About Assettocorsamods.org (Sim Dream Development)

Sim Dream Development (or Sim Dream for short) is a modding group that sells mods on their website assettocorsamodding.org. These people take advantage of the search engine optimization (SEO) capabilities to make people visiting their page (to the point of confusing the neophyte user to believe that their page is an official Assetto Corsa webpage) and unwisely buy “their” products.

Sim Dream is routinely accused of stealing and/or ripping models from other sources, and for good reasons. These mods are more often than not stolen, low-quality, and often ripped completely from other games and content creators without permission. Selling content without the original creator’s consent and ripped from other games is not only wrong but illegal.

But the one who loses especially is you, by buying some mods that you can find for free. The vast majority of mods posted on sim racing are free, in fact.

https://assettocorsamods.net/

https://www.racedepartment.com/

These guys stole thousands from the Stock Car Extreme community with the V8 Supercar craziness. They have also stolen Forza models, and then apply poor sounds and physics to them, but this is where things get serious. They started stealing from other modders as well, including F1Classic’s most recent “work”, the 1967 Grand Prix Season.

Keep in mind, the original modders, and modders that got permission to improve the original mods, are not getting anything from this. They are instead feeling stunned from the very communities they have invested so much time into. All they can wish is that these mods get shared for free so the thieves aren’t receiving any more money, because they sure as hell don’t deserve it.

The sim-racing community has known about them for years and afaik there was one attempt to shut them down after a mod creator complained. They changed their website name to assettocorsamodding.com (which was smart as it likely drives up traffic to their site) and have continued selling low-effort mods to unsuspecting racers. The mods on their website look good at first glance, but are cheap conversions from rFactor and Forza, with very little work done on the physics of the cars and how they drive in general.

Sim Dream has now taken steps to falsely copyright strike other mod makers and content creators to take down their original content. A friend of mine recently received a copyright strike on YouTube for a mod review video that he had made which featured the GPL 1500cc mod by Bazza. This copyright strike was made by Sim Dream Development. His review fell under fair use but was still removed. Sim Dream’s website lists the “Assetto Corsa Classic Competition Mod” which features several cars that have been taken directly from Bazza’s GPL 1500cc mod without his permission.

A few days later Sim Dream struck Bazza’s mod that he was hosting on Mediafire and the file was removed. So, not only did they steal his mods but they’ve also taken action to remove Bazza’s mods and claim they have the copyrights to them. I’m not sure how or why this is allowed to happen but it’s totally wrong.

I’m hoping that this post exposes some of the wrongdoing of Sim Dream and creates a discussion on how we can stop them from profiting from the works of others. I wouldn’t mind if they simply converted old mods from other games for free but they are actively making money and being di*** in the process. Let me know if you’ve had any negative experiences with their mods or services and hopefully something can be done.

They have recently abused the copyright system to issue false copyright claims on YouTube and against mod creators. It’s illegal to sell car/track models from other games.

People need to know about this blatant scamming, so we can take them down more easily and stop people from wasting their money on poorly developed and stolen cars. End this while you still can!

Don’t buy anything from assettocorsamods.org.

Don’t buy anything from Sim Dream Development.

You got that?

In fact, the only way to combat it is to eradicate payware mods altogether, because then people will only be obligated to download high-quality mods instead of being lured into ripped, half-finished shit because “well, it’s payware, and payware flight sim stuff is good, so it must be the same thing over here in sim racing.” “Stop stealing the stuff I stole and/or created without permission” isn’t much of an argument if you want to take proper action against all this nonsense.

---- WHAT YOU CAN DO IF YOU ARE A CONTENT CREATOR IN F1 CHALLENGE '99-'02 ----

Reduce the number of polygons of your cars and tracks as much as possible: in F1 Challenge '99-'02, the sky is the limit when it comes to F1C's FFB update rate. F1 Challenge '99-'02's Force FeedBack loop is tied to the refresh rate. In other words, the higher is the FPS in your game, the better will be your FFB. One of the best ways to increase your performance and driving sensations in this game is to have circuits with as few polygons as possible. In F1 Challenge, the quality of modeling is achieved by having the best possible model using a minimum number of polygons, with a quality that is consistent with the contents of the original video game. When these models are attempted to be exported to higher-end simulators, the shortcomings will become much more clear and this will discourage the purchase of many naive people.



Use 1024x1024 resolution textures or lower: When modeling vehicles, 1024x1024 resolution textures should be applied only to the chassis. Textures below 1024x1024 are acceptable in F1 Challenge '99-'02, but in today's sims, it's another story. The original game uses 1024x1024 textures very sparingly, only on vehicle models, other areas of the chassis, and specific terrain areas of a circuit. The great advantage of F1 Challenge '99-'02 is not only that its modding processes are the most efficient and fastest of any simulator known to date, but that everything can be converted to F1C without any complaints related to quality.



The Armos way This consists of locking all your MTS files for EVERY SINGLE mas file you use within your SeasonData folder, then create a new fake MAS file without the models. The true one should be hidden with a fictional and unrecognizable format. Very few people know how to do this, but I will also point out that this is the least effective way, because hidden pseudo files are easy to discover and unlock. The same goes for the locked MTS files. Nevertheless, is effective against people that don't master the English language and lacks the necessary specific tools and knowledge to do the reverse ARMOS way to unlock. This method also makes you suffer some sort of "rFactor2 syndrome", with every locked and put in such a way that new updates for your mods will be done at a much slower pace, losing F1C's saving grace as a videogame and racing simulator.



Extra tips: The most effective way to diminish leeching without harming the community in a game like F1 Challenge '99 -'02 is not done just by going private modding, but by offering a better mod than leechers do with all their gameplay features covered under permissive rules of use and exemplary ethics of its creative team, reducing the graphic and polygonal quality to the minimum standards (seen above) for the maximum benefit of fluidity and realism. Excess of quality in inappropriate areas such as 3D models or lack of it in key sections such as gameplay or consistency of physics often leads to content theft, regardless of the empathy (or lack thereof) of the person doing it.

For more information about Sim Dream Development:

Luigi70's work leeched by Sim Dream Development.

About leeching and selling stuff done from others in RaceDepartment.

Reddit post about Sim Dream Development.

A free blog dedicated to this topic that served as an inspiration for make this post.

About ethics and money.

Hard raw evidence that Sim Dream duplicates files

Payware mods are going out of control.

Spoiler:

Archive 1
Archive 2
Archive 3
Extra archive

(thanks to Pierino for sending me these captures)