Deep Silver has announced a new update for their NASCAR 14 video game, available today and for free, that brings the new Chase for the Sprint Cup format to the game… ahead of the format’s official launch in NASCAR events this upcoming season, meaning gamers get to be the first people in the world to experience this format.

While in itself that is big news, especially for fans of motorsport and NASCAR in general (who are presumably the people who buy the game in the first place), the update doesn’t just stop there, and actually adds a fair bit more to the game. The full list of updates that it brings with it include:

• New qualifying and Chase format rules announced by NASCAR in early 2014
• Additional drivers to complete a full field of 43 Sprint Cup drivers
• Various gameplay refinements around pitting, decals and paint, and the online private lobby
• Difficulty setting adjustments designed to bring AI closer to the selected level
• Adjustments to Darlington and Kansas race lengths

NASCAR 14 is available now. If you have the game and download the update, make sure to tell us what you think in the comments section.

The biggest fault of any NASCAR game- well, one of the several big faults- so far has been the stupid and unrealistic AI. With NASCAR 14, developer Eutechnyx has largely done away with the issue. The AI in NASCAR 14 is a lot more aggressive than it has been in previous installments, and when you’re racing against computer controller opposition, you get the feeling that they actually competing for a win. Strategizing becomes that much more important due to the same reason, and makes the game much more fun and multi-layered in more ways than one.

"As any good racing sim should be, NASCAR 14 provides gamers a fair bit of challenge. Especially if it's the career mode you're playing."

However, the AI hasn’t been perfected completely. There are still some niggles that riddle the races of NASCAR 14- your competitors will crash and collide with you, no matter what lap of the race you’re currently on. Whether you’ve just started the race or are just a few dozen meters away from the finish line, your opponents will always drive forward with the same menacing mentality. While this gives the game a sense of urgency at times- which is oftentimes much appreciated, given how exciting it can make things- it makes for some unrealistic situations during races and can detract from the experience if you’re looking for realism and authenticity in vein of the Forza and WRC games.

This linear thinking pattern of the AI drivers also results in a bit of monotony later on in the game, and not only does it make the game a little boring as time wears on, it also gives you an unfair advantage no matter what difficulty setting you’re playing the game on. After a few hours, you’ll have memorized the way and patterns your opponents move in, and you’ll be beating them and winning races not because of skill, but, in large part, because you know what your opponents will do and when they’ll do it.

That doesn’t mean the game is easy, though. As any good racing sim should be, NASCAR 14 provides gamers a fair bit of challenge. Especially if it’s the career mode you’re playing. The career mode has been revamped in NASCAR 14, and you’ll be playing in an entire season, playing in races and practicing, earning money and building your dream car and crew to help you through the season. In the initial stages, the races are rather tough, simply because your car isn’t as good as those of your opponents, which means that strategizing is very important in these stages. However, as time goes on and you get better cars to drive, racing becomes a lot more balanced and, as a result, enjoyable.

"NASCAR 14 is, by all means, a huge improvement over its predecessors, and developer Eutechnyx have certainly set up a solid foundation to build its future games on."

When you’re not playing offline, you can head over online to play against your friends, either in a similar season setup or in single races. Online racing is extremely fun in NASCAR 14, largely because you don’t have to deal with the finicky AI. While there’s not as much complexity or depth here to keep you coming back as there is in the career mode offline, there’s still plenty of fun to be had while playing with your friends and you’ll find yourself playing online for several hours.

The technical side of the game is also a little iffy. The sound effects are, granted, very well done and give the game a nice, authentic feeling during races, pit stops and customization sections. Even the menus are crisp and clean. However, the visuals of the game themselves are a bit off the mark. While they’re not terrible or downright ugly by any means, they’re not up to the level of contemporary racers or contemporary HD video games in general. The textures get blown up and heavily pixelized when zoomed in on, and the frame rate stutters at times. The effects and the physics themselves are often hilariously inappropriate (a car spinning out of control at the slightest touch then balancing itself perfectly mere seconds later, for example), and glitches run aplenty. There’s certainly not enough of these technical errors for them to be a massive hindrance, but you do notice them and they do get in the way of your enjoyment.

NASCAR 14 is, by all means, a huge improvement over its predecessors, and developer Eutechnyx have certainly set up a solid foundation to build its future games on. They haven’t, however, managed to squash out all the faults and errors of the game, and as a result, NASCAR 14 is a flawed yet fun game that fans of the sport and the genre might want to try out.

This game was reviewed on the PC.

Developer of the upcoming racing sim NASCAR 14, Eutechnyx, has announced that it has laid off 12 of its employees as part of some restructuring work going on. Some of these 12 staff members have been loaned to Ubisoft studio Reflections.

Eutechnyx also closed its London offices, which contained five people, in June last year, but with 131 current employees and other sub-contractors working for the company, this all represents less than ten per cent of the number of people the company employes.

“On Friday, we made unfortunately 12 people redundant,” said Eutechnyx CEO Darren Jobling. “It was part of restructuring at the company.

“We’ve made no bones about the fact we wanted to move away from being a work-for-hire developer on consoles to publishing our own titles,” Jobling added, “so it’s highly regrettable that we did have to make 12 people redundant.”

Stay tuned for further updates on the story as more info comes our way.

[Develop]

You thought games would just skip Wii U because of low install base? Haha! No! Now they are skipping Xbox One and PlayStation 4 too.

In all seriousness, it is happening where NASCAR 14 is coming only to the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, skipping out on Xbox One and PlayStation 4 entirely, citing their low install base.

“It costs us about $6 million to develop a next-gen version of NASCAR,” Eutechnyx EVP Ed Martin said. “You have to sell an awful lot of copies in order to meet the development costs, on top of all the licensing. There are about 4-5 million worldwide combined units of PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, so it just doesn’t add up for us right now. We own the rights, and we absolutely have plans, but it won’t be later this year.”

He pointed out that Sony’s own decision, for example, to skip out on a PS4 release of Gran Turismo 6 for the same install base reasons was proof enough to them that they should continue to focus on current gen platforms for now.

In addition to Xbox 360 and PS3, it will also be coming to PC.

[Extra Mustard]

Deep Silver have announced that NASCAR 14 will be hitting the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 in early 2014. The newest NASCAR game is being developed by Eutechnyx.

“NASCAR is a hugely popular sport, second only to the NFL in TV ratings with licensed games having been published by Activision in recent years. Deep Silver is thrilled to have acquired the publishing rights to NASCAR ’14 and looks forward to cultivating a long-term relationship with both the fans and the franchise,” said Deep Silver Inc. COO, Geoff Mulligan.

The newest title features a season highlights mode, which lets you recreate key moments from the season, a career mode, officially licensed cars and track, and online multiplayer.

In addition, it also features player leagues, which lets everyone duke it out with their own group of friends to see who is the best.

Stay tuned to GamingBolt for more coverage on the game, including a full review once it launches.