PS4 CareerPS4

[TT92]

PS4 Career

I am currently up to Intermediate Level 4 racing on easy and found some discrepancies in how the events have been created.


A little about myself, I have been on racing games with a wheel since GT5 Prologue. I have the platinum trophies for GT5&6, PCARS and Dirt Rally. I can finish in most GT6 time trials in the top 1,000 so I would say that I think I am a reasonably good driver that knows his way around these types of games and with a lot of experience on some common tracks. I am not bragging, just trying to say that I am not some “mug punter” on a controller struggling with his first driving game.


Career mode in Assetto Corsa is just plain wrong.


In the earlier events I could win the races quite easily, even not knowing some of the tracks at all but as the career has progressed there are some events that there is just no way in the world I could ever even remotely have a chance at.

I also should add that always starting at the back of the grid and now having cars that bog down and block my starts is making it even more challenging.

Example: Intermediate Series Two at Spa mixed car grid.

The winner of the event was a Ferrari 458 stage3 lapping at 2:39s, second was a McLaren MP4 12c lapping at 2:47 and poor old me in third, over 40 seconds behind at the finish lapping at 2:50 in a SLS AMG. So these two supercars take off like rockets and I am stuck in a Panzer tank with absolutely no hope of a win – ever. I was 20 seconds down by the end of lap 1!!!!


And not just here at Spa but the same thing at Monza too! I should add both these tracks are favourites of mine and I have raced on them for years. Not only do I know them very well but consider myself to be quite good at them.

Then when I did Intermediate 3 Monza in a Ferrari 458 I beat a McLaren MP4 12C by 16secs! Then at Spa again in a Ferrari 458 I easily won and I lapped at 2:43 (taking it easy) to the AI’s SLS AMG lap time of 2:50s which I might add is the same time as I did in the above example when I drove the same SLS.

Then, a little later in the Trofeo Series with the Ferrar1 458 stage3 and we were all in the same car my best time was a 2:15 and the AI was a 2.23 and I won by over 42 secs at the end of 6 laps


All this may sound long winded and a little confusing but what I am trying to say is Kunos knows how fast these cars are, knows what their lap times can be and yet has designed some races that are unwinnable. Even on easy!!!!! Yet like the above example I can easily win some events without really trying


The enjoyment quickly evaporates when you are presented with a task that is unachievable. Not to mention especially when they make some of these tasks mandatory *IF* you want to get all the trophies for the game.


It just does not make sense and IMHO is just very badly implemented.


I also wish to add no matter what I drive if the AI is in the same car it is *ALWAYS* faster in a straight line than me. It is very noticeable in underpowered cars. Supercars are not so noticeable as my higher corner exit speed usually nullifies the effect.


I am very interested to hear other’s experience with their career so far and how they tackled these races I have described problems with.

EDIT: Here is another glaring example of the discrepancy in career.

Early on there is in N2 a Quick Race and I was given an under powered BMW M3 E30 Step1 at the Nurburgring GP track There is no way on Earth I can win this event let alone get a podium. So I left it.

I have just finished the Ferrari 599xx Evo Trofeo series. The last race I did was at Nurburgring GP. So would you expect a similar result as the one I just mentioned in far harder car to drive? Well I would. I won it by 75 seconds!!! Yes, over half a lap in front. I was doing 2:02s and the AI were doing 2:12s

I just hope someone from Kunos gets read some of this.

 

[Cote Dazur]

My advice is forget about The "career", AC is not about meaningless trophies. There is nothing to win! All content is available for you to use, AC is the anti grinding SIM.
Choose the car you want to drive, choose a track, choose an AI level challenging to race and enjoy the journey.
You will find it is very rewarding to learn a car/ track combo, do a long race without errors, at the (your) limit, within 10th of second of each lap, take a few lap to prepare each pass, like it is IRL.
AC is the gate to racing simulation, for racing games where the driving is so boring that they have to feed you some extra motivation to keep at it, you will need to look somewhere else.

 

[exXboxfan]

career is fun enough, though. You just have to realize that the AI is better at certain kind of cars. I turn down the AI skill to 94% on (PC version) some cars, but up as high as 97% on some cars.

Also, Monza is more difficult in AC because it is not possible to clip all the corners like in GT. There are more big "sausage" curbs that make your car bounce. The physics being totally different in AC requires some tracks to be releaerned. In fact, learning how to drive again almost from scratch is probably a good idea

 

[TT92]

While I do agree with your sentiments Cote Dazur I do choose to differ. The career modes in a lot of games force me to drive cars that I probably wouldn't otherwise drive through choice. I would tend to gravitate towards cars I love and tracks I like where as career forces me to try other stuff. And forces me to get good at tracks I don't otherwise like.

For example, in GT6 I hated the KTM Xbow BUT it is a fantastic car in AC and I appreciate the game forcing me to drive it.

Same with trophy collecting, it forces me to try stuff I wouldn't otherwise do e.g the 24Hr races in GT5.

The game comes with a career mode and so I expect it to work. If you bought a new car with a cigarette lighter and didn't smoke you would still expect that to work too.

 

[paulpg87]

Totally agree, some events are insane. Special events are even harder. At the moment i'm finishing novice with the Lotus races. There was a race in an old bmw e30 vs New ones on the nurburg and it is impossibile. I won silver on easy after many tries. i looked in you tube and in the pc version ai was lapping 10secs slower. Do not know why the put such an insane difficulty.

 

[Nielsen]

While I do agree with your sentiments Cote Dazur I do choose to differ. The career modes in a lot of games force me to drive cars that I probably wouldn't otherwise drive through choice. I would tend to gravitate towards cars I love and tracks I like where as career forces me to try other stuff. And forces me to get good at tracks I don't otherwise like.

For example, in GT6 I hated the KTM Xbow BUT it is a fantastic car in AC and I appreciate the game forcing me to drive it.

Same with trophy collecting, it forces me to try stuff I wouldn't otherwise do e.g the 24Hr races in GT5.

The game comes with a career mode and so I expect it to work. If you bought a new car with a cigarette lighter and didn't smoke you would still expect that to work too.

I agree that Kunos should try to fix everything not working in their game. I disagree with the part about careers forcing players to try things they otherwise would not. Career events almost never overpower the things I'd rather do in a racing game, but I do appreciate they are there.

 

[Tired Tyres]

I spend most of yesterday trying to beat the E30 with an Alfa in the forth race of the first Novice series at Magione. Finally got it done. When I started I was doing 37's, then I got down to 36's and could keep up with the E30 then I got into the 35's and I could finally win.

Without this mode I doubt I'd spent so much time on this track. Later on I'll be driving on other tracks I would not normally drive on, 'Ring runner normally, (There are other tracks?) This mode is good. It is good to be forced to get faster to win rather than have the AI slow down to let you win. (GT6)

 

[LotusTeam]

Now I'm playing hard difficulty, I am so so confused with this career mode on PS4, i don't know whether it happens on PC as well, but on the novice challenge for some races, you will never beat the pole position car, the classes of the car on track are different, I mean you will never beat a BMW 1M by driving a Z4, the gap of power is too big to narrow down by my technique, simply impossible to take over the pole position car, not even close....more example is that in Novice career 4/5, you will never beat the BMW E30 by driving an Alfa Romeo, simply impossible.......and you know what? I won all tier 3 gold medal in the novice career because those AI cars have a serious glitch on the last lap that they all went into pit....XDDDD (so I am wondering if it was designed on purpose, not a glitch?)

And 1 thing need to mention is that I tried quick race or calendar race and set the difficulty to "ALIEN" and "One make", it was too easy to take over 1st place by 20+sec gap, the difficulty in this game is too hilarious....

 

[zzz_pt]

I agree with the impossible challenges and awkward car line ups. I'm playing with a DS4 atm (had to relearn the controls again from scratch) and I beat the E30 with the Alfa but it took me a while... (Easy difficultly).

Win against the M3 E92 with a E30 is simply impossible. I can't even get to 3rd...

I've always got 100% gold in GT games licences and careers for instance and in GTAcademy I was the fastest with a DS3 in my country (and always inside +2 / +3 seconds of the Top1 worldwide).

Another thing I can't understand is the fact that, with a controller, if the AI touches your rear you'll go off the track and it's impossible to stear and "control" the car. Even alone, sometimes if the car starts oversteering a bit I can't save it as I would do in GT and as we can do with a wheel (AND in real life).

(I hate having to set "easy" mode in order to win a badly design event... I like hard challenges)

 

[PhaedrusSocrate]

Is it possible to adjust set-up in career mode? And if so, how much time can you find (in cars like Z4)?

 

[LotusTeam]

Is it possible to adjust set-up in career mode? And if so, how much time can you find (in cars like Z4)?

For example, in hard difficulty, Career Novice2, Nurburgring Sprint, Pole car = BMW 1M, yours = BMW Z4, my gap between pole car per lap is around 2 secs per lap, I don't think tuning setup can make huge difference to the result, I finally take over 1M because she went into pit stop on last lap.....

 

[Tired Tyres]

Now I'm playing hard difficulty, I am so so confused with this career mode on PS4, i don't know whether it happens on PC as well, but on the novice challenge for some races, you will never beat the pole position car, the classes of the car on track are different, I mean you will never beat a BMW 1M by driving a Z4, the gap of power is too big to narrow down by my technique, simply impossible to take over the pole position car, not even close....more example is that in Novice career 4/5, you will never beat the BMW E30 by driving an Alfa Romeo, simply impossible.......and you know what? I won all tier 3 gold medal in the novice career because those AI cars have a serious glitch on the last lap that they all went into pit....XDDDD (so I am wondering if it was designed on purpose, not a glitch?)

And 1 thing need to mention is that I tried quick race or calendar race and set the difficulty to "ALIEN" and "One make", it was too easy to take over 1st place by 20+sec gap, the difficulty in this game is too hilarious....

Ha! Drive faster and you can win. It's difficult yes, impossible no. I'm no alien either. If I can do it you can.

 

[Donnced]

The are two races in the novice BMW series that you go against the AI with a Bimmer that is really slower than the others, and the AI pit in the third lap of four..

I realy think it's just made a proposal like that.
You start the race and they go ahead.. You got to maintain your pace and so in the third lap while they are in pits you can take the podium or win places. In the last lap you have to maintain your pace so the AI cars don't catch you up when they exit the pit again.

In the other races you receive a Bimmer that you can fight against the AI for the victory on track an they don't do any pitstop. (and in easy difficult you can win them easy if you don't make a lot of mistakes on track)

Ah...The special events, yup, those are hard, but nothing impossible if you practice and practice and practice....

 

[LotusTeam]

Ha! Drive faster and you can win. It's difficult yes, impossible no. I'm no alien either. If I can do it you can.

You mean you beat M3 E92 and 1M with Z4 in N2 2/6 (Nurburgring Sprint) in Hard difficulty?

Wow! that's awesome! What was your best lap time on that event? Did you tune? I drive default

 

[Tired Tyres]

No I meant the E30 with the Alfa. I did it on easy. E30 AI was doing 36's I did 35's to win.

 

[PhaedrusSocrate]

Is it possible to adjust set-up in career mode? And if so, how much time can you find (in cars like Z4)?

I appreciate the answer that it IS possible to adjust set-ups - but does anyone has more concrete knowledge how big the effect could be (on a car like Z4)?

 

[Cote Dazur]

While I do agree with your sentiments Cote Dazur I do choose to differ. The career modes in a lot of games force me to drive cars that I probably wouldn't otherwise drive through choice. I would tend to gravitate towards cars I love and tracks I like where as career forces me to try other stuff. And forces me to get good at tracks I don't otherwise like.

For example, in GT6 I hated the KTM Xbow BUT it is a fantastic car in AC and I appreciate the game forcing me to drive it.

Same with trophy collecting, it forces me to try stuff I wouldn't otherwise do e.g the 24Hr races in GT5.

The game comes with a career mode and so I expect it to work. If you bought a new car with a cigarette lighter and didn't smoke you would still expect that to work too.

TT92, I agree, you have every right to play AC the way you want, what I was trying to express is that for you and other coming in AC with similar background, Forza or GT, AC is a different experience and it might be beneficial to consider a different approach to maximize your enjoyment of the experience .
To use you cigarette lighter analogy, if I was to buy a Toyota and the lighter was not working, I would more pissed that I had bought a Ferrari or a Porsche and the same happened, in the Toyota the least they can do is have every thing work, in the other cars, if the driving is fun that is why I bought them, the lighter and the radio I understand they are commodities.
I also understand, coming myself GT, a long time ago in a far way Galaxy , that habits are difficult and take time to change, I just trying to help my fellow racing game console player to transfer to the dark side of SIM driving.
I use MP some time to help me re- discover combo that I would naturally be less attracted to.

 

[LotusTeam]

I appreciate the answer that it IS possible to adjust set-ups - but does anyone has more concrete knowledge how big the effect could be (on a car like Z4)?

Depends on track, Nurburgring Sprint for instance, generally tuning will improve a 1~2secs laptime

 

[LotusTeam]

No I meant the E30 with the Alfa. I did it on easy. E30 AI was doing 36's I did 35's to win.

All I did on career mode was at Hard difficulty, I can't imagine how crazy is it at ALIEN difficulty....and when I say "beat", it refers to clean take-over the pole car, not by any pit stop glitches of AI

Career N2 2/6 Hard difficulty, my best laptime so far is 1'47.295, the A.I E93 did it 1'44.014

 

[Tired Tyres]

Haven't tried that one yet. I use hard AI by default but drop it to easy if it proves to be too difficult. I've not had the AI pit yet.

 

[RikkiGT-R]

I got bored of the career very quickly. My problem is that there is no economy as such, no money to gather and no cars to unlock [afford to buy]. It's just something I've been used to for nearly 20 years. And given that there is no prize money for any position, once I realise I can't even achieve 3rd place I just quit the race as there is quite literally no progress to be made from finishing off the podium.

I'm just using the game for hot laps at the minute. The simulation itself is superb and hotlapping is good enough for me
I'll go online eventually...

 

[LotusTeam]

I got bored of the career very quickly. My problem is that there is no economy as such, no money to gather and no cars to unlock [afford to buy]. It's just something I've been used to for nearly 20 years. And given that there is no prize money for any position, once I realise I can't even achieve 3rd place I just quit the race as there is quite literally no progress to be made from finishing off the podium.

I'm just using the game for hot laps at the minute. The simulation itself is superb and hotlapping is good enough for me
I'll go online eventually...

Well...apparently AC is not something you have in mind, it's simply a simulator, nothing more

 

[LotusTeam]

Haven't tried that one yet. I use hard AI by default but drop it to easy if it proves to be too difficult. I've not had the AI pit yet.

It's the line up problem in career mode, how can you beat e93 with z4 in hard difficulty? No need to mention the alien difficulty...

But you can try quick race, it's just fair difficulty when you choose one make race even at "ALIEN" difficulty, usually I can take over the pole car in a lap or 2, and then win the race by 10+ secs, so as I said, it was the line up problem in career challenge

 

[LotusTeam]

Here comes the most ridiculous thing so far in career mode, N2, 3/6, Hard difficulty, has anyone beaten the E92 and 1M with your E30(step1)? It's just impossible.....

I insist on doing career on hard difficulty, more satisfaction for me to win, but I have already compromised on N2 2/6 and I won in Medium difficulty, I hate to make that difficulty level changed and actually I never play medium level before on Projectcars and GT6....

I must say AC is fun on physics and great FFB, but so far career mode sucks....

 

[Lewby1kenobi]

Game is ok. Few issues to mention though. I get this is a sim,so fair enough no complaints there. But why is it you are regularly forced to use basic controller layouts and not customise to how you play the game. Also where are the leaderboards? It is a massive part of any serious racing game that you want to see how you stand against other players,if these don't appear the game will be on its way back to the shop! At the minute I'm just wondering what is the aim of the game ,as if you want to drive round all these tracks with no incentive it doesn't make for a rewarding experience. Am with the guys saying about the impossible races, but this seems more like Something accidental, I would like too know if anyone has actually won one of these races, it might give me a bit of hope. Hopefully many updates to arrive in the future.

 

[paulpg87]

For example, in hard difficulty, Career Novice2, Nurburgring Sprint, Pole car = BMW 1M, yours = BMW Z4, my gap between pole car per lap is around 2 secs per lap, I don't think tuning setup can make huge difference to the result, I finally take over 1M because she went into pit stop on last lap.....

On you tube i saw a review video few days ago from irs and they guy adjusting camber and toe gained 6 s

Here comes the most ridiculous thing so far in career mode, N2, 3/6, Hard difficulty, has anyone beaten the E92 and 1M with your E30(step1)? It's just impossible.....

I insist on doing career on hard difficulty, more satisfaction for me to win, but I have already compromised on N2 2/6 and I won in Medium difficulty, I hate to make that difficulty level changed and actually I never play medium level before on Projectcars and GT6....

I must say AC is fun on physics and great FFB, but so far career mode sucks....

That event is insane, can't get better than 2nd Place. I'm lapping 1.47.8-9 but the AI is 1.45. even on easy they are still doing 1.45. I got silver but crashing into a car turn .

 

[LotusTeam]

On you tube i saw a review video few days ago from irs and they guy adjusting camber and toe gained 6 s

That event is insane, can't get better than 2nd Place. I'm lapping 1.47.8-9 but the AI is 1.45. even on easy they are still doing 1.45. I got silver but crashing into a car turn .

Mine at hard difficulty, A.I lap time was 1'42.1xx, and my best lap time on that event was 1'47 something as I remembered, but still...impossible to win the pole car

 

[exXboxfan]

I appreciate the answer that it IS possible to adjust set-ups - but does anyone has more concrete knowledge how big the effect could be (on a car like Z4)?

first think you should try - Tires. Don't always use the default tires.

After that, it's mostly driving style and learning a bit more about proper driving than GT can ever teach you. Like many of you, I played the GT games for years and thought AC would be an easy transition. It wasn't. It is so much more realistic that conservation of momentum and controlling the attitude of the car are much more important.

It's hard to accept for some of teh better drivers from GT-land - but it's true. You need to learn how to drive faster in order to beat challenges and some races in AC.

Remember how hard some challenges were in GT? That's because hadn't yet learned what they were expecting you to know. AC is no different.

 

[sircarltonlotus]

Well I'm certainly glad to hear I'm not alone on the E30 quick race! I actually winced a little when I found myself putting the AI on easy. To be honest I can still enjoy these career events. I'm sure plenty of things will be tweaked and improved in the next few months. I'm not 100% sure but in some races the AI cars seem to demonstrate some physics defying moments. I've noticed through the first bend on the nurburgring gp track and also the first and second chicane on monza. AI cars appear for all the money in the world to be going way too fast but suddenly still make the turns. But this only seems to affect one or two of them, not all. It can get frustrating but I'm loving it, warts and all so far

 

[Spitfire77]

When I lost interest with the career mode on pCARS I started using a randomizer to give my self cars and tracks to race on. I used to have the car and track lists on a saved document and would plug them in here.. https://www.random.org/lists/ then throw the results in a spread sheet. There are more cars than tracks so you just enter the track list in a few times till you fill the car list.

Just basic one type car races and put a number of laps depending on the mood and how much time I had. Went through the list and checked of the race I did. Found different cars and tracks fun I normally would not pick. Got me out of my M1 Pro Car on Laguna Seca addiction.

Have a feeling I will be doing this on Assetto Corsa as well.