GT5 again

[madmax2069]

This is one of the few games that will make me buy a PS3.

[Reaperman]

Yeah, this wait's about killing me. You'd think since it's completed that 'loner' copies would be hitting the magazines for videos and early reviews. Haven't seen anything yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

on a somewhat different note, I got bored and made myself a GT5 IR head-tracking setup a bit ago. I run a front-projection setup so I need something that likes the dark.

 

 

At the heart of it, is a $16 Deal Extreme IR module (link). the rest I'm sure you can figure out, a project box, playstation eye, and some servo tape. here's an image from it of me doing my best ghost hunter impression:

 

Edited November 6, 2010 by Reaperman

[Reaperman]

well the leaks are starting to appear.

 

Trophy list is out (check gtplanet)

packaging and screens:

 

also a couple gameplay vids:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-dJP4saO6I http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wm5ojKNR2M

 

GTplanet is the best source for up to the second info, but their servers are really taking a beating today. No release date yet, but with all the leaks, I'm hoping for sooner rather than later--or else this launch is shaping up to be a real mess.

Edited November 8, 2010 by Reaperman

[HammR25]

It's going to be out fairly soon if they're sending out review copies.

[Reaperman]

It's going to be out fairly soon if they're sending out review copies.

I don't think these are review copies we're seeing around, the pics of 'review copies' of other ps3 games that I've seen have had a very distinct look to them. Also, reviewers generally have decent means of capturing video, and would edit out things like their PSN ID to avoid waves of friend requests.

 

As soon as the pure thrill of seeing new GT5 footage wore off, my jaded side started to smell viral marketing. Maybe I'm wrong and there really is a robin hood out there with a copy of GT5 and a video camera. I think it's at least as likely that it's an ad company "leaking" some fuzzy images and video for a few hours and then have them pulled for 'copyright reasons.' Either way, the GT5 community really needs these regular shots of media to keep us medicated, or else we start turning on eachother, PD and Sony.

 

At least one good thing has come from today. The intro hit youtube. Not that the intro is good--it's the worst in GT history. But now I don't have to waste valuable gametime watching it when I finally get my hands on a copy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0vYu5_3Ut8

 

A fan made trailer from earlier this week looks/sounds *way* better than that official one. They should release a patch to put it in the game instead:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R8WDpwuJmHY

Edited November 9, 2010 by Reaperman

[+wood_jl]

I just hope it blows away Forza 3.....or even Forza 2. The wait has been so long, it better. I'm not sure how it could, but I'd like it to. One thing for sure, it better not be "worse."

[Reaperman]

Rain, Zonda, Eiger.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aCn8xslJhyI

[Reaperman]

Today is 'official news' day (finally).

 

Nov 24th release date for USA/EUR.

 

Complete car list (here)

Complete track list (here)

 

1031 cars

despite the rumors about 'all of them,' only 50 are skylines

 

El Capitan track--my favorite in the series--is missing. I wonder what happened, I'd swear there was a few seconds of it in a trailer.

citta di aria, costa di amalfi, Seattle, infineon raceway, new york, opera paris, seoul, twin ring motegi, mid-field, apricot hill, are all MIA too, but El Capitan hurts.

Edited November 12, 2010 by Reaperman

[The MilkMan]

Today is 'official news' day (finally).

 

Nov 24th release date for USA/EUR.

 

Complete car list (here)

Complete track list (here)

 

1031 cars

despite the rumors about 'all of them,' only 50 are skylines

 

El Capitan track--my favorite in the series--is missing. I wonder what happened, I'd swear there was a few seconds of it in a trailer.

citta di aria, costa di amalfi, Seattle, infineon raceway, new york, opera paris, seoul, twin ring motegi, mid-field, apricot hill, are all MIA too, but El Capitan hurts.

 

And the Top Gear test track! Its and air field, but still kinda cool.

[Reaperman]

Finally some decent vids from a capture card and not a handy-cam (here).

 

Over the last week, I've watched a lot of GT5 footage, and lost a lot of sleep following news threads. GT5 generally looks really good at a glance, but sometimes the visuals are just plain cringe-worthy. Granted in previous Gran Turismo games, if you put in the effort, you could see through the polish down to where things were fudged a bit, but with GT5 the level of effort required to do this seems to be a bit lower than on competing titles (including GT5 Prologue). Shadows and some effects pixelate out at distances where it's still pretty obvious, and though 'standard' cars look much better than they did gt4, maybe the term 'sub-standard' or 'filler' would be more appropriate.

 

One thing's for sure, this game beats the PS3 hardware to death. I'd love GT5 even if it gave me AIDS, but maybe there could have been some middle ground between 5,000 polygon standard cars and 500,000 polygon premium cars. I don't mean to come off as a graphics whore, but since I haven't laid my hands on the game yet, I haven't got much else to base my GT5 opinion on.

Edited November 22, 2010 by Reaperman

[+wood_jl]

A bit too many Hondas, Nissans, Mitsubishis, and Toyotas in that list. Not surprising, considering where the game's coming from, eh? Still, plenty of other cars, and that's fantastic.

 

My favorite track has always been "Trial Mountain" since the 1st game. Looks like I'm pleased.

[Reaperman]

One more day of waiting. How will I ever make it? More imporantly, what excuse can I come up with to bail on Turkey Day to play more GT5?

 

First patch came out last night. 130mb or so. Rumors are flying about what all it fixes, but GT5p garage importing, a new wet corner grip setting, and the online functions seem to have all started working. With online enabled, maybe we'll start seeing some major reviews.

 

As for the garage import functions from GTPSP and GT5p, I will be using them to the maximum. GT5 keeps your old cars away from the career mode so that experience won't be ruined.

 

 

My favorite track has always been "Trial Mountain" since the 1st game. Looks like I'm pleased.

I'm a big fan of Trial Mountain too. Call me weird but I have more interest in 'GT original' tracks than the 'Real Life' tracks that find their way into every other game. Original tracks are prettier and more fun to drive on. Hope I like the new one, 'Cape Ring.'

[Gaztee]

I'm hoping my copy gets in early. I finish work at 8am & NEED to sleep before I start playing with this baby!! I hope that the review embargo isn't trying to hide some bad news It seemed pretty good when I played a beta at a Sony show in August! Just a shame my 3D TV won't be making it in time - oh well a couple more days won't hurt!

[Reaperman]

Well I spent all day racing on GT5. It's hard to say it, but Gran Turismo is no longer the prettiest racing series around, or even close. The polish is laid on thin, and it's a lot easier to see through than previous releases. Lots of little visual errors everywhere, mostly hanging around shadows and visual effects. Damage is mostly AWOL, and there are promises of patches and bugfixes in the coming weeks. The car quality varies greatly (which everybody knew), but it looks like some tracks are straight out of GT4 too, with flat, cardboard trees right on the other side of the guard rail. Scenery pop-in is also noticeable and distracting, a problem all games should have done away with. The best part, when online bogs down, it slows the single-player menus to about 3min of waiting per screen.

 

Aside from the purely technical, the artistic side is a bit lacking. Now that GT is focusing on 'real life' tracks, there are fewer tracks with any real scenery to look at. Gone are the days of coming around the backside of a mountain to see an entire coastal city and marina laid out far below. Expect lots of flat fields and copy-pasted tents instead.

 

There are some new GT features that are neat, but most console gamers won't ever notice. Steering wheel uses strong feedback to limit rotation on cars that don't do the full 900 degrees. Head tracking. Changing weather and lighting conditions are neat. Racing grids are up to 16 now (32 for karts). I like this new stuff, but it's a sign that GT maybe targeting a much more narrow audience than before.

 

Not that I've been having a bad time either. I had some fun online with racing and free driving, and I can see myself spending a good bit of time here and coming back frequently. There's just very little "wow" this time around, and I really don't think this game is for everybody anymore. For anybody with a feedback wheel and a PS3, it is still a required purchase, of course.

[madmax2069]

Well I spent all day racing on GT5. It's hard to say it, but Gran Turismo is no longer the prettiest racing series around, or even close. The polish is laid on thin, and it's a lot easier to see through than previous releases. Lots of little visual errors everywhere, mostly hanging around shadows and visual effects. Damage is mostly AWOL, and there are promises of patches and bugfixes in the coming weeks. The car quality varies greatly (which everybody knew), but it looks like some tracks are straight out of GT4 too, with flat, cardboard trees right on the other side of the guard rail. Scenery pop-in is also noticeable and distracting, a problem all games should have done away with. The best part, when online bogs down, it slows the single-player menus to about 3min of waiting per screen.

 

Aside from the purely technical, the artistic side is a bit lacking. Now that GT is focusing on 'real life' tracks, there are fewer tracks with any real scenery to look at. Gone are the days of coming around the backside of a mountain to see an entire coastal city and marina laid out far below. Expect lots of flat fields and copy-pasted tents instead.

 

There are some new GT features that are neat, but most console gamers won't ever notice. Steering wheel uses strong feedback to limit rotation on cars that don't do the full 900 degrees. Head tracking. Changing weather and lighting conditions are neat. Racing grids are up to 16 now (32 for karts). I like this new stuff, but it's a sign that GT maybe targeting a much more narrow audience than before.

 

Not that I've been having a bad time either. I had some fun online with racing and free driving, and I can see myself spending a good bit of time here and coming back frequently. There's just very little "wow" this time around, and I really don't think this game is for everybody anymore. For anybody with a feedback wheel and a PS3, it is still a required purchase, of course.

 

Yeah i had a fear about the shadows and polish in this game when i played the latest demo, the shadows looked like blocks, its worse when looking at the shadows on the car. I was hoping they would have at least fixed that when the game shipped. I did like how the game felt overall. i only hope they get the issues ironed out before i get a PS3 and GT5.

[Mendon]

I found THIS ARTICLE to be very, very strange. I don't believe I've ever heard of "network congestion" affecting offline single player mode in any game before. Sony's temporary fix: unplug your PS3 from the internet to play offline.

 

Weird.....

 

 

Mendon

[Reaperman]

I found THIS ARTICLE to be very, very strange. I don't believe I've ever heard of "network congestion" affecting offline single player mode in any game before. Sony's temporary fix: unplug your PS3 from the internet to play offline.

 

Weird.....

 

 

Mendon

Menu lag is a real bummer. The game is *always* trying to do something online, and it rarely seems to account for it not being able to get there. It tracks your friends status, and has little facebooky friend walls, gifts and share buttons everywhere. (I hope the 'Mazda Trees' on my farm bloom today) It's probably a good bet that's time trial leaderboards would freeze up the whole 'driving section' in the same way, which is why they probably aren't up yet.

 

After I cut on the game here, I went back online, found a really good public room and had a blast. We were all ripping on this game pretty badly though. (5 years and $60-80 million?) Be prepared to have to bring your own fun to online, and don't try it without a headset, because the built-in race setup is nearly non-existent so it takes total cooperation.

 

The cars aren't up current gen's standards, some tracks aren't either. There is fun to be had, but I wouldn't recommend it to any less than the nerdiest car nerds. For us it will have to do.

 

Photomode is nice.

Edited November 25, 2010 by Reaperman

[HammR25]

Turn 10 did 3 games in the time it took Polyphony Digital to release 1.

[Reaperman]

Turn 10 did 3 games in the time it took Polyphony Digital to release 1.

GT5 took *WAY* too long, and even another 5 years at their rate wouldn't have finished GT5. They also have serious resource management issues if this is what $60-80m buys them. Some reports place GT5 as the second most expensive video game ever made.

 

But in PD's defense on the 3 Forza games, between GT4 and GT5, PD also released Tourist Trophy, GT5p, and GT-PSP. I really think they should poach an exec from Turn10 though.

 

 

On a side note, I really am having a blast playing GT5 online. It's online modes really suck, but the people I've met are all making the best of it. Bad or not, this game still has to last me for years.

Edited November 26, 2010 by Reaperman

[+wood_jl]

WOW. I am really disappointed to hear what I have been, about this game. This was supposed to be my reason for wanting a PS3. Maybe the chatter they (Polyphony) made in their announcement about Gran Turismo 6 means they'll be trying again, in less than 5 years. These guys certainly aren't perfect, as GT2 proved before. The Forza guys seem to be, though.

 

I thank Reaperman for posting an honest description/evaluation/opinion. That was very well-done.

[HammR25]

The Forza 3 guys didn't try to put everything and the kitchen sink into their games. Polyphony Digital needs someone who is willing to say no instead of trying to make a game that does everything and then ends up doing some of it poorly.

[Reaperman]

These guys certainly aren't perfect, as GT2 proved before. The Forza guys seem to be, though.

I used to be a huge Forza fan last gen. I guess I still am, but some silly hardware rules are keeping me from their series ever since it moved to 360.

Forza is not perfect, but they do a great job with a lot of the parts of making video games. Since I have never played the new Forzas with a wheel (and only tried it at a friends house) I can't compare physics, but GT5 'feels' great. I'm interested to hear what Inside Sim Racing has to say when they finally compare them. They only care about physics, so it might be interesting--Forza 3 is the clear winner in the 'game' department.

 

Turn10 is great at:

Responding to changes in the competition (I expect rain and day/night cycles in Forza4).

Communicating the strengths of their software--hell communicating anything to the outside world.

Picking a reasonable range of cars, and modeling them to the best quality time will allow for.

Releasing games regularly with further DLC support for those who want more.

Giving the online community the proper tools to easily have fun.

 

 

 

As far as my enjoying the game, I'm still having a blast online, and am having very few problems with getting pushed off the track. Lots of clean driving, which is surprising because GT5p's online seemed to be about 1/3 bullies. I think the mic support provides some added guilt.

 

I even had a blast trying GT5's NASCAR racing online. That was an entirely unexpected rush, since I'm from the Eric Cartman school of NASCAR hating. But the speeds were so high, other cars were very, and breaking points became hugely important. It really got the old ticker double-timing.

Edited November 26, 2010 by Reaperman

[akator]

I'm somewhat sad about the current GT situation. I bought the PSP version and was disappointed, since I found playing the PSX versions of GT and GT2 on the PSP to be better. Even on the PSP, there are so many racing games that have held my interest longer. Even the launch title Ridge Racer for the PSP is still more playable/re-playable than PSP GT.

 

GT3 is why I got a PS2. Since then, all of the other versions have been less than I expected. GT5 very much falls into that category, which is a real bummer because like the PSP version I have been waiting for it for years.

 

It's not horrible by any stretch of the imagination, but not the same level of "rocking my world" that GT and GT3 were. I think that we had to wait too long, and because of the previous series milestones I was expecting too much.

 

Ah well, it's not the first franchise that has disappointed me. I will no longer hold the GT series in the same regard, but I know that the vacuum created by this release will just give more opportunities to other developers to make the game I was hoping for.

 

It's all good. Nature, and even humanity, abhors a vacuum.

[Atariboy]

But in PD's defense on the 3 Forza games, between GT4 and GT5, PD also released Tourist Trophy, GT5p, and GT-PSP. I really think they should poach an exec from Turn10 though.

 

One reused Gran Turismo 4's assets (Even the physics engine didn't need much revamping from reports back in the day) with new motorcycle models and 1 new track. And the fact you were limited to two competitors on the track (As I recall) shows how little time was spent in optimizing it. The second was a handheld port of Gran Turismo 4. And the last was a several year old demo for the game that was just released.

 

It's three games, but it's a significantly different situation. One was basically an expansion pack, one was a port, and the last was a demo of a early build of this game. I also have to wonder what they've been doing all these years.

[Reaperman]

I agree totally about GT5p, GT-PSP and Tourist Trophy not really being full titles in comparison to the 3 Turn10 releases, but they have taken at least some effort to do.

 

This is really a game-changer for me, and I'm not entirely sure which direction I'm going to go. I've decided to let Sony's customer service help to provide me with an answer:

 

How is Sony going to make up for selling me a defective game without all its advertised features?

 

I'm quite upset, but I've decided to provide a chance for customer service to really surprise me. I recently purchased Gran Turismo 5, and noticed that the title is broken to an unprofessional extent. It freezes, forgets settings, doesn't use US measurements, has some broken menus, and many of the cars/tracks are unfinished imports from PS2 titles. On top of that some of the advertised features (PS Eye head tracking, for example) that are listed on your Gran Turismo US website appear missing.

 

Right now I'm thinking a lot about all of my past and future purchases from Sony. I'm putting the ball in your court now, and I'm hoping your response helps to change my mind about Sony's treatment of its customers.

 

A well-written response, year of PSN+ or $60 PSN credit might help change my mind about them. I doubt I'll get anything more than a form letter response though.

Edited November 26, 2010 by Reaperman