Previews WRC 8 first look preview part 1

French developer Kylotonn took over the officially licensed rally game reigns from Milestone a few years back.

Their first effort turned out pretty well considering they only had a single year to essentially create a game from scratch. Massive improvements were seen one year later with WRC 6 – the car handling was less “floaty” and the title boasted accurately modelled super special stages.

A further year later, WRC 7 wowed us with its beautifully crafted stages that were undoubtedly the star of the show – Kylotonn were clearly getting into their stride and showing great promise.

Surprisingly, last year didn’t bring us an official WRC game: Kylotonn took an extra year to bring us WRC 8 – and boy has that extra year paid dividends.

We recently got hands-on with an alpha version of the title coming to the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, PC, and Switch this September, and were left more than a little impressed.

DiRT Rally 2.0 left us somewhat disappointed by launching with just six stages, WRC 8, on the other hand, will launch with a colossal 14 (with over 100 stages) including the likes of Finland, Sweden, and Monte Carlo.

Kylotonn has certainly built on their already impressive stage technology from WRC 7 – stages have added detail and impressively detailed surfaces and you can see for miles at points thanks to some wide open vistas. Even more impressively, if you can see a mountain in the distance the chances are you will be driving on it a few minutes later: Kylotonn has clearly retained its crown as the king of stage design in the rally genre.

Dynamic weather will also feature in WRC 8 bringing the added challenge of sudden downpours of rain, falling snow and even the occasional hail storm. Stages can start dry and sunny but can change into an altogether very different scene. If you’re unlucky enough to be caught in a storm you’ll come up against pounding rain and fierce winds which cause the local flora to sway wildly from side to side – it’s so convincing at times that it may just send a shiver down your spine.

Dynamic weather with these extremes will throw up some strategic dilemmas – do you opt for dry or wet tyres? Your weather guy may give you a good idea of what to expect, however, the information may not be entirely correct.

Stages will also look very different depending on what time of the day it is. WRC 8 will feature four separate times: dawn, noon, evening and night – fancy taking on a nighttime stage in a hailstorm? No problem, just remember we did warn you.

Check out our preview video below where we caught up with Game Director Alain Jarniou and Game Designer Benoit Gomes who shed some more light on what we can expect with the latest WRC title as well as some exclusive gameplay giving us a look at those very impressive new and enhanced stages.

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Cyteless

3 years ago

Thanks for the insight. Looking promising in these early days. Without the distraction of the co-driver, I noticed how varied the camber and crowning of the road was. Very cool to see that level of variation in terms of the road geometry. WRC7, at least visually, looked pretty flat, or at least not as detailed. Hope it develops well.

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