Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown Discussion Thread

[GTPNewsWire]

This is the discussion thread for a recent post on GTPlanet:

A Test Drive Unlimited Sequel is On Its Way From WRC Developer Kylotonn

This article was published by Michael Leary (@Terronium-12) on March 5th, 2020 in the Gaming category.

 

[PaMu1337]

So all hope is not lost then!

Please, please, please be good

 

[Xavier2342]

I hope they're serious about TDU because it's a little too early for April Fools' Day.

 

[Firehound427]

Test Drive Unlimited is... was... is one of my absolute favorite driving game franchises. I really hope Kylotonn can pull this off.

 

[Nuschel01]

If this is as good as TDU1 and not as terrible ad TDU2 I‘m sold

 

[iName]

I wouldn’t even be mad if they just re-release TDU2 and only fix the handling

 

[Bloodytears]

Does any one remember the Lighthouse spot? Good times. TDU literally burned out my GPU, fresh anew Radeon, on one and only PC I ever had.

 

[RustyCitroen]

no way...

 

[Jtheripper]

Are they still doing wrc too? Do they have the license still? Or will do rally sim style games still? Lots of still lol sorry

 

[HuskyGT]

This game was like no other back in the days, but now there is tough competition given Horizon exists. They will have to come out with something really REALLY special to make it worth having. Good luck to the devs.

 

[SPhilli911]

Definitely good news, I love the WRC games by them and I miss the TDU games big time. Been hoping for a game like TDU again and The Forza Horizon and The Crew games do not cut it, in my opinion.

 

[JSHuiting]

Judging by the company who's making it, it's going to dissapoint big time.

 

[GTP_Versatile]

Really looking forward to this if they do the franchise justice, TDU and TDU2 were some of my favorite games back in the day.

 

[Nowax]

I have my hopes up to the skies!

 

[Northstar]

I wonder what will come out first, this or GTR 3?

 

[Wolfe]

Having played WRC8 I'm fairly confident they won't screw up the handling, unless it all goes awry with attempting to make it more "accessible". Suddenly, this notion of a new TDU sounds much more promising and concrete (not that my previous expectations were hard to top).

 

[mustafur]

The biggest question is if they have the sort of money to give a game like this justice, Horizon has a big budget and the crew is done by Ubisoft who are also a massive studio, this will need funds.

 

[Doomotron]

The biggest question is if they have the sort of money to give a game like this justice, Horizon has a big budget and the crew is done by Ubisoft who are also a massive studio, this will need funds.

Eden didn't have that much money to play with either, with the publisher being Atari.

 

[mustafur]

Eden didn't have that much money to play with either, with the publisher being Atari.

The first game was alright, but the map was half and on a older generation it would of been easier to make, the second one was horrific and was clearly lacking.

 

[Terronium-12]

I wonder what will come out first, this or GTR 3?

Definitely this.

They've been in talks to finalize a date since, what, last November? We still haven't seen the game in action, nor have we heard the slightest hint of when that could possibly happen.

 

[RodSk8Dude]

[...]now there is tough competition given Horizon exists. They will have to come out with something really REALLY special to make it worth having

[...]The Forza Horizon and The Crew games do not cut it, in my opinion.

[...]Horizon has a big budget and the crew is done by Ubisoft who are also a massive studio, this will need funds.

Honestly this game definitely has a place. It's not first party, so you can play on Playstation, or Windows 7 (EDIT: if it comes out soon enough), which I still greatly prefer over Win10 . And it's not by Ubisoft, so it's not always-online.

Bam! Two great advantages.

Really. Like it has been said, just TDU2 with better handling (TDU1 handling was good) would be great already.

 

[Mr Fahrenheit]

It's not going to be easy trying to surpass the reputation that TDU already have, but good luck to Kylotonn! I hope they create a solid game.

 

[TokoTurismo]

Oh, great... Another racing game that I doubts will be any good, let alone decent.

Honestly, not to offend anyone, but they just need to keep Test Drive dead instead of burning it into the ground. Why even try when you have Forza Horizon, The Crew and NFS? Why of ALL the ideas will you attempt to make a sequel to a game that failed miserably years ago? All it is is people getting hyped over it because of nostalgia, and have their expectations so high up they'll eventually complain endlessly after it launches.

Just reboot the franchise or just bring Test Drive back to closed racing again. It doesn't even need to be open world to be successful. Good luck to the developer I guess, but I don't think I'll jumping on the hype train like everybody else is currently doing.

 

[stupidstormy36]

I thought we already got that under the guise of The Crew? Or some other game the original developers made (spiritual successor)?

TDU was great and I played a lot of it on my PS2, then got the 360 and PC versions. But TDU2 suffered a lot from poor game choices.

I am cautiously optimistic as always. Don't want to see yet another franchise brought back from the dead just to me monetized to hell and back, utterly destroying the franchise as a whole.

 

[RandomCarGuy17]

Oh cool, the developers for the WRC games are working on the next TDU. I think I might be excited about this entry, it at least gives me hope that the driving physics will be better than the last TDU.

I mean, I haven't actually played any of the WRC games, but the gameplay footage I've seen looks like they would be fun racing games to play. So, maybe this game could be really enjoyable.

Honestly, not to offend anyone, but they just need to keep Test Drive dead instead of burning it into the ground. Why even try when you have Forza Horizon, The Crew and NFS? Why of ALL the ideas will you attempt to make a sequel to a game that failed miserably years ago? All it is is people getting hyped over it because of nostalgia, and have their expectations so high up they'll eventually complain endlessly after it launches.

and I'm going to disagree with this hugely. Killing off Test Drive was unnecessary, I really don't think TDU2 (or Ferrari Legends) should've marked the end of that franchise. TDU2 only failed because of poor management from the studio plus taking a few steps back, but it still had great attributes about it. Honestly as great as the current open-world racing games are, I still feel that TDU could stand out on its own as there are things these modern racing games lack that TDU had.

 

[Silver Arrows]

Definitely this.

They've been in talks to finalize a date since, what, last November? We still haven't seen the game in action, nor have we heard the slightest hint of when that could possibly happen.

And until that's proven otherwise, this means literally nothing.

It's not first party, so you can play on Playstation, or Windows 7 (EDIT: if it comes out soon enough), which I still greatly prefer over Win10 .

You...you do realize that Forza Horizon 3, 4 (and absolutely) 5 have been, and will now continue to be, on PC for the foreseeable future? This isn't the 'advantage' you think that is, especially since everybody and their mother who has a capable gaming PC (or at least, a computer good enough to run FH) has Windows 10, or 7, or whatever.

TDU2 only failed because of poor management from the studio plus taking a few steps back, but it still had great attributes about it.

As someone who was apart of the launch lead-up on the old Atari forums, and who saw the train wreck that was the launch period of TDU2 - it was a factor of Eden being way over their heads, and Atari in the death kneel of bankruptcy. But also, having played TDU2 maybe more recently then others...what attributes? Because yeah, TDU2 is the pinnacle of Euro jank. Some good ideas, sure, but the game throws one boneheaded move after another, and the actual game, not the driving around and exploring, is crap. The physics the series has, has been at best adequate, and in the worst case (as TDU2 showed) trash.

Look, I like the idea of the TDU games, but as talked about before, what place does TDU in a new, modern context have? Everything that has been done by it, has been added onto, or expanded upon, in later titles from others. Forza Horizon, as it stands now, is the game TDU wished it could have been, if it had a better budget and better support, and it's only getting bigger in terms of ideas and scope. The Crew is the direct successor considering it's made by the same people who made TDU. Why would I want to play another TDU game that's going to be hampered once more by budgets and being too grand of a idea in terms of scope?

TDU, as an idea taken by it's own merits within the time frame it was apart of, certainly paved the way for arcade racing games going forward. Now? It's a footnote - and bringing it back is going to expose the same flaws that I saw in 2006, and 2011, except now there's someone else's name on the box.

I am cautiously optimistic as always. Don't want to see yet another franchise brought back from the dead just to me monetized to hell and back, utterly destroying the franchise as a whole.

The hilarious irony of this is that TDU2 was already monetized to hell and back. Have people forgotten locking actual, useful variants of cars (the Veyron Super Sport as the most egregious example, but also the RS5 Coupe and Shelby GT500) behind pre-orders via specific outlets? Or the Casino add-on that was a prescient jumping off point to the thinly veiled gambling aspects of modern gaming?

 

[Silver Arrows]

delete

 

[DDastardly00]

I think we all knew this was coming. The real burning question is, however, are the Wilder Brothers still squabbling with Stuart? Because inquiring minds need to know if they were able to settle their difference on and of the road!

 

[Terronium-12]

And until that's proven otherwise, this means literally nothing.

I goofed, but it doesn't make the situation better by any means. SimBin have been discussing who knows what with their partners and have been trying to narrow down an agreed upon release date since Gamescom...last friggin' August.

Their Twitter hasn't been updated since last October either. So we're due for something in June.

That is based on nothing at all. I repeat: nothing at all.

 

[RandomCarGuy17]

Some good ideas, sure, but the game throws one boneheaded move after another, and the actual game, not the driving around and exploring, is crap. The physics the series has, has been at best adequate, and in the worst case (as TDU2 showed) trash.

For sure, I'm aware of the issues of TDU2. Hence why I said a few steps back, I was irritated by TDU2's driving physics and their horrid dlc additions. The story mode was cringe aswell. TDU1's physics, I don't think were too bad in comparison to the other arcade games out at the time.

With that said, the developer working on TDU now could end up bringing decent physics.

Look, I like the idea of the TDU games, but as talked about before, what place does TDU in a new, modern context have? Everything that has been done by it, has been added onto, or expanded upon, in later titles from others. Forza Horizon, as it stands now, is the game TDU wished it could have been, if it had a better budget and better support, and it's only getting bigger in terms of ideas and scope.

While I think Forza Horizon 4 is excellent and I really enjoy NFS Heat and The Crew 2. However, there's a few things that TDU had that I miss such as the ability to buy houses. FH4 has this, but they're just backdrops. Meaning that there was no incentive to really buy them other than having another fast travel spot or a few rewards. In TDU, the houses functioned as part of your progression as a way to increase your garage space, like in real life. I liked that in TDU2, you could even interact with the houses.

This is a small thing, but I liked the car delivery missions where you could try earning a huge amount of money, but had to try driving normally. There was also other missions that involved balancing driving fast with driving carefully with the part delivery missions for instance.

Another thing I kinda miss is being able to explore different car dealerships to buy cars versus just having one universal dealership. Sure, one dealer makes things more convenient and arguably less tedious. However, it might have made things too easy; I had a bit of fun exploring the map in TDU1 trying to find the dealerships myself and see what they had each. Kinda like walking into a real-life car dealership where you pick out the interior and exterior.

I suppose those ideas could be placed in future games from the 3 other franchises, but there's no guarantee of that. So, no. Not everything was improved or expanded upon. A universal car dealership isn't exactly expanded upon.

EDIT: I thought of another small thing, the avatar customization in TDU2 was a bit more detailed than in any of the current racing games. FH4 and NFS Heat just have set avatars plus changing clothes.