Happy New Year! (Patreon)

Public update might take a bit longer than anticipated since a few more bugs have popped up, but here is a quick fix with some changes:

• RainFX: issue with distant surfaces fixed, static rain intensity set in online servers now is adjusted to keep things compatible (basically multiplied by 0.2), online servers can disable rain physics with “[EXTRA_RULES] DISABLE_RAIN_PHYSICS=1”, rain drops show up in rear view mirrors.

• Physics: ground height calculation for wings has been fixed.

• New option for rear view mirrors reprojection: instead of updating mirrors each frame it’ll skip a frame or a few and reproject previous image to make things smooth. Should help with performance, although it does introduce some artefacts (while opponent cars and track can be reprojected pretty accurately, some other things such as smoke or lighting effects would lag a bit, but at 60 FPS with a single frame skipped it might be tolerable).

• ExtraFX with triple: TAA now works, and wipers won’t mess up screen-space reflection. Also added support for ExtraFX with fisheye and 360° mode, although currently limited (not working well with some camera views).

• Mobile Gamepad FX script and the app have been updated with improved Android support and smoother steering.

• Smoke from overheated brakes should work now (heating values were way too low before).

• Some other smaller bugs have been fixed as well, like D-pads not working for quick pits menu without controllers integration option in GUI or Lua apps unable to draw TTF text with draw-text-aligned function. And new trees now will show up in rear view mirrors as well.

RainFX physics is being verified now to make sure average rain thickness correlation to rain intensity matches reality, but also I would like to provide some details about the latest design changes:

• Logic of wetness and water parameters have completely changed, requiring controllers update, but old controllers should work well with a compatibility option automatically applied by CSP to older controllers (ones using “ac.setConditionsSet()” function). There was an issue with online servers with fixed rain intensity, but it should work now as well.

• Before the update, puddles were arranged completely wrong, leading to a situation where aquaplaning wouldn’t even occur (because of unevenness, car tyres would quickly find a lot drier spot and stop slipping). Now water thickness is a lot more evenly distributed, so cars might lose grip and start aquaplaning a lot more, especially without rain tyres or with the intense rain.

• To make things accurate and controllable rain intensity now scales linearly and can go a lot higher, so old 50% rain (medium) now can be achieved with 10% rain, and old 100% (heavy barely drivable rain) is only 20% now. Everything above that is for truly extreme conditions only.

Sorry for such a large change, but the old system was very limiting in a lot of ways and not that accurate at all, so I do believe it will make the simracing experience better in the near future. Also, if you find water level too even and puddles too few for some tracks, tracks can alter that behavior with a config to simulate a more rough environment, documentation update is coming soon (although first I might need to reconsider placement of that option, but you can test its effect with “Override puddle amount” slider in WeatherFX Debug App).

Thank you for the support! Finished public release is coming soon. Happy New Year and happy holidays!