The Forza 4 & Gran Turismo 5 Of Online PC Games - Auto Club Revolution Interview

Auto Club Revolution is a big deal for racing fans. Not only does it give you hundreds of licensed cars, real-world tracks and events to compete in, you can do it all free to play. 

It's a massive project, and rests quite comfortably shoulder to shoulder with the Forza 4s and Gran Turismo 5s of the world. The difference is that Auto Club Revolution features an insanely vast social network and more car customisation feature than you will ever need. 

To learn more about Auto Club Revolution, we sat down with Doug Wolff, executive producer at Eutechnyx to discuss why you need to play this game when it drops next year. If you're a car fan, you owe it to yourself.

What can you tell us about Auto Club Revolution and why should racing fans out there be excited?

I think there are two areas that would excite players; first we’re bringing a best-in-class racing game experience with licensed cars, tracks and upgrades and it’s available to play for free. Secondly, the game has deep social features built-in help players get close to friends and with the car manufacturers themselves.

Can you give us a total figure of how of those licensed cars will be in the game at launch, and to what extent will these companies support Auto Club Revolution post-launch?

We have over 40 car manufacturers and over 150 after market parts brands already signed and the level of involvement varies by brand. Of those brands that we’ve identified as key to the game, we’ve developed a very close working relationship with them ranging from engineering advice to co-operative car launches in the future.

In addition to licensed cars, you also have many real-world tracks such as Spa and Silverstone, but you’ve even opted for custom tracks as well. Can you give us an insight into how many tracks you’re aiming for in total, and why you opted for both real and fictional tracks?

We want to ensure that we provide a wide variety of tracks for players to race on including some of the world’s most famous race tracks.  We do know that the licensed circuits can provide a tough challenge, so we’ve designed some unique custom tracks which allow us offer challenges for a wide range of player types. Custom tracks also allow us to create some fantastic looking race tracks in environments that might not other wise be possible.

Social features are also a big part of Auto Club Revolution’s DNA. In what way are you looking to foster a healthy active community through social features and other tools?

We didn’t want our game community living outside the game environment in, say, a forum so we’ve built this feature right into the fabric of the game. This unlocks a lot of nice social and connectivity features. We’re still putting the final touches to this ahead of launch early next year.

In terms of handling, would you say Auto Club Revolution leans more towards the hardcore simulator side of racing, or can players tweak assists to create an experience that fits their style better?

We’ve built the game on a simulation platform using real physics and complex mathematical modelling to create accurate handling.  We then add layers of simplicity via a range of driving assists such as ABS, traction control and automatic transmission. We plan to further develop this feature to possibly even include braking and steering assists for arcade racing game fans.

Auto Club Revolution handlles like a dream.

Auto Club Revolution is also in closed beta right now. What are the key, or prevalent pieces of feedback you have received so far, and how will this inform development of the game ahead of release?

The most important feedback we get relates to bugs which are very important for us at this stage. Many of our testers asked for controller and wheel support early on, which meant that we added support for lots of peripherals much sooner that we’d planned.

Penalties was another big request from the beta test community, so these went in early on too. We have a good number of motor industry and sports people in the test, so we take their comments on car handling very seriously and have made changes based on their feedback.

Finally, when we began testing the Performance Upgrade Shop, testers were telling us that they needed a straight drag track to test their changes on, so recently we built and released a drag track called L.A. River Sprint.

Focusing on lifespan, just how ‘long term’ are you hoping to go with this project? What challenges do you foresee in realising this goal, given how volatile the online/MMO space is at the moment?

We’re in this for the long haul and are committed to making a best-in-class racing game and car community however long that takes.  We see Auto Club Revolution as a social platform built around a game and which will evolve overtime.

We have lots of plans to cooperate with the motor industry to develop specific channels of interest over the coming years and players can expect a constant stream of new features through

Car and track detail is stunning.

As Auto Club Revolution is a free to play title, how are you looking to monetise the game, and how delicate do you have to be when pricing up in-game items? 

I agree that pricing is a challenge and we have set very specific rules for this area of our offering. In short, we don’t accept any kind of play-to-win model. Our plan is to build a compelling game, playable for free and forever but to offer lots of cool content that people might like to buy, such as rare and cool cars.

A few games have enabled players to sell their own created content in exchange for game time, or online store points? Have you ever considered this approach via your decal/car editing tool?

The paint and decal shops are very expansive and we can do a lot more with this in the future. We have designed a service which allow users to share/trade user generated content and we’re monitoring customer demand for this before deciding when to deploy.

We’re asking all of our interviewees about Wii U – even if they aren’t developing for it – just to get their thoughts on the E3 reveal, and if the idea of the console sparks your imagination as a developer at all. Do you have any thoughts on what has been revealed so far?

From a personal point-of-view I’m a big fan of Nintendo as a games company. They continue to produce some of the best game designs in the industry and I am expecting to see this again on Wii U. They have a big task to capture the imagination of the consumer, but they’ve definitely gone with something bold and different and I can’t wait to see the results.