Earn Your Turns! My Review.

[Tracker_168]

Edit: After putting more hours into this game, here are some more thoughts.

1) Its f-ing awesome! Super fun and challenging once you start pushing the pace. Its a game you really have to put hours into to get pace and find the limits. The game does not reward you unless you are really getting to the limits of the grip.

2) The default set ups are very safe and stable. I think this is partly where the complaints come from regarding its too grippy and forgiving. In every car, I adjust the springs and dampers and sometimes the diffs. So far I have not needed to use any extreme settings, usually just 1-2 clicks from the default. However, it makes a noticeable difference in how the car handles. I have played games where I am not sure if tuning the set up,made any noticeable difference. In this game, it does and that is awesome.

For the Rally 1 cars, in the very least, I reduce slow rebound 1-2 clicks which makes the back end more responsive to brake induced rotation. I usually soften the springs 1 click as well and increase ride height by 0.5-1cm. For gravel stages.

3) For some reason, the default brake and handbrake set up is really weak. I usually dial it to at least 75% of the max on the slider for both. I think this is partly where my criticism of the forgiving brake physics comes from in my initial post. Before I just mash the brake as hard as possible and the front tires never seemed to lock up. Now with the higher brake force settings in the car set up, I feel like I have more ability to modulate the brakes, even to the point of lock up now. I still feel the traction under braking could be a bit better programmed, maybe like 5% lower threshhold before lock up would be nice.

4) To loosely compare how the game "feels" to what real rally 1 cars might drive like. I looked at Kalle Rovanpera's Estonia onboard again and focused on how he turned the steering wheel, how much counter-steer, how quickly he counter-steers and how long he countersteers for (my observation was he uses quick jabs of opposite lock to about 90 deg) to catch a slide. I then did a time trial on Estonia. Initially, I didnt think driving with his steering style really suited the car. But with some set up changes, I was able to more closely replicate his style; Now this is not exactly the most scientific test but it was cool to see the game be able to respond to set up changes and allow me to get the car to rotate more sharply; thus requiring the sharp assertive counter-steers. And it felt natural in the game.

Anyway, the biggest finding after putting more hours is that car set up matters.

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My review of EA WRC. For those who are on the fence about buying this game, here are my impressions.

Unless you are a lucky IRL rally driver, we all come to this game with pre-conceived notions of "How a rally car should feel" and we are probably wrong in some or many aspects of this notion. I include myself in this casual not-real rally driver group but I have had some experience with real rally-prepped cars that I use to judge rally games. But these are my thoughts nonetheless.

As background of my experience in where these impressions are based, I have been a big rally fan since the 1990s, watching broadcasts on SpeedVision at 3AM. I am not a rally driver but have had the fortune of doing a couple 3-day driving schools at IRL Dirtfish (highly recommended!!!). I play rally games using the same techniques learned from attending those schools and how a game responds to those inputs is largely how I judge the driving physics.

I loved DR1 when it came out, played WRC7 a bit afterwards, then DR2, never really played WRCGen as I think is broken and RBR-rsf for the last year. I play using a a Simucube base, 350mm round wheel, HE sprint pedals, Seq shifter and loadcell handbrake.

I think EA WRC is awesome but its not a hardcore punch you in the face Sim either, mostly because of really forgiving braking physics. However, the more I play it, the more fun I am having as I grasp the handling physics of the game more. I think the developers took many of the complaints about DR2 and made them better. If you come into this game hoping it will drive like DR2, WRC Gen, RBR, or how your street car handles in the snow, then you will be disappointed, it drives its own way and IMO a way that is more towards realism compared to DR2.

There are multiple complaints that this game is to arcadey or had too much grip. Yes and No. If you separate the grip into different parts of the driving dynamics, some aspects are overpowered and others parts, I think EA WRC does better than any other game, including RBR!

The good first. I think this game simulates what a car does when sliding better than the other games. In particular, how much effort you have to put in to get the car to rotate AND how much resistance to sliding builds up once the car is sliding. I think we have this preconception that driving on gravel is like driving on ice. In Dirtfish, I remember the instructors telling us that the problem students have initially is that we are all too timid initially with the car and getting the weight transfer happening to rotate a car takes intent and (for lack of a better term) aggression. Cars do not want to rotate. You have to force it with a good amount of weight transfer to overcome the momentum of the mass of the car and overcome the friction in the tires. Once you do get the car to slide, there is also a resistance to that sliding. Your tires are now shovels pushing gravel to the side of the road, they dont just skip over the top of the road, unless you are on wet grass, ice or mud. This resistance is what I feel some people perceive as "stability control" in the game.

In DR2 and even RBR, there is a overall lack of lateral resistance to sliding, something I think even IRL rally drivers have commented about with RBR. The cars in DR2 and even RBR to an extent, rotate and slide really easy, you dont have to "Earn your Turns". It makes us feel like we are all Sebastian Loeb but not fully realistic. In EA WRC, getting the car to slide is not difficult, but it is harder than the other games, and it actually requires more thought to weight transfer. In the other games, I barely need to use Scandi-flicks/Pendulum turns to cause the necessary weight transfer to get the car to rotate, no matter the corner. It was done more as a party trick than necessity. For more acute slower corners in EA WRC, that technique is actually helpful.

Now the bad. I think the straight line braking in EA WRC in too overpowered and RBR does this aspect better. In RBR, I need to really think about slowing the car down into corners more. I feel in EA WRC you can brake really late. Maybe I'm just braking too early still in the game but it seems like there is a large margin of error with the braking. Its not on railroad tracks, but the braking make the driving more forgiving There's less risk of those "Oh s*** I overcooked this corner" moments.

The more I play EA WRC the more fun I have and Ive just started. I have been driving WRC2 mostly, doing quick races. I have tried Rally 1 cars and a few of the H3 RWD cars but not enough to really comment on them.

As for other aspects of the game, the graphics are good. I would not say its a big leap ahead from DR2 but I'm okay with that. I run mostly med-high settings with a 5900x/3080Ti system and get 120-130fps consistently. The stuttering issue all but disappeared after 2 days of playing. Sound is good, similar to DR2. One complaint I read is that the gravel sound should be louder. Personal preference but IRL, the sound of the car and wearing a helmet usually drowns out most other sounds. FFB is good but was a pain to set up. Im still fine tuning it to my liking.

The stages are amazing. How long have we been hoping and begging for longer stages. I did a 21km Sweden stage yesterday that had a bit of everything from twisty technical to flat out for 500m. DR2 never had that variety in one stage.

My greatest beef with the game is that the UI is bad. If you have a steering wheel that covers the bottom of the screen, be prepared to constantly look around the wheel to see the menu as its all at the bottom! Also, UI is not the most intuitive and requires a lot of clicking, confirming things. Im also hoping that the Devs keep their word that they are going to officially support telemetry.

Overall, especially for the price, I think this game has earned a spot beside RBR-rsf as my current favorite rally game/sim. They both are good in their own ways. I honestly cant say one is a better experience over the other right now.

Edit: Id also add that there are bugs with the game. Nothing that has really hindered my overall enjoyment but they are present. The livery editor is sometimes glitched. Replays have terrain popping in. The bloom issue, which some great ppl on this forum has found a fix. And I suspect but have not confirmed that there is some input lag when using cockpit view (the one with the steering wheel visible). Even if you set the Show wheel and hands to off, I did not feel as connected to the car. even if I try to replicate the dash view FOV. I felt like I had to make a lot of unexpected micro-corrections that I don't in dash view.

[Badjoe]

I agree with what you said, I have put quite a few hours into this game and it has been a smooth transition from DR2 which I had many hours in. I'd say this game is simply different, but it does have a very wide selection of tracks, vehicles and other features that makes it greater than some of the competitors.

It does feel more forgiving(especially with braking like you said), but that could also be me starting off with hundreds of hours of experience and also driving the highly advanced WRC2 cars.

I feel like a lot of people have strange complaints that are based on two things, what they believe is real while also having no real experience and also what is their favourite rally game, whether it is DR2, the previous WRC games or Burns. And that is then "how it should be". I have zero rally experience in real life so I have no clue what parts are less realistic. Overall I have certainly enjoyed the game so far. I just simply think it is a bit different, that's all.

[Some Call Me Tim]

That's just about the best review of WRC I've seen. I've also got a 3080Ti and again for me it's been running great at 4K and those micro stutters soon disapear once you've played a bit. Initially I really couldn't get on with the Tarmac handling after but some adjustmenets to the FFB settings it feels pretty good now, btw for me the magic was dropping both Tyre and Wheel Friction settings down to 5 which made a dramatic difference.I'm loving the variety and length of stages and number of differnet cars and overaqll it's just huge fun to play. Ok the menu's could be better, the water splash effect is tragiclly bad and maybe the road surfaces are a bit too uniform but so far I've only had one bug where the co-driver appears dead and his hand flops out of the door lol so it's a pretty good experience so far. I've not driven a rally car at full tilt through a forest so I can't comment on exactly how accurate the handling is but to me WRC makes me "feel" like I'm driving a rally car. I think some of the handling complaints people are making are due to thier FFB settings clouding their opinions and the default setups especially regarding diff settings could do with a bit of tweaking to make things feel a bit more natural. Overall for me though WRC is really exiting to drive and I'm just having a huge amount of fun.

[Calvin W]

Total agree, clearly an expert's saying.

[Tracker_168]

Originally posted by Some Call Me Tim:

That's just about the best review of WRC I've seen. I've also got a 3080Ti and again for me it's been running great at 4K and those micro stutters soon disapear once you've played a bit. Initially I really couldn't get on with the Tarmac handling after but some adjustmenets to the FFB settings it feels pretty good now, btw for me the magic was dropping both Tyre and Wheel Friction settings down to 5 which made a dramatic difference.I'm loving the variety and length of stages and number of differnet cars and overaqll it's just huge fun to play. Ok the menu's could be better, the water splash effect is tragiclly bad and maybe the road surfaces are a bit too uniform but so far I've only had one bug where the co-driver appears dead and his hand flops out of the door lol so it's a pretty good experience so far. I've not driven a rally car at full tilt through a forest so I can't comment on exactly how accurate the handling is but to me WRC makes me "feel" like I'm driving a rally car. I think some of the handling complaints people are making are due to thier FFB settings clouding their opinions and the default setups especially regarding diff settings could do with a bit of tweaking to make things feel a bit more natural. Overall for me though WRC is really exiting to drive and I'm just having a huge amount of fun.

I agree that FFB settings makes a huge difference. Even saying what settings you use does not help if the other person uses different hardware. And what feels good to one person feels off to others. I tried the FFB setting from one of the Youtube reviewers and it felt like the wheel was going to rip my hands off with the self-align torque. Even on my own settings, Im still trying to fine tune as even a difference of like +/- 10 on the sliders makes a car go from feeling good and intuitive to awkward and sometimes undrivable.

[Tracker_168]

Edited original post.