We’d like to thank all those who took part in the 1.40 Open Beta, made bug reports, and provided general feedback on this new version. We hope you can now begin to fully enjoy the various new features which are included within this update. So, what can you expect to find in the 1.40 update for ETS2?

Let us give you a quick recap of the most significant changes.

New Visual Lighting System

One of the biggest changes you’ll notice when you first hop into your truck cab is the implementation of our new visual lighting system.

To prepare for this new lighting system, our teams had to make a lot of changes not only to our graphic renderer, its code, and other functionalities, but also to existing in-game world objects; including a majority of the in-game assets, textures, and materials to better work with the new physical model of the new lighting system. Want to get an in-depth look into what we had to revisit to make this major graphical change happen? Read more about it here.

We are very excited for you to be able to experience and immerse yourself in driving in the new light. The result is the culmination of a ton of hours by our programmers and visual effect artists and many other teams involved in the creation process of this new system. And even after this tremendous amount of work already spent in this area we are still not completely done. You can expect further changes and improvements to be done in the future. So while the open beta is done, we are still open and more than happy to get your feedback and opinions about this new graphics upgrade for our games.

Revisiting Germany

1.40 also brings the final phase of our Revisiting Germany project which a small team of mappers has been working on.

For those who are new to our game, the Revisiting Germany project consists of a small dedicated map team, who has been working hard to update one of the oldest map sections of the base game with a more realistic and up-to-date look.

The biggest change that comes with this update is a complete reskin and rework of all the highways and roads in this part of our in-game world, which was not retouched in previous updates.

Additionally, the areas around Dortmund, Köln, Dusseldorf, and Duisburg have not only benefitted from a complete road network redesign but a few new intersections and roads as well! The southern part of the Bundesautobahn 7 is now available in this update.

Vive La France ! New Cities

With the upcoming release of the Iberia expansion for Euro Truck Simulator 2, we know that many drivers will be excited to progressively make their way down Europe to cross into the peninsula for the first time. With France being mainland Europe’s gateway to Spain and Portugal, our team has developed 2 new French locations which are a part of a free update to the Vive La France ! DLC coming with 1.40.

The first of these is the city of Bayonne, located in the southwest of France; it is the capital of the French Basque Country and an important connection for drivers heading to Spain as it is located close to the border.

The second location is the smaller commune of Lacq, which is located in the Arrondissement of Pau. While this small village is going to be just a scenic drive-through for most, Lacq is home to the largest refinery in France.

Both of these areas plus two new connecting junctions in Toulouse and Bordeaux come as a free update to the Vive La France ! DLC for Euro Truck Simulator 2, which we originally announced would arrive with the release of Iberia. However, with them being ready now, we thought it would be a nice surprise to include them early in this update.

Super Stripes Paint Jobs Pack Update

Our latest ETS2 DLC is also about to get an update – two of the amazing designs in the Super Stripes Paint Jobs Pack have been expanded and are now applicable on owned trailers! And believe it or not, there was a small social media experiment behind the choice of the two paint jobs that were picked for this upgrade.

Back in November 2020, we wrote several short and seemingly insignificant posts on our Euro Truck Simulator 2 and SCS Software Facebook pages, where we called upon our community to cast votes on which DLC designs you liked the most. Today we are happy to share with you that the two most popular designs are getting an upgrade so that everyone can match these designs on both trucks and trailers!

Your engagement and activity on our social media channels really do matter! We can’t wait to see all the beautiful matching combinations on your vehicles. This may be a good opportunity for some VTCs to redesign their virtual corporate identity!

Changelog

Visual

• New Visual Lighting System

Map

• Germany Reskin
• New French Cities (Vive La France ! DLC)

Vehicle

• Two new paint jobs (from the Super Stripes Paint Jobs Pack) for owned trailers

Source: SCS Software’s blog

<p>The post Euro Truck Simulator 2 – 1.40 Update Release “new visual lighting system” first appeared on Simuway - Simulation Games, News, Mods, Simulator.</p>

We’d like to thank all those who took part in the 1.40 Open Beta, made bug reports, and provided general feedback on this new version. We hope you can now begin to fully enjoy the various new features which are included within this update. So, what can you expect to find in the 1.40 update for ATS?

Lets us give you a quick recap of the most significant changes.

New Visual Lighting System

One of the biggest changes you’ll notice when you first hop into your truck cab is the implementation of our new visual lighting system.

To prepare for this new lighting system, our teams had to make a lot of changes not only to our graphic renderer, its code, and other functionalities, but also to existing in-game world objects; including a majority of the in-game assets, textures, and materials to better work with the new physical model of the new light system. If you’ve missed our special and in-depth article on this topic, you can make yourself a big cup of tea/coffee and read it here.

We are very excited for you to be able to experience and immerse yourself in driving in the new light. The result is the culmination of a ton of hours by our programmers and visual effect artists and many other teams involved in the creation process of this new system. And even after this tremendous amount of work already spent in this area we are still not completely done. You can expect further changes and improvements to be done in the future. So while the open beta is done, we are still open and more than happy to get your feedback and opinions about this new graphics upgrade for our games.

Extended Chassis Update

Our vehicle team has worked hard to bring you a range of long and short chassis types, allowing you to customize your truck for the job at hand. This update will feature 4×2, 8×4, and 8×6 chassis types which are used for a range of different trailers.

4x2s, also known as single-axle trucks, are frequently used for local distribution deliveries by supermarkets and by logistic companies for hauling doubles. 8×4 and 8×6 chassis are the big guns of the heavy-haul industry and can handle just about any load you decide to take on. All of these new options bring more variety to you – the driver! We hope you enjoy this awesome addition to 1.40!

Here’s a full list of all the new extended chassis options now available in 1.40:

• Freightliner Cascadia: Day cab 4×2
• Mack Anthem: Day cab 4×2
• International LoneStar: Day cab & Sleepers 8×4
• Peterbilt 389: Day cab & Sleepers 8×4 & 8×6
• Volvo VNL: Day cab 4×2, Day cab & Sleepers 8×4
• Peterbilt 579: Day cab 4×2
• Kenworth W900: Day cab & Sleepers 8×4 & 8×6
• Kenworth T680: Day cab 4×2
• Western Star 49X: Day cab & Sleepers 8×4 & 8×6

New Mexico & Oregon DLC Viewpoints

 

Back in October last year, American Truck Simulator saw the arrival of viewpoints to the states of Washington, Colorado, and Utah after their popular debut in Idaho! Today we are happy to share with you that 1.40 sees the introduction of new viewpoints to the states of New Mexico & Oregon.

Source: SCS Software’s blog

<p>The post American Truck Simulator: 1.40 Update Release “New visual lighting system and much more…” first appeared on Simuway - Simulation Games, News, Mods, Simulator.</p>

However, please keep in mind that this is the first iteration of the open beta, which is still very much a work-in-progress build. If you want to take it for a spin, you can help contribute by reporting any bugs you may encounter in the appropriate section of our official forums. Your feedback and reports are extremely valuable for our team and we thank you in advance for taking the time to help us out.

Please bear in mind that this huge update will likely render many community MODs incompatible. MOD authors may need to adjust and update their mods to work with this update. We strongly recommend that you use a profile without any third-party modifications if you wish to participate in the 1.40 Open Beta. 

So, let’s take a look at what the 1.40 update has in store!

New Visual Lighting System

One of the biggest changes you’ll notice when you first hop into your truck cab is the implementation of our new visual lighting system. However, this isn’t just a simple change of our skyboxes; our new light system is fully dynamic and can now change not just according to current weather, but also based on simulated camera exposure taking into account not just current daylight intensity and weather, but also surface properties of game world elements in the view.

This new light system and the start of our new physical light model is a very important step towards a complete and better physical model of the whole world in our game, and how real it looks and works. All of our lighting is now based on real physical ratios and units, to make it as realistic as possible.

To prepare for this new light system, our teams had to make a lot of changes to existing in-game world objects; including a majority of the in-game assets, textures, and materials to better work with the new physical model of the new light system.

We are very excited for you to be able to experience and immerse yourself in driving in the new light. The result is the combination of thousands of hours by our programmers and visual effect artists and many other teams involved in the creation process of this new system.

During this open beta, your feedback is incredibly important and valuable to us, so we ask that you please submits yours to us in the 1.40 section for American Truck Simulator on our forums which you can find here.

Extended Chassis update:

For the 5th anniversary of American Truck Simulator, we wanted to bring a heavily-requested feature to our community to celebrate its progress and journey so far! This suggestion has always frequently appeared in our suggestions pile, and today we are thrilled to bring you an extended chassis range to all current truck models.

Our vehicle team has worked hard to bring you a range of long and short chassis types, allowing you to customize your truck for the job at hand. This update will feature 4×2, 8×4, and 8×6 chassis types which are used for a range of different trailers.

4x2s, also known as single-axle trucks, are frequently used for local distribution deliveries by supermarkets and by logistic companies for hauling doubles. 8×4 and 8×6 chassis are the big guns of the heavy-haul industry and can handle just about any load you decide to take on. All of these new options bring more variety to you, the driver! So we hope you enjoy this surprise addition to 1.40.

Here’s a full list of all the new extended chassis options now available in the open beta:

Western Star 49X Update:

With the exciting release of the Western Star® 49X in September 2020, we are happy to share with you that with the arrival of 1.40 for American Truck Simulator; the 49X will receive 2 sleeper cabin options as well as a lot of other new options. In fact, this truck just became the one with the most chassis options available, with up to 36 possible chassis/cabin/fuel-tank combinations.

We have just finished covering and showing the options which are coming for this truck in our special live stream on Twitch, Steam, and YouTube. Don’t fret if you’ve missed it, as you can always watch it again on our official YouTube channel. Additionally, we will be releasing a dedicated blog post in the near future with more information, images, and also a very cool video; be sure to keep an eye out for it!

Plus, if you are very eager to check out the new updates, be sure to join the 1.40 Open Beta and check it out for yourself!

New Mexico & Oregon DLC Viewpoints

Back in October last year, American Truck Simulator saw the arrival of viewpoints to the states of Washington and Utah after their popular debut in Idaho! Today we are happy to share with you that 1.40 sees the introduction of new viewpoints to the states of New Mexico & Oregon.

For newer players of our titles, Viewpoints are certain spots found across the map, where drivers can activate a special in-game cutscene with a short showcase of a near location or place of interest. These can be found displayed as a grey question mark on your GPS, so be sure to stop and discover them on your journeys.

You also have the option to skip the viewpoint or replay it if you wish to watch it again. From populated cities to historic monuments, each viewpoint highlights a point of interest or industry, so make sure to discover them all!

Changelog:

So enjoy all the new additions, but please remember: It’s only an experimental open beta, not a stable public version – so you may encounter bugs, instability, kinks, or crashes. It’s completely okay if you want to wait for the final release. But if you’re interested in helping us to move there faster, we’ll appreciate all of your feedback on our forum and your bug reports in this section.

Please check our modding wiki to get details pertaining to mods for the game.

If you wish to participate in the open beta, you can find this version in the public_beta branch on Steam. The way to access it is as follows: Steam client → LIBRARY → right-click on American Truck Simulator → Properties → Betas tab → public_beta → 1.40. No password required.

Source: SCS Software’s blog

<p>The post American Truck Simulator 1.40 Open Beta: New Visual Lighting System first appeared on Simuway - Simulation Games, News, Mods, Simulator.</p>

Please do keep in mind that this is the first iteration of the open beta, which is very much still a work in progress build. We anticipate that several weeks of further tweaking will be needed to get things stable. If you want to take it for a spin, you can help contribute by reporting any bugs you may encounter in the appropriate section of our official forums. Your feedback and reports are extremely valuable for our team and we thank you in advance for taking the time to help us out.

So, let’s take a look at what the 1.40 update has in store!

New Visual Lighting System 

Our art teams had to make a lot of changes across the whole catalogue of our in-game world objects; including a majority of the in-game 2D/3D assets, textures, and materials to better work with the new physical model of the new light system. Some of the textures, including our new HDR skyboxes, have a bit higher resolution, but for now, we are still keeping things in limits to maintain reasonable performance on mid-range GPUs and below. We plan to bring a more in-depth article to our ‘Under the Hood’ series focused on this major graphical rework soon, with more info and comparison images.

We are very excited for you to be able to experience and immerse yourself in driving under the new light. The result is the combination of thousands of hours by our programmers and visual effect artists and many other teams involved in the development and implementation of the new system.

During this open beta, your feedback is incredibly important and valuable to us, so we ask that you please submits yours to us in the 1.40 section for American Truck Simulator on our forums which you can find here.

Germany Reskin

1.40 will also bring the final piece of our revisiting Germany project which a small team of mappers has been working on.

For those who are new to our game, the revisiting Germany project consists of a small dedicated map team, who has been working hard to update one of the oldest map sections of the base game with a more realistic and up-to-date look.

The biggest change that will come with this update is a complete reskin and rework of all the highways and roads in this part of our in-game world, which was not retouched in previous updates.

Additionally, the areas around Dortmund, Köln, Dusseldorf, and Duisburg have not only benefitted from a complete road network redesign but a few new intersections and roads as well! The southern part of the Bundesautobahn 7 will also be available in this update.

---

Vive La France ! New Cities

With the upcoming release of the Iberia expansion for Euro Truck Simulator 2, we know that many drivers will be excited to progressively make their way down Europe to cross into the peninsula for the first time. With France being mainland Europe’s gateway to Spain and Portugal, our team is currently developing 2 new French locations which will be a part of a free update to the Vive La France ! DLC in the future.

The first being the city of Bayonne, located in the southwest of France; it is the capital of the French Basque Country and an important connection for drivers heading to Spain as it is located close to the border. The second location will be the smaller commune of Lacq, which is located in the Arrondissement of Pau. While this small village will just be a scenic drive-through for most, Lacq is home to the largest refinery in France.

Both of these areas plus two new connecting junctions in Toulouse and Bordeaux will come as a free update to the Vive La France ! DLC for Euro Truck Simulator 2, which we originally announced would arrive with the release of Iberia. However, with them being ready now, we thought it would be a nice surprise to include them early in this update.

Super Stripes Paint Jobs Pack Update

Our latest ETS2 DLC is also about to get an update – two of the amazing designs in the Super Stripes Paint Jobs Pack have been expanded and are now applicable on owned trailers! And believe it or not, there was a small social media experiment behind the choice of the two paint jobs that were picked for this upgrade.

Back in November 2020, we wrote several short and seemingly insignificant posts on our Euro Truck Simulator 2 and SCS Software Facebook pages, where we called upon our community to cast votes on which DLC designs you liked the most. Today we are happy to share with you that the two most popular designs are getting an upgrade so that everyone can match these designs on both trucks and trailers!

<p>The post ETS 2: 1.40 Update Open Beta “New Visual Lighting System” first appeared on Simuway - Simulation Games, News, Mods, Simulator.</p>