Eudemon

Porsche Pack Vol. 3 For Console Next week will see the release of Porsche Pack Volume 3 and update 1.12 on the PlayStation 4, but unfortunately Xbox One users will have to wait as the update “encountered some issues” on the platform. The final of the three Porsche Packs will deliver yet another quality selection of vehicles from the Porsche brand, both old and new. Modern racing machinery gets a big nod, with two 991 GT3 racers and the 2016 Le Mans-winning 919 Hybrid among the pack's contents. Classic racing isn't overlooked either thanks to the inclusion of the iconic 908 Lang-Heck (LH) and 917 K, which are both ready and willing to be let loose on the numerous circuits and roads of Assetto Corsa. Last and by certainly no means least, the pack contains two of the most sought after modern Porsches, the 911 R and a 911 Turbo S. PORSCHE PACK VOL. 3 DLC CARS Porsche 911 GT3 Cup 2017 Porsche 911 GT3 R 2016 Porsche 919 Hybrid 2016 Porsche 908 LH Porsche 917 K Porsche 911 R Porsche 911 Turbo S For those of you who remember the early days of when the car lists were revealed, you might be thinking ‘there’s something not quite right here?’. And you would be right, as the 911 RSR 2017 was meant to be included in this pack. However due to Kunos not feeling that the car was ready, they replaced it with the Turbo S with the promise to bring the RSR 2017 as a free upgrade to owners of the pack at a later date. It seems that they will be keeping to their word, as this promise has been repeated in the blog post announcing this pack. However, there is no mention as to when this could be. As with previous updates, the latest will bring another free Porsche to owners of the standard game, with the last of these being the Macan Turbo. UPDATE V 1.12 RELEASE NOTES Added support for DLC content: Porsche Pack #3 FREE bonus car! – Porsche Macan Turbo The damage and repair system has been improved. As a result, collisions will now appear more realistic Various 3D models have been tweaked and improved, including that of the cockpit instrumentation All-new special events 15 events for The Red Pack DLC 13 events for Porsche Pack Vol. 2 DLC 12 events for Porsche Pack Vol. 3 DLC [via Assetto Corsa blog]

Project CARS² After being teased by the numerous leaks and unofficial mutterings over the past few months, we are finally getting our first official look at Project CARS 2! ‘Difficult Second Album’ syndrome doesn’t seem to apply to pCARS2, with the trailer showing that it is improving on the high benchmark set by its predecessor. Other studios should be concerned with just how much Slightly Mad Studios are planning to include in this game, they are without a doubt living up to their name. The game will arrive sometime in late 2017 for PC, PS4 and Xbox One. The Trailer: In the video we are shown features such as day to night, fully dynamic weather including snow and icy conditions, and so many vehicles that it is clear pCARS2 will have much more than what the original offered. The accompanying info below the video states that there will be “over 170 licensed cars” and that it will have the “largest track roster ever on console” which is a huge increase over the pCARS1 inventory of vehicles and a strong statement to make in regards to the amount of circuits. Being a technical showcase, support for 12K and VR is also a given and no doubt will be shown in all its glory on some snazzy new Panasonic gear. (that deal is still in place right?) Because of fan feedback, eSports and player championships have also been given a boost and will see some excellent features ensuring that pCARS2 is the go-to game for those who want to run these events. A multitude of new locations can be seen, such as an ice circuit set within a snowy wilderness however the traditional tracks such as the Nurburgring and Brands Hatch are still present. Rest assured that the new Ice Circuit will push the traction of whatever you choose to drive to the limit! New vehicles are also a given, with the Aston Martin Vulcan, new Honda NSX and a green wheeled Ford F150 being a few examples highlighted in the trailer’s footage. And if rumours are true, Lamborghini, Porsche and Ferrari could make an appearance. Previously, it was easy to excuse Porsche due to the EA exclusivity agreement, but Lamborghini and Ferrari were sorely missed from the first game and so fingers crossed that pCARS2 remedies this. It is looking more promising for Porsche though as that stupid exclusivity deal is finally dead as of the end of last year. All in all this game is shaping up very nicely and appears even at this early stage to be deserving of its ‘Ultimate Driver Journey’ tagline. If they can nail all that they have already shown and keep the game running smoothly and stable with less of the bugs and problems that the first one occasionally suffered from, then they could very well smash the opposition. [gallery type=rectangular" link="file" size="seven-post-image" ids="6610,6611,6612,6613]

FH3: Playseat Car Pack Been a bit of a wait for the first Tuesday of the month to arrive as this is when a new slice of car pack DLC for Forza Horizon 3 tends to drop, and with this February having a whole 7 days before a Tuesday rolls around it has felt like this latest pack has taken its time a little, but it hasn't, it's actually right on time. The new Forza Horizon 3 Car Playseat Car Pack is out now and contains a collection of seven new vehicles, including the brand new Aston Martin DB11... aaaaaand a Vauxhall Corsa. A bit disappointing in a way this latest release in my opinion, considering what we saw being leaked with the whole unencrypted developer version mistake at the start of this year, but hey it’s a new car pack, and there will be players out there who will very much be feeling it. Forza Horizon 3 – Playseat Car Pack 2017 Aston Martin DB11 2016 Cadillac ATS-V 1985 Holden HDT VK Commodore Group A 2016 Honda Civic Type-R 1970 Honda S800 1990 Renault Alpine GTA Le Mans 2016 Vauxhall Corsa VXR [gallery type=rectangular" link="file" size="seven-post-image" ids="6585,6586,6587,6588,6589,6590,6591] The Playseat Car Pack is available to download now on PC (Windows 10), Xbox One and is free to those who own the Car Season Pass. [via Forzamotorsport.net]

GTR 3 Real SimBin and the GTR series of games are notorious in the sim-racing history books but despite their past glories there have been torrid times too. The history of SimBin is a fun one to read but what cannot be denied is that their games were some of the very best for racing simulation fans. For long time followers of the genre you may be thinking ‘GTR 3 is already in development is it not?’. Well yeah it was, I still have the GTR 3 announcement trailer on my Xbox 360 in fact, and we all remember that screenshot where they took a dig (‘threw shade’ for you kids out there) at Forza and Gran Turismo, but alas irony has a way of being pretty ironic, as the game seemed to go into hiding and experience a delay that Polyphony Digital would be proud of! Skipping forward only a short near to 5 years since we last heard anything, RaceDepartment has scooped that GTR 3 is on its way and that SimBin UK and Sector3 Studios (of RaceRoom Racing Experience fame), are in the process of creating the new instalment for a 2018 release. Unlike previous GTR titles which were PC only, GTR 3 will be coming to console too, on the PS4 and Xbox One. For so long console players have wanted a PC type of racing simulation on their side and now there seems to be a barrage of them consistently landing. It will also utilise the splendid Unreal 4 engine and so should be looking fine in the visuals area. Day to night transitions along with dynamic weather conditions have been confirmed too, with the tracks being prone to hazards such as aquaplaning. Puddles will pool and then gradually disappear as the cars move through the standing water or the weather improves due to the dynamic water control. Better damage modelling is another aspect that will be getting a substantial improvement with the new title, over the current system seen in RaceRoom. From the interview it does appear they view those on console as wanting less of a real experience than their PC counterparts, but here’s wishing they mean that the options will be there for them to do this, rather than the game being fundamentally set up this way on those platforms. "I think another point we need to take note of is, whilst the PC community would love this hard core simulation thing which is fine, as Allan said there is a console community that aren't going to fully adhere to that. The product at the end of the day needs to appeal to both sides, hardcore racer as awell and the casual gamer. – Chris Speed, Sector 3 CEO Take a look over at RD for the full interview and prepare for yet another incredible racing sim to vie for our affections. [via RaceDepartment]

Assetto Corsa Takes The Highlands Road A good amount of new images and a couple of videos of the still as of now unnamed fictional Scottish location heading to Assetto Corsa has been posted by teaser-pleaser, Marco Massarutto. The new selection of images that have appeared over the last few days gives a further look at the Highland town track that the Audi Quattro S1 rally car was also shown in at the end of last month. We don’t know how many of the four track layouts this area will feature in, but we can see that this part which is made up of cobbled streets and surrounded by homes is before the longish narrow high-speed section. [gallery type=rectangular" link="file" size="seven-post-image" ids="6574,6575,6576] Through only still images it is difficult to get a sense of how a course runs, and so thankfully, Massarutto has added some videos to his page. Rushing through at high-speed with a Ferrari 488 GTB, the small clip provides an idea of the challenges and thrills that can be expected at this point. var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_GB/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.8&appId=159301820896907"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); " data-width="auto" data-show-text="false"> Some classic racers were also visible in the images shared. The best view of the “Highlands” track was in the latest video where we see a much longer video of Massarutto threading the 488 GTB (he REALLLY likes this car) through the opposing racers, racing cleanly and speedily as he aims to make it from last place all the way to first. " data-width="auto" data-show-text="false"> With very little space to run off the road. The edges are littered with rocks sitting close to the painted white lines and there are objects dotted along that will cause your vehicle damage or even end your race. The new track is expected in “late February” and will be available as free bonus content for all platforms. Whether they will all get the content at the same time is something we will have to wait and see. Assetto Corsa is OUT NOW on PC (Steam), PS4 and Xbox One.

Happy 10th Birthday To The Duck Oh my gosh I can’t believe it, we bloody well made it to year number 10!! Wow! Where do I start with this one then? I think starting at the start would be a good start, so that’s where I’ll start. Before It All Back in 2005 a trailer for a game showed at E3, this game was Test Drive Unlimited and it hooked me almost straight away. With its massive environment, great cars, bikes! (and I’m not even a huge bike fan but it was something different) and a general feeling of being more about the drive than the race, here was a title I had been waiting a long time for. In the run up to the original release for Xbox 360 in September 2006 it was clear that this game was going to draw in a good crowd and that those people would be of a sort that would just get what this game allows. Well that happened and they were easy to spot as they all visited the official Atari community forums, of which I later became a moderator on because of my selfless promotion of the game… I mean my helpfulness to others was just that amazing. Over that time of being on these forums I came to meet many of the members from it in the game itself. This showed there was just so much potential for a dedicated community to the game and being that I was in fact a long time admin of the Forzacentral community, the idea of where to go in relation to a name was obvious. And so... Welcome to Test Drive Unlimited Central Funnily enough, I still remember writing the original ‘Welcome to TDU Central !!’ thread at 3AM in the morning, ready for the ‘switch to be flicked’ at noon the same day. And as that time came to strike, the community of Test Drive Unlimited Central kicked off right on time at 12:00pm (UK time) on February 1st 2007. After about 2 mins this was shortened to TDU Central (TDUc) for obvious reasons and the community that enjoyed the game flocked over to the new place. All the good eggs came over and signed up and plenty of discussion, showing of media and arranging meet-ups and such were well underway. The PC mob weren’t staying away either as the release of TDU was heading their way and so over they came also. And it is thanks to these early pioneers that our popularity spiked as their early experiments in the modding of TDU started to show some real promise, and when new vehicles were getting closer and closer to being able to be put into the game, visitor numbers surged and activity frankly exploded. Unfortunately all this attention made our hosting practically do the same and so we had to look elsewhere and moving up the power chain meant increased costs, but thankfully a good amount of generous members contributed from their own pockets to keep things running. Over the years there were some really hard times and there were moments where we actually were away and had moved to a temporary free hosting forum which we subsequently labelled ‘TDU C-rap’ if I remember correctly. These hardships were overcome and forum life in general was pretty sweet, with plenty of regulars having fun and joking about with one another, game sessions and meets being proposed and members for clubs being sought after. This was a fun time! Here comes Test Drive Unlimited 2! In early 2009 the infamous BADNED, who you may know from Forza circles, posted about how a sequel was on its way, showing some of the old media and information that he had available to him. Unsurprisingly this lit a fire under people in our community and the chatter started to happen about what they hoped to see, what they wanted fixed and improved, and what the new location could well be. Well after that little burst of news I took it upon myself to go hunting for goodies myself and so, armed with Google and some knowledge on how to go about performing advanced searches, I set out on my web expedition and to my surprise, found quite a lot of stuff. Concept art, vehicle renders, interface graphics and icons and a small clip from a work in progress trailer video. Some of this concept media was displaying some weather scenes and so again another flourish of conversation and hype-building was unleashed on us. At the end of 2009 I received an email, this email was from none other than Mr David Nadal, head chieftain of Eden Games and in it he was responding to the info I had found and commented that he found it flattering and showed that the desire for a sequel was strong. He ended his message with words to the effect that '2010 will be an important year' and left it at that. It wasn't until March 2010 that the official drop arrived on the scene. As this is when an email containing details about TDU 2 and its first official screenshots went out. Naturally though, I was out taking care of some business down in the town when it arrived and so I missed being able to post it for our members before it spread like wildfire around the internet. (sods law and all that) Shortly after this I was invited to attend a TDU 2 event in Lyon at Eden Games with another fansite admin, Fabien of tdu.fr fame, where we were treated to a presentation about the game, allowed to ask questions, watch the game, watch the game crash (these things happen during development), play the game, comment on how the game was “twitchy” and “had too much grip” and then get a tour around the studio where many a vehicle model was seen that we had to keep quiet about. (still sour about no Lamborghini even though…) Understandably the other TDUc muppets were thrilled that I had been able to do this and had nothing but warm wishes and smiles for me when I got back but hey they and some of the regular scum members got a chance to head on down to London where at Namco Bandai Partners we got to check out TDU 2, eat pizza and watch Baldy consume an unhealthy amount of sparkling water. This was a really fun day and one I am so glad to have been able to do, not because of the game but because of being able to meet the people behind the words and see just how they were in real life. They were all quality people and I really would like to see them again in the future. *Aww* TDU 2 What Happened To You?! Not going to lie, TDU 2 for many of the original game’s players was not a good game at all. It fixed the problem of the roads and gave us a whole other island to play with but the core of it, the driving, was horrible. The cars were very twitchy and performing a powerslide was not as natural as it was in its predecessor, and not just in Hardcore mode either but there was a real feel of delay in getting the vehicle to respond to your controls and despite the lovely smooth roads compared to TDU, the driving just didn’t make it fun to play. I myself spent 98% of my TDU 2 playtime in the Casino, playing the slots or praying for the roulette not to crash out or say you’ve won but still take your money. Out of most of my gambling time a good amount was probably spent drinking cocktails in order to win a ticket for the high stakes Poker game. Don’t get me wrong I enjoyed this aspect and the winnings from it allowed me to buy the yacht, all the Veyrons and every other hypercar but that was it. I could not drive them in that game and that kind of hurt as this was a sequel myself and my community had been waiting years for, and here it was and it was pretty bad…. for us anyway. Not ignoring the people who do enjoy the game but for fans of the original TDU 2 over on our place, it was quite the disappointment. Why turboduck? Within a very short time of the release of TDU 2 we realised that being a dedicated TDU community wasn’t going to work any more and so we opened up the discussion about where we should go from here. This talk was mainly contained within our chatbox amongst the regular and veteran members until a thread was created by tWm looking to create a proper conversation on the matter. It descended into mainly jokes and piss taking but there were a couple of genuine suggestions and comments on the matter. One of these was made by me™ who commented “Rename it to TDuck, as in Turbo Duck” and this was noticed, in fact as we were known as TDUc which was said as T-duck the name had came up before along with other words that begin with ‘t’. As I liked the name that much, in August I went ahead and registered the domain to keep it as a proper option. Throughout the rest of 2011 and into 2012 the name was picking up steam amongst people and so it was decided this is what we were going to rebrand ourselves as. I started work on the first version of turboduck which included a main site that had been missing for too long and version ‘one’ went live on October 23rd 2012. The focus was removed from TDU and all other games were brought in along with more typical gaming, automotive and motorsport talk and that has been our way ever since. We still have our crazy laid back ways and aim to make our members find fun on our place and will continue to do so for as long as I hold the admin hat. The future… ? Looking ahead, it’s going to a bit of a strange one. A new TDU looks to be coming so naturally people are watching that but with more caution because they do not want to be bitten again. A new Forza Motorsport is on its way and should be looking incredible on Scorpio and PC, GT Sport is just coming at some point (starting to really not care about that series), Assetto Corsa has brought an awesome PC racing sim to console, DiRT Rally has shown that a proper sim can sell and play well too, VR is making games even more fun and immersive and old names are reappearing making some of us ask… It’s been an epic time and a hard time but it’s certainly been one that’s been amazing to see. I thank each and every member who has posted and shared anything worthwhile on our community forum and wish you all the best in life, even if that means leaving us and finding your way in the real world. Just make sure to come back now and then and let us know how you are getting on. As for us. We will just keep on keeping to our motto: Be Stupid Responsibly! Cheers! – turboduck team