Tag: Gran Turismo

Gran Turismo Sport – A Fresh Start

Mmmmm, nothing like that new track smell. It’s the perfect cure to that nauseating “new car” smell of freshly glued plastic. A new location is a little more refreshing to breathe in, and different to play. I can smell the ocean air and hear the breeze hit the mountain with a calming whoosh. After a somewhat reluctant installation, this is what Gran Turismo Sport needed to draw me in. This wonderful track called Dragon Trail. Where’s that? Nowhere. This is a brand new make-believe racetrack for GT Sport and it brings some much-needed identity to make this feel like a brand new special videogame. As someone who’s played every world circuit track in dozens of racing games before, the new tracks in GT Sport are exciting. Not just because of the new scenery, but it’s a brand new stimulating challenge with new corners and layouts to learn.

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Gran Turismo 6

After all the buzz about micro-transactions and the absolutely filthy excuse for a game that was Forza 5, I was hesitant to support Gran Turismo 6 after hearing that same word, “micro-transaction”. I took the plunge and bought the game last month because the allure of racing at Bathurst was too strong and I was keen to check out the new car handling physics. I’ve been playing it since it came out and I owe the developers at Polyphony Digital a giant apology for my assumptions. Gran Turismo 6 is not the devil’s next DLC scheme and the experience has been surprisingly fun and refreshing.

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Realism – How much is it worth?

Gran Turismo 6 is out later this year, and it’ll arrive a full 3 years after Gran Turismo 5. I am excited about playing the game with the new physics revamp, but can’t help but feel flat about the lack of new tracks to drive on. Polyphony are making a big deal about having 5 new tracks in the game. Yes five. Why does it take them so long? Because they scan the track and gather shitloads of data making sure it’s an accurate representation. Admirable attention to detail, but in my opinion it’s seriously holding back the gameplay experience.

dulltrack

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Racing Developers – Let Me PLAY YOUR GAMES

Polyphony, Codemasters, System 3, Turn 10, SimBin, Brain In A Jar, this is directed towards ALL of you. I’ve been enjoying Supercar Challenge lately with my new wheel, playing a good few hours every few days. It’s the most satisfyingly realistic driving simulator I’ve ever felt. However, I’ve still only unlocked 3 cars in the game, out of 44. There are 41 cars I can’t drive. Despite the fact that this is a videogame, my options are artificially limited by in-game money earned by competing in hundreds of races with dull, easy, brain-dead AI opponents. That’s no knock on Supercar Challenge’s AI racers, all racing games have AI I don’t care about.

Should I really have to spend 50 hours in career mode just to enjoy Time Trial properly? Would it be considered a crime to let me drive the cars I want from the start? This is mindblowingly terrible design that has somehow become the standard in console racing games. Time Trial is what I love – I want to drive to my own limits and challenge myself, to properly appreciate the physics of these fantastic simulators. Why can’t I take ADVANTAGE of the fact that this is a videogame, and drive the car I want?

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Big Beach Sports 2 – Motorsport Massacre

Oh yes, this game exists. Reception of the first game was mixed – some people actively hated the game, some passively hated it. Big Beach Sports managed to sell over a million copies; a very impressive milestone for any game. Despite this claim to fame, the game was a broken mess, and was only popular for being the first Wii game to feature Cricket. The motion controls didn’t work and it was a frustrating game to play. THQ decided this was a formula for success, and now it’s back. I’ve been lucky enough to get my hands on a copy of Big Beach Sports 2, and I thought I’d give THQ a chance to redeem themselves. After all, they went to the effort of getting a special team to handle this sequel. What could go wrong? With two all new racing mini-games, I couldn’t help but try it.


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Forza vs Gran Turismo, which is better?

Ah, the age old question. It’s a debate that’s raged on over the internet gaming community for the past decade or so. Gran Turismo has dazzled people over the years with its fantastic presentation, wealth of options and satisfying career mode. Forza has emerged with improved driving physics and community aspects, and now thanks to Kinect support you can move your head in your living room to look around realistically inside your TV. If only there was some kind of “joystick” device for such a feature, maybe in the future. Nevertheless, both Forza and Gran Turismo have a lot to offer. For someone looking for a true racing experience, which one is the best bet?

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FlatOut Wii – Impressions

Initial Play Time:  About a half-hour
Game type:  Semi-realistic arcade street driving

FlatOut is a budget Wii racer developed by Team6 Game Studios and published by Zoo Games in the USA. Sporting a debut price of $20, FlatOut can be summed up as a Budget Burnout or Casual Burnout – and in some ways this is a good thing, cuz you could’ve done worse by getting $50 of debut-disappointment on any of the FOUR Need for Speed titles on Wii. There are obvious limits on the scope and features of the game, but I could immediately tell Team6 was very serious about this project based on one of the very first screens the game loads: a note on the detectable range of Wii Remote tilting angles.


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OUTTA THE WAY DICKHEADS! Gran Turismo is here to save the next gen!

Oh man can you believe there are skeptics out there who doubt the revolutionary power of PS3’s Cell™ chip to change the way we think about games? I mean no game is a better showcase for Sony systems than Gran fucking Turismo, right? They haven’t even put gameplay into the previous four releases ensuring they totally focus on the graphics and hasn’t it shown?

Personally, I’m glad Polyphony Digital took the brave step of removing cars from the latest version of the game, which is also the first version of the game but now in HD! Genius. And don’t the latest screenshots just affirm this as the correct course of action? I’ve annotated all the new features of the game in case you’re an idiot who can’t see them from the crystal clear high definition screen capture. It’s fidelity is so high, in fact, that we can’t even contain it in our tiny column-based blog!

Gaming will be fun again!

I can’t wait.