The American Way of Assetto Corsa Competizione

One of the most discussed topics between the fans of Assetto Corsa Competizione is about when KUNOS Simulazioni would expand the SRO licensed sim racing title out of the European scope, considering that there are now four FANATEC GT World Challenge series around the World that also feed the Intercontinental GT Challenge, and the American Track Pack DLC is an extra step in that expansion, of course looking at the other side of the Atlantic.

The FANATEC GT World Challenge America was already included in an indirect manner in ACC, considering that the Intercontinental GT Pack brought the Laguna Seca circuit when the California 8 Hour was held, along with the American teams that competed in it, but the American Track Pack includes three venues used in the series, while an update to the main game adds the series entries, in this case being limited to the 2022 season.

The Indianapolis Motor Speedway is home of the GTWC America season finale since its inclusion in the calendar, but it also hosts the only endurance round of the season, as the Indianapolis 8 Hour is also the American round of the Intercontinental GT Challenge, which replaced the California 8 Hour as Stéphane Ratel, the SRO supremo, wanted a change of pace in order to attract more entries, with Roger Penske’s high interest in bringing some events to the Speedway being a massive help.

The Circuit of the Americas is home of the United States Grand Prix, and despite being one of the country’s FIA Grade 1 circuits with a good flow and variety of corners, it isn’t exactly unanimous between fans and simracers inside and out the United States. Also, when rain hits the Texan circuit, it always hits hard, being another factor to spice things up in the circuit, and despite SRO having used it only for sprints until 2021, it held from Grand Prix racing to 6 hour and 24 hour races.

Watkins Glen is present in the majority of racing simulators, unlike COTA, has a rich history in both national and international level and it really makes the old school hearts beat faster - considerable elevation changes, the traditional combination of grass-tarmac-grass wrapped by armco on both sides, and some iconic corners in the full Boot layout, like the Bus Stop chicane.

Then you might ask, where are the other tracks, which may have been more popular choices? Why not a full calendar in this DLC? Well, KUNOS Simulazioni had to do some choices based on what they have in their hands and considering a bunch of factors, related to data at disposal, commercial factors and time constraints since this involves tracks they can’t do a track walk as they are across the pond, for example, you can consider Indianapolis is delayed stuff since the IGTC’s switch from Laguna Seca to Indianapolis happened in 2020, but then there was the whole stuff where the World got itself into. 

The American Track Pack DLC is available on Steam for PC users, and console release should go on an unconfirmed later date, and since the 1.8.15 version update has one of the smallest changelogs released by KUNOS Simulazioni, here are the notes:
 

GENERAL:

- Added Circuit of the Americas as DLC content.
- Added Indianapolis Motor Speedway as DLC content.
- Added Watkins Glen International as DLC content.
- Added bonus liveries from the 2022 GTWCHAM season for all players (via Open Series).
- Added all full-season liveries from the 2022 GTWCHEU season for all players (via Open Series). 

GAMEPLAY:

- Added support for new DLC tracks in custom championship (via Open Series).
- Fixed mass driver duplication when playing against the Lamborghini Huracán ST EVO2.

UI:

- Fixed ever-increasing memory usage when refreshing unfiltered server list.
- Added new nationality options.

PHYSICS:

- Tweaks in GT4 slick tyres rolling resistance, camber simulation, combined grip.
- Tweaks in Wet tyres.
- Fuel consumption tweaks for Bentley, Porsche 992 Cup, Ferrari 488 GT3 EVO, Porsche 991.2 GT3 and more.
- BOP tweaks for Bentley, Aston Martin V8.

IMAGES: Assetto Corsa Competizione screenshots