
Brand new, modern, customisable file format with much more freedom for audio designers
Improved debugging tools for dev mode

Formula Pro V0.93

Added TEST version which includes shift protection, push to pass, and engine cooling and brake duct cooling split

Dallara IR-18 V0.93

Added TEST version which includes shift protection, engine cooling and brake duct cooling split

A couple of hotfixes have also been released:

Client 8558551
Dedi 8558556
– Fixed AI not having fuel in some circumstances at the start of races.
– Fixed default camera profiles for Freelook
– Added Moza Controller Profiles

Oreca 07 0.93
– Added audio compatible with new sound engine