I browse forums a lot while waiting for races in GT. Not much waiting anymore since I installed it last night. I did have a shittonne of credits.. I've spent probably 1,500,000 so far in about 12 hours of play.

Quote from dawesdust_12 :

I browse forums a lot while waiting for races in GT. Not much waiting anymore since I installed it last night. I did have a shittonne of credits.. I've spent probably 1,500,000 so far in about 12 hours of play.

I installed it as well, but just the animations and loading inbetween races and series is just annoying. Even if I had a laptop on the couch sitting next to me, I would have to concentrate to keep hitting buttons to navigate the menus and all that. I enjoyed the experience, but I think it'd wear off pretty soon anyway.

When you get photo locations for rewards I get annoyed, I think the photo mode on the reply is ok, but like any type of photo mode I won't use it. I still think they could have used the programing space on other things, the game still needs a bit of refining on the graphics and we could have had some of the other tracks back in and some more premium cars rather then photo mode.

Quote from Hotdogxx60 :

... like any type of photo mode I won't use it.

Its simply matter of personal preference. The level of detail on the premium cars + photomode features alone are a huge incentive. I've been using it on my flatmate's PS3 (as I'm not a big fan of PS3/XBOX-controllers for racing) and I absolutely love it! I would prefer more photo-locations over more race tracks

actually the only place where the graphic engine truely shine is in photo travel, the in race photo mode don't have the same environmental mapping details. I hope there's more lighting variations between different locations though.

Finished grand tour in all Gold! Love the rally stage, I think the rallying in this game put a lot pure rally games to shame.

Got it in the mail yesterday, and played till I reached Level 8

As most things have already been said, I see what I can come up with that hasn't been mentioned.

Force feedback is really great for the premium cars (haven't driven a standard car yet). I especially like how the steering goes light when the front wheels lock up.

The graphics can be beautiful (and in motion, the standard cars actually don't look as bad as I feared. Still far from as good as i'd like though)

The physics are definately improved and feel more like Enthusias now. Still, to fully apreciate them, you need top turn the steering model to "simulation" and search through one or two other submenues to disable all driving aids. It almost seems like PD tried to hide their physics deliberately.

Also, the level system is rubbish. I kind of do understand that they wanted to give the a- and b-spec points more of a value than mere bragging rights, but as it is now, there are two hurdles to overcome to advance: level and money. Seems a bit redundant and unneeded.

EDIT: Btw, my PSN ID is ColeusRattus (surprisingly) if anyone wants to add me.
Someone with enogh free time and boredom should compile a list with all the PSN IDs mentioned in this thread.

Tried out online racing and OMG.. put it this way, if it were LFS 13/16 people would be banned

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qotsrSxyqXA lol! real driving simulation..

I have mixed feelings regarding the physics so far. Sometimes they feel really good (most of the time), sometimes there's moments when things feel really wrong (especially watching replays on certain tracks (nordschleife) the car sometimes seems to hover above the ground)).

I also had the impression that certain cars handle a lot better than others.

There's a race in the toscana during the grand tour special event where you drive a lamborghini... that thing handles like... i don't know, but it feels VERY wrong.

Anyway, drifting my S2000 is a blast... from time to time i catch myself saying things like "wow!", "holy ****", "ohh man, this is brilliant!" during the process.

arghh what's the point of the paint item limitation? why can't I paint my car whatever I want?

Quote from JJ72 :

arghh what's the point of the paint item limitation? why can't I paint my car whatever I want?

I thought that was silly too... also, I couldn't put any wheels on my car I bought from the used car lot, what's up with that?

Quote from BlueFlame :

I thought that was silly too... also, I couldn't put any wheels on my car I bought from the used car lot, what's up with that?

You can only change rims on premium cars. Also im Aspec Lvl 22 and extreme race series is easy. Theres no challenge.

Quote from Franky.S :

Also im Aspec Lvl 22 and extreme race series is easy. Theres no challenge.

Maybe your car's too fast? That has always been a problem with GT games, if you enter races with a too fast car, they'll be far to easy to win.

Quote from Tomba(FIN) :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qotsrSxyqXA lol! real driving simulation..

LMAO! xD
Real driving simulation ftw!

although im very keen to buying the combo (PS3 + GT5) in a near future i think i will give it a little more time regarding to updates...but ohh boy, you should see me drooling over what ive been reading/watching on youtube so far!

I tried gifting a friend the 350,000 cr LFA, but then it says upload failed and it disappeared! FML!

My Mini-Review

I like:

• The general fun and must-come-back-and-have-another-go feeling of the game
  
• The weather (but have only had one go with it)
  
• How the car behaves with a pad - much more like GT3, which is a HUGE improvement over GT4.
  

I dislike:

• The shadows cast on or by the car that flicker - low resolution shadow maps...
  
• The rubbish graphics in places - trees around the Top Gear track for example. Generally a bit cartoony and clean.
  
• Having to leave a track for each stage of each Special - for instance, with the Nurburgring special, I have to leave and reload for each stage. Why not have a 'jump to next challenge' button like with licences.
  
• If you complete a challenge, but don't reach your target (e.g. miss out on gold by 0.001 seconds as I keep doing in NASCAR) you have to go through about 15 minutes of screens (exaggeration) to have another go. I want a QUICK RESTART option AFTER I've passed the finish line.
  
• The handling - it's all very loose and slippery. Very very very VERY rarely do you do a single corner feeling like the car is gripping - you're either understeering massively or in a huge slide. Cars are NOT like this in real life (although for quick cornering I know a small amount of yaw is needed).
  
• The segregation of Standard and Premium in the garage, although now we have favourites I can get around that.
  
• Photo Travel mode is a bit rubbish to be honest, but maybe it will get better.
  
• Don't like the level system all that much, although it currently is an incentive.
  
• Annoyed that Nurburgring and Top Gear tracks were not in Arcade as standard. I've unlocked them now, but Gran Turismo is best when played split screen with friends in my opinion.
  
• The NASCAR guy has 4 phrases, non of which are useful to improving or relevant to the mistake you made. Clip a cone on a full throttle turn challenge and he say "you gotta be smooth with the gas"?????? But he is American, so maybe this is realistic.
  
• You can't change sound/graphics/controller options in game
  
• The menus are rubbish. Why not a standard grid? Having to go up and down to select the menu immediately to the right is not sensible. And an over-reliance on icons that don't mean much is silly. Takes ages to find the right thing sometimes.
  
• Some of the 'race' starts are silly - START being displayed on the screen right where you need to be looking.
  
• The auto-driving line isn't even close to the proper line at times. Even the AI ignore it half the time, so effectively the line is teaching people wrong. Fortunately I don't use this often (unless I'm learning a track)
  
• Why don't they put something nice during loading screens. Info about your car or the track or the challenge? Even a pretty picture of the track (trackmap) would be nice.
  

Is it realistic? Ha ha ha ha ha ha. No, it isn't really. The karts don't handle like karts. The cars don't handle like cars. The graphics don't look real (at 720p60). The sounds are 'okay', but not all that great really.

I have NO idea how they made this game take so long to make... It needs lots of patches to make it anywhere near worth the hype.

I don't mind the loading times too much, as long as they are cleverly kept to a minimum (i.e. not flushing it from memory until you actually choose a different track, so that reloading the same track is near instantaneous (see AMG challenge thingy above).

Is it worth buying? Yeah, I think it is. It IS fun.
Is it worth buying a PS3 especially for this - No.

I give it a 6 or 7 out of 10. 8 for some aspects, but not enough to warrant an overall 8.

(and no, I haven't used my G25 with it yet. I can see several challenges and races that will be about 500% easier with the accuracy of a wheel, but I haven't uprooting my living room to test that).

Quote from tristancliffe :

My Mini-Review

I like:

• The general fun and must-come-back-and-have-another-go feeling of the game
  
• The weather (but have only had one go with it)
  
• How the car behaves with a pad - much more like GT3, which is a HUGE improvement over GT4.
  

I dislike:

• The shadows cast on or by the car that flicker - low resolution shadow maps...
  
• The rubbish graphics in places - trees around the Top Gear track for example. Generally a bit cartoony and clean.
  
• Having to leave a track for each stage of each Special - for instance, with the Nurburgring special, I have to leave and reload for each stage. Why not have a 'jump to next challenge' button like with licences.
  
• If you complete a challenge, but don't reach your target (e.g. miss out on gold by 0.001 seconds as I keep doing in NASCAR) you have to go through about 15 minutes of screens (exaggeration) to have another go. I want a QUICK RESTART option AFTER I've passed the finish line.
  
• The handling - it's all very loose and slippery. Very very very VERY rarely do you do a single corner feeling like the car is gripping - you're either understeering massively or in a huge slide. Cars are NOT like this in real life (although for quick cornering I know a small amount of yaw is needed).
  
• The segregation of Standard and Premium in the garage, although now we have favourites I can get around that.
  
• Photo Travel mode is a bit rubbish to be honest, but maybe it will get better.
  
• Don't like the level system all that much, although it currently is an incentive.
  
• Annoyed that Nurburgring and Top Gear tracks were not in Arcade as standard. I've unlocked them now, but Gran Turismo is best when played split screen with friends in my opinion.
  
• The NASCAR guy has 4 phrases, non of which are useful to improving or relevant to the mistake you made. Clip a cone on a full throttle turn challenge and he say "you gotta be smooth with the gas"?????? But he is American, so maybe this is realistic.
  
• You can't change sound/graphics/controller options in game
  
• The menus are rubbish. Why not a standard grid? Having to go up and down to select the menu immediately to the right is not sensible. And an over-reliance on icons that don't mean much is silly. Takes ages to find the right thing sometimes.
  
• Some of the 'race' starts are silly - START being displayed on the screen right where you need to be looking.
  
• The auto-driving line isn't even close to the proper line at times. Even the AI ignore it half the time, so effectively the line is teaching people wrong. Fortunately I don't use this often (unless I'm learning a track)
  
• Why don't they put something nice during loading screens. Info about your car or the track or the challenge? Even a pretty picture of the track (trackmap) would be nice.
  

Is it realistic? Ha ha ha ha ha ha. No, it isn't really. The karts don't handle like karts. The cars don't handle like cars. The graphics don't look real (at 720p60). The sounds are 'okay', but not all that great really.

I have NO idea how they made this game take so long to make... It needs lots of patches to make it anywhere near worth the hype.

I don't mind the loading times too much, as long as they are cleverly kept to a minimum (i.e. not flushing it from memory until you actually choose a different track, so that reloading the same track is near instantaneous (see AMG challenge thingy above).

Is it worth buying? Yeah, I think it is. It IS fun.
Is it worth buying a PS3 especially for this - No.

I give it a 6 or 7 out of 10. 8 for some aspects, but not enough to warrant an overall 8.

(and no, I haven't used my G25 with it yet. I can see several challenges and races that will be about 500% easier with the accuracy of a wheel, but I haven't uprooting my living room to test that).

I know I said I wouldn't post on this thread again, but this post warrants me returning.....

Spot bloody on Tristan

Quote from tristancliffe :

(and no, I haven't used my G25 with it yet. I can see several challenges and races that will be about 500% easier with the accuracy of a wheel, but I haven't uprooting my living room to test that).

Which renders your whole review a bit useless.

I mean, i basically agree with you regarding physics, even with a wheel, the cars don't handle exactly as they should (i also think they feel too loose/slippery/snappy a lot of times).

However, i've played it whith the controller a few times now (at night when the wheel is making too much noise), and compared to the wheel, it feels like a crappy arcade racing game. Try it with the G25, it's worth it.

yeah, there are some cars which grips properly and feels more connected, the SLS on AMG driving school or the 8C on grand tour for example.

I'm sure it is better with a wheel. But that doesn't change the huge proportion of general naffness with the game. Poor menu systems. Poor graphics in a LOT of places. Generally annoying stuff. Using a wheel doesn't make them any less rubbish.

But as I said, I can't wait to play it again. But I said the same thing about F1 2010, and that enthusiasm soon faded when I realised just how messed up it was (and, I believe, still is, even after the patch).

The patch (tomorrow?) for GT5 had better be good. With any luck it'll be 2GB and contain the work from the last two years.


Edit: Put it this way. I sat for AGES thinking of stuff to put in the I Like section. The Dislike stuff rolled off my tongue easily. Often when I get a new game I show it to people, going "wow, look at this, it's amazing". I did that at times with F1 2010 (which has far better graphics than GT5 overall). I have yet to do that with a single aspect of GT5. Not once have I gone wow. Not once have I felt compelled to get my housemate to look at something particularly impressive. Not once have I turned my phone off so that nobody phones me whilst I play. But I still enjoy playing it.

It's hard to write a review that basically says "I love playing it but, and let's be honest here folks, nothing is new, nothing is impressive, and a lot of it is embarrasingly poor". But that's what I'm trying to do. It's like an HD version of GT3, with a few extra cars and tracks and a bit of rain (which rarely seems to make the track have puddles or a dry-line - indeed, on my first go in the rain (F40 at Suzuka in Arcade) the only way I could tell it was wet was the stupid amounts of wheelspin and switching to an external view. Looking forwards, once the rain had stopped, there was no indication it was damp?!?!?!). When I unlock damage (I'm level 15 I think) my review might change. We shall see. Patches will also change it.

Sorry for walls of text and un-edited poorly argued prose.

I agree.

I quite like it, but it's thoroughly unimpressive.

I finally got a copy, not the one ordered, just a copy from EBGames, which I will return when the one I ordered gets here.

Anyway, it does feel better with a controller than GT5:Prologue and the Time Trial, but the physics with a wheel don't feel as good as I remebered the Time Trial feeling, in general, but the sliding/drifting feels better. It feels more like Prologue felt with a wheel FFB wise - strange :/

And I think Prologue and the Time Trial actually looks better in some ways. Better shadows that's for sure, especially under the car, which kinda makes GT5 look more floaty. The field of view and shades of colour just feels so different on Suzuka vs the Prologue version. Too dark perhaps, not quite as clear looking or something. Just did a run on Suzuka, with dynamic weather has the track go from rain to sunshine.

Did a few Track Creator runs on the Mount Aso theme. That was pretty cool.

I dunno, some things were better in GT4, like the wheel shop. And the layout and overall look in Prologue was better.
I have the FFB at maximum and it still doesn't feel like it's enough...Whereas in the Time Trial, FFB at 5 was plenty! Something has changed, but not all good it seems...

Was hoping for GT5 to be like what I got in the Time Trial, but improved. I could play the TT back to back with iRacing and it still felt good, but just a little bit more numb in FFB. So in many ways I'm glad I did get a PS3 to experience the Time Trail to feel what might have been.

I'll see how things feel tommorrow after a good night's sleep.

Quote from sinbad :

I quite like it, but it's thoroughly unimpressive.

Thats the "box shot" right there

I've put quite a few hours into it now (20+), level 19, 30% of the way through, it is, without a shadow of a doubt, entertaining, I do find myself drawn back into it, without really understanding why, but the feeling is still the same.

Its pretty much the same game as GT1 was back in 1997 with a bit of a make over, there are many areas that other games have exceeded in, that GT5 doesn't even attempt to broach, in particular customization, settings, and modifications, anyone else noticed you can't actually adjust gear ratios?, or save settings? (tunes), or that you can't adjust tyre pressures?, or that the way tyres heat up and cool down is completing unrealistic, that side of it is very, very basic compared to the sophistication that some game have made in these area's.

The lack of racing modifications (something like 15 out of 220 can actually be modified), the lack of wheels, the lack of aero parts, the intrinsically contrived paint system, all point to an incomplete "vision" of a game.

Then there is the shonky AI, which is clearly rubberbanded, also the way over done slipstream effect, which make races a bit of a chore, the lack of qualification, which means you always plonked in the middle of the field, the lack of actual racing events (3 days in, and I have completed 4 off the available "stages" which leave me with one "stage" (9 events) to go, and then what?, time trialing?, whats the point no time trial leaderboards, B spec?, yawnsville, licenses are fun, but why did they removie the "need" to do them to actually do A spec races

**** it, you know what, if you really think this is a worthy racing game of this generation, then you are clearly deluded, blind, or brainwashed, it is a dissapointment in more area's than those it does well, heck it doesn't even look as good as GT5:P.

For 6 years of work, and the amount of hype and money that has been spent on it, I think PD need to sit down and take a long hard look at what they've produced.

Quote from tristancliffe :

snip

I completely understand what you mean.

I also expect the experience to "fade" once i've played this game for an extended ammount of time (notice that i'm still saying game, not sim). The experience is very immersive for me at the moment, and i love it, but i have a feeling there's a pretty undetailed and basic physics engine underneath (which usually shows when you've played enough, or in this case, when you play with a pad... felt weak to me (but also more fun again like GT3, as you mentioned)).

What i dislike the most is the sometimes weird looks of the game (tyres/wheels hovering above ground, bad quality shadows, etc) and the really long loading times.

I actually like the menus and everything. It's in proper Gran Turismo style in my opinion. Depends a lot on personal taste of course...

I know this is not the best game out there (physics wise), but damn, can you name another one that is better on a console with a wheel?

For me this is the most "rounded" experience i've had so far regarding a racing game on a console. Maybe LFS and iracing are better (ok, not maybe, they are, period.), but as a whole experience (including immersion, graphics, fun, etc), GT5 is great.

I know i didn't have as much fun behind a wheel for quite a while as i'm now having in GT5. I hope it'll last longer than a week or two...

Quote from danowat :

**** it, you know what, if you really think this is a worthy racing game of this generation, then you are clearly deluded, blind, or brainwashed, it is a dissapointment in more area's than those it does well, heck it doesn't even look as good as GT5:P.

As i've written above, please name another racing game on a console with better graphics, better physics (i honestly don't think Forza has better physics, they feel a bit more natural regarding tyre modelling, but overall a lot more toyish, i believe FM2 had better physics), that works with my G25, has a good selection of real tracks and cars, etc. I can't think of one right now. Maybe one would think we could expect more from a racing game in 2010, yes... I thought the same actually... but can you name one that does it better (and not just in one area, i mean as a complete package)?

And regarding graphics. GT5P looked better? Come on!
I popped in the GT5P disc two days before i got GT5 and i was seriously worried about it, because GT5P didn't satisfy me anymore visually. Appart from the shadows and such things, which are horrible in GT5, this looks a LOT better than Prologue.