Information Regarding Career Mode Crashes & AI Performance

Hello players,

Following the v1.4.0 update to EA SPORTS™ WRC, an unforeseen issue with Career Mode has occurred that is affecting a number of players.

Please see below for further information and what we are doing to resolve it for you all.

What happened:

• The v1.4.0 update was released.
  
  
• This update added Central European Rally to the game.
  
  
• Central European Rally was also added to Career Mode, both as part of the WRC class, and across several other Championships and Events in Career.
  
  
• The addition of Central European Rally caused a mismatch in the game code with a specific set of Benefactor objectives.
  
  
• Affected players will experience a 100% crash rate if their Career Mode save features these specific objectives.

How are players affected:

• Career Mode contains hundreds of combinations of Benefactor objectives, specifying which Events and Championships the player must compete in as progression targets.
  
  
• These Benefactor objectives are randomly assigned to players at the start of each Career Mode Season.
  
  
• Players who have specific combinations of these Benefactor objectives will experience a game crash if they attempt to continue their Career.
  
  
• Players who have not started Career, or start a new Career are not affected in Career Mode Season 1.
  
  
• Some players may be able to load a Career Mode save without any issue, though this cannot be predicted in advance.
  
  
• Players who are currently in Career Mode Season 2 and beyond in WRC2 and Junior WRC are at risk of a crash if they attempt to continue their career.
  
  
• Players who are currently in Career Mode Season 2 and beyond in WRC are also at risk, and players in Season 3 and beyond are at a higher risk.
  
  
• If a player has experienced this crash, there is a chance that their Career Mode progress has been lost with no ability to recover.

How players can mitigate the issue:

• If a player has an active Career Mode save, we are advising all players to avoid playing in Career until an update is released.
  
  
• With the hotfix we are aiming to restore existing Career Mode Saves for those that do not start a new Career.
  
  
• If a player wishes to start a new Career, they can do so without being affected by this issue, however their previous save will be permanently lost.

How we are fixing the issue:

• This issue is the #1 priority for our team as regards fixes and updates.
  
  
• However, as this is a complicated and delicate issue that affects save games, we do not wish to rush a quick fix, and inadvertently cause further issues down the line.
  
  
• With this hotfix we are also aiming to recover lost Career Mode saves for those that do not start a new Career.
  
  
• The aim is to have a hotfix ready as soon as possible.

What else will be in the hotfix:

• The primary goal of the hotfix will be to resolve the issues causing Career Mode to crash for players.
  
  
• In addition, we believe we have found a fix for the commonly-reported “inconsistent AI performance when resuming an Event” issue.
  
  
• We plan to implement this AI change into the hotfix as well, thank you for your recent reports which have helped us to potentially diagnose the root cause.
  
  
• Finally, we plan to implement a fix to the track limits issue reported on Rally Chile stages, which arose after the v1.4.0 update was released.

When will a hotfix be released:

• Due to the complexity of the Career Mode issue, the action required to resolve it, and the time required for testing and certification, we aim to be in a position to issue a hotfix on all platforms in mid January.