COBAL

1. 17 GT3 cars, two circuits, nothing to tune. Choose from 11 Kunos GT3 cars and six RSS GT-M cars, all supported at Barcelona GP and Spa. You just race.
2. More competitive and realistic race starts, with opponents accelerating more consistently instead of giving away easy positions on the opening straight.
3. More commitment in close fights, including wheel-to-wheel duels and moments when an AI opponent comes under pressure.
4. Content Manager’s Opponents Strength setting has a car-specific calibration for the 11 Kunos GT3s at both circuits, providing a more reasonable and linear progression in difficulty from 70% to 100%.
5. More competitive opponents throughout the race. With COBAL ON, opponents can already be quite competitive at an AI level of around 80–85%.
6. AI opponents can now defend and change their line more aggressively when you challenge them for a place, but I’ve made sure they cannot change their line under braking.
7. Smarter pursuit when an AI opponent closes in on another car, whether it’s driven by the AI or by you.
8. A closer and more natural field, keeping more opponents within racing reach for longer. This also means more opportunities for sustained battles and overtakes as opponents meet on track.
9. Positioning that accounts for nearby cars and available track space and much better awareness of closing gaps, which can help avoid some rear-end contacts.
10. Subtle (and legal) racing-line variation from AI opponents ahead between battles.
11. A calmer response during recovery after an off-track moment, contact or a significant slowdown.
12. An optional COBAL AI Leaderboard with live race information, a live COBAL activity indicator and an estimated safety rating.

COBAL launched with Barcelona GP on 2 October 2026, then added Spa-Francorchamps on 9 October. On 10 October, support expanded to six RSS GT-M cars alongside the original 11 Kunos GT3s. All 17 are supported at both circuits.

More choice for the grid, with the same focus on competitive starts, effective defence and sustained battles throughout the race. Watch the first gallery clip for a side-by-side COBAL OFF/ON comparison at Spa with identical racing settings.

COBAL stands for Context-Oriented Behaviour Augmentation Layer, and it is built on one principle: context is king. Built using the Lua libraries provided by Custom Shaders Patch, COBAL uses a scenario engine able to understand and automatically infer each AI car's context many times per second, and uses this information to continuously adapt and improve every AI pilot's racecraft.

COBAL reads the situation around each car and adjusts commitment, cohesion and defensive positioning as the race unfolds. Its interventions include AI grip, tyre confidence and throttle adjustments. It works with Assetto Corsa's native AI to encourage closer, more sustained racing.

Barcelona GP and Spa support the same 17 GT3 cars: 11 Kunos and six RSS GT-M models. COBAL's racecraft augmentation works throughout the race. No tuning, no per-track files, nothing to configure. Your only job is to drive and enjoy.

By measurement, not by feel. An automated laboratory ran hundreds of full races, sweeping candidate settings and scoring every race on pre-defined metrics: side-by-side time, completed overtakes, physical pack spacing, contacts and spins. A setting was kept only if it produced more racing with a physically tighter pack and clean driving. At runtime COBAL learns nothing and searches nothing: it simply executes the calibrated laws.

Spa went through the complete development and calibration process: automated race campaigns, circuit-specific refinement, combined-race evaluation and driving review. The result is a complete, ready-to-race addition to COBAL.

COBAL combines measured settings for supported content with live racing context. Opponents respond to nearby cars, pressure and gaps through the controls exposed by CSP. The racing result and your experience at the wheel are what matter.

Across the 457-race Barcelona evaluation, the best experimental configurations reached 2.8× the baseline AI-pair duel time and up to 83% more completed overtakes.

Moreover, COBAL comes ready to use across the supported Kunos and RSS GT-M grids at Barcelona GP and Spa, with no tuning or configuration required from the player.

Yes. The COBAL AI Leaderboard makes the racing context inferred for every AI car visible as the action unfolds. Alongside the familiar timing information, each AI pilot carries a live, plain-language status: CLEAR AIR, CLOSING IN, ON THE TAIL, WHEEL-TO-WHEEL, MIRROR WATCH, UNDER ATTACK, or RECOVERING.

Each status is the readable face of COBAL's shared Scenario Context Engine (SCE). It is derived from live race geometry such as gaps, closing speed, lateral overlap, and incidents. The same context feeds COBAL's augmentation modules. At a glance, you can spot a chase developing, distinguish a nearby follower from a genuine attack, and follow battles elsewhere in the field without interpreting timing gaps alone.

The leaderboard shows the situation COBAL has inferred for each AI car. That same context guides COBAL's bounded behavioural adjustments in real time.

Automated evaluation found more AI-pair engagement and overtaking in the leading configurations. Read the white paper on Zenodo for the methods and results.

Watch the Spa comparison above to see COBAL's racecraft in action: competitive starts, stronger opponents and sustained battles, with COBAL OFF and ON under identical racing settings.

COBAL supports Barcelona GP and Spa-Francorchamps (Kunos, 24 pits) in offline dry races. Both circuits support the same 17 GT3 cars: 11 Kunos and six Race Sim Studio GT-M models.

Kunos · 11 cars: Lamborghini Huracán GT3, McLaren 650S GT3, Mercedes-AMG GT3, Audi R8 LMS (2016), Nissan GT-R GT3, McLaren MP4-12C GT3, Mercedes SLS GT3, Porsche 911 GT3 R (2016), Audi R8 LMS, Ferrari 488 GT3 and BMW Z4 GT3.

Race Sim Studio GT-M · six cars, supported at both circuits:

• GT-M Adonis V8 Evo
• GT-M Bayer i6 Evo
• GT-M Furiano 96 V6
• GT-M Hyperion V8
• GT-M Macca 72 V8 Evo
• GT-M Protech P92 F6

Install the RSS cars separately; they are not bundled with COBAL. RSS Formula and MP-H models are outside this supported GT-M list.

Every car on the grid, including yours, must be supported on that circuit and belong to the same supported cohesion group. One unsupported opponent makes augmentation inactive for the entire grid. COBAL then leaves the race to native Assetto Corsa AI; it does not augment only the supported cars.

Choose a listed Kunos or RSS GT-M car at Barcelona GP or Kunos Spa (24 pits), and use supported GT3 cars for every opponent. Mixed grids of the listed GT3 cars are supported on both circuits too. Check your complete intended grid before joining. Other layouts, modded versions of Spa, modified car physics, wet races and unlisted content are outside the supported experience. Each later release will list its own coverage.

Assetto Corsa on PC, Content Manager and Custom Shaders Patch 0.2.7 or later, plus Barcelona GP or Kunos Spa (24 pits) and the supported GT3 cars listed above. For RSS grids, install the relevant RSS GT-M cars and a COBAL release that includes RSS GT-M support. One unsupported car, including the player's car, makes augmentation inactive for the whole grid.

Close Assetto Corsa and extract the complete release ZIP into its installation directory; it supplies apps/lua/COBAL/. Download the release that includes your chosen cars and circuits from Patreon and follow its included README's upgrade instructions. Earlier releases may not include Spa or RSS GT-M support. Enable CSP Lua apps and open COBAL from the in-game sidebar. There are no separate track files to install or models to tune; install any RSS car mods separately.

The X closes settings without switching gameplay off. The master stops ongoing augmentation; OSO's starting difficulty adjustment remains until the next session. Start the next session with COBAL off to use the original difficulty.

If the COBAL panel shows INACTIVE, read the reason beside the disabled enable switch. Check the circuit layout and every car, including your own, against the supported list, then correct the grid and restart the session. For Spa, use the original Kunos circuit with 24 pits. For RSS, check the exact GT-M model and that your COBAL release includes RSS support. Your saved enable preference is retained.

COBAL is an ambitious project built for the Assetto Corsa community. Behind every release lie months of development and measurement campaigns spanning hundreds of hours of automated racing.

Community support funds development, calibration, compatibility work and support. After expanding from Barcelona GP to Spa, COBAL now welcomes six RSS GT-M cars, giving you more choice for close offline GT3 racing at both circuits.

Supporter receives new circuits, cars and features as they ship, including Spa and the RSS GT-M addition. Contributor includes those benefits plus voting on feasible development priorities. Early members retain their price. See Patreon for pricing, current downloads and membership details.

COBAL was born of a passion for sim racing and is dedicated to the Assetto Corsa community that inspired it. A special thanks goes to Ilja Jusupov, aka x4fab, creator of Custom Shaders Patch: his work is the foundation this project stands on. Without CSP, there would be no COBAL.