French publisher Nacon has revealed the next official World Rally Championship game is being developed by a new studio called Grit Games.
While it might have been assumed the series would return to KT Racing after departing Codemasters, this has not turned out to be the case. KT Racing was the developer of 2022’s WRC Generations and six prior games in the series.
Nacon has revealed very little information about WRC 2027 in its debut video. Other than the fact a part of the Grit Games team visited the 2026 Monte Carlo Rally in January, we only know it will be a fresh project built from scratch and will use Unreal Engine 5. Assetto Corsa Rally, which is currently available on Steam Early Access and shaping up most impressively, also runs on Unreal Engine 5. 2023’s EA Sports WRC from Codemasters was built using Unreal Engine 4.
Nacon named several Grit Games staff who formerly worked at KT Racing, including Hardouin Pouzet (lead game programmer on WRC 7 to WRC 9), Alexandre Assier (producer on WRC 7 to 9), and Laura Gayet (an artist on Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown).
After Codemasters pulled the pin on any further WRC games following the release of EA Sports WRC in 2023 (announcing it would be “pausing development plans on future rally titles” as a result), the official license was re-secured by Nacon for 2027 to 2032. Nacon previously held the WRC license from 2015 to 2022, publishing seven WRC games made by developer Kylotonn (also known as KT Racing). For clarity, WRC 5 through to 2019’s WRC 8 were officially published by Bigben Interactive before its parent company (which also operated Nacon) merged the two groups under the single Nacon name. It’s also correct that WRC 4 was published in Europe by Bigben Interactive, but that game was developed by previous license holders Milestone.
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