C-Zeta & GT - In-game reviews [The GT Sport review?! - 21/5/16]

[C-ZETA]

"Peak"
"Bad luck, gutted. When some **** goes down that is bad on your behalf, peak for you. When something bad happens to a mate , peak for them. Effectively meaning bad luck / gutted to ****. English street slang." - Urban Dictionary

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I rather like Pikes Peak.

For a start, it's based in the Rockies, in Colorado. Since I chose to support the Denver Broncos in the NFL, I now feel contractually obliged to support anything from Colorado. Oh, and I did choose to support the Broncos before Tebow or Peyton ever joined, thank you very much. In fact, I started with them when Gay Cutler was their QB.

But Pikes Peak itself hosts some properly awesome stuff. Or had, anyway.

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Today, Pikes Peak is paved over completely with tarmac due to a government enforcement. I now plan to make a campaign to become government leader of Colorado, despite 1) being British and b) knowing **** all about politics, to pave it back entirely with gravel. Or get someone I know who does know something about politics to do it on my behalf, at any rate.

The tarmacing of the track means that the famed time of 10 minutes that was constantly aspired for is now nothing. Indeed, this year, Sebastian Loeb, a selfish and dominant French ****, went and set a time of 8:13.878 in his overpowered and unfair Peugeot 208 Pikes Peak. Maybe next year, given the 908 wing, it'll break down next time. Given the famous inconsistency of the French, I wouldn't be too surprised.

The real men there were the ones who took the course on back when there was gravel of some actual sort on the track.

The most notable of these, without question, was Nobuhiro Tajima, who held the record for a long while before finally breaking the 10-minute barrier in the Monster Sport Suzuki SX4 - which features in this game. He has broken the 10-minute barrier since of course - in the E-Runner that also features in this game.

He was the man who drove surely the most infamously fast car in the Gran Turismo series - the Suzuki Escudo.

Among others, there is Rod Millen, 5 time winner at the course in a selection of wild Toyota Celicas and Tacomas. His son, Rhys Millen, races there often now, in an unusual selection of Hyundais. If there was one brand of car I'd choose to race, it wouldn't be Hyundai...also, I think he's a bit of a **** in my mind as well.

Then there was Ari Vatanen in the Peugeot 405 - his winning drive providing the material for the short film 'Climb Dance'. Look it up now on Google. Obviously, this inspired Peugeot to come back after 25 years and won it by being too powerful with an unkind French person who never lets others win ever.

Vatanen's drive was followed by a winning drive from Robby Unser the next year - whose father Bobby had won 3 years in the car you see pictured here, the Audi Sport Quattro.

The Audi quattro won Pikes Peak in various guises 6 times on the trot - firstly in its original form twice with John Buffum, then in its Sport form twice in a row with French girl Michele Mouton - the most successful woman in motor racing. Then after Unser's win, this 1987 spec quattro was driven once again to the win by a very esteemed rally driver - Walter Rohrl.

In fact, the double world rally champion was even scheduled to take the very car up the mountain again, over 25 years on from its first trip...but the car was pulled out. A great shame.

The great new representation of Pikes Peak cars, with this original classic along with the modern SX4 and E-Runner, signal the first additions since the original two Pikes Peak cars introduced in GT2 - the Escudo, which has stayed ever since, and the Cultus which preceded it in real life, but hasn't stayed with it in game.

Gran Turismo 2 even had a 'Pikes Peak' course to drive on, although it was not actually Pikes Peak as such - merely a much shorter likeness of the course. You could even drive it downhill.

In fact, even the Group B quattro from 1986 has been introduced into Gran Turismo 6. I tested the Anniversary Edition of that prior to driving this, and on the dirt it was a very fun and fast drive.

However, the Pikes Peak quattro (not to be confused with the actually titled Pikes Peak quattro concept that spawned the Q7 SUV) bears almost too much of a likeness to it for my liking. But its stats aren't actually anything close to the Group B. Not surprisingly, it's much more powerful and lighter. And contrary to my previous views, much more differently liveried. But can it hook it on the closest possible equivalent to the classic Pikes Peak on this game - Eiger Nordwand K Trail?

The answer is: yes. Undoubtedly. Though the unusual placebo effect of similarity between the two quattro's was a bit offputting in my mind as I tested it, the fact is, it's still a fast mother****er on dirt.

590bhp pulling on just 1000kg of car makes for a fast combination, especially when combined with the ever dirt-friendly 4WD drivetrain. The result is just scintillating to drive.

Not even much difficulty is necessary in driving it. Though my dirt skills leave much to be desired, mainly in terms of cornering speed, the quattro never disappointed through the turns. It plowed through them perfectly.

At under 1.5 million Cr. the Quattro is expensive in terms of the game's cars but again, with new monetary measures being taken, that value will soon be next to nothing.

The problem I've got though, is that odd placebo effect that keeps making me think that actually, the Group B quattro is not too far from this model. Because that's no slouch either, and with the actually slower speed feels friendlier to drive and easier to push.

I think it's the fact they have the same sound. And the way they accelerate, their style of doing so, is so similar that it ****s with my mind as a result.

But really, the Pikes Peak quattro is nothing like its Group B counterpart. It's far faster in truth, as little as I can actually feel it. Really though, both new quattros are quality cars. The road version that has been standard since its introduction in GT4 is definitely not bad either. Even given my birthday settings that meant I received one every year, because it was the only 1982 car.

So what are you waiting for? Go out and live the Pikes Peak dream again. Not just with this, but with its three fellow Pikes Peak cars.

Don't be fooled like I felt - this is way wilder than the Group B quattro. Both are great, so save up for them both.

This was the Audi Sport quattro S1 Pikes Peak '87 at Eiger Nordwand K Trail.
Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the Most Inconsistent Car of the Minute!
Because it won't even be consistently inconsistent in the next minute

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Not many people seem to point this out, but France and anything originating from it is always, always good in places and bad in others. And not even all the time...something on it can be brilliant one minute and the next it could be ruining your life.

And this applies for everything from the country. But even the rate at which they can be inconsistent fluctuates.

I could give one quite general example, about this one part French girl I know who's been on my mind all too much recently, for all the right and wrong reasons. But this is a car review, so let's stick to racing, which is something we all know about. Not my life story at present, which is something you don't.

The most annoying example I have in mind is Sebastian Loeb. He is annoyingly consistent, in that, no matter how old he is, he just doesn't stop ****ing winning. I mean, why doesn't he just let someone else actually win?? Even Michael Schumacher did that when he first joined Ferrari. And then after he had locked out F1 for 5 years, Ferrari went and designed a car that wasn't as good so that Alonso could take two championships.

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But no. Loeb and Citroen have not had the heart to just let someone else even try and challenge them. So with his retirement this year, after 2 wins from 4 rallies even this year, you think "At last. WRC will be more free with many more drivers in with a chance." Right? Right?

No. Because this time, another Sebastian is set to ruin WRC for another decade, this time Sebastian ****ing OGIER.

He almost completely locked out the WRC this year driving for VW and is set to do so with the same team for ever and ever and ever until eventually another Frenchman called Sebastian does the same thing for another decade. With, oh I don't know, Hyundai. Or some Chinese brand.

Needless to say, the modern WRC has never appealed to me because really, who wants to watch the same driver winning for a decade? I don't. And that's why people are losing it with F1 because of Sebastian Vettel too. Notice a trend here?? Hopefully there aren't too many Sebastians coming up in motorsport, there's only so many categories that can be dominated by them.

So Sebastian Loeb and Ogier can be consistent to the point of causing me to want to cause harm to them. So how do you explain the behaviour of France's actual top driver these days - Romain Grosjean?

When he joined Renault in 2009, in place of Nelson "Race Fix" Piquet Jr., and in an admittedly horribly troubled time for the team, he didn't really set anyone's world on fire. He did win GP2 in 2011 though, which put him back in a seat for 2012 alongside the legend himself, Kimi Raikkonen.

I wasn't expecting much from him myself. Until he put the car 3rd on the grid on his first race back, behind just the McLarens.

I was now expecting quite a lot. And he duly went and hit Pastor Maldonado on Lap 2, forcing him into retirement. Early collisions would become his forte for the year. Ironically Maldonado would see similar inconsistency and collisions, making it rather fitting that the two drivers are now team-mates...

Grosjean would end up being known for these first lap collisions more than anything else - most especially thanks to becoming the first driver to actually receive a ban from racing since Schumacher in 1994, by tearing the Belgian Grand Prix to shreds by cutting across Lewis Hamilton and removing the pair as well as Fernando Alonso in a scary incident.

But there were plenty of brilliant flashes still for Romain. He had scored 3 podium finishes including a 2nd in Canada and was well in the running before mechanical failure at Valencia.

Grosjean though would cap the year off by winning the Race of Champions (which Ogier had won the previous year of course), which would prove a point going into 2013. He took a while to make it fully - until the end of the season in fact, but when he did, he was thrust into a position of real respect, his reputation repaired.

This had come through 4 podium finished in the last 6 races, including 2nd in America, a 3rd place in India whereby he had started 17th, and what could have been a win in Japan that eventually didn't quite work out. At a time where Vettel was absolutely rock solidly locked into 1st place in F1, Grosjean's late season form was a note to take.

The question is, in 2014, with new regulations and as a number 1 driver at Lotus, how will Grosjean reckon in 2014. The fact is, his unpredictability and inconsistency means, no one knows. With the new rules there is no guarantee that Grosjean will show pace like his 2013 late season type.

And so we now arrive rather belatedly at the subject of this review. The Peugeot 908.

Now Peugeot's efforts are one part of the French that I do really love. Because they've always been around at just the right time for my liking.

The first real works effort from Peugeot came in the form of the 905. It didn't start off too well - of course - but then the Evo 1B came around and, as a truly beautiful racer, won the final WSC season and Le Mans, finishing 1st and 3rd. Then the next year, 1993, racing just at Le Mans, it went 1-2-3 to solidify its position as the last Group C winner ever. And so I've come to love it.

14 years after their last appearance, Peugeot went back again with the 908. By this time, Audi (German translation for consistency) had locked out Le Mans since 2000. Given Peugeot's reputation on the road now though, you wouldn't put them down as Audi-beaters at this point. Not even in their own country.

And they weren't straight away. On their first effort, they finished 2nd but 10 laps down. 2008 saw an improvement but not in position, still coming off 2nd best but at least being on the same lap as the Audis this time.

But in 2009, Audi switched from the R10 to the R15. And, amazingly, it didn't work.

Peugeot happily took a 1-2 at Audi's expense. The streak was broken.

The car featured since GT5, and reappearing here, is the 2010 model that attempted to defend its crown.

With what turned out to be the fastest racer to grace the Le Mans circuit, and what might be the fastest for a while yet, Peugeot locked out spots 1 to 4 in qualifying. Audi didn't stand a chance.

Until, surprise surprise, the French consistency bug hit again. And all 4 Peugeots failed. Leaving Audi clear to score a 1-2-3 and break a distance record. Oh dear.

The bitter irony is, that in the World Sportscar Championship that had been reformed from that year, Peugeot won every other race. But this time, Le Mans left them hanging.

2011 saw them just barely fail - by about 13 seconds. Audi now had the new closed R18 TDI, but, with a bit of help from Ferrari, two of them were gone in some outstanding accidents. But Audi #2 stood strong and, with some actual speed to match Peugeot now, won it.

And then Peugeot pulled out before 2012.

Truthfully though, I absolutely love Peugeot's Le Mans racers. The fact is, when I went and watched the whole event in 2011, I was backing Peugeot like no tomorrow. I have never backed a manufacturer quite so much in one race - and never will. I believe my original love I found for the 905 made this happen - I even owned a rather small scale replica of the 905. It's just the beauty of it that made me love it, and seeing Peugeot come back with what was undoubtedly a real challenge to Audi, no matter what their reputation was, makes them probably the only racing team that I've actually supported since F1 stopped becoming a sport where any of the drivers could be loved.

The weird thing is, I'd heard of the 905 from GT4 first, and the 905 in GT4 was, as it turned out, well below par. This came down to its gear shift, which actually turned out to be the slowest in the game. Seriously, I could have gone to school in the middle of one of its gear shifts, finished the school day and come back home before it actually shifted into the next gear.

Thankfully for GT5 this was fixed. And its big bruising diesel son was added in its #1 form - the 908.

Because of the way that LMPs and Group Cs are quite unusually worked out in terms of overall speed, the 908, despite being the fastest Le Mans racer ever in this form, is actually around the midfield in terms of overall speed - possibly even the lower midfield. Obviously, calling it slow in any form is a ridiculous gesture, as the reality is that relatively speaking its speed is insane, and always will be.

In this game though, once again for the French, it is an inconsistent drive.

Thankfully for the most part it is consistent to keep on the road - if you know what you're doing it's easy to hook up with the killer 885 ft-lb torque its diesel provides. But somehow, there will always be a moment where you will slip up slightly and have to try and rescue it. It's not a difficult job to do that, but it always happens - and at a point you never expect it. It's a slight niggle but realistically not too much more.

The sound is of course a low diesel grumble - but a really angry grumble at that, a threatening one even. It's way better than the sound the Audi gets which actually matches a lot of the petrol racers. The 908's sound is much more unique.

Obviously at 1.9 million Cr. there is a price to pay - but with 700bhp and this speed, you do get what you pay for.

So in GT6, the 908 is not the best option to take necessarily. It's not the most consistent to drive and not the fastest, and even a very cool and surprising Base Model doesn't quite contribute its cause above other cars. But there's no way you can go wrong with it either. And of course, I absolutely love it and cherish it. So go and check out real life's fastest Le Mans racer - ever. Provided it doesn't fail. Which it will, as it's the 2010 spec.

Remember - never trust anything from France too much. Not even the girls. As I mentioned at the start of this review. Oh, except the Renault Megane RS 265. That's something French that delivers at every level in every way every time. So that's the exception to the rule.

The one I will remember, as the first racer I ever supported. Not the best in GT6 terms but still a perfectly fine racer that will win any race it can.

This was the Peugeot 908 HDi FAP - Team Peugeot Total '10 at Cote d'Azur.
Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

Any chance you could tell me what you've tuned on the car? Whenever I drive it, there's a huge amount of understeer which produces snap oversteer on corner exit! Thanks!

The GT-R NISMO GT3 was tested from the Arcade Mode selection - that is to say it was completely stock. Granted there is a bit of understeer perhaps but it's certainly bearable if you drive it carefully. The oversteer on corner exit if you throttle it is perfect for me, in that it's so light it is of no hindrance but it really allows you to be quite free where you place it.

It's a superb thing to actually drive.

 

[tje23]

The GT-R NISMO GT3 was tested from the Arcade Mode selection - that is to say it was completely stock. Granted there is a bit of understeer perhaps but it's certainly bearable if you drive it carefully. The oversteer on corner exit if you throttle it is perfect for me, in that it's so light it is of no hindrance but it really allows you to be quite free where you place it.

It's a superb thing to actually drive.

Ah, okay! Thank you! Guess I'll just have to try harder...

 

[jeep2008]

Great respect for all the time to do this!Keep up the good work,cheers!!

 

[C-ZETA]

Before reading the other reviews, why not try the Honda FIT RS '10?
The best starter car in the game! Because it's the only one.

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The path of Gran Turismo's career mode has been well set since number 1. And it hasn't changed since then.

You start with a small number of credits which you are most advised to spend on the fastest car available at the time. That often meant drafting through the used car section, apart from GT3. The choice was surprisingly nice and varied, even if there were a few dominant starter cars that came to mind as the best and most common choices.

In GT1, for me, it was above all else, the Toyota MA70 Supra. Not even its FR drivetrain, something of a warning sign back then, stopped it from being easily the best value for money car at the start of the game. Never mind the fact it was a lard arse, it had the potential to carry you through almost every event in the game (you'd have to push on some though. And much better stuff came your way anyway...)

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Gran Turismo 2 though, was rather different. Because of some pretty counter-productive HP limits, you had to think about which event to do first before proceeding ahead with your first buy. And the choice was maddening. The used dealer contained it all, from kei cars to 80s classic to the prototypical used 90s sports cars. Even the MA70 from previously was an option.

On balance, I think the 1986 Toyota MR2 was the best to choose there. But I probably liked the Mitsubishi FTO GR the most because of its beautiful soundbyte. I don't recall if the Mazda Lantis was available at that point, nor the completely brilliant Mazda Familia GT-R or Nissan Pulsar GTi-R. But they were both brilliant cars regardless.

GT3 shook it up by removing the used dealer outright in spite of the fact it had a reduced car list. So the Daihatsu Cuore came out on top of that. But overall the lack of opening car choice made the beginning of GT3 rather boring. Thank god there was plenty to keep one entertained after that...

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Gran Turismo 4, though not as diverse as Gran Turismo 2, brought back the GT2 feel of the first car by adding a varied choice of used cars to pick for your first - but also more license prizes to ease the process. Indeed, the Pontiac Sunfire would be an often chosen car for the eventual Capri Rally (Easy) race that gave you some very easy credits indeed via the Toyota RSC Rally Raid Car.

But if you didn't do that, there were still options aplenty. One for instance being the original Lancer Evo, available on Day 1 and only just within budget but still more than fast enough for the beginning of the game. However a better value for money choice was the Honda Civic SiR-II - which was also one of the best choices from even GT1. It provided a substitute for the aforementioned Sunfire, doing the same job with similar ability.

Or you could just be really boring, and in all the games buy an NA. You unoriginal ****ers.

​

Gran Turismo 5 added a rather new dimension to the start of the game with its pre-order bonuses that shattered the start of the game completely. I took advantage of these, so don't really know what starting car was truly best. But on balance of the events, the Toyota Vitz, Civic Type R (my choice) or NA, again, were the best choices. But the reduced UCD reduced the choice with it.

So with GT6 removing the UCD, giving you 20,000 Cr. to start with all these cars available...it was everything GT3 would be in an ideal world. The massive choice, the variation, it was to be madness. Even further pre-order bonuses wouldn't deter that. And then-

"Why not try the Honda FIT RS '10?"

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...Sorry? ...Were you not supposed to be sponsored by Nissan, PD?

So yes. There is no first car choice here. You have to take the Fit, or as we call it here in the real world, the Jazz. Jazzy it is not, though it doesn't look that bad. Or the face doesn't at any rate.

Except there's a better looking car that would have cost 800 Cr. less. The Mazda Demio Sport, or as it's known by proper people, the Mazda2.

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I haven't driven the Mazda2 stock yet. I tuned mine as soon as I bought it. So I can't really compare it driving-wise to the Fit. But I'm not sure it'll have too hard a time beating it.

Now the Fit didn't feel too bad in the first races of GT6 which I did in it. But here on Suzuka East it was not so good.

The understeer through the first corner was sometimes difficult to fight. And the tyres wailed like banshees through the esses. Every single time, through each one of them.

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The car rolls about consistently, and doesn't feel in balance. The speed seems rather decent for its class though. But that's not much use without proper handling I'm afraid.

The decision to fix this as the only starter car available was not a good one in my eyes. It sticks with the GT feel for sure, but it also doesn't. This is the type of car you should realistically start with, but it's your only choice. And having the choice of previous games removed does not bode well. It's a move designed to fit casuals. And no, I will not complain about that, but even then it wasn't a necessary move.

Indeed, with the 20,000 Cr. you should be able to spend on anything else, looking at the cars available for that money, there are some properly good options.

One of those is my beloved Mazda Lantis, which would not only crush the first part of the game, but also handily beat events after that. And that has the best driving ability of any FF I've encountered, so never mind the fact you'd only have 80 Cr. left, don't even think you can go wrong with that.

There's even stuff like the Toyota MR-S for the anti-FF crowd. But then you also have cars like the Yaris RS Turbo, FTO GR (!), a Silvia K's S13, the CR-X del sol, the AE86 and numerous NAs that outshine the Fit RS. It's a silly choice for the one starter car really. Screw the Premium factor too, because even the Mazda2, as said, beats it and that's new and Premium too.

And since selling it won't give you the money for any of those cars either, there is only one course of action. Tell PD to get rid of it. Then when they do, buy a Lantis.

Suffers all of the FF problems, very incapable. If you're looking for a starter car, look elsewhere. Oh wait, you can't...

This was the Honda FIT RS '10 at Suzuka Circuit East Course.
Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

What a hateful little car.
My least favourite hot hatch comes to town.

​

I've already talked about dominance in motorsport and how it annoys me. I even did it on another French car, the Peugeot 908. There I talked about the dominance of people and the resulting dislike for them. But this also spreads to the car world.

Sidenote: that girl I mentioned in the 908 review isn't even being annoying now. She isn't even talking to me at all. But knowing her that'll change next week.

Indeed, the French are not even immune from this, but the only area of the road car world they have even remotely dominated at all is the hot hatch world. My favourite...which means that everyone else must have done well to combat it.

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A slight trace of this can go back to even the Peugeot 205 GTi. It was the heir to the throne of the original Volkswagen Golf GTi. That is something I can markedly respect as the original great. But the Peugeot 205 GTi, I don't really care about as much. I don't hate it by any means, but the way it seemed to be all that was talked about those days meant I rather passed it off and don't care for it as much as I could.

However, the hot hatch world wouldn't really get a car that persistently annoyed me, until 2010. And this time, it wasn't the French. It was the now joint worst offender.

Ford. The Focus RS was now out and was amazing everyone with its power and mad looks, which they loved so much despite the fact that even they knew that realistically it was only suitable for berks. They said it was awesome, amazing, better than the Megane RS, Golf GTI of the time...except it wasn't. The Megane RS was by far the best drivers' hot hatch still by miles, and the Golf GTI was still the all-rounder and the best period. But no one cared because...POWER!! Nothing else is relevant because this has the most POWER.

I pretty much hated it.

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Ford would later repeat the annoyance with the Focus ST, which actually did turn out to be probably the best hot hatch, unfortunately. Though not in everyone's mind...like Jeremy Clarkson's. The Fiesta ST is now the best in its class but only because everything else is so uninspiring...including this car's sequel. The Clio RS. And the previous Clio RS here, was the worst offender of them all.

Nothing in its class got close. It was lower in specs than the Megane and Focus and Golf obviously, but because it so clearly dominated the smaller hot hatches, everyone seemed to treat it like a holy grail. The best drivers' hot hatch of them all, period. And so everyone claimed it, seemingly, as the greatest thing ever to hit the shores of England ever. Oh how angry this made me...

Now, I love the Megane RS to pieces, mainly because I know that, even within its unbelievable beauty, and superb performance and drive, it is fundamentally flawed. It has been said it is a bit too rough, and impractical. Which makes the Golf and others better for everyday living. But this extra focus on driving gives it much more of a soul, and unlike stuff like the Focus RS which is just absolute power corrupting absolutely, the Megane RS is built to get round corners, and well. See my review of it for more details.

The Twingo RS, the lowest level model, was also a nice and lovely thing too. But this Clio was going around, being too perfect for its own good. No fundamental flaw seemed to be pointed out within it, ever. It was just praise, praise, praise, best in the world ever stuff. And as a result it appealed to me on no levels at all.

Thankfully, Renault fixed their own problem by making the new model of Clio RS the biggest pile of hot hatch dog **** in the modern day. The turbocharger made for a different and wrong feel, the flappy-paddle gearbox killed all feel of control and the car also features less appealing looks and an incredibly bizarre choice of engine to put into the cabin - including the Nissan GT-R, Alpine A110 and some bizarre future Renault - which didn't actually change the real sound of the car in any way whatsoever.

It makes you wonder what might happen to the next Megane RS. But that is pretty much guaranteed to have more power, something which the Clio RS crucially was not given.

But here in Gran Turismo, along with the brilliant Megane, we have the 'perfect' Clio RS.

Something to note first though. You will say that the first car you drove in GT6 was the Honda Fit RS '10. I mean it was your starter car. But in the month this game has been out, you might just have forgotten that the demonstration drive was done at Brands Hatch Indy in one of these.

Now, while the standard affair of default aids was on without question, the car did feel, actually, rather nice to drive. Or rather, it did, in between all the bloody pauses for messages that were, if you check, implemented only in 1.01. The original version did not have those pauses. The messages were merely displayed as you drove. This was much better.

And now, driving the Clio RS without any of those aids, on Matterhorn Riffelsee - a far different beast altogether, and also an unorthodox but cool circuit - it really wasn't that good.

Despite its real life reputation, understeer is still the name of the game here. It's just no different handling wise from a normal FF, though granted, it is not too bad. But it is bad enough to mean that you can't push the Clio hard enough to get the most speed out of it. At the first corner of Riffelsee, after the down-uphill section, if you brake at a point that would be acceptable in other cars, you will run off. It wasn't too difficult to handle throughout other parts of the circuit thankfully, but it was still not easy enough to push for me.

More noticeable on Riffelsee especially was the Clio's ability to get up hills. It might have basically 200bhp but on the really high, and immediate uphill section of Riffelsee, whereby you don't carry any real speed to start with, the Clio RS was slow. Very, very, very slow.

The naturally aspirated engine might be a cause of this. Indeed, this Clio ended up being one of the last true hot hatches left without one. Which is probably why the motoring corps got so hot over it to be fair.

But I don't care about the fact it's still naturally aspirated, the fact is there isn't enough of it. It isn't interesting enough to ponder any other good judgment, so it can only be judged on how fast it makes the car go...and it doesn't go fast enough.

The Clio RS is effectively the first car everyone receives as a prize in the car in this game. And if it impressed you at Brands Hatch Indy, you might think about keeping it. But you will be disappointed. So, for your benefit, but mine especially, sell it for money and leave it to settle into a turbocharged piece of piss that is completely ousted by the Fiesta ST and 208 GTi, leaving it as the worst car I have ever encountered and known in my 16 and some years of living.

Dominant in real life? Too much so. Dominant in GT6? No ****ing way.

This was the Renault Sport Clio RS '11 at Matterhorn Riffelsee.
Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

My favourite car ever.
Well, a variant of it at any rate.

​

The Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution series of car is, without any question, shadow or doubt, my favourite.

There are several single cars that I can pick out that have interested me. I've certainly been engaged in wanting to drive them. But the fact that just about every Mitsubishi Evo ever has encapsulated me, that I would take any one that came my way, make it my number one.

I believe my love for the machine started back in, I believe, 2006. For Christmas, the lucky soul that I was back then got a model of Gilles Pazzini's Mitsubishi Lancer WRC04 - one of the last that competed in the WRC, in the first year that started Sebastian Loeb's bloody dominance.

​

It was a super cool model. It was the largest I had at that time, the first one I had where the doors opened, the interior was detailed, the bonnet even opened. It also had unscrewable wheels, whereby then you could place some spiked snow tyres onto the model. It was unbelievably cool to me, and when time goes back to me just moving cars around on my bedroom floor, the Evo is one of the cars I can recall to. Among others, I even had an Enzo and MC12 together. The MC12 ended up being the one I preferred.

That was what started my young Evo love, and also hearing of the Evo 10 that was coming about helped that. I never got to really play about with one on GT4 at the time, though I was well aware of the fastest at the time - the Evo 8 MR GSR. I kind of liked that one too, with its awesome Medium Purplish Grey Mica paint. I also distinctly remember the Evo IX being a useful (read: required) car in GT5, though that didn't hit the spot quite as well.

I also remember distinctly viewing the Top Gear clip of the Evo 8 FQ400 beating the Lamborghini Murcielago around the track. That gave me some more love for the Evo. Remembering it as one of the first big car names engraved in my mind, and even the WRC as one of my first sports I watched, gives the Mitsubishi the spot in the centre of my car heart.

​

What I wasn't quite so aware of at the time, and not aware of for even a while, was the history of the Evo itself. I had only known the Evo in the then and now, so was pretty surprised to see the basic concept stretched back to 1992.

The original Evo 1 now looks so basic compared to some of the other Evos, but relatively speaking, in terms of the concept, there is no difference. What happened was that Mitsubishi decided to take their Lancer saloon and make it a Group A car. A 4WD saloon with some quite mad looks resulted, and it worked rather well...seeing as they kept going in WRC for 13 years after that.

And the road car kept going in production 20 years from the original's release. But in the UK, they eventually went and stopped it. And now there's talks of it going all hybrid. No real news has been heard of it since. Oh no.

​

It is absolutely worth noting my Evo rankings by the way. I mean, there's 10 of them, so I have to have a good order for them. And I do...sort of. I know roughly the top and bottom, but the middle is a bit more difficult. My best rankings for me at this point are:

10-8-3-1-5-6-9-4-2-7

So with that noted, this Evo 6 T.M.E. here ranks about in the middle of my list. Notably it is just below the 5, even though the differences there were rather lesser than some other jumps between Evos.

​

The Evo 6, actually, is the most represented Evo in this game. By quite some considerable distance.

The standard and typical GSR is present - a car which actually seems like a nice car to own even if I prefer other Evos, a beautiful, classic drive on a mountain road, on and off road. However this was also the point whereby PD decided to include the more hardcore RS version, so that's present too.

But that wasn't enough for PD. They also decided to release the respective Tommi Makinen Editions - aka the Evo 6.5 - of the GSR and RS, originally specced from one year after their release, not to mention the Evo 6 Rally Car that was Makinen's final championship winning car. Oh, and lest we forget the Mine's Evo VI, a car cursed to be left behind unfortunately among many other tuners. Poor Mine's. They can do R34s brilliantly but Evos evade them. Other tuning companies do them better...much better.

​

So not surprisingly the Evo 6 was chosen to be given the Premium treatment for GT5 - but in another new model. It was another TME, this time from '99, but this one came with a BIG STRIPE!

Interestingly, this colour scheme had featured in a separate model in Gran Turismo 3 as well. But for Gran Turismo 4 it was nowhere to be seen.

Nonetheless, I'm good with the choice of Evo 6 as Premium. I still think the Evo 3 was a more obvious candidate as a separate model base, but that would have probably been a better choice than, say, the 4.

​

Off-road here, as seen, it is clearly excellent. What did you expect from the WRC champion?

The Evo can apply its power very well onto the gravel, and doesn't struggle even slightly with the bends. Technology abound here to make this happen, as the Evo does still contain some extra gizmos among the more normal stuff to make it happen. AYC is the most notable of these and manages to make the Evo one of the most variable cars to tune theoretically in the game.

Yet even aside from this, on the road, the Evo does turn out to be a very useful car to work through the game with.

​

You receive it very early indeed into career mode, and it will reach 500PP with very little effort. You can really take it and breeze through an absolute ton of races, which is probably why it became my most used car for a while. Ironically the KTM X-Bow Street, which I reviewed rather poorly, actually turns out to be a great alternative for any events that the Evo can't do. It's the reviewer's curse indeed, as the misnamed Austrian lightweight has really been used a lot by me in races because of this.

And on the road, it is a superb racer. At 500PP it is capable of even beating GT-Rs in the Tour of Japan race. R35s, that is. And if you do fall off the road, then the 4WD means you don't even slow down that much in, say, gravel.

While this is the Evo you will end up with, is it the one I'd recommend? ...No.

I'm sorry Evo 6, it wasn't meant to end like this...​

Obviously the Evo 6 is superb, I'd be lying if I said it actually wasn't. But I reckon that if you do want an Evo to use, you should make it the Evo 8 MR GSR. It is probably my favourite Evo road car in game, though the actual fastest is the Evo 8 RS due to its lighter weight. But you can make a proper FQ400 replica out of an MR GSR, though I don't choose to do that. Or if you want a premium, buy an Evo X then make its FQ400 there. I would do that...and I have.

That said, my favourite Evo period hasn't even been mentioned here.

The Evo 6 T.M.E. It's excellent. But if it wasn't a prize, I wouldn't buy one.

This was the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution VI GSR T.M.E. Special Color '99 at Eiger Nordwand K Trail.
Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

Tuned car of the year (most tuned, that is)
Still the most reached for car in the tuner toybox.

​

I reviewed so many Honda S2000s in my GT5 reviews thread that you'd think I'd be mad. Until you realise that none of them were the multiple (duplicate) S2000s that feature here as well. Instead, they were all tuner types, with the addition of the S2000 LM.

Indeed, in my biggest review of them all, All Tuners Tested, no less than 8 of Honda's critically acclaimed roadster were lining up to be tested.

In fact, my first review of all on this website was of an S2000. Just...not a very good one.

Describing it here is probably for another time.

​

But, that S2000 aside, the multitudes of tuned S2000 were, for the most part, all very good. Because they all retained some feel of the stock model, which, for the S2000, is very important.

Even the rather more warped stuff such as the Amuse S2000 GT1 and AEM S2000 still had the feel good factor there, the former as a speed machine and the latter as a drift one. But these weren't the best S2ks by a long way.

The best S2000s in the game lied in the ones that were only very light tunes. But god, were they effective.

​

OK, the Mugen S2000 was biblically awful with the performance of a coffee table. But hey, it wasn't Mugen's problem it was fitted with CS to start with.

Also, the Amuse S2000 R1 rather backfired in GT5, or certainly something had gone wrong with it since its blissful GT4 form. But its Street Version sister was without question one of the most fun cars to drive in the game. Despite its low level of tuning, it was absolutely bonkers, a free spirit that you could throw anywhere at any angle and still come out of it completely intact. I loved that one.

So much was the fun it provided, that it even managed to overshadow the Spoon S2000, whose speed was a good bit higher but its driving feel was just a bit lower - and that wasn't good enough here.

But while the Street Version was a mad machine for the history books, there was still one S2000 that it couldn't match. That was the Opera Performance tune.

​

Though slightly more hardcore than the other light tunes, the fact is, it provided real speed, but crucially perfect obedience to the driver. If you wanted to go fast on track, it would stay straight and true with immense speed thanks to its almost complete weightlessness. But if you were just about to mess about, then it was a superb slider, with nothing getting in the way of its cool, controlled smoking. That was my second favourite tuner in GT5. It could well remain there here.

The tuned S2000s have all been retained for GT6 of course, though none have been added. But here, breaking the trend severely from my GT5 days, we have the actual stock S2000 - the Premium one, the only one that actually should be in the game now.

​

The S2000 has an immensely checkered GT history. Even without appearing in GT1, it arrived in the world's Honda dealers just in time for GT2 to come out. And its status as a big new car kind of showed.

Some have pointed out the focus on the S2000 throughout the intro of the game, and state it as being even the game's cover car. But that wasn't all to see, as in-game it was...well, ridiculous.

It was the fastest Group B car in Arcade by miles. So it was an annoyance to see it consistently waving its stupidly high-revving VTEC right on my normal Merc/Lancia/Fiat's arse 24/7. Even the one-hit-wonder Plymouth PT Spyder couldn't get close. Of course, it hasn't been much worse in Arcade since... (He frowns angrily.)

The S2000 GT1 that also showed up proved a hit, even if it wasn't one of the game's fastest.

​

In GT3, it was placed in a rather big role as the S2000 GT1 became the S2000 LM and the now successor to the seemingly irreplaceable CR-X del sol LM. With 600bhp on hand, it did the job pretty well...but by GT4, it was all a ruin.

Despite the introduction of the tuned S2000s mentioned earlier, the big one, the S2000 LM, had been cut in half. Literally, in power figures. Its power had dropped to just over 300. Never mind the new howl it had, its missing speed was a missing figure in GT4. And it's stayed that way since.

In addition, the S2000 fell to the dupe syndrome in GT4, and incredibly received a further dose of it in GT5 by separating US and EU versions. What the ****?

​

As the Premium model introduced in GT5, the '06 spec S2k is the only stock one you should think of buying. And you should, because it is really quite good.

If you know how to, you can make this thing speed along at whatever rate you wish. And it's not difficult to find how.

If you throttle it, the S2000 will not be a stable machine to handle. But taking advantage of the S2k's fantastic balance and chassis by lifting off, and slightly oversteering, will give you absolutely free reign over the roadster.

​

This driving characteristic unsurprisingly made it a big hit, and a perfect base for the JDM tuners to build on. That's why there's so many tuned versions of it around and in GT6. And you should join them...if you so wish.

The fact is, the S2k is completely fine stock. Frankly, the fact that cars like this are seemingly a requirement to tune is ridiculous. Everything around seemingly has to be tuned these days, but surely, one cannot realise that some things are just best left alone.

Mind you, the S2k is not one of those. But that doesn't mean you have to go and give it more beans. And maybe, just maybe, even ruin it...

A great base for tuning...but does that mean you have to? Absolutely not.

This was the Honda S2000 '06 at Tokyo R246.
Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[Vic Reign93]

^^ Nice write ups. 👍 quick piece of info regarding the SLS GT3.
It says the horsepower is 493 at the dealership but it in actual fact makes 570 stock in the garage. PD underrated the quoted horsepower quite badly on it.

 

[C-ZETA]

There is no 'wrong' Lancia...only a right one.
It's not this one though

​

You really can't diss Lancia. Unless you're French. Because they have a rivalry with the Italians I imagine. And why not. Though, knowing them, they'll be singing praise about the Italians next week instead.

It is the only brand with two cars in GTP's Ice Box, as owned by Lord Kelvin. The most recent one to get in there was the Lancia 037, which beat out the Ferrari F40 (rightfully so), the Aston DB5 and the Porsche 917, as well as Lancia's own Stratos and the Ford RS200 Evo (which is just about in the Box). Only the Lamborghini Miura, Shelby Cobra and Mercedes-Benz 300SL lie above it. And you wouldn't argue against those 3 being at the top.

Note: the 037 actually has the most single votes of Sub-Zero of all the cars, on 95, just 1 ahead of the Cobra. But 20 frankly idiotic people dragged it below the other 3's belt by not voting that somehow...

But even I didn't expect the 037 to come out only behind those. Especially because the one who nominated it was...me.

Ouch dat wheel tho​

I was planning on making my nomination rather random to allow for some balance on the Cool Wall, because the main regime there is that someone nominates a car they really like, and it ends up as cool. Or, if you're lucky, Sub-Zero. The only time something gets into the Ice Box is because somehow no-one had thought of it before.

The random pick didn't quite go to plan. Both were Beemers, but one was a Mille Miglia tribute that ended up in cool, while the other was the fast but probably pointless 760Li, which ended up in the lower half of the wastelands. Though notably both were nominated when the Cool Wall was beginning to die down, before its eventual revival.

The one car I had picked before had was the Mitsubishi Legnum VR-4. Which, as it turned out, ended up going to cool. I didn't quite expect that, but it was nice.

I think I decided to nominate the 037 after going through my time, having got carried away and witnessing it once again. I noticed it wasn't on the Cool Wall, and something like it clearly deserved its place.

​

The 037 was a mid-engined rally car built by Lancia in the 1980s purely for the Group B WRC. Driven by Markku Alen, Attilio Bettega and Walter Rohrl, the car won Lancia the manufacturers' world championship in the 1983 season. It is the last rear-wheel drive car to win the WRC.

For approval in Group B it was necessary to build at least 200 road versions of the model in question. The road version had an Abarth developed 2-litre inline-4, with a supercharger which developed 205bhp capable of pushing the 037 to over 137mph and reaching 60 from a standstill in less than seven seconds.

The perfect storm for coolness, then. Mid-engined rally car, built by Lancia, who remain the best in history, for Group B. The rear-wheel drive factor is one of the most key parts though. Much as I love the 4WD drivetrain, the 037's status as the last WRC winner of its kind gives me immense respect for it. The engine was awesome too, and most importantly, it looked not just brilliant. But, in my opinion, the most beautiful car...ever.

​

Even then, I wasn't expecting it to go into the Ice Box. But it went in easily, and well. At first it looked like it might even be in the Miura's top spot of 'Steve McQueen's Garage'. But 20 ill-informed people were enough to drag it down and leave it in the still incredible spot of the world's 4th coolest car (as of this article) according to GTP.

Me though, it's my coolest, as well as my most beautiful. It's in my top 5. I want one badly. I saw one at a legends motorshow once and, even though then back then I didn't even know that much about it, I just could not get enough of it. It looked just...way beyond anything else.

Of course, the Stratos is probably the one that sticks in most people's minds as the Lancia god. The reason GTP voted the 037 well above it is probably because, as true car nuts, we see the 037 in an even bigger light that the mere car-likers don't. But there's also the one that hit after the Group B storm had been catastrophically stopped - the Delta Integrale.

​

After the utterly brilliant Delta S4 had contributed in Group B's saddening downfall, Lancia stuck with the Delta itself, making it a rally car for the new Group A rules that came about. What resulted was a car that eclipsed the Stratos and 037's achievements before it by winning the WRC 6 times...in a row. It makes up 60% of Lancia's 10 wins...so while it looks rather more boxy than its beauty-filled forefathers, it must clearly have been the best...and in some ways, that was the case.

Indeed, of all the Italian brands that can be claimed to have an unreliability reputation, Lancia stretches above all by far. Every car had the most fundamental and ridiculous flaws, but come on...just look at them!

The Delta Integrale, Lancia's last great car to date, went ahead and reversed the trend by being more limited on looks but instead...being a pure masterpiece to drive. It summed up everything rally cars would be known for until the modern day, whereby homologation really is no longer a thing. Homologation specials, in case you haven't noticed, have a reputation for being the coolest of all...just like the Stratos and 037.

The Delta Integrale was more of a mass modification to the rather paltry normal Delta, but it was built so Lancia could go rallying once again. So that makes it a semi-homologation. But no less cool regardless of its worse looks.

​

Upon Lancia's introduction into Gran Turismo in the 2nd installment, PD acknowledged the rally legend so well that they put 3 versions of it in the game. The Integrale 16v, which was the second version of the Delta, then the Evoluzione model that were to be the final homologation cars built by Lancia, and which is present here in Premium form having been made so as early as GT5 even. And in GT2, as a little extra something, the Collezione version.

The Stratos was also included in GT2 but was left hanging around in GT3's code, accessible by Game Shark but out of the main game otherwise. The Delta meanwhile got its first feature in its famed rally car form, in the 1992 spec Martini livery that would be the last of the winning Lancias.

For GT4 the road Delta was brought back in addition to the predecessor Delta S4. The Delta and now the Stratos have since been Premiumed and now stand as fan favourites in the GT series.

​

Where does the Delta stand then on its famed rally surface of the dirt? It does a supreme job, actually.

Relatively speaking, on the road the Delta can be surprisingly slow. It also unfortunately didn't feel too sprightly in GT5 in the handling stakes either, but on the gravel here, the tables are turned completely. The 4WD not only means that speed is ideal but also it is a superb car to handle as well. It doesn't do anything less than you'd expect on the dirt, and on the wide confines of Toscana it really can be stuck wherever you damn well want it.

It's quite a cool reverse, and a useful one too. Lancia's rally cars before, the mid-engined ones, were kings on tarmac but a handful elsewhere. Lancia's focus here on the other surfaces meant that it was the best by far this time.

The sound is worth a mention too. It's a low, angry growl of a big dog, which in some ways gives the Delta that spirit. It reaches a pitch that's not quite perfect. But it's still very good, good enough that you don't care too much that you wish it were just a bit higher.

​

As an early game prize car, the Delta is also a car you will receive very quickly and probably have to use well in career mode. Though you won't be taking it to the dirt, it should still serve you well.

The Delta really deserves its place in car history, this game, any car game really. So does the Stratos of course. And so does, above all really, the 037...but wait...where's that in GT6? Kaz?

A truly beautiful machine, even despite not being as good looking as the Stratos and 037. But what it does best, it does very well. Keep it, as a legend and as a car.

This was the Lancia Delta HF Integrale Evoluzione '91 at Toscana.
Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

The most important machines in racing-kind
Everyone has to start somewhere, don't they?

The 10 hp Junior karts, the slowest.
​

Every champion in racing got there because they started to do it. These are the vehicles they usually started it in. Karts.

The Spec II Racing Kart 100s.​

Karting was announced to be arriving in GT5 with one type, the Racing Kart 100. It would come with a track at the Piazza del Campo, as well as two course creator themes designed primarily for karts.

Sadly, legal disputes ruined the chances of the Piazza del Campo kart track. God damn those Italians. Why didn't they just kindly offer the actual flags to PD for usage? Or maybe, why didn't PD simply replace them properly? Either way, it remained a still-born track in the GT series, only playable on some demos.

The karting came about though and it turned out to be a welcome addition...or was it? Indeed, they seemed way too difficult to drive in any way...but thankfully PD went and eased them up a bit quite soon afterwards.

The water-cooled 125.
​

Spec II would prove to be a far bigger gallop forward for the karting game in GT5 though. Three completely new karts were to be introduced. As well as the very light-spec Jr. model, the 100 was being reconfigured and replaced at the top by the new and unique 125, which came with a different water-cooled engine and a sweet display on the wheel.

But the big news for karting was, finally, a dedicated track for them, Kart Space. This slippery indoor night-life track was super short but super fun and a whole new challenge, which was even available for the full monty cars if you dared. Usually, only 4WDs got round it.

The karting game, though, remained somewhat questioned as to its purpose. The ever ignorant crowd of fan-boys wanting for something else 'more worthwhile' than karting (usually an E30 M3), not realising that if something is added into the game without compromise to it, it shouldn't really be complained about. It's there. So why complain about them not adding something else instead of karting?

The 125 featured a new display to differentiate it from the other karts.​

Besides, karting is a very important part of motor racing. Many champions will start with it, and they do it from a young age. Indeed, for youngsters, even such as myself at this point, karting is the only experience of driving themselves they can access. Sitting down low gives them a feel of real speed no matter what. All youngsters love it. It encourages them to really buy the fast stuff when they grow up to get the proper wheels for their own garage.

In GT6, the karting game was shifted again. The addition of the Gran Turismo Arena came as another perfect kart track, but there was now a new, much demanded kart to take it out on...the shifter kart.

The speed freaks of karts - the shifters.
​

The power of these was already way more than the other karts before it, but the 6-speed gearbox and front brakes added to the new machine added a new type and realm of speed to the game. Indeed, the shifter kart has proven a surprisingly fun addition to the game for me. The shifter race series also provided a more difficult challenge than much of the rest of the game, for sure.

It also proved to be a surprisingly good looking machine. The front bodywork is almost formula inspired, and does add a different view to the karts that would normally have been overlooked prior.

The stunning bodywork of the shifter karts really does provide some surprising inspiration.
​

But the shifter kart would not be all to the karting scene. Indeed, the original Racing Kart 100 returned as well as the 125 SPL., which came with special chromed paint and no light. But what did come as a surprise, given the situation, was the introduction of the Red Bull Rcing Kart 125 in light of the Red Bull X Challenge's arrival.

The Red Bull kart put the 125's mechanics into a newly formula-inspired body.
​

In some ways, the first event proved to be rather a nice warm-up to the eventual events that will, as of this write-up, be coming soon. But sadly, not on January 1st. It's gone an awfully long time since then, I'm afraid.

Karting does deserve a place in the Gran Turismo series, and I'm certainly fine with its presence. The mindset required for them is a completely different one to that of the myriads of other cars in Gran Turismo, and their speed and cornering ability defies their low power.

The original 100 karts.​

Indeed, even the Jr. karts, while fundamentally quite slow, still provide one with a collected drive, but crucially one that can easily lead a driver into the different driving style of a kart. It can be quite useful in that sense.

The middle-ground 100 also proves a perfectly fine drive, with enough speed to be called fun for sure. But with the 125 karts, the tempo really picks up.

No matter what form - chromed SPL, coloured 125 or liveried Red Bull, the 125 really does provide a challenge to drive, but a fun one and plenty of speed to go with. Its clear differentiation can also provide interest over the two slower karts.

The chromed 125 SPL. karts.​

For me though, it's the shifter that's the big winner. Way more unique than the other karts obviously, and in a different league of speed, they prove to be the most fun for me, as well as the best looking and a drive that really does manage to appeal to me.

But really, all of the karts do have their rightful purpose in the game, and I can't really go too far against any of them. And of course, crucially, they are all as cheap as chips.

So for the love of god, why would you want karting out? It's a concept that works perfectly fine in the GT series. Wish for your other cars of course, but for the love of god do not slag off other features because they are there instead. That's poor form.

A brilliant concept. A nice variation, and plenty of fun to race, even challenging. Give them some love.

These were the Gran Turismo Racing Karts at Various Tracks.
Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

Now check out the Racing Kart 125 Shifter tearing it up at Suzuka. Or vaguely tearing it up, at any rate.

 

[C-ZETA]

^^ Nice write ups. 👍 quick piece of info regarding the SLS GT3.
It says the horsepower is 493 at the dealership but it in actual fact makes 570 stock in the garage. PD underrated the quoted horsepower quite badly on it.

I figured as much.

But even so it still doesn't change the fact that it's a fat bastard that can't negotiate the Ring with any remote success.

 

[eSZee]

Strange choice of track for the MiTo review, and couple others.
Dd you review the FR-S with that slammed suspension?

Making my way through page 1 and enjoying it. Keep up the good work, sir.

 

[JogoAsobi]

Very entertaining!
You put a lot of passion into what you do! 👍 👍

 

[tankuroded]

You do realize that the S4 is in GT2, right? 💡

Also, I want to see what your thoughts on LCC Rocket and DeltaWing.

 

[C-ZETA]

Thanks for the kind words all ^_^

I'm starting to put replays up for upload. Well, I only have 1 right now. It's the 125 Shifter Kart at Suzuka. But still. More will come about eventually. Sadly my Megane and M3 replays are obviously WRS bound...so they're not going up here.

Strange choice of track for the MiTo review, and couple others.
Dd you review the FR-S with that slammed suspension?

Chose Monza there because Italy. And judging a car, I think, needs to be done on tracks that could well expose some glaring flaws in the car. Just sticking it where it's most comfortable might give a skewed view.

The FR-S reviewed was the courtesy car from Arcade Mode. As were the rest of the first 20.

You do realize that the S4 is in GT2, right? 💡

Also, I want to see what your thoughts on LCC Rocket and DeltaWing.

Oops I forgot about it. But then I never drove it there anyway so of course I was gonna forget. All I remember about that is the hp view in the dealer which was way off.

My Rocket is currently sitting as a figure in my tuning garage, but I did drive it stock, at the Nurburgring race for the Tuned Car Festival race of all places. Needless to say it was a quite exciting race. Had to push very hard, and had to do a bit of blocking, but the Rocket pulled it off with aplomb. So for that I should give it credit.

The Deltawing I have also driven, the chromed 2013 model, both stock and with a tune. The stock model wasn't very good in the brief drive I had, and the tune...completely failed to improve it. So that's way out for now.

 

[tankuroded]

^Well I mean as a full blown review of both Rocket and DeltaWing, @C-ZETA

 

[synchromesh]

These are excellent!

 

[C-ZETA]

Gran Turismo legends
Gran Turismo 1

Mitsubishi FTO LM

​

In the wild, wacky, wonderful world of Gran Turismo 1, this is almost certainly the best car to actually drive. The racing cars are a cut above the rest of them, but a lot of them are too bouncy, too wild, too heavy or not as fast as this. This has it all in the bag.

Mostly what makes it the best is how easy it is to drive. Unlike rear-wheel-drive cars which can really kill you in this game if you don't know what you're doing, the four-wheel-drive in this means you basically press the throttle and turn the wheel and good things happen. Always.

The result of its brilliance is that the car has lasted up until the modern day. While the FTO Super Touring Car is a world different from this FTO LM, it is to driving in GT6 what this is to driving in GT1; that is, to say, both are just about the absolute best the game has to offer.

The modern equivalent: The FTO 'STC'

Honda CR-X del sol LM

​

I don't care what any of you say about any car in any other GT game. If you want to prove you're a real driver, this is what you need to get hold of.

The Honda CR-X del sol LM, a mid-engined, rear-wheel-drive, 600hp conversion of a front-engine, front-wheel-drive convertible which didn't come close to 200hp to start, is a genuine challenge of a car to drive. It bounces so often it spends more time on two wheels than four, the car slides every time you brake and turn the wheel, and every time you spin it around you have to rev it up else the turbo bogs you down before it comes to its senses.

And yet. When it all goes right, this is as much fun as a Gran Turismo game gets. The absolute perfection of nailing a long drift in this thing is utterly, utterly rewarding. This thing teaches you exactly what GT1 is all about in terms of its physics. If you can get this thing down, you can get anything down. And I love it for it.

The modern equivalent: Nothing

Dodge Concept Car

​

American readers probably know this as 'the fastest car in the game'. This is, if you know how to use it, entirely correct.

What PD did was jack up the Dodge Copperhead car and turn it, quietly, into a race car. But they made an error in typing it at first and made it weigh little more than 1200lbs, which the Americans use for some reason. They actually made this error in the Japanese version as well, but somehow didn't notice it until it was time to bring it to Europe.

The Concept Car was not invincible, though. There were flaws, some which could be fixed, and one which couldn't. Initially, the car was largely hopeless with its default settings, so you had to get it hooked up properly before it became a true monster. And even then, a physics quirk held it back; the extreme stats of the car meant the engine 'shuddered' up and down hills, compromising acceleration there or even slowing down your car on them at high enough speed.

But once it was all ready, then the Concept Car could reign supreme. Where it manifests its speed most of all is out of corners. Once you get round a turn, hit the throttle and it's like hitting a hyperspace button. It just zooms out of the corner instantly, and with great agility as well. So, the fastest car in Gran Turismo 1, yes? ...No, actually.

The modern equivalent: An F1 car

TVR Cerbera LM

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Before PD made a horlicks of the Concept Car, they had made the same error with this, the Cerbera LM. The difference is, they did fix this outside of the Japanese version.

The initial result was a car with 599ps (what the Japanese use for hp) and 602kg of weight. That is ludicrous. And so it proved in the game.

The thing is, the Cerbera proved the polar opposite to the Concept Car in the way it expressed its speed. Whereas the Concept Car was fastest out of corners, the Cerbera was fastest in them. Because it didn't need any tuning up to be brilliant, the car drove like it was on rails right from the start. Which meant that if all went well, no one had a hope in catching you. But of course, a power-to-weight ratio of near 1:1 brought its issues in the crazy world of GT1.

Firstly, the hill issue of the Concept Car was present with the Cerbera LM too. Secondly, braking and turning in the wrong place could result in the most extreme example of the 'bouncing' phenomenon in this game. Whereas most cars need some big assistance (ie hitting kerbs) to start bouncing, the Cerbera LM could do so of its own accord. On a surface with, say, camber, it just lifted two wheels off the ground. Where it happens often decides how much harm it causes.

But no matter what, the Cerbera LM was simply the fastest thing to be put into GT1's mad physics engine. And yet in theory, you could get something to go even faster...

The modern equivalent: An X car

This physics glitch​

I talked earlier about that glitch on the hills. This is present in all three versions of the game. Whilst you can't get it to happen on anything in the PAL version, some AI cars suffer from it in certain races. Try and find an NSX Type S RM in the Japan vs UK/US championships and see what it does on Trial Mountain.

But in the Japanese version, there was another glitch. And, very occasionally, it can be an incredible sight to behold.

You would be well advised to watch this video here before reading on. Because the results here really have to be seen to be believed.

​

What happened there was the FTO LM quite literally rode up the wall. Which was promptly treated as a piece of tarmac by the driven front wheels...whilst the rear wheels were still on the actual road. After that, it managed to stick to said wall, and all hell broke loose.

This can happen with any car, but the characteristics of the FTO LM make it among the easiest to use for it. It doesn't always end up like this. A lot of the time, it'll just fling straight off the wall. Sometimes it hooks on for a little while but flings off at only a decent rate of knots. But sometimes, you end up with what happens in the video.

You might notice it sometimes in normal play, as when your car crashes into a wall it can try to ride up it as well. Sometimes it can even cling onto the walls there, but no other walls are long enough to facilitate what can be managed here. But in some places, you can very much get flung away at very tremendous speed as it tries and fails to get off the wall. By its very nature, SSR11 is probably the easiest place for it to happen.

So there you have it. That's how you get a car to the fastest possible speed in GT1.

The modern equivalent: A rocket sled

Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

Gran Turismo legends
Gran Turismo 2

Renault Espace F1

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First of all, just acknowledge the fact that this actually exists.

To commemorate the MPV’s tenth anniversary, as well as Renault’s third Formula 1 championship as an engine supplier, it was decided that two birds could be killed with one 3.5-litre V10 engine, by putting the heart of an F1 car into the body of a people mover. Genius.

Performance figures? It weighs 1,300kg and the V10’s wick is turned up from 700bhp to 820bhp. It was, of course, a strict one-off, and never offered to the public.

Ironically, in GT2, it sounds closer to the more recent V8s. And no, it doesn't actually go like an F1 car. Because it's too heavy. Still though, it was not only very definitely one of the game's fastest cars but perfectly alright to drive too. But mad and mental. That's what this is at the end of the day.

The modern equivalent: An actual V8 F1 car

Honda CR-X del sol LM

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Yes, this again.

Almost every LM from GT1 was retained but a lot were left looking hopeless. The ones that weren't were replaced, such as the Chaser LM which was taken away by what the game calls the 'Toyota IS 200 LM Edition'. Make up your mind, PD, it's a Toyota or a Lexus...

Three former LMs stood out in particular, as prizes for golding each of the IC, IB and IA licences. All challenging. The FTO LM was one of them, but whereas it was the best to drive in GT1, GT2 crippled it with huge understeer in medium to fast corners. The GTO LM was another, and that actually got a second, updated version, a 1999 spec 3000GT LM with more power, a better drive and a roof scoop.

But one survived the ordeal, the CR-X del sol LM. A far cry from the sliding madness of the past, the car now took the FTO LM's stability and threw it in to the lightweight 600hp body. Unusually, it had the same power despite lacking the turbo it had before. The result was not only one of the game's fastest cars, but also a drive that was both fun and brilliant in equal measure. Once again the del sol LM was the most fun car to drive. And since GT2...it has never been seen again.

But wait. That wasn't all it had in GT2...

​

...because you could take it offroad. Yeah. You'd better believe it, baby. Speaking of which...

The modern equivalent: Still nothing, because no one has thought to make anything quite like this

Lots and lots of rally cars

Spoiler: Here's a great deal of them

Gran Turismo 2 brought with it the advent of rally, and the choice given was very large. All the modern greats were in the game, this being at the time before the WRC was ruined. Granted, all of GT4's rally cars were before that time as well (2003 was the last good season, by the way) but GT2 had an even bigger choice. And it certainly wasn't limited to just the cars in the pictures, which include classics from before the WRC had even been formed. There were even a couple of relatively custom rally cars, such as the hyper-powerful Celica ZZT Rally Car, and LM editions from before were, as you saw above, able to go rallying too. The FTO LM was another such option, and remained that way for GT3 as well actually. But they'd do well to beat the one rally car that was above all cars in this game.

The modern equivalent: Videos of the WRC from the same time as this lot were around

Suzuki Escudo

​

Taking over the mantle of the errors that were the first Cerbera LM and Concept Car as the fastest in the game was this. But whilst the previous two were errors, this was more of an oversight...in the physics engine.

See, it's entirely possible that GT2 did not cater to general bodies to decide how fast stuff went. I suspect it just took the power, weight, drive and downforce and then saw how fast it went. And the result was this, the Suzuki Escudo.

980bhp, 800kg, 4WD and a giant wing made this the fastest car in the game. Absolutely uncatchable and, of course, usable offroad too just to rub salt in the wound. It was biblical in this game. So much so they ended up nerfing it in GT3. The cornering, to be specific. Since then the Escudo has been beatable.

The modern equivalent: One of the V10 F1 cars

The HKS drag cars

​

GT2 was supposed to have drag racing in it. So a few bits of it were put in...then the game promptly went on sale without anything like it. Only three cars like it were left in the initial copy, and once the Dodge Intrepid RM was normalised and the percentage put down to reflect the fact that drag racing was, in fact, not in the game, these two were left. The most powerful cars in the game.

Both the HKS R33 GT-R and 180SX make 1011hp, which makes a real difference on the straights. But of course, without drag racing, these cars do have to take corners. Neither is very good at it. But hey, the power would at least keep you in the race...

The stats say that the lighter 180SX is the faster of the two. That holds true down the straight. But cornering is a damn sight harder than in the heavier, 4WD R33, which will at least not spin out at every chance. Unless drag racing does finally come about as an official mode in GT, we probably won't see the likes of these two again.

The modern equivalent: Whatever the fastest drag racing car is in GT6

Mercedes CLK Race Car

​

The car PD don't want you to know about.

The Mercedes CLK Race Car would be a fine car, on par with the seemingly similar DTM racers, the Calibra and Alfa 155. The CLK sounded the same, after all. Of course the DTM still hadn't actually come back by this point, but whatever.

At some point, the car was taken out of the game. But all they did was make it inaccessible. It was still there in the code and people have long since dug it out again. And it's worth it, because it does come with one very good feature - utterly ludicrous brakes. The thing stops quicker than anything else in this game for sure. You can brake later than you thought possible in this thing. Which makes you wonder if it was no more than a testbed for how far such things could go in this game. Or rather, it was put in that place when it was decided it didn't have a place in the game for whatever reason...

The modern equivalent: Running into a wall suddenly and quickly

All the mad stuff

​

GT2's car list was a vibrant one and I dearly wish more of it would be brought back in the future. You've already seen some of the mad stuff, but there was more of it within. The Skyline Silhouette Formula was a mad hatter of a racer from the 80s, exactly as touring car racers were back then. The Chrysler Phaeton concept was utterly out of place in a game such as this, but no one was complaining. The Vector W8 was one of the game's top road cars, all while having a 3-speed gearbox and looking like an actual piece of cheese in yellow. And the Ford GT90, probably the most 90s of all concept cars. May a car list be as mad as this again at some point, please, PD...

The modern equivalent: Will hopefully come around some day

Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

Gran Turismo legends
The modern era
​

Since everything from GT4 is in GT5 and/or GT6 (and nearly everything in GT3 as well), I'm bundling the lot into one feature.

PD's Formula cars

Spoiler: Here's the lot

​

The closest PD came to actual Formula racing was the Espace F1 that I brought up as a GT2 legend. In GT3 they went one step further and put players pretty much right in Formula One cars.

The six Formula cars put into GT3 were each based around (read: looked near identical to) some of the greatest F1 cars of the 80s and 90s. The five they chose were the Williams FW11, the Lotus 99T, the McLaren MP4/4, the Williams FW16 (which formed the base for two of the cars) and the McLaren MP4/5B. As you can tell, some of the liveries got awfully close to their real-life counterparts as well.

PAL players didn't get quite the luxury of six different cars. Instead, they only got two...but one was different to all the others. The Polyphony 001 was based off the Williams FW18. The Polyphony 002, meanwhile, was the same as the MP4/4 copy. But that was all they got.

For GT4, PD brought one single Formula car in that was rather more up-to-date. The Formula Gran Turismo was instantly the game's fastest car, and while it has been surpassed since - by real life F1 cars, no less - it remains in the game with that rarest of things, a Standard car cockpit.

Is there another modern Formula Gran Turismo to come? Well, perhaps not. But with the premise of GT Sport it might well cross their mind.

Minolta Toyota 88C-V

​

Gran Turismo 4 opened the floodgates for the title of fastest car with a massive selection of Group Cs and LMPs. Those expecting one of the Le Mans winners to be the obvious fastest were in for a shock.

This, the Minolta Toyota 88C-V, was GT4's defining car. Already at a statistical advantage thanks to its weight advantage, what really pushed it over the edge was the ease of accessing it in GT4. I have to say, I was very excited when my younger self won this after the El Capitan endurance.

But what actually made it best on the track was the fact that, inexplicably, it had 6 gears, one more than its closest rivals, the Nissan R92CP and Sauber C9. This simple change is what ultimately elevated it to being the game's most useful car. In fact, enough set-up work could quite possibly put it ahead of a Formula GT and make it the game's outright fastest, in every relevant aspect.

Today, the 88C-V remains a top-tier pick. Whilst it's possible some cars might just have caught it up, it still remains one of the game's ultimate speed freaks.

Cadillac Cien

​

In GT4, Cadillac's Cien concept was to road cars what the 88C-V was to road cars. That is to say, not only was it the fastest, but it was also easily accessible.

The only hard part about Umbria Rally Easy is the track. Citta di Aria is unforgiving to put it kindly but if you already had the Toyota RSC Rally Raid Car - another seriously easy car to get - then it was a cakewalk. And this was your reward.

The Cien actually debuted in GT Concept where it was also the fastest road car in the game. I used the hell out of it and it didn't disappoint. In GT4 it remains a go-to road car...except the events where it's not allowed. Unless the AI is entering, where suddenly it is legal.

It wasn't invincible by any stretch, but damn was it cool to use in my young mind. It has been surpassed since; the Bugatti Veyron is in the game after all...it remains a cool blast from the past, though.

Red Bull X cars

​

Whether you love or hate them, Red Bull's X cars are worth talking about.

This fantasy car, quite simply, blew the wheels off anything in any sim game ever. Even if you couldn't drive it, and, let's be honest here, a lot of people couldn't. I drove myself to madness trying to do the Sebastian Vettel Challenge too.

The X cars carried on after the original and remain as untouchable as they did before. At least, that's what you'd think. But I'll bring up its new rival in another place, at another time.

Mitsubishi FTO Super Touring Car

​

Not one of the original LM cars from GT1 remains intact quite as it was. The vast majority were cast off after GT3. Only two that would resemble something like one of the LM Editions remains now; the RX-7 LM, same name but vastly different car. And the FTO 'STC', different name and vastly different car.

This FTO is not nearly as powerful as the FTO LM it originated from. The FTO LM name actually survived into GT3 with the same power and vaguely similar looks, but then this is what it has now become.

Surely it isn't anything near as special as the original. Wrong. It might even be better actually. This remains the single best car I've driven in any Gran Turismo game, so utterly perfect it is. It corners faster than you would ever think, and totally without fault. Nothing can shake it from its grip. Nothing. If you find anything better to drive, let me know...

GT by Citroen

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Before the modern day Vision GT malarkey, Citroen beat them all to the punch with the GT by Citroen.

Originally an electric insanity of a machine when introduced into GT5, that concept remains one of the game's fastest road cars today. But they changed it up for GT5 and made not just a more conventional supercar of a road car, but also a race car.

The concept retains an aura of real coolness about it, what with being an actually fast electric car and all. It and the road car both look very dramatic, especially in red. But not as dramatic, by any stretch, as the race car. That remains one of the best-looking cars I know. That big wing is just insane. It's also pretty nifty too.

But importantly, compared to the modern VGTs, they actually sold one of these. Some VGTs have been modelled in real life, but they aren't getting sold. This is, by one example, a real car.

Chaparral 2J

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The Chaparral 2J was a late-comer to the party of greatness, having been in GT4 and generally amusing people with how much of a washing machine it looked. But it wasn't just for show. There was genuine speed within, enough to put it close to the very top tier of the game's race cars.

But it wasn't until a certain point in GT5's history that it got its big break. Thanks to the bizarre decision to give the clearly fan-boosted aerodynamics recognition on the track, but not the settings screen, and the ludicrous physics of wet weather and Sports: Soft tyres, the 2J was briefly the most sought after car in GT5. Why all this? Because one B-Spec Seasonal Event at Le Mans favoured all of these conditions. With the 2J 70PP down on the Le Mans racers it was able to now beat, the monetary rewards were immense.

If I recall, it also turned out to be utterly broken in a lot of Seasonal Time Trials. I don't know if this is still the case, but if it is, do tell me about it.

By the way, it manages all this despite having three gears. That sums it all up, really. But to its credit the Chaparral is a lot of fun for all the right reasons.

Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[Niku Driver HC]

If PD's love relationship with FIA is anything to go by, then GT Sport should see a special kind of Formula car to help train future racing drivers resorting to a videogame. Then again, you could argue that the RedBull X2014 Junior already fills that gap quite nicely, but it's not exactly up to current FIA Formula regulations... Either way, the FGT is certainly a furious beast, but I cannot help but to think that keeping the old GT3 F1 hommages would be fitting now that Senna's Lotus has joined the fray as a classic turbo-era F1 car.

The 2J? I'd say it's still broken as a 600PP car, much like the modern equivalent in the 700PP class, the purely mental Chaparral 2X. If anything, against most 600PP cars, it has grip and vicious acceleration for a car with only 3 gears in its gearbox. It's still a tough contender to beat in its class, from what I've seen and driven...

Also, welcome back. It's good to see GT reviews from you again, even if they are more rewinds of your past reviews and top 10s than actual new ones. Keep up the good work, and good luck! 👍

 

[C-ZETA]

The Vision GT war
Aka "Who can appeal the most to young children with their cars?"
​

The Vision Gran Turismo project is not yet finished. Makes have pulled out, some are unfinished, a couple are ready to go for GT Sport, but a total of 21 cars have appeared in GT6.

The first few were fairly terrible. The Mercedes VGT was big when it came about and they made a real model of it. And it was OK as a road car. But there was such a big gap between the next one coming about that Mercedes made a racer of its own VGT to fill the gap. And it was awful.

The Bathurst track I first drove it is awful in this game, make no mistake. But a good car can quite evidently counter it. The Mercedes VGT Racing Series is not one of those cars. It was horrible. One of the worst cars I've had the misfortune of driving.

But then BMW came out with one and the floodgates finally opened. BMW's wasn't that good either. Too jerky to race in. And Mitsubishi's wasn't that much cop either, if I'm honest. It was a bizarre car that didn't live up to its PP. The good thing is you could take it offroad and it was fantastic there.

But then VW came along and made something awfully attractive.

​

Their GTI roadster is what a supercar crossed with a hatchback would be like. It turned to be really rather good. 4WD and masses of power said it all, really. What sold even more people was the presence of an actual cockpit. Other VGTs had no such thing, but open cockpits always get their due in GT, and they went the extra mile with the GTI Roadster by making it properly work.

So good was the GTI that, much, much later on, they made an actual hatchback out of it.

​

It turned out to be much the same. Only without the cockpit. Notably, at this point they changed the sound on both cars at this point, from the rather unattractive wheeze of the old one to a high-pitched growl. A lot of high-quality sounds have debuted on VGTs and other cars introduced to the game. This isn't one of the better one of those, as while it's probably realistic the sound at its highest point is a bit screechy.

After the first VW there were a batch of VGTs that were all relatively normal. Nissan's attempt was very fast and the first of numerous 'R1-button' boosted (KERS and other things) VGTs, but was a bit boring. Aston's DP100 had plenty of power but had very little in the way of cornering ability.

​

Toyota's Vision Gran Turismo was particularly unusual. It was actually based on another concept which was separate from VGT, the FT-1. Which had already been put into GT6 and might as well have been a VGT anyway. The car itself was even weirder, another KERS-boosted car with a tendency for dreary understeer, and optimistically high gearing.

Then the entire VGT game changed. Because it was Chevrolet's turn.

​

Theirs wasn't a Chevrolet. Instead they brought back the Chaparral name. The 2J I brought up previously was ordinary compared to this. Completely ordinary.

Because what Chevy thought GT6 needed was a 900hp, 450kg car. Powered by a laser.

The result was a ludicrously fast machine that sounded like a silenced sub-machine gun. Cornering was a difficult task in it, but you can get used to it. And once you got on the throttle it zoomed off into the distance. It reminded me, ironically, of the Dodge Concept Car of GT1.

But it did something more important. It turned VGT into a massive competition of 'who can make the most preposterous concept'.

​

Sure, there was some normality within. The Infiniti was utterly plain, whilst the Mini was a standard piece of jacked-up mega hatchery and the Lexus was a 90s DTM racer crossed with a Ridge Racer car.

But Mazda came up with another speed freak of a car in the LM55. One of the most infamous cars, it got put on a massive plinth at Goodwood that year. I saw it and everything, I was there. But even by the Le Mans standards it was emulating, it was still largely over-the-top.

Then came Alpine's super good looking machine. Another car coming with a cockpit, it was actually very magnificent to drive. It came in two forms, a road and race model. And it looked damn nice. It was probably the best of the VGTs but again, was largely mad.

​

The last two VGTs in GT6 were both up there among the most implausible. Quite apart from the fact the Peugeot VGT has no side visibility, the stats were quite difficult to believe. It looks like a supercar, and it might have had the stats of one had it come about earlier. But Peugeot was leading us to believe that actually, it had the stats and speed of an LMP. I can't believe this thing could be so light. But at least it's a decent drive.

Then finally, for GT6, came some of the three maddest cars to hit any racing game ever.

It is entirely possible that, before Chevrolet released the Chaparral 2X, that the SRT Tomahawk was meant to be no more than a radical looking supercar concept. But then SRT saw the 2X and thought they had to beat it. This is the result.

The S model, supposedly an effective 'road car', is at least barely within reality's grasp. Again, the weight is difficult to believe, but hey. It has the speed of a very highly powered race car with the pneumatics (which is what the R1 button powers) active, but the fact it can corner faster than most race cars on Sports: Medium tyres does point to a sign of relative madness.

The GTS-R, the racing model, is the most implausibly light Dodge since GT1's concept car. Fast as an X car down the straights with pneumatics, it is, unbelievably, relatively average as the middle child in the series.

This is because the simply ludicrous X model beats it down. This is very possibly the fastest car in the game.

Faster than you can think with the pneumatics down, it also corners at undiminished speed as all the aero bits move about like dervishes. It is almost uncontrollable for all but the very best players. And yet it's still the fastest around no matter who is driving it. If someone matches it in VGT's history, god only knows what the concept will be.

And yet whilst it is going on there is still a chance. Because two more ludicrous VGTs which are coming in GT Sport have since been announced. Bugatti's has proven to be very much a prequel to the Chiron road car, and is now left looking like a Chiron race car. It should be suitably fast. And Hyundai have come up with what they say is a racing prototype...apart from how mad it looks, and the fact it's powered by hydrogen. Which is awesome, but it's a far cry away from the 7-year warranty reality of the company. I was half expecting their VGT to be a new type of warranty. Possibly one that lasts till the end of time.

And there are, it can be guessed, more to come. 11 more manufacturers are still down, and while we don't have pictures of all of them, each one of them has the chance to make something insane.

• Audi doesn't have a pic yet, but it'll probably be something insanely TDI powered.
• God knows what something like Daihatsu will come up with. A kei car on crack probably.
• Ford's picture hints at some very good looking lightweight. Though the way their fellow Americans have gone they'll probably try to claim it's actually lighter than air.
• GM will probably design something preposterous to counter the Tomahawk which has beaten their colleagues at Chevrolet now.
• Honda's looks like being the only comparatively normal one now. Good on them.
• Italdesign have something grand-tourer-ish in the wings. But being only a design studio they'll find a way to make it more interesting than is appropriate somehow.
• Lamborghini...well, knowing them as we do, what they'll do is anybody's guess.
• Zagato's picture could hint at just about anything.
• Tesla probably has the biggest chance at making something more deranged than all the other VGTs. Knowing Elon Musk he'll probably make one that, I dunno, can drive on the moon stages.

The last two are the ones I'm most interested in, and which will probably take the prize; Nike, and...Michael Jordan.

If you don't know, Nike actually are no strangers to making concepts. I said the GT by Citroen predated the VGTs but it is not the first such thing. Because that actually lies with GT4's Nike One, a preposterous machine.

​

The facts behind it are so mad I'll let them speak for themselves.

In the video game, this vehicle resembles a "Sci-Fi" buggy with a maximum speed of 230 miles per hour (370 km/h) and an eight-gear automatic transmission. However, the top speed of 230 miles per hour can only be achieved by drivers in their physical peak (those who exercise between 60 minutes and 120 minutes per day). The fictional timeline of this vehicle would see its origins in the year 2022 with the invention of a wearable generator by the Nike Sport Research Lab.

And now Nike are coming back with the sequel. The picture in the game makes it clear enough by its resemblance to the One but the original VGT trailer flat out said it.

Lastly, there's Michael Jordan. Enough said. This is the only picture of it from the trailer.

​

I'll leave you to think just what the six-time NBA champion could come up with.

Pictures and writing by C-ZETA.

 

[C-ZETA]

The 2J? I'd say it's still broken as a 600PP car, much like the modern equivalent in the 700PP class, the purely mental Chaparral 2X. If anything, against most 600PP cars, it has grip and vicious acceleration for a car with only 3 gears in its gearbox. It's still a tough contender to beat in its class, from what I've seen and driven...

Also, welcome back. It's good to see GT reviews from you again, even if they are more rewinds of your past reviews and top 10s than actual new ones. Keep up the good work, and good luck! 👍

I literally completely forgot the 2X had the potential to do exactly the same thing. The sneaky bastards.
That's how I won the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Though you do have to re'fuel' it. How would that come about in real life? Do you literally 'charge' the laser?

I was on a hot streak when GT6 first came out, then I totally failed to keep it up. That and other bits of writing, which I told you about, are the reason I haven't written anything here for two and a third years. Also the fact is that everything I might really want to review has already been done in GT5.

GT6 has rendered GT5 essentially obsolete. I did say it'd be a GT5.5 before it came out, but here's the thing; what does it say that it took over two years for my GT5 love to wain even slightly (as in, miss a day of playing it when I was at home), and three weeks for my GT6 love to do the same? I suspect what it actually says is how much my life had changed from 2010 to 2013. Which was an incredible amount. But the fact is that GT6 did not capture the imagination as GT5 did.

I've also made my next gen move. With a lack of material now in GT6, I've waited for a lot more DLC to come to Forza 6. Now there's a lot there, I suspect my next pieces are gonna be back there. Or even somewhere else after that. I dunno. I could talk about other games I like. And Dirt Rally is out now as well...

The question is, will I make a second next gen move? And when might it happen? Can I make another move, even?

 

[Niku Driver HC]

I literally completely forgot the 2X had the potential to do exactly the same thing. The sneaky bastards.
That's how I won the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Though you do have to re'fuel' it. How would that come about in real life? Do you literally 'charge' the laser?

Well, the 2X does have a slight issue when it comes to 700PP; top speed. Yes, it has blistering acceleration and zero need to shift gears thanks to its CVT-esque gearbox, but those gear rations are short and not exactly sweet. And in Le Mans, especially against Group C cars, you cannot overlook top speed that easily. Of course, for anything else, the 2X is my go-to car in 700PP events. Whenever I see that the most difficult seasonal event within a batch is a 700PP one, I always say "Well, time to bring out the 2X"... It's just that damm good in circuit racing, really.
How would one charge its batteries? I dunno, maybe via portable flux capacitors? That would not be too far-fetched, considering that we are talking about a 900-horsepower, laser-fueled wing car.

I was on a hot streak when GT6 first came out, then I totally failed to keep it up. That and other bits of writing, which I told you about, are the reason I haven't written anything here for two and a third years. Also the fact is that everything I might really want to review has already been done in GT5.

GT6 has rendered GT5 essentially obsolete. I did say it'd be a GT5.5 before it came out, but here's the thing; what does it say that it took over two years for my GT5 love to wain even slightly (as in, miss a day of playing it when I was at home), and three weeks for my GT6 love to do the same? I suspect what it actually says is how much my life had changed from 2010 to 2013. Which was an incredible amount. But the fact is that GT6 did not capture the imagination as GT5 did.

I've also made my next gen move. With a lack of material now in GT6, I've waited for a lot more DLC to come to Forza 6. Now there's a lot there, I suspect my next pieces are gonna be back there. Or even somewhere else after that. I dunno. I could talk about other games I like. And Dirt Rally is out now as well...

The question is, will I make a second next gen move? And when might it happen? Can I make another move, even?

I guess you are going throught a rollercoaster-esque streak when it comes to writing and posting reviews, no? As for the other bits of writing, I forgot what those were, but thanks for reminding me about their existence. And it is surprising that you have reviewed most of the material you liked in GT5, but I suppose that when you have a select list of material it isn't worth going through that once again for a new game unless big changes occur between games...

GT6 was just a strangely-placed child; right before the PS3's final days as the main PS dog, after a game that was long in tooth and right smack in the middle of an ongoing racing game war, that doesn't seem to be won by anyone in particular. Couple that with PD's dangerous faults and incoherences and one can wonder why GT6 didn't strike love into the players' hearts quite like past Gran Turismo games.

Of course, since you have bought Forza 6, which comes with a lot of new unique material for you (Aztek FTW), it's clear that you'd eventually shift focus back into reviewing cars there. Dirt Rally sounds like an interesting venture, just because I have yet to see anyone review cars there... Whenever your next move comes, here's hoping that you eventually make it. It's difficult to find motivation, I can relate to that, but there are people who do care.

 

[C-ZETA]

I guess you are going throught a rollercoaster-esque streak when it comes to writing and posting reviews, no?

When it comes to just about everything I'm still hot and cold with writing. I've planned out a lot of stuff I want to write, and the most notable things I've done are a couple of guides for different games. But not only am I waiting on doing some exciting stuff, I'm also probably waiting too long to do stuff. Annoyingly, I have the dreadful habit of thinking of things to do and then thinking of reasons why it's better to do those things tomorrow. Couple that to the way I try to keep my interest up in everything I like and finding the time to write something is a struggle. Keeping my interest up in everything I like also makes it hard for new things in anything to get me interested (before this year, the last time I properly got into something properly new was three years ago). Admittedly though, this year I have had a job to keep up with...but I'm not in that job anymore, so I've got time on my hands, for now.

Dirt Rally sounds like an interesting venture, just because I have yet to see anyone review cars there... Whenever your next move comes, here's hoping that you eventually make it. It's difficult to find motivation, I can relate to that, but there are people who do care.

Sitting in my laptop right now is my Colin McRae Rally 3 disc. I played it on Sunday. I always relish a fix of rallying from the days when it was still utterly awesome. Which, as I said, was any time before 2004. On the face of it, Dirt Rally isn't quite perfect, if I'm honest. A relative lack of Evos is, on a personal level, a black mark, the only one there being the Evo X which obviously isn't WRC spec. Also I keep hearing tales of doom about how I will definitely be killed if I try to play it on controller. And I'm not sure how much of my own money I have to fork out to play it...but I don't care. The lure of a good bunch of rally cars is very strong for me right now.

 

[Niku Driver HC]

When it comes to just about everything I'm still hot and cold with writing. I've planned out a lot of stuff I want to write, and the most notable things I've done are a couple of guides for different games. But not only am I waiting on doing some exciting stuff, I'm also probably waiting too long to do stuff. Annoyingly, I have the dreadful habit of thinking of things to do and then thinking of reasons why it's better to do those things tomorrow. Couple that to the way I try to keep my interest up in everything I like and finding the time to write something is a struggle. Keeping my interest up in everything I like also makes it hard for new things in anything to get me interested (before this year, the last time I properly got into something properly new was three years ago). Admittedly though, this year I have had a job to keep up with...but I'm not in that job anymore, so I've got time on my hands, for now.

Again, I cannot add much to that, other than the fact that I feel the exact same way about all those aspects. Thinking about all sorts of good writing ideas and not exactly putting them to practice, procrastination, and fledging interests... All of those things bother me as much as they bother you, with the added bonus of a 3rd year university course that needs finishing with proper grades, so that then I can enroll in real-life driving license class and get an actual driving license for my benefit. No job just yet does not mean that I have extra free time, because I do need to shift that towards studying and fixing my procrastination issues...

Sitting in my laptop right now is my Colin McRae Rally 3 disc. I played it on Sunday. I always relish a fix of rallying from the days when it was still utterly awesome. Which, as I said, was any time before 2004. On the face of it, Dirt Rally isn't quite perfect, if I'm honest. A relative lack of Evos is, on a personal level, a black mark, the only one there being the Evo X which obviously isn't WRC spec. Also I keep hearing tales of doom about how I will definitely be killed if I try to play it on controller. And I'm not sure how much of my own money I have to fork out to play it...but I don't care. The lure of a good bunch of rally cars is very strong for me right now.

So you have Colin McRae 3, huh...? Can't say I remember much about that game; most of my Colin experiences are closely related to demos of 2.0 and borrowed copies of the very first game. After that, all I really have are the experiences with DIRT, as well as DIRT 3 thanks to Steam's library sharing feature (and my cousin, who owns the game in Steam, mind you). DIRT Rally certainly has the realistic looks and feel that players have yearned for so long, at least that is the impression I get from footage related to it. And of course the lack of Evos would put you off somewhat, I'd bet you get rid of some Imprezas in exchange for more LanEvos... (laughs)
As for the controller? Right now, if that's the best way for you to play it, then go for that. I'd do the same myself because A) I currently do not own a PS4 and B) I do not have the budget to spend on a steering wheel for my PC, or parts that would make the game run smoother on said PC.

 

[Giygas]

Great articles 👍 @C-ZETA

Which did you like more, the Toyota or Lexus VGT?

 

[C-ZETA]

The GT Sport review?!
​

I was at the Copper Box yesterday for the big GT Sport event. Not all of it, you understand. Work calls on me for weekdays at the present moment and so I was only there from 6 till 9. But it was still enough for me to sample all I needed.

The first thing I sampled was the Lamborghini Huracan outside, actually. I might've taken something else but it was the most readily available car there and also the most powerful. It wasn't drifting around but it's 4WD so I wasn't bothered either way. It was one very fast, furious and incredibly fun ride. The fastest I've ever had and might have until I get the chance in something faster. It was almost over too quickly, though. And it was really barely stretching its legs. Still, I suspect that among the other rides there, it'd be much like Stealth, the super-fast accelerating rollercoaster at Thorpe Park. Great fun.

But then it was time to actually sample the game itself. After taking pics of all the pretty VGTs around, I sat down and took my first sample in of GT Sport. With a controller, of course. I'm hopeless with a wheel and probably will continue to be until I can actually drive. And maybe even then I'll still be hopeless.

The first thing that I noticed (read: caught me out) was rather significant; GT Sport is finally going to an R2/L2 control scheme. While this might be a bad thing to confess, I did all my reviews here and before with the old-school X-button control scheme. This has actually been ridiculously outdated for a long time now and so I'm glad that's what I'll be properly judging stuff with.

But what was I judging with it first? Well, I'd decided before I'd got there. Of course it'd have to be one of the Mitsubishi Evo's that are now in the game. I'd seen the new Group B Rally Car on the dirt track and I'm not ashamed to say I was very aroused by it. And the Group 3 version that eventually came around as well looked promising as well.

So inevitably, neither was available for me to sample on the demos. It was always going to be thus, wasn't it. So I decided to take probably the next best thing; one of the new VGTs. I picked the one I was most curious about, the Hyundai N2025.

​

Sadly, the tracks to test it on turned out to be rather limited. I decided at that moment that Brands Hatch was the one to go for, which was not that great a choice as it happened. I'm really not that good at the circuit in anything, and especially not in an LMP1 spec racer. But from what I could sample the Hyundai was pretty impressive. It's obviously not the best test for any new sounds, since it's so quiet being a hydrogen car, but its grip was still lovely and was certainly a great help.

But there wasn't much time to sample too much else because coming up on the big screen coming up was a race on the big screen. Group 3 on the Nurburgring, mercifully reduced to just 1 lap this time, and which proved to be damn frenetic. The final race of the day proved to be just the same. Also, I failed to clock it until it was mentioned at the end of the first race, but it turned out that - I'm guessing through a largely GTP-inspired effort - they'd managed to get Tom commentating on the race. We were all impressed, PD were impressed, I thought he made a damn good effort too...what are the odds on him getting hired?

But after that it was time to get back to more cars. And, after hearing Kaz's presentation again, I thought I'd go out and try as many of the newest cars as possible. Or indeed anything I really liked.

First up was the other new VGT available to us now, the Bugatti.

​

I actually ended up going on both new tracks in it, Northern Isle Speedway and Tokyo Expressway. I went for the latter first, and it again didn't really turn out to be ideal for the Bug. While I'm sure it'll be conducive to some good racing, it really is far too narrow and unforgiving to properly test something in it. So the Bugatti was rather left out there. But even so I did notice the sheer level of grip it had and how easily you can adjust it in a corner. So it's certainly a solid drive on first impressions.

I did my only real actual race on the Northern Isle Speedway in the Bugatti. (Everything else I tested in Time Trial.) To be fair, a short track is not really the ideal place to test anything, and I have to say it seems a little out of place in this game now, unless they do put in something akin to NASCARs. Then it'd be ideal, I suspect.

The Bugatti is also blessed with an onboard view, thankfully, unlike most other VGTs at the moment. As it turned out, it would be the only one I could really sample, for reasons that are pretty silly but which will be explained in a moment.

Also given a test on Tokyo Expressway was something that wasn't really that new, but still worth testing in my eyes. The Nissan GT-R 2017.

​

This was as good as I could reasonably expect, a grippy speed machine of a road car that actually could keep itself on the Tokyo Expressway. Here though, I uncovered a problem.

The switch view button, which is now the square button, wasn't doing its job on the TV I was playing here. Thinking it had been set to something else, I tried R1 and found it switching to...an ugly shot of some hexadecimal extreme of the track's environment. Pressing it again made it fine, but it was pretty disconcerting. At first I thought this was a GT-R exclusive issue but it happened with everything else I tried on the one TV I did a good deal of my testing on. Judging by the car sounds that seemed to be picked up, I suspect it might one day be used to be a cinematic camera of sorts...but when you can't see the car here, driving it is, unsurprisingly, impossible. So I was stuck driving everything here in nose view. Annoying.

Still, it didn't really distract me from driving anything else. Even though not everything else was that good at the job.

​

The Volkswagen GTI Roadster is not new to us, but this racing version certainly is. Volkswagen would have to be mad to actually race a roadster against GT3s, but the Supersport VGT is being reserved for the rally class in this game, unsurprisingly. I look forward to trying it out here, but I noticed this race version wasn't all that good. Indeed I suspect that whilst the original was 4WD, this is RWD only and was consequently a whole lot slippier for it. That, and I was driving it on Brands Hatch. I did not enjoy this anywhere near as much as the original VGT.

Two other not new cars I sampled weren't all that good for me either.

​

First was the Peugeot 908, which I made my first drive on the Nurburgring. It wasn't an entirely successful endeavor. It was even more wild and out of control than the typical LMP and really wasn't better off for it. Still, it didn't escape me here that the sound did appear to be rather closer to a modern day diesel LMP.

​

The Mazda LM55 was rather better, as would be expected of something like it. I could really throw it around the Nurburgring properly, but as it turned out my driving prowess didn't do it many favours. I mean, in this I managed to crash at Aremberg without cocking up Schwedenkreuz first, which never happens to me on the Nurburgring these days. Normally I cock up the first one then end up blowing the second as a result. I can't imagine that the sole Magners I had there had anything to do with it. I'm not that lightweight normally and I wasn't that night either. But I wasn't really there with the LM55. It'd be great otherwise.

The three best cars I tested were also pretty much the last three I properly tested.

​

I wasn't expecting too much from the Alfa Romeo 4C Group 3, if I'm honest. I was really expecting it to throw me around the Nurburgring and make me back out of driving it immediately. But then, whilst I hate to bring up the doomed word 'Forza' in here, I thought much the same would happen when I drove Forza 6's Lancia Montecarlo. And that turned out to be a paragon of stability. The 4C ended up providing much the same result. Not to the same extent, mind you. There were plenty of little flicks to deal with and sometimes it did still snap quite badly, but at speed it is a great car. A car I'd certainly consider driving in the events it's allowed it...were it not for the aforementioned Evo, of course.

​

The one car I drove all night on Willow Springs was the Volkswagen Golf GTI. What it seemed to prove most of all was how much tracks can affect one's perception of a car in any game. Indeed, the Nurburgring from my experience is actually a great choice because I've noticed it makes the great cars really shine and the bad ones look as hopeless as they are. But, if anything, Willow Springs is nearly too good a track. Because I've noticed it makes plenty of cars seem really damn good. And that's probably why the Golf GTI felt like the best thing I drove all night.

But in any case, there's no escaping the fact that its turning in was utterly perfect. It hooked onto the road with absolute precision and with no hint of hesitation. These days even slow cars can feel fun when done right and the Golf GTI is one of these. I suppose this is why it is considered one of the best cars in the world right now.

​

The Mazda MX-5 ND was the last thing I drove all night, and my only drive on Brands Hatch Indy. It wasn't a very long drive because I was pressed for time before I had to go home, but it was plenty long enough to see that it was a good as I thought it would be. I wasn't sure what to expect from it, actually. MX-5s in the past have varied from surprisingly stable to far more out of control than I want an MX-5. This swang on the drifty side of the scale for sure. That wouldn't be what I wanted if it were wild drifting, but luckily this wasn't. This was very controlled drifting that was completely harmless and still fun at the same time. I really quite like the ND as a real world car - I reckon it might be as sexy as the NB was, too - and I can tell I'll probably enjoy it once I have the game itself. I'll take one in metallic red, please.

There wasn't much else to sample at the time first-hand but I can at least comment on other bits that have been announced. Sport Mode is pretty much just what we all expected, and given the car count I suspect they can't possibly get in every relevant Lancia, so that means I'll be going for Mitsubishi in the Manufacturers cup. Especially with the sweet, sweet promise of what is called 'Group B' rallying in this game...oh yes. Though I suspect I'll be mostly spectating races seeing as I'm a long way from the best driver in the world.

The single player mode in this game doesn't look the greatest, but then I suppose that's not really what they're focusing on. I'm as impressed by the graphics as everyone else mostly is, but I suspect they really have taken the livery editor a little too literally. Because at the moment it does appear to be just that. A menu where you can edit a livery...that is already on a car. But not create your own from scratch. Still, if they do it properly, I have many ideas for liveries to put on, say, some GT3 cars. Ideas I've applied in other games already...

But I suppose I really should say that I'm loving the idea of Scapes. I don't say this too often, but I do really love travelling. And so somewhere with 1000 different photo spots in a ridiculous number of locations is a massive appeal to me. Especially because the photos themselves will look so utterly brilliant. So I look forward to that.

Really, what I'm waiting for now is the next batch of cars we can drive to be unveiled. Because that's what I'm in it for, into the whole racing game genre for. To drive as many wonderful cars as I can.

Because, let's face it, I'm probably not gonna drive in any of them. Maybe ride in a few of them, like the Huracan there. But mostly at this rate it'll just be stuff like the last thing I ended up in; the miserable old 388 bus that took me into London for my train home. Needless to say, that will not be in Gran Turismo Sport.