Note: I've updated this guide to reflect the changes in the 1.4 patch 1.5 patch. The major change is that finishing 9th or worse causing you to have to redo the stage no longer applies to the Professional and Simulation Modes.

Also, as a general heads-up, each new patch has reset the option settings back to default values, so it is important to write down or take a screenshot of those changes you need to remember!

Dakar Desert Rally can be a very challenging game, especially if you are older or have reactions just a bit slower. However, it is a game that rewards not just raw skill, but planning, judgement and patience. I'm a sixty-nine year old (not a joke) with a touch of arthritis and I've been pretty successful so far in the game:




I have just gone over 90 hours in Dakar Desert Rally on Steam and I thought I'd pass along some tips with an emphasis on those like myself who don't have the raw talent but love rallying and especially the Dakar.

I don't intent to explain what the game is about or the basics of playing the game. I'll assume that when you are reading this guide you've already tried your hand at doing some rallies and are looking for some advice.

Also, my thanks to Commodore and Xilence, I've used quotes from your postings in the Steam discussions. I'm not sure of the proper protocols for attribution and sadly I can't find the originals posts, but if you'll post in the comments any requests I'll be happy to make the appropriate adjustments.

The following was posted by PauloJGames, of the Saber Development Staff, over on Discord in a post dated December 11, 2022. Link to his post here[discord.com]

Here is out Road Map for Patch Updates (Free Content):
================================================
Already delivered:
1.4 - SAUDI ARABIA EXTENDED MAP
1.5 - FREE MODE > CUSTOM PLAY

What's coming next (January / February 2023):
1.6 - FREE MODE > FREE ROAM / TREASURE HUNT
1.7 - LANGUAGE PACK (MORE TEXT LANGUAGES AND VOICE OVER LANGUAGES) + STEERING WHEELS DEVICE WIZARD

What's coming after that (Until June 2023):
1.8 - ROAD BOOK EDITOR
1.9 - TEAM CUSTOMIZATION
2.0 - REPLAY AND PHOTO MODE
Each patch also includes several fixes and improvements.

The DLC Roadmap apparently remains the same, although the dates are now in 2023.

I'm adding this new section (Oct 30, 2022) to describe how I play the game. Some of these items might not be applicable or the way you wish to play, but I thought that for new players it might be a good introduction on how to get into DDR.

I've played in all three modes of DDR, Sport, Professional and Simulation, and I can't really say that I prefer one over another. Sport mode is more arcade-like, fun and satisfying when you are more interested in throwing a vehicle around rather than focusing on navigation. Simulation mode is the most difficult to master, because not only is navigation very critical, but the stages are very long (30-60 minutes) and if you damage your vehicle enough you'll have to do repairs which will likely knock you out of being in the top eight which will block you from proceeding into the next stage. Professional mode can be thought of as the Goldilocks option, with the critical navigation of Simulation mode but with shorter stages, less damage accumulation and, importantly, the ability to save at any time, leave the game and return to where you left off, something you cannot (currently) do in Professional mode. But as I say, there is something in each of the modes for me.

When it comes to the actually driving, I use a Logitech G920 wheel & pedal set for the SxS, car and truck classes. These are the settings I use in the game:


.
.
For the bike and quad I use an Xbox 360 controller with the following settings:


.
As a general heads-up, each new patch has reset the controller settings back to default values, so it is important to write down or take a screenshot of those changes you need to remember!
.
While racing I use the further out of the two chase views. I find that this view lets me get a better look at the upcoming terrain and also watch out for any competitors passing me. One thing I have noticed is that sometimes the chase view tends to sink down a little after going over big jumps. There is a view reset button which I use periodically if I notice this.

.
.
I leave most user interface settings at the default values. This isn't so much in thinking they are better than something else, it's more that I tend to adapt myself to what's given rather than tinker to trying to perfect them. One setting that I do change is the transmission. For bikes, quads and SxS I set it at automatic, but for trucks and cars I put it into semi-automatic mode. This is especially important in Simulation mode as the SxS, car and truck classes get penalized if a certain speed is exceeded. Using the semi-auto transmission gives me a way to try to keep from going too fast.

This is a rather basic question but has many nuances. And part of the answer depends on what controller you are going to use. While I'm sure it is possible to race with keyboard + mouse, I've never tried it in DDR and haven't for many years in other games, probably not since Pole Position.

If you have a gamepad controller like those for the Xbox or Playstation (I use an old X360 controller myself on the PC) then you are equipped for all five vehicle types. However, a controller is best for the bikes and the quads. Still, nothing wrong with using it for the other vehicle types.

Be very aware that using a gamepad controller has been a challenge for many. However, I'm using the advice posted by Xilence:

Originally posted by Xilence:

Funny enough, I believe the steering options are backwards! So lowering these options actually makes the car MORE sensitive with its steering and raising them makes it less sensitive.

Change your Controller Steering options to what I mention below, it makes a WORLD of difference on how twitchy the vehicle is. Put Steering Linearity at 1.00 and then adjust your steering sensitivity between 50 and 100, the higher it is the slower the front wheels will turn. I personally like 75 for sensitivity and 1.00 for Linearity. I also added a 10% deadzone, just to have some wiggle room with my joystick.

I'll add some driving advice for the controller later on.

If you have a wheel+pedals set that the game currently supports (there are quite a number that aren't currently supported, but hopefully updates will start adding those in) then you'll probably find that it is easier to drive the SxS, car or truck with them.

And I don't know about other hardware brands, but the Logitech G HUB client I was running had some issues a while ago and I was advised by folks on the web to roll back to a more error free client. I'm now running the G HUB client version 2020.10.6293 and of course have turned off auto updates. I'm using a Logitech G920 without any issues, although I've turned down the feedback from 60% to 40% but otherwise I'm sticking with the default settings.

So which vehicle is the best choice at first? I'd recommend the SxS. Slower than the cars, but more stable than the bikes and quads. And stay away from the trucks at first, they are a handful!

Note, the info below was written before the release of the 1.4 patch, which greatly improves the handling of the quads and also improves the handling of the bikes. I think the info is still pertinent to some degree so I'm leaving it unchanged for now.

I'm making this a special section since there are quite a number of folks who swear that the quads cannot be raced since they are so uncontrollable. Yet I've raced quads on many stages successfully. Part of the secret is the settings in the game for the controller mentioned above. And part of it is the tuning for the quads. What I use is shown below. I've lowered the tire pressure and tightened up the steering angle. These changes will make the quad more manageable.

However, the biggest effect in controlling the quad is to drive it more carefully. Quads are sensitive on dirt and are very sensitive in sand. Move the steering stick gently. This means you're going to have to plan your turns earlier so you don't have to jerk the stick at the last moment. The way I visualize this is to image that the front wheels aren't on a smooth surface (which they aren't in the game) but instead alternately dig in and skip over the surface. So if you happen to change direction suddenly when the wheels are digging in your quad will snap around. Minor corrections to the steering angle works pretty well.

The other really important thing to remember about the quad is when you are jumping over a rise or a crest or a dune or practically anything. When the front end hits and the wheels are turned (you have steering input), then it is likely the quad will snap around. So if you are in the air, release the steering stick and let the wheels point forward.

Again, a lot of folks are going to think I'm full of #$%^&$, but I've got in hours of stages on the quads and have won a lot. It's about patience and practice.

So what about bikes? Same rules apply from above. Bikes will dig in and snap turn if you over-control. Ride gently!

Since I first published this guide, I've found out something that adversely affects the handling of the quads. It probably also affects the other vehicles, but on the quad it seems most noticeable. If you pick up some damage, even if it doesn't trigger the yellow warning triangle to the left (see below), it might start effecting handling and speed.


If your handling suddenly start being off, even if you didn't run into anything, you could have picked up some damage. Open the Repair Vehicle screen (see below) and decide if you wish to fix it.


As I said, I've been running a quad that suddenly started behaving badly, or at least oddly. Each time I found some damage which when fixed also fixed the handling issue.

I've added this new section to collect various setup tips and advice posted on Steam and Discord that I've come across. Since I'm at a complete loss when it comes to determining which setup tweak is better or not, I'll just list the original message from the poster without interpretation. If anyone has additional tips or comments on what's posted, please add them to the comments at the bottom of the guide.

From azaris on the Discord DDR chat channel:

1. Most vehicles you can run maximum or near maximum stiffness on the suspension. If the vehicle lands awkwardly after jumps, soften by 1-2 click. In stages with lot of steep dunes, you may want to run 1-2 clicks softer to give more traction.

2. Tyre pressures should be at maximum for bikes and quads, and for other vehicles as low as possible so that you just hit the speed limit in 5th/6th gear while going flat. On stages with lots of fast sections it may be faster to increase the pressures by 1-2 clicks and monitor the speed limit manually. In pro/sport mode run maximum pressure that still gives you enough grip on dunes (27 is a good balanced value for cars, 24 for trucks).

3. Cambers should be set between 2.0-1.0 negative in front, 1.0-0.0 negative in rear. Helps reduce uncatchable passenger slides (especially rear camber).

4. Ride height should be minimum value possible where you no longer hear scraping sounds when you drive over bumpy terrain.

5. Brake bias should be set at 59-67% depending on the vehicle. You want the vehicle to start rotating under heavy braking, but not so much it spins uncontrollably.

6. ARBs can be adjusted to reduce body roll (increase to have less roll), which is useful in trucks and cars to avoid rolling over. Otherwise put forward ABR > rear ARB if the car is oversteering too much, and forward ARB < rear ARB if the car is understeering too much.

7. Toe can be set a few clicks negative in front, and a few clicks positive in the rear. Adds some stability and makes the vehicle turn more sharply. If the vehicle is unstable in a straight line, remove toe from both ends and reduce cambers.

8. AWD torque balance should be left at 50%.

There are three game modes. Sport mode is the first you'll probably try and it can be very frustrating for those of us on the more, err, life experienced side. All the competitors are released at once and your vehicle will be in a random position. And, no matter your position, several competitors will inevitably blow past you. You'll try to speed up and duel with them and that will probably end in a crash.

A lot of people bad mouth Sport Mode, saying it isn't really rallying and it is too arcade-like and more of that ilk. True, it isn't like really rallying, but this is, after all, a game. Professional Mode and Simulation Mode are more like the real Dakar rally, but they are also very intense, time consuming and sometimes less than fun. Sport Mode appeals to me in two ways. One, I can blow off some steam throwing my vehicle around racing against other opponents and not having to worry about some much navigation. And second, and probably even more important, Sport Mode really hones your driving skills. It's one thing to be driving by yourself during a stage, but if you are trying to dodge wild-eyed opponents, vehicles from other classes, blizzards, lightning, etc, you really learn how to drive at 10/10ths.

So what to do? First of all, remember that driving in this game requires lots of practice and patience. You are not going to be very good at first, but you will soon develop skills that will help you get faster and more importantly, be more precise in your driving.

Sport mode is focused on driving, but navigating still has to be done. Most of the time when you reach a waypoint, the next one is in view, however this is not always the case. You need to be paying attention to the navigational clues at the top center of the screen.

As I keep emphasizing, you'll get better with practice and sometimes the best way to learn is to drive slowly. Do a rally but don't worry about your position. Let those hotshot AI drivers zoom away and concentrate on figuring out how the symbols on the top of the screen correlate to what is happening ahead of you.

And in Sport mode, you have a secret weapon! Those hotshot AI drivers and riders have the skill set of Wiley E. Coyote[looneytunes.fandom.com]. They may be fast, but inevitable they will drive into rocks, over cliffs or into each other. The longer the rally, the more likely you're going to finish up front because your AI opponents are accumulating lots of repair time!
.

Professional mode is the meat and potatoes of Dakar Desert Rally. It involves doing some serious navigation. To get a good introduction to navigation I can recommend the Steam Guide "Roadbook tutorial (Video)" by RED.

Again, I'm not going to give you blow by blow advice on how to navigate in Professional or Simulation Mode for two reasons. I forget the first one, but the second reason is that you can safely ignore most of what you see in the roadbook.


What? Aren't all those little symbols important? Well, no. And for the primary reason that you are going a zillion miles an hour (or kph) and don't have time to study each little box. And for those of use older and maybe without the best of memories, there are just too many things going on. I have read that the time compression for Dakar Desert Rally compared to the real thing is five to one. In other words, what happens in DDR in one minute would be what would happen in the real rally in five minutes. I don't know how accurate that is, but I figured out from my experience in DDR that I'm going through something like four to five waypoints every minute. There is just no way I can possibly keep up with everything being presented in the road book.

And I don't need to...

I've divided up the rest of the discussion on Professional Mode into two parts because of one major difference, the co-driver. In bikes and quads, there is no co-driver. There is nobody telling you to drive this direction or turn left or warn you about figures. Nope, it's just you, the open world and the roadbook.


For those with less than rocket-fast-reactions, Professional Mode on a bike or quad is about learning to balance looking ahead with looking at the roadbook and looking at the CAP and kilometer display at the top. The most important thing to learn from the roadbook is, where am I going and how long before the next step in the roadbook? You don't care if there are power poles or trees or camels nearby, you only care which way to go.

And this can be made even simpler. There are only three types of paths that you are going to follow. The first is an established track, something that looks like you would know it was a road even if there were no tire marks on it. This is noted in the roadbook with a capital "P". That's french for "it's a road". You've seen a lot of those in Sport Mode.

However, tracks are tricky in one respect. As you go from one waypoint box to the next one down, if you are staying on the trail, there may not be a "P" in the right hand box. Yes, that's confusing. The way to verify this is to look at the diagram in the center box and check out the blue line. If it is a solid line, then you are on the trail. If it is a dashed line, then it is traces or off-road.

The next path you'll be following is traces. These are literally traces left by tires in the dirt or sand or heaven forbid, snow. If a roadbook box says "follow traces", then follow those traces.

The third path is trickier, but logical. If there is a roadbook instruction to "Qt traces" or "Qt P", then that means to quit following the traces or the road. There should be a number, highlighted in yellow, in the center box. That's the heading, or CAP, that you need to follow. You follow that to the next waypoint

OK, so it's not quite that simple. In the image below, you can see in the middle set of three boxes, in the box on the right, the instruction "Qt traces" then right below that is a "P". That means quit following the traces and instead follow the road.


Finally, let's expand on that number highlighted in yellow. If there is the word "MOY" highlighted in yellow below it, it means that the heading/CAP is an average, which means your either following traces or following a road. If there isn't a MOY below the number, then that number is the actual heading you need to follow.

There are a lot more nuances to the roadbook, but really the best way to understand them is, yes, practice and practice. And drive slowly. Look at the roadbook, then look at what you see as you go, and learned to associate the terrain up ahead with the symbols in the roadbook.

Oh, one tip if case you're feeling like you might be getting lost... look for helicopters. These are overflying other competitors as well as yourself. If you see a helicopter, odds are good it's either somewhere you've been or somewhere you ought to be going.

As I mentioned above, the difference with these vehicles is that these have a co-driver yelling in your ear. The quoted section down below has a lot of useful information, but again for the purposes of simplicity, remember three words, "track", "traces" and "off-road". Your co-driver will use one of those three words to indicate which path type (mentioned in the previous section) you should be following. If he says "off-road" you will need to be following a CAP (compass) heading. If he says "track" or "traces" then you know you should be following one of those types of paths.

While I could try to do a bunch more tips about it, I think what I saw posted by Commodore in the Steam discussions says it best:

Originally posted by Commodore:

The co-pilot reads the road book, he doesn't give wrong instructions.

I think a common misconception is that people expect him to give directions in a WRC style, corner by corner, but the roadbook doesn't have every corner. Each waypoint is multiple kilometers away.

How it goes is that after passing a waypoint, he reads the next. For example, it might go "4km, prepare to turn right, rocks, danger 1, downhill". The road you're following might have multiple turns in between, the navigator doesn't know about those, he only tells you about the roadbook. He'll repeat it once more at 2km away, and one right before, then as you pass it he'll read the next waypoint in the book.

Another example that can be confusing at first are intersections. Imagine a Y intersection where you have to take the right path. You are currently driving with a cap of 0 degree. The roadbook will have written on it a cap of 90 degree. That roadbook cap is the heading you will have after the turn. The navigator, on the other hand, will say "keep right, cap 15". That's because cap 15 is where you need to head when entering the intersection. This is useful at complex intersections with 3-4 or more path you could take.

Finally, if you miss a checkpoint, meaning you were driving too far away for the game to register it, he will say you're heading the wrong direction. After a while of saying you're getting lost, he will eventually give you a cap to return to the last known waypoint. However, if you yourself got back on track and think you know where you're going, you can keep going, and when you reach the next waypoint, the navigator will stop saying you're lost and go back to reading the roadbook.

What I'll add is that while your co-driver is a great help, you must keep an eye on the roadbook. The co-driver can get a little behind and then his calls will be somewhat confusing. As the human driver supported by an AI navigator, you need to remain aware of what waypoint in the roadbook you are driving to and what you are expecting to find.

I have done some Simulation stages. The example below is from the Dakar Experience 2020 event. It consisted of three stages which took me in total just over two hours and thirteen minutes.


So what is Simulation Mode anyway? You can read the description in the game, but what are we letting ourselves in for?

The stages are longer in duration, for me the three stages in the first event took 38, 47 and 47 minutes. And there are no in-stage saves. So if you can't complete the stage you either need to leave the game open or lose the progress you've made.

Next is that damage accrues faster in Simulation Mode. In Sport or Professional Modes you could bang into the occasional rock or tree or something else hard and as long as you didn't do it too often you probably never had to do in-stage damage repair. Not so in Sim Mode. Here the damage from those bangs build up quickly, even going over bumps and landing hard will contribute. And when you do get enough damage that demands an in-stage repair, you are talking minutes to fix, not seconds. So a single stop for repair might knock you down several places.

And just like in Sport and Professional Modes, if you finish below eighth, you need to redo the stage. In those modes redoing a stage isn't too bad, but in Simulation mode you may have just spent three quarters of an hour doing a stage and now have to redo that same amount of time. This has now been changed by the 1.05 patch. The rule about finishing 8th or better or you have to redo the stage now only applies to the Sport Mode. It has been removed from the Professional and Simulation Modes so that in those modes, no matter where you finish, you will be qualified to continue to the next stage.



Also the three classes with co-drivers (SxS, Car and Truck) have speed limits. In other words if you exceed a certain limit at any time, you get a time penalty. You do get a second or two of grace to get your speed down, but after that you get a ten second penalty for each occurrence. Now there is a way to mitigate that issue by following the suggestions in the Steam Guide "A method to make staying under the speedlimit a bit easier in sim mode" by Latapi. That guide explains how to use tire pressure to lower your top speed and then by using the semi-automatic gearbox setting and not going into top gear. I've used it and it works great.

Update: I've also found that the Audi e-Tron is a good car for avoiding going over the speed limit. In its default settings, at full throttle the Audi will stay just under the 170 kph limit on the flats or of course going uphill. Going downhill you do need to be careful.

The two classes that don't have co-drivers, bikes and quads, don't have a speed limit.

Simulation Mode is much more like a true Dakar rally stage and so there is more time between waypoints. Even in Professional Mode it can get rather frantic with waypoints occurring quickly one after another, but in Sim Mode it feels like you can take your breath and think about your navigation.

And navigation is harder in Sim Mode. There will often be a number of roadbook instructions between waypoints, so if you make a mistake you may be way off the route by the time you would be expecting to reach a waypoint. For those classes with a co-driver, he will be notifying you that you are off course, but in quads and bikes it will be up to you to recognize that you're in trouble.

And in Sim Mode, you can't reset to the last waypoint. You can only keep searching to try to find your way. You can always hope to see another competitor and follow them, or maybe get lucky and spot a helicopter following another competitor.

But in some ways the challenge of the navigation can be more rewarding. With more time and distance between waypoints, sometimes you can figure out a better route, especially if you missed an instruction in the roadbook. Only missing a checkpoint will count against you, gaining a time penalty, so if you get lost, spot a competitor and take an unintended shortcut, you might actually get away with it.

Update - Thanks to RED for clarification regarding the difference between waypoint and checkpoint, as quoted below:

in the "More about Navigation" you mention penalties for missing waypoints, but that's checkpoints (WP are the ones with no GPS and colour), can you take a look and correct this occurence and any other potential one? Differences between WP and CP need to be clear

I've intended this guide to be just some tips and suggestions, it is certainly not the definitive guide on the game. If there are any errors please note them in the comments. And likewise if you have suggestions for new sections or expansion of existing sections. I'm really enjoying the game and hope that by posting this guide I can help make it enjoyable for others.