Latest Roadmap Update - December 2020

Discussion in 'News & Notifications' started by Paul Jeffrey, Dec 31, 2020.

  1. Paul Jeffrey

    Paul Jeffrey

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    The latest (and final for 2020) Development Roadmap update has been released!

    Read all about it here: https://www.studio-397.com/2020/12/roadmap-update-december-2020/

    Once again, thank you to our community for your continued support throughout 2020, it has been a wild ride, and we look forward to even bigger and better things in the New Year.

    roadmap_december_2020_wp_header.png
     
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  2. Alexandre Martini

    Alexandre Martini Registered

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    what a great year for rfactor 2, indeed!

    keep it up, guys!
     
  3. pkelly

    pkelly Registered

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    Great year end wrap-up, Paul. S397 gang continue to innovate and surprise. Thank you. Stay safe and looking forward to a better 2021. Bravo.
     
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  4. David O'Reilly

    David O'Reilly Registered

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    Thanks for a comprehensive wrap up of the year for RFactor2.
    Well done on all the work, LeMans was EPIC!
    See you on the other side.
    Happy New Year.
     
  5. pilAUTO

    pilAUTO Registered

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    What was achieved in 2020 has been well explained, the past, very well.

    Virtually no information on the future.

    For example on the content to come, on what you privileged to update, and a lot of other things.

    I read a wall of text because I like rF2, but I hardly keep anything.
     
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  6. John R Denman

    John R Denman Registered

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    Good progress this year despite the challenges thanks for all the efforts and achievements!
    Hopefully the new UI will continue to progress to where all the original features are functional as well as the new features. I'll keep a backup copy of the old UI (along with entire content) handy just in case.
     
  7. Emery

    Emery Registered

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    The hints are there. Concentrating on the competition system rollout and content updates.

    "Fear not dear sim racers, further track and vehicle updates will be coming on a reasonably regular basis next year, as we continue to work hard to bring all the content within rFactor 2 up to the quality levels deserving of this racing simulation."

    Some new content has been teased already, but I think S397 prefers to be coy about it for awhile longer so they have something to announce in 2021.
     
  8. MarcG

    MarcG Registered

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    Lovely Roadmap Look back on what has been an unprecedented year for Gaming & Sim Racing in general, not every Roadmap has to be the same so it's a nice fresh change, I mean it's not like S397 have NOTHING planned for 2021 is it?!

    Anyway, cheers S397 & RF2 Fans, see'ya on track 2021
     
  9. lagg

    lagg Registered

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    Thank you very much S397.
    Happy new year to all.:)
     
  10. Binny

    Binny Guest

    very nice update and nice to see they showed what they did in 2020, would love to see a similar road map outlining maybe what they intend to do for 2021 in the January road map. happy new yr
     
  11. pilAUTO

    pilAUTO Registered

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    What is it about ?
     
  12. Adrianstealth

    Adrianstealth Registered

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    Great keeping an eye on the good progress of this ever increasingly brilliant sim
    Happy new year to s397 & the community !
    ( & the ISI team if they still read )
     
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  13. JRoque

    JRoque Registered

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    Hi all.

    I've nitpicked on this before but I'll throw it in again: a roadmap is colloquially forward-looking in nature - a forecast, if you will. Your roadmap announcements are titled for the last month while discussing both progress made so far and very much forward-looking plans. Why make your announcements appear instantly old by tagging them with last month's date?

    This roadmap that you just published is for last year, implying old news when it is most definitely, not. Someone in Marketing is not watching, I'm guessing, because it also misses the mark on that.

    With that bit of self-righteousness nitpicking done, congrats on the progress and happy new year!
     
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  14. Lazza

    Lazza Registered

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    The month in the roadmap is the month the roadmap came out; not sure which timezone you're in, but nearly every single roadmap has been released in the month it's posted here. The early ones actually came out just past halfway through the month (let's say 18th-20th), but then they migrated slowly to the very end of the month and now that's standard except for a rare exception.

    So, considering it's just saying what month it was released, the fact it's forward-looking means it doesn't really matter which month it was.

    How's that for nitpicking your nitpicking? :p
     
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  15. davehenrie

    davehenrie Registered

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    It was the end of the year.....holy jeez....never look back or you'll git nitpicked ta death. The fact they used an established publication to highlight the past year is a crime? Does this mean, since there WAS no forward looking content, that nothing is coming out next year? Oh I have the VAPORS!
     
  16. Lazza

    Lazza Registered

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    @davehenrie I've said it before and I may say it again - you read that wrong.
     
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  17. davehenrie

    davehenrie Registered

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    I wasn't responding to just one post. Although some of my text could have been rather specific. I have been rather crabby lately, that may be coloring my responses.
     
  18. Lazza

    Lazza Registered

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    I just assumed if you were answering any of the earlier ones you would have done it in the day since they were all sitting there, rather than 5 mins after I replied to a post. That's my assumption, sorry. You could probably make it clearer though, but ah well :p
     
  19. burgesjl

    burgesjl Registered

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    Well here's my summary of the last 2020 Roadmap.
    Highlight of the year was without doubt the LeMans 24 Virtual. A very professional presentation, I enjoyed watching it, and there were times you really had to shake your head an marvel that what you were seeing was not actual real life racing cars on screen. Adding Ferrari a mere few weeks before the event must have been a fraught time.
    Having said which, I can't be the only one amazed it went off as it did with the glitches only temporarily impacting the event; it was frankly a miracle. There seems to be a belief these have been fixed; I have my doubts, especially some of the ones where individual drivers had issues during simple driving. Whilst the graphics looked highly believable in most cases, there were some clear areas where it didn't: cars going over curbs especially. I think the 'fidelity' of this is basically determined by the replay system, and it seems to 'interpolate' based on AI physics in some instances. Cars would launch off the curbs just like the AI cars do in most cases. In fact, if it is related to the replay system, this is the part of the sim most in need of a major overhaul, after the AI control issues (on/off throttle and brake especially, conga-line no overtakes). I have regular replay glitches and outright sim crashes with in-session replays, all the worse on the new UI.
    In terms of future events, I can see a greater likelihood of Formula E coming to the fore. FE itself will be facing some challenges as the manufacturers bail before the Gen3 cars. This is also true of GTE in endurance racing, and we await the LMH/LMDh transition in prototypes in the next couple of years, which should result in a renaissance there. S397 would seem to be well positioned for that with relationships now with 2 LMP2 chassis builders, DPi/LMP2/LMP3 teams, Porsche etc. Hopefully there is another chance to do an LM24Virtual.
    As for the other eSports events, frankly they didn't do much for me, cool as it was to have some former F1/IndyCar champions take part; the events I watched on TV for those was frankly awful. And the infrastructure just wasn't properly there for "regular joe" competitions either, BMW M2 and GTE series for instance.
    So that's the million-dollar question for 2021; the new UI and Competition System progress beyond the one-offs. Frankly neither one is anywhere near as developed as it needs to be; and I have to conclude resources had been pulled off this to support the aforementioned eSports stuff opportunities during the pandemic. The 2 existing competitions - Tatuus and GTE - show the lack of progress. For example, at time of writing Tatuus is at Silverstone; which layout? There's so little information to be gleaned, it feels pointless to sign up. Results are so sparse as to be almost non-existent. What is currently displayed? I couldn't even explain it. Having the process for sign-ups and usage as part of the Roadmap is the wrong way to go about it. This barely even qualifies as a public beta at this stage. So for 2021, there's a whole lot of work to be done on this to be made viable.
    Meanwhile there are still major issues in the sim code itself. Broadcast overlays are all well and good, but the content (cars), physics, and vehicle dynamics all need much more polish and consistency. I'm not sure there is any development plan for this.
    Other than FE tracks, we got basically one road course done by the core team last year (Spa). It's just not nearly enough. There's probably only about 5 tracks of consistent quality that can be used for eSports events (broadcast) or even internal/regular user high quality events or series.
    In short, though there were triumphs this last year, I don't get the sense they are repeatable without similar levels of commitment from the staff for one-off situations. That can't keep on happening. The people are the glue when the systems are inadequate.
    2021: the work is never ending, and the pace of development required isn't keeping up with expectations and opportunities. I don't envy anyone at S397, and best of luck navigating this.
     
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  20. Flatspotter

    Flatspotter Registered

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    I totally agree with this nitpicking! The roadmap tells what's going to happen in the next month, so it should be called by that month. The next road map that comes out should be called the February roadmap. Of course, it's too late to switch to that nomenclature now, because everyone would freak out about missing the January roadmap and since this is the internet, there would be lots of conspiracy theories about the "missing" roadmap. :D
     

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