Another week, another manufacturer on-board. This time, Project CARS partners with the road and racing machinery of the innovative and historic German company, Audi.
Slightly Mad Studios announced the latest addition to its ever-growing and already substantial car portfolio on Tuesday.
In recent times, Bentley Motors, Radical Sportscars, Renault and McLaren Automotive have joined the fray with everything from Prototype-class racing cars through exotics old and new and on to road-going cars that’ll quite simply be a joy to drive (and, er, throw around!).
Back to the news, Wednesday brought a pleasant surprise to CARS testers at Team Member level or above – the arrival of, if it is the right collective term, a clutch of three Audi cars. With the collection set to grow in future, the freshly adopted brand is off to a fine start with a sample of ‘something for everyone’ when it comes to the creations of the Bavarian automobile producer.
Audi. Here. Now.
- 2011 Audi R18 TDI LMP1
A Le Mans winner – the Audi R18 TDI LMP1 (2011)
- 2013 Audi R8 LMS Ultra GT3
Audi’s R8 LMS Ultra – another endurance racing winner?
- 2013 Audi R8 V10 plus
A Connecticut Summer evening behind the wheel of the Audi R8 V10 plus.
Audi. More to Come.
With the early Audi-to-player introductions done, the selection is by no means finished. A complete Audi garage will in fact extend over the coming months and look like this:
- 2012 Audi A1 quattro
- 2002 Audi R8 LMP900 (Audi’s first Le Mans-winning car)
- 2014 Audi R18 e-tron quattro
A Real Legend.
There is more.
- 1989 Audi 90 IMSA GTO
Apparently implemented as part of a brand-building exercise in difficult times, the IMSA GTO could be considered a melding of Audi’s earlier and highly successful racing programmes. Seemingly every available racing technology of the time was put into the car, a machine unusual in its looks as well as its advanced design features. Audi’s IMSA project would surprisingly run for only a single season. In 1990, the sport division would make its debut in DTM. From there, Hans-Joachim Stuck would quickly follow his 1989 IMSA achievements with not only fastest laps and podium placings in that year’s DTM series but after seven wins, the championship itself!
To varying degrees, the current Audi trio are place-holders for future builds. To give a couple of examples, there may be random physics oddities and the R8 V10 plus notably has a thwacking great thunk of a gear change. However, as it’s tempting to expect by now, the many people involved in these digital creations have built three impressive, responsive and fun foundations for the Project CARS Audi stable. They each drive differently and that’s a good beginning.
Project CARS is presently scheduled for an Autumn 2014 release, with development ongoing for Windows and SteamOS PCs, the Wii U, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
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