Chnages to Raceroom'S DX verison needed I would only welcome if these do not come at the cost of needing to move to W10. Also I think Raceroom is not in the need to improve its graphics system soon, not at all, since it already looks awesome right now, as it is.
Should R3E continue permanently, like iRacing, than something must happen if R3E will stay in competition to other sims that will come up sooner or later. A release isn't needed now, thats for sure - but the work in background like planing and conceptional things should start soon, as the work wouldn't be done in a few month. Maybe a Vulkan-based/compatible engine could be wise to avoid dependencies to Win10 and MS. in that case not so unimportant: http://www.bit-tech.net/news/gaming/2016/02/22/vulkan-unreal-engine-4/1
Hasn'T it been indicated just a week ago with a certain screenshot that they are investigating and exploring new technologies...!? Its just that I see zero need to implement new graphics in a hurry, in the near future. The sim still will look great in three years from now on, I say. And beyond. If RR should fail in the long run - its looks will not be the problem. GSC/Automobilista uses even older graphics engines, and see how they attract attention and find their audience.
There are far more aspects in a technologie-change than only the Visual aspect. Look at the video above - there has nothin changed in visual quality of the game. But with changing iracing to DX11 they gain an advantage in FPS from around 30% by less Memory and Power-Consumption. And that is DX11 - with Vulkan or DX12 it is even more, which would help getting an acceptable performance in Triple-Screen-Support, g-Sync/freesync and VR-Support. And yes - R3E's visual setting is great and IMO it is the most natural looking sim at the moment - especialy when watching the cars on the track. In AC and much more in pCars, the cars looks like foreign objects in the environment. But you already notice in R3E that the shader-technology isn't state-of-the-art anymore. With an attitude like "everything is good as it is now" humans would still live in caves!
Not necessarily how it looks (although if coded properly it would look better) it's what you can do with it, more realistic damage models, sparks, debris, trees swaying in wind, Mcdonalds burger box blowing into yer brake duct etc etc etc.....................
Three years from now R3E will look pretty dated imho. We will have pCars 2 and Forza games on PC. In R3E the tracks are able to keep up, but the lighting and cockpit graphics are behind DX11 offerings. (AC and pCars). I tried the WTCC15 cars but compared to AC's cockpits it looks more simplistic in model/lighting/textures. That being said, for a DX9 game it looks good but its showing its age.
DX11 does not look better but the fps is much higher which means more power available. I wish they use this power in order to improve car's graphics.