Gran Turismo Sport at Two: Still In Its Prime

Ahh going for the quick headline reader Gran Turismo Sport Two clicks. Smart.
While GT is not my favorite, there is no doubt it’s the best supported racing title today.
Even though Sony would never let it, I really wish it would officially come to PC one day.
 
It's a good retrospective, but for me personally I've moved on from GTS, let me explain.

I bought into the PS4 purely for GTS having seen how far it had come in the intervening years after GT4. I'd seen some youtube replays and I thought "no way, that looks real" and for just over a year I religiously put in my daily milage, and then some. I loved it.

But then I started to notice that things weren't quite right - there was an uncanny valley developing. Things were too smooth, running a track like Brands was like running on fresh and perfectly laid tarmac. Watching some AC replays of the same car bucking and bouncing over the inherent bumps of an old circuit and then comparing them to GTS replays which were as smooth as my freshly shaved bald head gradually convinced me that GTS might not be the driving simulator it proclaims to be.

This is not to say that GTS is bad, it's just that it needs to be roughed up a bit, well a bit more than a bit. Everything seems just too clinical - you can see it in the official PD events as well as the GTPlanet series - the cars just seem to glide with no bumps or any other perturbations while they really need to at least undulate a bit.

Just my take on it, and I still think the presentation of GTS is slicker that a 2019 F1 Pirelli direct from the mould. ;)
 
I disagree with the article in the sense that the car categories would be a problem per se. Actually, they could work a lot better, if some relatively small changes were made.

Let's take the example with N400 cars BMW M3 and Ford F150. The current BoP does what it can do with the Ford. It gets maximum power within N400 (439hp) and minimum weight (70%, although it is unclear how PD determines how much weight can be taken off for each car). The BoP for the M3, however, sets it at the N400 standard power at 394hp and 85% weight at 1406kg, which is also close to the average weight in that BoP. If you now test the 2 cars, they are about 2.5s apart on a track like Suzuka GP. So, what is keeping PD from making the M3 slower...? You could give it less power and/or more weight, so it should be possible to get the 2 cars on par.

One other thing that is definitely needed for the N-class BoPs, is to give the cars a custom gearbox setting adapted for each car's BoP. If you down- or uptune a car the gear ratios will just not match the cars' power anymore, so they need to be changed for the car to stay competitive.

Saying that, obviously it will be a stretch for SOME cars to fit into certain BoPs. But they could make a much better job of trying.
 
Slapped
Watching some AC replays of the same car bucking and bouncing over the inherent bumps of an old circuit and then comparing them to GTS replays which were as smooth as my freshly shaved bald head gradually convinced me that GTS might not be the driving simulator it proclaims to be.
Click to expand...
I mean...duh? "Real Driving Simulator" is just a monicker, everybody knows if you actually want simulation racing you go to superior alternatives like iRacing and RRR

snowgt
I disagree with the article in the sense that the car categories would be a problem per se. Actually, they could work a lot better, if some relatively small changes were made.
Click to expand...
The real problem is N group cars should not have been categorized strictly by the first digit in their horsepower stat, it opens too many inconsistencies as you can have cars from completely different eras in he same group. X is the same case here, actually, since it includes Super Formulas, late 70's racecars, VGT prototypes, and safety cars (for some reason)
 
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queleuleu
@Famine I think the lack of original GT tracks deserves some words in your article, even more two years later and one year before the end of this gen?
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I have a better idea, I think this subject deserves an updated whole new article on GTP.

https://www.gtplanet.net/trial-mountain-grand-valley-deep-forest-arent-gt-sport-yet/
See? This will turn 2 years old in December, and the simple fact it was published so long ago and absolutely nothing about it was mentioned since then is making all the words said there no longer "valid" than they were back when it was fresh. What I'm trying to say is: we all know they have direct contact with Kaz, and putting this question again on the table up for a brand new article seems really interesting.

I'm not saying the classic tracks need to come for GT Sport or something, all I want is an updated answer for this very controversial subject, and I'm 100% sure I'm not the only one thinking this way.
 
Guffaluff
Been good two years. Hundreds of hours and tens of thousands of kilometers later, it remains my go to game :)

Keep up the good work PD, looking forward to see what the next year has in store for us.
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And once next year comes, another decade starts.
Oh, wait a minute. Is it truly the start of a new decade? Some people would contemplate in believing that. :lol:
 
Had a good experience overall, (I miss the honeymoon period when I couldnt put it down) but recently I play other racing games as GTS has evolved from too little grip to too much of it. Its a shame the series has put so much emphasis on e-sports as this has no appeal for me at all...
 
Guffaluff
Been good two years. Hundreds of hours and tens of thousands of kilometers later, it remains my go to game :)

Keep up the good work PD, looking forward to see what the next year has in store for us.
Click to expand...

Happy Anniversary GTS! I can echo the same sentiments. GT Sport was my return to the franchise after an absence since GT5. I’d played the previous versions like crazy. Fast forward some years, I’d been completely away from Gran Turismo so I’d not heard anything about GTS when I decided to download it in April of 2019(yep just a few months ago). Was browsing PSN that night when I came across it and thought, why not… As it turns out, it was an excellent decision.

Started playing again on controller and was immediately hooked! From there I discovered the YouTube videos, the Kaz documentary and the GTPlanet website. As you can see, I went about things completely backwards. Many hours of enjoyment, very passionate community and I took to the online portion a very profound way. So much so that I bought a GT Omega rig and a Fanatec CSL Elite set.

I’m thoroughly enjoying what this title has to offer, and I’m looking forward to the future of Gran Turismo!
 
I'm quite pleased to see what GTS has become two years on. To be honest I'm still convinced that GTS is basically this generation's equivalent of GT3 in the sense that it trimmed out most of the fat (maybe a bit too much in terms of tracks, but car-wise it was sorely needed IMO) and it's the soft reboot that the series needed.

Hopefully next year we start seeing more "new-to-series" cars and hopefully some more legacy tracks come around. It's still jarring that the only legacy track that's come back is, of all things, Route X.
 
LotusEvoraGTE
I'm quite pleased to see what GTS has become two years on. To be honest I'm still convinced that GTS is basically this generation's equivalent of GT3 in the sense that it trimmed out most of the fat (maybe a bit too much in terms of tracks, but car-wise it was sorely needed IMO) and it's the soft reboot that the series needed.
Click to expand...
That's exactly where I'm at with GT Sport. GT Sport got me back into the series at a level I haven't been at since GT3 & GT4. I'm very satisfied with it and I can't wait for new content and GT7. GT4 took a significant leap forward, and I hope GT7 will do the same.
 
Still needs more tracks. The car list is much better now but GT is really underutilising it by shoving them into broad N-classes and Group X.

It would be great if they could change the schedule for sport mode.
Race A- 12 minutes, means five races in an hour.
Race B - 15 minutes, four races per hour.
Race C stays at 30 minutes.

If I'm in sport mode, I want to race, as much as possible. If I need to qualify or change livery, I will skip a race so I do it properly. At the moment I waste 65% of the time waiting around when I can only participate in one seven minute race every 20 minutes.
 
At this point in GT6's life, the game was pretty much dead and most people had moved away. GT Sport enters it's third year with a lot still to give. There'll most likely be another World Tour series and some more updates before the next GT comes out on PS5. We obviously don't know many more updates we'll get but I don't think this month's will be the last. It would be great if the game was updated right up until the release of the PS5. The wait for the next game would be much easier to bare.
 
CLowndes888
At this point in GT6's life, the game was pretty much dead and most people had moved away. GT Sport enters it's third year with a lot still to give.
Click to expand...

I'd argue GT6 also had the misfortune of being released on an older console while a shiny new one has just come out so there was only a matter of time before a huge amount of people migrated to the big shiny new thing out there. GT Sport is lucky that its release, while surrounded by a whole bunch of sim racing releases, was well away from a console transition period so it obviously was able to maintain people a lot longer, even if it took awhile for the amount of content to be somewhat satisfactory (At least in regards to the cars as the tracks are still abit scant).
 
RACECAR
I'd argue GT6 also had the misfortune of being released on an older console while a shiny new one has just come out so there was only a matter of time before a huge amount of people migrated to the big shiny new thing out there. GT Sport is lucky that its release, while surrounded by a whole bunch of sim racing releases, was well away from a console transition period so it obviously was able to maintain people a lot longer, even if it took awhile for the amount of content to be somewhat satisfactory (At least in regards to the cars as the tracks are still abit scant).
Click to expand...
Yeah the release of GT6 on old hardware wasn't the best decision for PD. GT Sport has got itself in a good place, and the lack of a new console has definitely helped in this regard.
 
It was lacking in a few things at the start but is in a really good place right now. Best of all, the DLC has been free. Even after 2 years, it's still my go-to racing game. I hope they just keep adding updates well into the PS5 era, similar to what Blizzard did with World of Warcraft. I would definitely pay for more content or "donate" by using their microtransactions.
 
If they keep getting combinations right like Daily Race B last week & this week and listen to people and apply like they did with FIA races then this is going to stay in Prime forever.
 
Two years on & IMHO I feel it's still the worst game in the series. The lack of Shuffle, the forced on understeer vibration effect, & the lack of public lobby options from GT6 has pretty much killed it for me personally. I really dislike Sport Mode with its matchmaking, & hate driving against random people without any racing rules. The automatic knee jerk reaction fantasy penalty system is also something that I despise. Even though the audio has been redone, I still think the cars mostly sound lame; so sterile, droning, digital & harsh. The game sure does look pretty, but I think that's all it has going for it. I haven't bothered updating it in a while, & don't play it at all anymore.


👎
 
Slapped
It's a good retrospective, but for me personally I've moved on from GTS, let me explain.

I bought into the PS4 purely for GTS having seen how far it had come in the intervening years after GT4. I'd seen some youtube replays and I thought "no way, that looks real" and for just over a year I religiously put in my daily milage, and then some. I loved it.

But then I started to notice that things weren't quite right - there was an uncanny valley developing. Things were too smooth, running a track like Brands was like running on fresh and perfectly laid tarmac. Watching some AC replays of the same car bucking and bouncing over the inherent bumps of an old circuit and then comparing them to GTS replays which were as smooth as my freshly shaved bald head gradually convinced me that GTS might not be the driving simulator it proclaims to be.

This is not to say that GTS is bad, it's just that it needs to be roughed up a bit, well a bit more than a bit. Everything seems just too clinical - you can see it in the official PD events as well as the GTPlanet series - the cars just seem to glide with no bumps or any other perturbations while they really need to at least undulate a bit.

Just my take on it, and I still think the presentation of GTS is slicker that a 2019 F1 Pirelli direct from the mould. ;)
Click to expand...

I've kind of always felt this way after a while with literally all the Gran Turismos. Mainly the way it feels when you hit anything or something hits you. There's that dull unsatisfactory thud sound and it just feels like bumper cars at a fairground.

Other than the cars physics in that regard and the way it reacts to the track etc the game is fantastic for what it is. It really needs to address these elements of its going to go to the next level or be a true rival to the latest Assetto Corsa or iRacing etc imho.

Presentation wise it's in a league of its own however and a great advert or showcase for manufacturers of cars. Just a shame it's not more like those other games when cars interact with each other as it completely ruins the immersion factor. All those fancy graphics and it just feels like an early race game and the illusion is shattered.

In a sense arcade games like Wreckfest or even older titles like Driver San Francisco have more realistic handling and interactions when it comes to physics. With the power of next gen they won't have the excuse of needing to prioritise the look of the graphics anymore either. People will expect more of any potential GT7 on PS5.
 
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snowgt
I disagree with the article in the sense that the car categories would be a problem per se. Actually, they could work a lot better, if some relatively small changes were made.

Let's take the example with N400 cars BMW M3 and Ford F150. The current BoP does what it can do with the Ford. It gets maximum power within N400 (439hp) and minimum weight (70%, although it is unclear how PD determines how much weight can be taken off for each car). The BoP for the M3, however, sets it at the N400 standard power at 394hp and 85% weight at 1406kg, which is also close to the average weight in that BoP. If you now test the 2 cars, they are about 2.5s apart on a track like Suzuka GP. So, what is keeping PD from making the M3 slower...? You could give it less power and/or more weight, so it should be possible to get the 2 cars on par.

One other thing that is definitely needed for the N-class BoPs, is to give the cars a custom gearbox setting adapted for each car's BoP. If you down- or uptune a car the gear ratios will just not match the cars' power anymore, so they need to be changed for the car to stay competitive.

Saying that, obviously it will be a stretch for SOME cars to fit into certain BoPs. But they could make a much better job of trying.
Click to expand...
Cars like M3 and Raptor shouldn't be in same category in the first place. Raptor should be driving against some N200 instead, with some BoP it could work.
 
VBR
the lack of public lobby options from GT6
Click to expand...

This is the killer for most of us who can't stand anything Sport Mode or FIA related.
For a game that promoted online racing against real people GTS is a huge fail in this department when it comes to the player controlled lobbies. The lack of online lobby options compared to GT6 is just inexcusable for a title that's been out two years.
Guess they are afraid of people creating a better racing environment than GTS beloved Sport Mode/FIA.
 
I didn’t play much GT6, what lobby options are you talking about? @VBR @Rinsky


Ddkklop
Cars like M3 and Raptor shouldn't be in same category in the first place. Raptor should be driving against some N200 instead, with some BoP it could work.
Click to expand...

The way they group cars is awful, each car should be in a sub category with other similar models. F150 grouped with Tundra, FWD hot hatches in their own group, etc.
 
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MikeV27
I didn’t play much GT6, what lobby options are you talking about? @VBR @Rinsky
The way they group cars is awful, each car should be in a sub category with other similar models. F150 grouped with Tundra, FWD hot hatches in their own group, etc.
Click to expand...


The filtering system for cars was much much better and bigger. You could select one Manufacturer or multiple manufacturer up to your liking to race against. If you wanted to do the F-150 against the Tundra you could.
Now in GTS all you get to select is a class group or one makes.


No tuning was actually no tuning. Select no tuning in GTS and you can still tune on the car.

The ability to set how many pit stop were mandatory in your race

The ability to make players switch to different tire compounds throughout the race. Just like they are doing in the FIA events now.

Qualifying was a huge one that just finally got added and took them almost two years to give us that.

Time of day progression and more options along with this but all of GTS is without this feature.

Shuffle racing from GT5
Probably the single most requested option by fans that was abandoned on GT6 & GTS. No one will never why because It was so popular.

I know I'm forgetting more options but it's been awhile since I've even seen the GT6 lobby format as it's no longer available but I'm sure someone else will remember what I haven't.
As you can see there are some big options we once had and now we don't.
Options like those go a long way in tailoring your lobby to fit certain criteria.
 
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