The Launcher page is where a shift actually happens. Every simulator at the venue is a row. Open a row, type the driver's name, pick how long they have paid for, and the rig wakes up with their name on it. Pick a car and a track, press Launch, and the game starts on their screen. When their time is up, or when they are done, you end the session and the rig goes back to waiting for the next person.
The three lists
Rigs are grouped by what they are doing right now. Each group has a coloured dot and a count, and disappears when it is empty.
| Group | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Live Now | A driver session is running on this rig. The timer is counting down, whether or not the game is open at this moment. |
| Idle | The rig's launcher is connected and sitting on its standby screen. Nobody is signed in. |
| Offline | The rig is saved in Settings but is not connected. It is switched off, or the launcher is not running. Offline rows cannot be opened. |
Each row shows the rig's name, the driver, the car, the track, and the time remaining. Rigs are named in Settings; until you name them they appear as sim-1, sim-2 and so on. On a phone, only the dot and the name are shown to keep the list readable.
The page checks every rig every three seconds and updates rows in place, so nothing flickers while you are working in one. Only one row can be open at a time; click it again to close it.
Starting a session
Click an Idle rig. The row opens with two things: a Driver box and a row of time pills.
- Type the driver's name.
As you type, names from your driver database are suggested. Pick one and the session is tied to that driver's record, which is what makes their laps count on the leaderboard under the right name. A name that is not in the database is fine too; it can be linked later on the Drivers page.
- Pick a time.
Press 15 min, 30 min, 1 hour or ∞ for unlimited. Pressing a pill starts the session immediately. For any other length, type a number of minutes from 1 to 480 in the Custom min box and press the Start button that appears.
- Watch the row move.
The rig receives the session, its standby screen changes to the driver's wizard, and the row moves up into Live Now with the driver's name and the time. Car and track stay blank until something is launched.
If you press a time before typing a name you are asked for the name first. If the rig has just gone offline you will see Failed to start session; check the rig.
Once a session is running there are two ways to get a game on screen. The customer can work through the wizard on the rig with the wheel, choosing their own event, car and track. Or you can choose for them from this page and press Launch. Both end up in the same place. Many venues let regulars drive the wizard and launch for first-timers.
The live session panel
Open a Live rig and the panel has four rows: driver and timers, vehicle, rules, and the action buttons.
Driver and time
| Control | What it does |
|---|---|
| Driver | Editable at any time. Change it and the rig, the leaderboard and any other open admin panel pick up the new name within a second. If the rig is in a group race the field is locked, because the roster is managed on the Groups page. |
| Time left | Counts down in the venue's accent colour. |
| Seat time | Counts up from the moment the session started, in amber. Useful when a customer asks how long they have been in. |
| +15 min +30 min +60 min | Add time to the running session. The rig's timer jumps up straight away. |
| min box with ✓ | Add any number of minutes from 1 to 480. |
Vehicle
| Control | What it does |
|---|---|
| Track | Every track installed at the venue, alphabetically. |
| Class | Filters the car list by class. All by default. |
| Car | The car to launch. Changing it reloads the liveries and tyre options below. |
| Tires | The tyre compound. Default lets the car choose. The list is filled from tyre data extracted when the car was scanned on the Cars & Tracks page; cars without that data show the selector greyed out. |
| Livery strip | Thumbnails of every livery for the chosen car. Click one to pick it. Leave none selected and the rig uses its own default. |
Rules
| Control | What it does |
|---|---|
| Mode | Practice is free driving with no opponents. Hotlap is a solo timed session. Race puts the driver in a race against AI and reveals extra fields. Server joins one of the online servers saved under Settings and hides the car and track selectors, because the server decides those. |
| Sim Mode | Standard turns on ABS, traction control, stability, the ideal line, auto shift and auto clutch, and turns off damage, fuel use and tyre wear. On the rig this appears as ASSISTED. Pro switches every aid off and damage on; the rig calls it SIMULATION. A third option appears if you have enabled a custom mode in Settings, using the name you gave it. What each mode actually sets is editable in Settings. |
| Time of Day | Day or Night. |
In Race mode five more fields appear: Laps (default 5), Opponents (6), AI Strength as a percentage (90), AI Aggression (50) and Start Pos (1). In Server mode a Select Server list appears with your saved presets. Pick one and Multitap asks the server which cars it is running and fills the car list from that. If you have no presets yet the list says so and points you to Settings.
Assists
The assists strip carries one switch, Autogrid. Autogrid is on by default and tells the in-game app to put the car on the grid and get it rolling without the driver touching a menu. Flip the switch and the rig confirms the change; the small dot next to it turns green when confirmed, amber while it is pending, and red if the rig did not answer. The setting is also sent with every launch.
When a rig is part of a group race or a traffic session, a fuller assists panel appears below the buttons with live ABS, TC, virtual mirror and ideal line controls. That panel is described in the Groups chapter.
The buttons
| Button | What it does |
|---|---|
| 🚀 Launch | Sends everything above to the rig, which writes the game configuration and starts Assetto Corsa. The button reads Launching… for a few seconds. The car and track appear in the row on the next refresh. If the rig is missing the car or track you chose, the launch fails on the rig and the failure is listed on the Dashboard under Recent Launch Failures. |
| ⏻ End Game | Closes the game on the rig but keeps the session open. The driver stays signed in and their timer keeps running. Use this to change car or track mid-session: end the game, pick something new, launch again. |
| ■ End Session | Closes everything. The timer stops, the game closes, the rig returns to its standby screen and the row moves back to Idle. There is no confirmation for a single rig, so this is the button to be careful with. |
| ↻ Refresh | Asks the rig for its status again. Handy if you think the row is stale. |
End Game stops the software. End Session ends the customer's time. If a customer has twenty minutes left and wants a different car, use End Game. If they are leaving, use End Session.
Ending every session at once
The bar above the lists holds one button, End all sessions. It asks you to confirm, telling you how many sessions will be ended, then ends each live session in turn. If nothing is live it tells you that instead. This is the closing-time button.
Sessions started from the rig
Rigs can also start sessions themselves. Staff can press a hidden key on the rig's standby screen to open a session without the admin panel, and a customer who reaches the end of the wizard launches the game from the wheel. Either way the session shows up here in Live Now, and every control in this chapter works on it. The rig launcher chapter covers what the customer sees.
The broadcast PC
A broadcast PC is an ordinary PC connected to your spectator TVs. It runs a small Multitap app that plays your idle video loop between races and joins group races as a spectator, cycling through camera angles. Its state lives in a pill at the top right of the Launcher page: Broadcast PC with a green Connected or red Disconnected. Press ⋮ Manage to open its panel.
While connected, the panel shows what the broadcast PC is doing: Idle (Playing Video), Idle (Video Stopped), In Group Session with the track, In Server Session, or In Individual Session. The controls change with the state.
| Control | When it appears | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| 🛑 End Idle Video | Idle, video playing | Stops the idle loop and leaves the screen blank. |
| ▶ Restart Idle Video | Idle, video stopped | Starts the loop again. |
| 🎮 Exit Game | In any session | Closes the game on the broadcast PC. |
| Join Active Group and 📡 Join Selected Group | Whenever a group race is running | Pick a running race from the list and the broadcast PC leaves whatever it is doing, waits a moment, and joins that race server as a spectator. This is how the TVs follow a race. |
| Launch to Server and 🚀 Launch to Server | Idle | Send the broadcast PC to one of your saved server presets, for example a public server you run for remote players, so the TV shows that instead. |
| 🔄 Emergency Restart Idle Video | Always | Forces the idle loop back on, whatever state the PC thinks it is in. |
Joining a group needs the venue's server address to be set in Settings; if it is missing you get a clear message saying so. The broadcast PC's status is refreshed every ten seconds.