SUMMARY :
- Ibiza returns
- New cars
- Seasonal content
- AIs rebalancing & adjustments
- Steering wheel animation
- Proximity voice chat
- Season 2 Dev Diary & next steps
Ibiza returns
The city of Eivissa on Ibiza island is back on Test Drive Unlimited, recreated on a 1:1 scale, offering you a new map to explore. Fans of the license will feel a sense of nostalgia as they navigate through the narrow streets of Ibiza Castle, making their way to the luxurious Talamanca district and passing by the charming marina.
You can expect nostalgic and emotional cruising times around the different Eivissa districts with well known points of interest, but also speed traps, and a variety of collectibles. Many new races are also available on the Spanish island, with a brand-new system of restriction rotation offering new challenges to conquer.
A special heliport on the northern part of Hong Kong Island is available to transport you directly to Ibiza. You must be a Sharps or Streets member (reputation level 12 is needed to join a clan) to fly until Eivissa. Both clans have a lot of influence on the island and their leaders are part of the journey as they are waiting for you inside of the Selene social hub.
This hub can host up to 16 players simultaneously, features a new car dealership with exclusive vehicles, a clothing store with clan-themed items, and a well known NPC for Test Drive Unlimited fans, CEO of the Selene organization.
With 20 additional clan levels, there are now 70 levels to complete whether you're a Streets or Sharps member. Clan races in Ibiza are organized by Selene, without any traffic unlike Hong Kong clan events, and will help you to climb Streets or Sharps ladder which is needed to unlock the new cars available in the Eivissa dealership.
New cars in the Selene dealership
Seven new cars from all classes are available in the brand-new dealership. Leading the lineup are the iconic Ferrari California from TDU2 and the Lamborghini Aventador SVJ Xago Edition. To these two new exclusive cars are added the special Selene edition cars. Discover 5 vehicles with enhanced performance and a unique livery, crafted in the style of renowned automotive tuners.
Here are the seven cars available in the Ibiza dealership:
- Ferrari California
- Lamborghini Aventador SVJ Xago Edition
- Fiat 500 Abarth Selene Edition
- Alfa Romeo 4C Selene Edition
- Alpine A110 Berlinette Selene Edition
- Chevrolet Corvette C1 Selene Edition
- W Motors Fenyr SuperSport Selene Edition
Also, the launch compensation will be available on Wednesday, for all Gold Edition players who have played the game before October 12th. The compensation includes the 1986 Porsche 911 Carrera Coupe “Adventurer Edition” aswell as a pack of 5 “Pioneer of the Solar Crown” stickers.
Solar Pass for free & new live activities
A new 25-level Solar Pass will be offered to all players. Reaching level 25 unlocks the Lamborghini Diablo VT from 1993, a stunning addition to your car collection. Until the ultimate Solar Pass rank, you will unlock a new reward at each level reached, such as:
- Car paints
- Rims
- Clothes
- Emotes
- Solar Coins
Many new Live Events will continue to be published every Wednesday at 8 AM UTC. We heard your feedback about these weekly challenges and we adjusted their rewards for the upcoming season. Special liveries have been designed to make car skins a new reward type for the weekly completion.
Season 2 also brings a new Solar Crown competition and a new car prize for those reaching the Solar Court or the Solar King/Queen rank. The exclusive reward will be none other than the Bugatti Chiron SuperSport 300+. This top-tier vehicle will be a coveted prize, available at the end of the season for Solar Court players.
We are aware that the ranked matchmaking experience isn’t optimal and the development team is actively working on something new to improve the overall experience for all players.
AI rebalancing & adjustments
As announced in early November, improving the game’s AI has been a top priority for the development team. Guillaume Guinet, Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown Game Director at KT Racing, explains what has been done about racing AI:
Zitat:
Guillaume Guinet:
We have two topics to work on with the AIs: difficulty and behavior. About difficulty, it will now be harder to reach the Expert level at first, and you will more often switch from one difficulty level to another depending on your race results. The AIs have also become easier to beat, especially at the highest levels of difficulty. The achievement of inhuman times from AI opponents will be resolved in Season 2 and we aimed to make the races more challenging and interesting.
Also, we worked on AI behavior. First of all, they won't “cheat” anymore in Season 2. AI will be subject to the same constraints as you are. If they hit a barrier, or a pole, their speed will drop as yours. On another side, AIs will also behave better on wet roads and adapt better to different surfaces, from asphalt to gravel for example.
We're still working on the AIs, we're going to improve them even further after the launch of Season 2. There's a lot that can be perfected. The subject of AIs is very complex with systems that are correlated to each other with many parameters to adapt and test in depth in order to offer you the best racing experience.
We have two topics to work on with the AIs: difficulty and behavior. About difficulty, it will now be harder to reach the Expert level at first, and you will more often switch from one difficulty level to another depending on your race results. The AIs have also become easier to beat, especially at the highest levels of difficulty. The achievement of inhuman times from AI opponents will be resolved in Season 2 and we aimed to make the races more challenging and interesting.
Also, we worked on AI behavior. First of all, they won't “cheat” anymore in Season 2. AI will be subject to the same constraints as you are. If they hit a barrier, or a pole, their speed will drop as yours. On another side, AIs will also behave better on wet roads and adapt better to different surfaces, from asphalt to gravel for example.
We're still working on the AIs, we're going to improve them even further after the launch of Season 2. There's a lot that can be perfected. The subject of AIs is very complex with systems that are correlated to each other with many parameters to adapt and test in depth in order to offer you the best racing experience.
For Season 2, a significant improvement in AIs has been implemented. We continue to work on this to introduce enhancements as the seasons progress.
Steering wheel animation
Another highly requested improvement will be deployed: the steering wheel angle animation rework. From Wednesday, the wheel angle in the cockpit view will no longer be limited and a brand-new animation is coming for all cars with the Season 2 launch, whatever your game controller is. You also will be able to set an angle limit by yourself through the settings menu (now up to 1080°).
Proximity voice chat
Vocal chat has also been improved as it now becomes a proximity chat in the different social hubs (Solar Hotel, Selene Hub, workshops, clans HQ, etc.). It means the volume is evolving with players positioning themselves, conversations becoming louder or quieter depending on proximity. Last but not least, vocal ice chat is now available in freeroaming in both Ibiza and Hong Kong Island. This will allow you to talk directly with other players behind the wheel!
Season 2 Dev Diary & next steps
Alain Jarniou, Creative Director at KT Racing, and Guillaume Guinet, TDUSC Game Director, are back with a new dev diary to give you the exciting new content and features coming your way in Season 2! But that’s not all, they’re also dropping some hints about the new plans for Season 3, inspired by community feedback.
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Update & servers maintenance
The update (~38Go) will be downloadable from 9:00 AM UTC on all platforms, during the game maintenance which will begin at 8:30 AM UTC. Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown will be inaccessible during the maintenance and the Season 2 with all its content will start right after it.
This is a big maintenance for our network team, with new content and many fixes & improvements included. Servers should be back online in the late afternoon UTC. We will keep you updated on the progress of this maintenance on our different socials.
The whole development team of Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown is looking forward to meet you on Ibiza’s roads!
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