Car of the Week 228: COTY GTS Finale
- Thread starter Racer283
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I've been thinking to myself that we'll stick with GTS until they shut down the servers. That's assuming of course if GT7's lobbies don't stop lagging.
The main reason why I'm so hesitant to move over to GT7 is precisely because I see it as a big opportunity to gain new participants, and I don't want to sour their first impression of us with lag contact in the lobbies.
If enough of us want to move over to GT7, I'm willing to. It just seems like such a downgrade and a hassle to me, hence why I personally want to stick to GTS till its end.
The main reason why I'm so hesitant to move over to GT7 is precisely because I see it as a big opportunity to gain new participants, and I don't want to sour their first impression of us with lag contact in the lobbies.
If enough of us want to move over to GT7, I'm willing to. It just seems like such a downgrade and a hassle to me, hence why I personally want to stick to GTS till its end.
- 685
- Golden
- racer2833
During this era of LMPs, there was only one contender that rained supreme. While Peugeot did contend with Audi at Le Mans, Audi just had better reliability. After 2011, Audi would be the sole LMP1 category car until the next generation LMPH cars arrived on seen. This week we are taking a look at the Audi R18 '11. This weeks car is chosen by @RX8 Racer.
Feel free to run the normal R18 or Team Joest.
Feel free to run the normal R18 or Team Joest.
- 6,656
- Hanover/Germany
- alexpkas
AWESOME car. Superbly stable Gr.1 LeMans winning vehicle. No wonder it won...
Driven stock on hard racing tyres without any driving aids, except ABS. First lap in third person view, second one in cockpit view and third one in cinematic replay view. All driven laps are the same lap.
Managed a 05.40.169 on RH tyres on the Nords with it.
Have fun tomorrow guys!
Driven stock on hard racing tyres without any driving aids, except ABS. First lap in third person view, second one in cockpit view and third one in cinematic replay view. All driven laps are the same lap.
Managed a 05.40.169 on RH tyres on the Nords with it.
Have fun tomorrow guys!
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I'm rubbish with high–downforce cars, but I will say that the R18 '11 is a lot more stable and predictable of a drive than that wanker of a Peugeot we tested some months back. It's no TS050, so it's garbage in Gr.1, but it is pretty cool for being one of the very few diesel cars in the game, and also one that needs to be revved out.
Seeing a few of my friends rock the R18 Le Mans '11 car, I decided to spend ~2 hours clearing up the last few missions I've left in the game to see if I can win the elusive unicorn from there. No luck
Ahh well, I guess it's good enough that I didn't get shot on the home straight mid race, or have a bomb planted on the back of my car only to be detonated by my own father.
Seeing a few of my friends rock the R18 Le Mans '11 car, I decided to spend ~2 hours clearing up the last few missions I've left in the game to see if I can win the elusive unicorn from there. No luck
Ahh well, I guess it's good enough that I didn't get shot on the home straight mid race, or have a bomb planted on the back of my car only to be detonated by my own father.
- 685
- Golden
- racer2833
Who doesn't love a cute little hatchback from Britain but the newer models are made by BMW. Mini started out during the Suez Crisis when Sir Leonard Lord of Morris Company asked his top engineer Alec Issigonis to create a small, fuel efficient car capable of carrying 4 adults. This lead to the original Mini Cooper. Later on Mini Cooper would receive a bigger engine and more horsepower thanks to racing legend John Cooper. Since then Mini Cooper would go on to win 3 Monte Carlo Rally races and continue on in the racing world. Today we are taking a look at the modern version of Mini Cooper. This week we are testing the Mini Cooper S '05. This weeks car is chosen by @Obelisk
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Of course Obewan would choose the Mini 
For those unaware, Obelisk runs the Forza Horizon 5 version of Car of the Week, and one of the regulars there, SomePlayaDude, often scouts the week's track with his Mini Countryman before taking the chosen car onto the track. Too bad he took his sweet time to nominate it for testing, as Vic ninja–ed him and picked the Countryman, inciting some pretty comical rage in SPD's Countryman review, hence why "HOWDAREU" plates seem to be standard issue in FH5's COTW thread now.
I attempted to recreate SPD's Countryman on our '05 Cooper S, complete with FH5's plates. I've since redone the livery, because SOMEHOW I'm blind and dumb enough to miss the freaking stripes on the bonnet on my first attempt
While I was at it, I corrected the colour a bit to a flatter, duller blue, changed the front plate to be white to be inline with most European plates (FH5 doesn't seem to have front plates, oddly) and changed the wheels to the closest match I could find in GTS. Below are the livery link and photos.
...is it just me, or does the bonnet scoop look blocked off in the Scape shot?
For those unaware, Obelisk runs the Forza Horizon 5 version of Car of the Week, and one of the regulars there, SomePlayaDude, often scouts the week's track with his Mini Countryman before taking the chosen car onto the track. Too bad he took his sweet time to nominate it for testing, as Vic ninja–ed him and picked the Countryman, inciting some pretty comical rage in SPD's Countryman review, hence why "HOWDAREU" plates seem to be standard issue in FH5's COTW thread now.
I attempted to recreate SPD's Countryman on our '05 Cooper S, complete with FH5's plates. I've since redone the livery, because SOMEHOW I'm blind and dumb enough to miss the freaking stripes on the bonnet on my first attempt
While I was at it, I corrected the colour a bit to a flatter, duller blue, changed the front plate to be white to be inline with most European plates (FH5 doesn't seem to have front plates, oddly) and changed the wheels to the closest match I could find in GTS. Below are the livery link and photos.HOWDAREU Euro Front plate decal
HOWDAREU Euro Rear plate decal
HOWDAREU US plate decal
HOWDAREU 2.0 livery link
HOWDAREU Euro Rear plate decal
HOWDAREU US plate decal
HOWDAREU 2.0 livery link
...is it just me, or does the bonnet scoop look blocked off in the Scape shot?
Obelisk
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Speaking of, I know @SomePlayaDude has GT7 (not sure on Sport) and plays it on and off so consider this an invitation to him to offer his 2¢ on the HDY Mini. 😉
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- XSquareStickIt
I'm almost afraid of the rage that might follow
- 1,738
- Singapore
- XSquareStickIt
I did show the first version of the HDR Mini on the COTW thread. I don't think he was very amused by it, seeing as he didn't respond.
And yes, he does (did?) play GTS; he makes some awesome decals, actually. I don't know if he'll be able to join us tomorrow though, seeing as our meet starts at 12 noon Singapore time, and he did say he would be busy till Christmas.
And yes, he does (did?) play GTS; he makes some awesome decals, actually. I don't know if he'll be able to join us tomorrow though, seeing as our meet starts at 12 noon Singapore time, and he did say he would be busy till Christmas.
- 6,656
- Hanover/Germany
- alexpkas
Who doesn't love a cute little hatchback from Britain but the newer models are made by BMW. Mini started out during the Suez Crisis when Sir Leonard Lord of Morris Company asked his top engineer Alec Issigonis to create a small, fuel efficient car capable of carrying 4 adults. This lead to the original Mini Cooper. Later on Mini Cooper would receive a bigger engine and more horsepower thanks to racing legend John Cooper. Since then Mini Cooper would go on to win 3 Monte Carlo Rally races and continue on in the racing world. Today we are taking a look at the modern version of Mini Cooper. This week we are testing the Mini Cooper S '05. This weeks car is chosen by @Obelisk
NO WAY someone actually picked the car, which would've been next on my list!
Managed an 08.37.090 on the Nords stock on its stock SH tyres with it. Yep, it's a pretty well done legend revival I think.
Tsukuba rivals:
Obelisk
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He did make his own version of it in GT7 during the Miura week, so I'd like to disagree there. But again, we won't know either way unless he says something to all of us...or tells us all to shut up and go away.
- 3,931
- On the move
- SomePlayaDude
Ahh, it's late night packing time for a journey first thing in the morning. Better hop on the site for a peek and guess what:
A mention?
People talking behind my backsies??
And worse: memories left to be sealed are being set up to come out strong?!
How strong? Well, to be honest it should've been stronger. I can't be angry about it: it's not very SPD to remain vengeful over what I don't control.
Okay, quick writeup time.
Want context? Here's numero uno: a picture I took in Gran Turismo 7..
And I can't believe it has come to this, but.. here's context dos: the dreaded Week 34. Which looks unremarkable at first, but keep scrolling up. There ARE hints in my posts, but even I don't remember all of them.
But on with the MINI: now the only models I probably liked in this brand would be those currently competing under X-Raid.
And then one day, upon looking up history of a certain now Star Wars influenced Buick for Horizon 5's take on COTW, I just faffed around with a Countryman. Particularly the Gen 2 JCW trim.
I told myself if there was a crossover I had to like, it'd probably be one that's not as remarkable or as common. That sounds a lot like a sleeper, don't cha think? But constant exposure does something to one's thoughts and opinions. After week 34, that 24 week period of mucking about gradually evolved into genuine interest.
But is this bit of laughing along me getting, umm.. sort of angry with quotations, going to be how I get introduced to the much more beloved modern era Cooper? To answer that, I booted up the PS4, got on Gran Turismo 7 for the first time in a while and saw this modified 05 Cooper S waiting for me after a quick scroll down the garage. I don't even know what tune it had on, it was at 550 on sports hards. It had a wide kit, custom wheels and a front side fender combo.
And I took it out for a thrashing.
It might be just the 2 turns, but after swapping cars, I kept coming back. It might have my name on it, but how about my soul? Maybe this tale will continue later whenever the December update comes out. Guess it's probably after the wedding hubbub is done, but you never know what dark grip does Christmas hold to influence people's schedules.
Okay, proper writeup done, now to answer some queries.
- I guess when it comes to that tongue in cheek livery made by @XSquareStickIt, umm.. to be honest, I don't really recall, maybe my mind's on a different place. And I probably thought: ohh that exists, and just scrolled down, actually forgetting about it. Until today.. hmm.. HOW DA-redacted.
- And speaking of liveries, if anyone's actually going to go on Gran Turismo 7 and check the tag for cotw, you'll see it. Considering the kit, I'm quite sure it's not for everyone, especially how it's designed with the JCW Countryman in mind. This is a 7 exclusive livery, so if you find me driving this 05 Cooper in GT Sport, it's a different livery. You can go and look for that livery since I did share it for transfer purposes. Uhh, if we go ahead and leap into HotWheels for a second, it looks like this.
- Looking back at my legacy in GT Sport, I was both funny and relevant decal guy. Man what a past. I found decals I never knew existed.. Lancia Delta and Mazda RX500 comes to mind. But that time's gone now. Couldn't find a niche and audience to motivate myself to continue in 7.
And I'm done, good night and insert say the line Bart meme here.
A mention?
People talking behind my backsies??
And worse: memories left to be sealed are being set up to come out strong?!
How strong? Well, to be honest it should've been stronger. I can't be angry about it: it's not very SPD to remain vengeful over what I don't control.
Okay, quick writeup time.
Want context? Here's numero uno: a picture I took in Gran Turismo 7..
And I can't believe it has come to this, but.. here's context dos: the dreaded Week 34. Which looks unremarkable at first, but keep scrolling up. There ARE hints in my posts, but even I don't remember all of them.
But on with the MINI: now the only models I probably liked in this brand would be those currently competing under X-Raid.
And then one day, upon looking up history of a certain now Star Wars influenced Buick for Horizon 5's take on COTW, I just faffed around with a Countryman. Particularly the Gen 2 JCW trim.
I told myself if there was a crossover I had to like, it'd probably be one that's not as remarkable or as common. That sounds a lot like a sleeper, don't cha think? But constant exposure does something to one's thoughts and opinions. After week 34, that 24 week period of mucking about gradually evolved into genuine interest.
But is this bit of laughing along me getting, umm.. sort of angry with quotations, going to be how I get introduced to the much more beloved modern era Cooper? To answer that, I booted up the PS4, got on Gran Turismo 7 for the first time in a while and saw this modified 05 Cooper S waiting for me after a quick scroll down the garage. I don't even know what tune it had on, it was at 550 on sports hards. It had a wide kit, custom wheels and a front side fender combo.
And I took it out for a thrashing.
It might be just the 2 turns, but after swapping cars, I kept coming back. It might have my name on it, but how about my soul? Maybe this tale will continue later whenever the December update comes out. Guess it's probably after the wedding hubbub is done, but you never know what dark grip does Christmas hold to influence people's schedules.
Okay, proper writeup done, now to answer some queries.
- I guess when it comes to that tongue in cheek livery made by @XSquareStickIt, umm.. to be honest, I don't really recall, maybe my mind's on a different place. And I probably thought: ohh that exists, and just scrolled down, actually forgetting about it. Until today.. hmm.. HOW DA-redacted.
- And speaking of liveries, if anyone's actually going to go on Gran Turismo 7 and check the tag for cotw, you'll see it. Considering the kit, I'm quite sure it's not for everyone, especially how it's designed with the JCW Countryman in mind. This is a 7 exclusive livery, so if you find me driving this 05 Cooper in GT Sport, it's a different livery. You can go and look for that livery since I did share it for transfer purposes. Uhh, if we go ahead and leap into HotWheels for a second, it looks like this.
- Looking back at my legacy in GT Sport, I was both funny and relevant decal guy. Man what a past. I found decals I never knew existed.. Lancia Delta and Mazda RX500 comes to mind. But that time's gone now. Couldn't find a niche and audience to motivate myself to continue in 7.
And I'm done, good night and insert say the line Bart meme here.
Obelisk
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The Mini Cooper is a pleasant car, but it got absolutely destroyed by a diesel Atenza and, for some reason, a BMW i3 around Tsukuba. It also doesn't have a proper diff according to the game, so that's a couple of blemishes on what is otherwise a solid car. Gonna call it a neutral.
- 2,833
- Lincoln
- Victory_Reign93
- Linthium Reign
The I3 wasn’t a surprise for me around there, quick acceleration, no shifting and could hit top speed quickly, perfect for a short track like Tsukuba.
Also i’m leaving this video here from my recent stint in the Sunday Night League’s GTE Season 4, this one being the final round.
@RobboGTAddict invited me into the league awhile back and i’ve been rubbing shoulders with some rapid racers ever since.
I came so close the previous season to winning the drivers title so I was.. motivated for Season 4.
You can go and watch the previous 4 rounds if you want to or just watch the finale up there, it’s a treat. 😉👍
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- XSquareStickIt
The I3 wasn’t a surprise for me around there, quick acceleration, no shifting and could hit top speed quickly, perfect for a short track like Tsukuba.
Also i’m leaving this video here from my recent stint in the Sunday Night League’s GTE Season 4, this one being the final round.
@RobboGTAddict invited me into the league awhile back and i’ve been rubbing shoulders with some rapid racers ever since.
I came so close the previous season to winning the drivers title so I was.. motivated for Season 4.
You can go and watch the previous 4 rounds if you want to or just watch the finale up there, it’s a treat. 😉👍
Not really COTW related, but I wanted to ask this here nonetheless, because WHAT THE HELL is going on in GT7 lobbies?
First Vic was 1s behind on the Mulsanne Straight, then teleports 2s ahead of the leading Toyota before the braking zone. A Supra on Soft tyres setting a 3:54, 3s faster than Vic's soft shod 650S? And they're somehow racing neck and neck in spite of all that shenanigans?
I think I'll stick with GTS until the servers shut off, thank you.
- 2,833
- Lincoln
- Victory_Reign93
- Linthium Reign
It’s actually mentioned in the Live Chat on the video, but it’s a screen freeze issue, apparently an issue related to PS4s from what I saw mentioned afterwards.
It affected me at the start of lap 2 and I lost the lead, it effected my championship rival at least twice mind you.
I will say however, that was the first time it happened throughout the whole season for us.
As for the pace difference, the Supra is a straight line monster under BOP as it has nearly 40hp more than my 650S, I had to trim all the downforce off just to hang with it. 😳
- 1,738
- Singapore
- XSquareStickIt
You've turned many laps in the sublime Huracán Gr.4. You've died just as many times in the horrifying Huracán GT3. You might think you know all there is to know about the Lamborghini Huracán, but do you know which side of the coin the road car falls on?
Well, wonder no more, because this week, we're testing the Lamborghini Huracán LP 610-4 '15!
It might enthrall us. It might kill us. Hell, it might do both. Only one thing is for certain for a car that served as a base for such successful race cars: it's going to be quick! Join us tomorrow on Tuesday, 10 P.M. CST to find out if you have the cojones to tame the Huracán on some road legal rubber!
Well, wonder no more, because this week, we're testing the Lamborghini Huracán LP 610-4 '15!
It might enthrall us. It might kill us. Hell, it might do both. Only one thing is for certain for a car that served as a base for such successful race cars: it's going to be quick! Join us tomorrow on Tuesday, 10 P.M. CST to find out if you have the cojones to tame the Huracán on some road legal rubber!
- 6,656
- Hanover/Germany
- alexpkas
Not a car that tries to kill you at all. Quite the opposite. One of the best behaved cars in the game, and in a straight line, it's actually quicker, than a Murcielago LP640 (at least in a 1km drag race). On the Nords, stock on SH tyres, I could manage a 07.15.609.
Nordschleife rivals:
Tsukuba rivals:
Verdict: No baby bull really, but a sleeping brutal one. Sleeper.
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Very rarely even for those who drive many different cars for a living, they will come across that one car that just completely breaks every preconception of how things should be, what can reasonably be expected of a car or a category, and in doing so, unearths every yard stick in their mind, with every car they drive henceforth having to be measured against that new standard, spoiling that blessed person beyond any mere mortal's conception. A Lotus Elise's steering feel, for example. A Porsche Taycan's acceleration, or even a Honda Fit's packaging. When it comes to the way an FF sports car drives, the car that blew my overstimulated, desensitised sim racer mind and spoiled my cynical brain silly was the DC2 Honda Integra Type R, a car so magical that Honda themselves have never really replicated that magical feel all these years later.
I'm here to tell you that the DC2 ITR has itself been DC2 ITRed by the 2005 Mini Cooper S.
Just as vehemently as understeer usually dominates the experience of driving an FF sports car, the driving dynamics of the Cooper S is so unexpectedly fantastic that it could almost render irrelevant the fabled history of the Mini marque. You really needn't know any of the original Mini's successes in rally, how it revolutionised drivetrain packaging, or whether you can steer it from the roof to appreciate this modern Mini, because the R53 generation Cooper S does all the talking for itself without needing to rely on nostalgia when driven on the racetrack—not something many modern cars wearing old namesakes can lay claim to. Despite the sacrilege of being more than double the size of its forebearer, the Bayerische Mini Werke is, in my millennial eyes, in just that perfect sweet spot of both power and mass for a hot hatch; big enough to fit most, pack some grunt, and be seen and safe, but small enough to be chuckable, intuitive, and engaging to drive, before all the modern safety regulations and demand for insane power bloats and neuters cars to where they can no longer offer these sensation of an agile and responsive pocket rocket in the palm of your hand. Almost as if they knew they had to capitalise on that golden moment in history when such a car is possible, BMW fitted a supercharger onto the sporty version of the Cooper, the Cooper S, only for this generation of Coopers, making this week's car a special standout even in the long, ever growing history of Minis.
...which makes the peculiar omission of the supercharger whine in Gran Turismo Sport all the more sorely missed. This 2005 Mini Cooper S has been with the Gran Turismo series since 2010's Gran Turismo 5, but it took Polyphony Digital twelve years to finally give the Cooper S its supercharger whine in 2022's Gran Turismo 7, giving the quirkily styled car a personality to match. Here in GTS though, you'll have to make do with just the rather uninspired sound of the transversely mounted Tritec T16b4 inline four banger, though the extra 54 horses herded by the supercharger are all here and accounted for. The resultant 167HP (125kW) then goes through a close ratio 6 speed manual gearbox to the front wheels, another first for the now big boy, business meaning Mini, which can now bring its 1,180kg (2,601lbs) body up to 100km/h in somewhere around the 9.3 second mark on Sport Hard tyres.
As with any Mini, its acceleration isn't going to set anyone's pants on fire, not unless they had just jumped out of a burning Mazda Roadster. Even with all that gleaming and bespoke hardware, the R53 Cooper S only truly comes alive when it comes time for the supercharger to shut up and the Getrag gearbox to drop some gears. German this car may now be, but the R53 Cooper still embodies the spirit of a good David punching up against Goliaths with little power but much finesse, just as the Queen intended. Chuck this thing into a corner, and the car's four main strengths immediately become apparent, those being its diminutive body, light weight, incredibly direct and talkative steering, and some shockingly stiff 1.5Hz springs to prop it all up with. Despite the car not accelerating fast, the close ratios enabled by the 6 speed gearbox ensures that the engine can be kept screaming at all times, like it naturally wants to, making it sound and feel fast. Backed up by readily available responsiveness and some serious cornering speeds, the Cooper S is not only a serious track toy, but also one that never stops bombarding you with information and requests for your input, making it among one of the most engaging and technical drives I have ever driven here in GT Sport!
What that all translates to is that the car is so easy to learn and such a natural fit that it somehow skips the due process of feeling intuitive and jumps straight to feeling familiar, despite the fact that it was my first time helming one during race day, almost as if I met a younger, hotter version of my high school sweetheart I never knew she had. I'm usually someone who needs a few races to learn a car's idiosyncrasies before I can really bring it to my peers during race day, but in the Mini? I went at them hammer and tong from race 1! Despite our small group representing a range of driving abilities, most races ended up with about 6 cars all within three seconds of each other, a testament to how easy the Mini is to learn and how much it encourages close–knit tussles, a.k.a. the best kind of racecar, certainly better than Formula 1. More than inspiring immediate confidence, the way this car handles brings out the hooligan in every person. During race day, all I could think of were naughty thoughts, like, "Yeah, I can fit into that gap!" "Yes, I can take that hairpin at 120!", and "hell yeah, I can take that gap in the hairpin at 120!". I usually feel drained and tired at the end of our ~90 minute sessions, but the Mini gave me so much zest for life that I actually had a hard time winding down mentally after the session, wanting to drive it more! In other words, instead of draining me, driving the Mini somehow energises me!
*For legal reasons, these are exaggerations.
Drawbacks? Mostly just one if you can ignore the irony of an impractical hatch: The Cooper S, despite being the sporty variant of the Cooper, ironically still has an open differential, and it's an irony that will be at the forefront of the driving experience on the track that's quite literally impossible to ignore. It's not a super big deal on the Comfort Soft tyres the car comes default with in GT7, but in GTS where every car is slapped with Sport Hards, the extra lateral gs the car will gladly pull in the corners does transform the inside wheel into a Sports Hard mechanical eraser for road markings. Past the apex of a turn, you could be doing a middling 6,000rpm when you give the Cooper the beans, and well before the corner exit, you would have already smacked the limiter set at 7,000 several times, owing to the inside wheel spinning so fast and bringing the engine to the limiter, forcing a fuel cut and robbing the car of all momentum coming out of the turn. As an example, the car tops out at 172km/h in 4th gear, but you'll be smacking the limiter constantly while doing a mere 160km/h on Miyabi's centre section chicane, taken flat out. 12km/h (~7mph) doesn't sound like much in writing, but in a close ratio box mated to an engine that begs to be revved out and rewards the driver handsomely for doing so, it's completely counterintuitive that I have to take corner exits a gear higher simply to prevent the limiter from cutting in, which, while mechanically disadvantageous, does work out to be much faster. I don't even want to imagine this thing on anything other than the smooth, dry racetracks we ran. I mean, come on, an LSD isn't sorcery; Mazda can fit it on a Speed3 and a diesel Demio, why can't BMW on a sporty version of a sporty icon that has a history of winning dirt rallies and revolutionising drivetrain packaging?
Open diff or not, one thing for sure isn't open for interpretation: the R53 Cooper S is among some of the best FF cars you can drive in the game, even shaming some FR sports cars in the process; I genuinely think the R53 Cooper S is a better "traditional British recipe made better by foreigners" car than most Mazda Roadsters. As you can probably already guess with my heavy mentions of Mazda cars by this point, I'm a HUGE sucker for Mazdas, and so I hope it comes across how high a praise I mean it to be when I say I would rather a R53 Cooper S over most Roadsters. The supercharger of the Cooper S gives the car some real personality where the Roadster has none. Both cars heavily emphasise weight transfer and momentum driving, but the stiffer FF car won't kill you if you muck something up, whereas the softer FR car wouldn't hesitate to snap on you if you take liberties too far with it. In essence, I think a Roadster is more of a dance partner you have to respect, and a Mini is more of a toy you can just keep ragging on endlessly, and I don't care what it implies about me as a person that I prefer the toy over the dance partner. Short of the Japan–exclusive NR-A grade, a Roadster has never given me that serious liberating track toy feel before, and it'd need some serious bloat from a 2.0L engine just to share a track with this not–even–a–JCW Cooper.
Hell, I love it so much, it just might get my Car of the Year vote in a year where we tested the ND Roadster, S-FR, and R34 GT-R.
I'm here to tell you that the DC2 ITR has itself been DC2 ITRed by the 2005 Mini Cooper S.
Just as vehemently as understeer usually dominates the experience of driving an FF sports car, the driving dynamics of the Cooper S is so unexpectedly fantastic that it could almost render irrelevant the fabled history of the Mini marque. You really needn't know any of the original Mini's successes in rally, how it revolutionised drivetrain packaging, or whether you can steer it from the roof to appreciate this modern Mini, because the R53 generation Cooper S does all the talking for itself without needing to rely on nostalgia when driven on the racetrack—not something many modern cars wearing old namesakes can lay claim to. Despite the sacrilege of being more than double the size of its forebearer, the Bayerische Mini Werke is, in my millennial eyes, in just that perfect sweet spot of both power and mass for a hot hatch; big enough to fit most, pack some grunt, and be seen and safe, but small enough to be chuckable, intuitive, and engaging to drive, before all the modern safety regulations and demand for insane power bloats and neuters cars to where they can no longer offer these sensation of an agile and responsive pocket rocket in the palm of your hand. Almost as if they knew they had to capitalise on that golden moment in history when such a car is possible, BMW fitted a supercharger onto the sporty version of the Cooper, the Cooper S, only for this generation of Coopers, making this week's car a special standout even in the long, ever growing history of Minis.
...which makes the peculiar omission of the supercharger whine in Gran Turismo Sport all the more sorely missed. This 2005 Mini Cooper S has been with the Gran Turismo series since 2010's Gran Turismo 5, but it took Polyphony Digital twelve years to finally give the Cooper S its supercharger whine in 2022's Gran Turismo 7, giving the quirkily styled car a personality to match. Here in GTS though, you'll have to make do with just the rather uninspired sound of the transversely mounted Tritec T16b4 inline four banger, though the extra 54 horses herded by the supercharger are all here and accounted for. The resultant 167HP (125kW) then goes through a close ratio 6 speed manual gearbox to the front wheels, another first for the now big boy, business meaning Mini, which can now bring its 1,180kg (2,601lbs) body up to 100km/h in somewhere around the 9.3 second mark on Sport Hard tyres.
As with any Mini, its acceleration isn't going to set anyone's pants on fire, not unless they had just jumped out of a burning Mazda Roadster. Even with all that gleaming and bespoke hardware, the R53 Cooper S only truly comes alive when it comes time for the supercharger to shut up and the Getrag gearbox to drop some gears. German this car may now be, but the R53 Cooper still embodies the spirit of a good David punching up against Goliaths with little power but much finesse, just as the Queen intended. Chuck this thing into a corner, and the car's four main strengths immediately become apparent, those being its diminutive body, light weight, incredibly direct and talkative steering, and some shockingly stiff 1.5Hz springs to prop it all up with. Despite the car not accelerating fast, the close ratios enabled by the 6 speed gearbox ensures that the engine can be kept screaming at all times, like it naturally wants to, making it sound and feel fast. Backed up by readily available responsiveness and some serious cornering speeds, the Cooper S is not only a serious track toy, but also one that never stops bombarding you with information and requests for your input, making it among one of the most engaging and technical drives I have ever driven here in GT Sport!
What that all translates to is that the car is so easy to learn and such a natural fit that it somehow skips the due process of feeling intuitive and jumps straight to feeling familiar, despite the fact that it was my first time helming one during race day, almost as if I met a younger, hotter version of my high school sweetheart I never knew she had. I'm usually someone who needs a few races to learn a car's idiosyncrasies before I can really bring it to my peers during race day, but in the Mini? I went at them hammer and tong from race 1! Despite our small group representing a range of driving abilities, most races ended up with about 6 cars all within three seconds of each other, a testament to how easy the Mini is to learn and how much it encourages close–knit tussles, a.k.a. the best kind of racecar, certainly better than Formula 1. More than inspiring immediate confidence, the way this car handles brings out the hooligan in every person. During race day, all I could think of were naughty thoughts, like, "Yeah, I can fit into that gap!" "Yes, I can take that hairpin at 120!", and "hell yeah, I can take that gap in the hairpin at 120!". I usually feel drained and tired at the end of our ~90 minute sessions, but the Mini gave me so much zest for life that I actually had a hard time winding down mentally after the session, wanting to drive it more! In other words, instead of draining me, driving the Mini somehow energises me!
*For legal reasons, these are exaggerations.
Drawbacks? Mostly just one if you can ignore the irony of an impractical hatch: The Cooper S, despite being the sporty variant of the Cooper, ironically still has an open differential, and it's an irony that will be at the forefront of the driving experience on the track that's quite literally impossible to ignore. It's not a super big deal on the Comfort Soft tyres the car comes default with in GT7, but in GTS where every car is slapped with Sport Hards, the extra lateral gs the car will gladly pull in the corners does transform the inside wheel into a Sports Hard mechanical eraser for road markings. Past the apex of a turn, you could be doing a middling 6,000rpm when you give the Cooper the beans, and well before the corner exit, you would have already smacked the limiter set at 7,000 several times, owing to the inside wheel spinning so fast and bringing the engine to the limiter, forcing a fuel cut and robbing the car of all momentum coming out of the turn. As an example, the car tops out at 172km/h in 4th gear, but you'll be smacking the limiter constantly while doing a mere 160km/h on Miyabi's centre section chicane, taken flat out. 12km/h (~7mph) doesn't sound like much in writing, but in a close ratio box mated to an engine that begs to be revved out and rewards the driver handsomely for doing so, it's completely counterintuitive that I have to take corner exits a gear higher simply to prevent the limiter from cutting in, which, while mechanically disadvantageous, does work out to be much faster. I don't even want to imagine this thing on anything other than the smooth, dry racetracks we ran. I mean, come on, an LSD isn't sorcery; Mazda can fit it on a Speed3 and a diesel Demio, why can't BMW on a sporty version of a sporty icon that has a history of winning dirt rallies and revolutionising drivetrain packaging?
Open diff or not, one thing for sure isn't open for interpretation: the R53 Cooper S is among some of the best FF cars you can drive in the game, even shaming some FR sports cars in the process; I genuinely think the R53 Cooper S is a better "traditional British recipe made better by foreigners" car than most Mazda Roadsters. As you can probably already guess with my heavy mentions of Mazda cars by this point, I'm a HUGE sucker for Mazdas, and so I hope it comes across how high a praise I mean it to be when I say I would rather a R53 Cooper S over most Roadsters. The supercharger of the Cooper S gives the car some real personality where the Roadster has none. Both cars heavily emphasise weight transfer and momentum driving, but the stiffer FF car won't kill you if you muck something up, whereas the softer FR car wouldn't hesitate to snap on you if you take liberties too far with it. In essence, I think a Roadster is more of a dance partner you have to respect, and a Mini is more of a toy you can just keep ragging on endlessly, and I don't care what it implies about me as a person that I prefer the toy over the dance partner. Short of the Japan–exclusive NR-A grade, a Roadster has never given me that serious liberating track toy feel before, and it'd need some serious bloat from a 2.0L engine just to share a track with this not–even–a–JCW Cooper.
Hell, I love it so much, it just might get my Car of the Year vote in a year where we tested the ND Roadster, S-FR, and R34 GT-R.
- 1,738
- Singapore
- XSquareStickIt
I'm a week behind in my reviews as you can probably tell. Plus, being broke in real life tends to take away time from games and writing.
I do feel guilty for not writing a review, though. After all, I picked the car. Maybe if next week's car is a total dud, I can spend the week writing a review for the Huracán.
I did get some seat time in GT7 as a result of not writing a Huracán review though. Have to say I'm having some fun with it. The experience should really help when (or if) we transition to GT7, because right now I'm easily the one with the least experience with GT7 among us.
I do feel guilty for not writing a review, though. After all, I picked the car. Maybe if next week's car is a total dud, I can spend the week writing a review for the Huracán.
I did get some seat time in GT7 as a result of not writing a Huracán review though. Have to say I'm having some fun with it. The experience should really help when (or if) we transition to GT7, because right now I'm easily the one with the least experience with GT7 among us.
- 685
- Golden
- racer2833
- 6,656
- Hanover/Germany
- alexpkas
Average Gr. 4 entry. 15th fastest Gr. 4 of the 28 in total. Not bad or anything. Pretty pleasent to drive as well.
Driven stock on hard racing tyres without any driving aids, except ABS. First lap in third person view, second one in cockpit view and third one in cinematic replay view. All driven laps are the same lap.
Managed a 07.01.353 on RH tyres on the Nords with it.
Verdict: neutral.
Driven stock on hard racing tyres without any driving aids, except ABS. First lap in third person view, second one in cockpit view and third one in cinematic replay view. All driven laps are the same lap.
Managed a 07.01.353 on RH tyres on the Nords with it.
Verdict: neutral.
- 1,738
- Singapore
- XSquareStickIt
The RC F Gr.4 is what you get when you throw good parts onto a bad car.
It has phenomenal brakes. It's arbitrarily blessed with a 7 speed gearbox in the same category where Corvettes and NSXes have only 6 speeds. The suspension soaks up bumps and kerbs to the point where they almost aren't felt. The tyres on this car actually feel properly aligned; a rarity in this game. They'll bite on trail braking and corner entry, and the inside tyres aren't the first to give up mid turn. Plus, slides in this car can even be easily corrected with just a flick of counter steer. Hell, I even recall at one point in the game's life when the powers that be blessed the RC F with OP straight line speed via Balance of Performance. Unfortunately, all that is thrown at a fat, ugly car with a half assed prototype interior and a lopsided 54:46 weight distribution, largely owed to having a hulking 5.0L V8 up front.
The end result is as mixed a bag as they come. Due to the Gr.4 RC F being based on the 2016 RC F GT3 prototype, it not only shares the awkward interior still featuring an out of place clock, but it also inherits the prototype's even more awkward 2nd to 3rd gear shift, which makes the car feel like it choked on its own engine oil. With the gears that close and an engine that peaky, you'll be making that shift many times across several tracks. But, just like the RC F GT3, the RC F Gr.4 is a very neutral, stable, and predictable drive otherwise, one that earns and begets a reckless amount of trust from its driver, and shouldn't require too much time to get to know. The front end bites in wonderfully on corner entry, so much so that the rear end starts hinting at a slide in the tighter turns, helpfully rotating the car as a whole into a corner, and the car even puts down power really well for an FR. But, on the flipside, it does struggle a little with high speed sweepers owing to that heavy front end, and you'll have to make the front tyres scream slave labour to squeeze that cornering prowess out of them. I like my RC F Gr.4 with -1 front brake bias for that extra biting edge into a corner, but I suspect for longer races, that will have to get knocked back a bit to even out the tyre wear front to rear.
I'm tempted to say that the RC F Gr.4 is a good all rounder, a jack of all trades that you can default to if you had to pick a manufacturer for a season for which you're unsure of what lies ahead. The reason I can't say that is that, despite the GT3 cars fitting the bill and the Gr.4 car handling well, the latter is just SAH-LOOOOOOW in practice; I recall Vic of all people driving his RC F Gr.4 being harassed by my Cayman GT4 around Nürburgring GP during Week 205 when we tested the 86 Gr.4. The RC F just couldn't compare to the mid engine menace in the corners, and it's not like it pulled away at all in the straights, partially due to the slipstream it was providing the Cayman. That doesn't sound like much of a knock against the RC F in writing, until you realise that the Cayman is one of, if not the slowest car in Gr.4 with BoP applied in a hot lap scenario; it has much less power and weighs so much more than the RC F with BoP applied. It's essentially a 5 speed toy going up against a 7 speed Kaijuu. That such a thing can more than harass the RC F around a track then, is as atrocious as saying a paintball gun has the same stopping power as an AR-15. Why is the RC F so slow? HOW can it be this slow with those numbers and that good a driving feel?
To be more thorough in my test, I ran the Cayman against my peers mostly running RC Fs this week, and I overtook them all within two laps of Willow Springs before setting the fastest lap of the race. I might have thrown the entire race away, but don't let that distract you from HOW FREAKING SLOW the RC Fs were. It's almost like the "F" in RC F stands for "failure".
It made for some tremendous one–make races, but the RC F is proof that, to make a good race car, it's better to start with a good base that requires minimal work than to throw expensive parts at a bad base.
It has phenomenal brakes. It's arbitrarily blessed with a 7 speed gearbox in the same category where Corvettes and NSXes have only 6 speeds. The suspension soaks up bumps and kerbs to the point where they almost aren't felt. The tyres on this car actually feel properly aligned; a rarity in this game. They'll bite on trail braking and corner entry, and the inside tyres aren't the first to give up mid turn. Plus, slides in this car can even be easily corrected with just a flick of counter steer. Hell, I even recall at one point in the game's life when the powers that be blessed the RC F with OP straight line speed via Balance of Performance. Unfortunately, all that is thrown at a fat, ugly car with a half assed prototype interior and a lopsided 54:46 weight distribution, largely owed to having a hulking 5.0L V8 up front.
The end result is as mixed a bag as they come. Due to the Gr.4 RC F being based on the 2016 RC F GT3 prototype, it not only shares the awkward interior still featuring an out of place clock, but it also inherits the prototype's even more awkward 2nd to 3rd gear shift, which makes the car feel like it choked on its own engine oil. With the gears that close and an engine that peaky, you'll be making that shift many times across several tracks. But, just like the RC F GT3, the RC F Gr.4 is a very neutral, stable, and predictable drive otherwise, one that earns and begets a reckless amount of trust from its driver, and shouldn't require too much time to get to know. The front end bites in wonderfully on corner entry, so much so that the rear end starts hinting at a slide in the tighter turns, helpfully rotating the car as a whole into a corner, and the car even puts down power really well for an FR. But, on the flipside, it does struggle a little with high speed sweepers owing to that heavy front end, and you'll have to make the front tyres scream slave labour to squeeze that cornering prowess out of them. I like my RC F Gr.4 with -1 front brake bias for that extra biting edge into a corner, but I suspect for longer races, that will have to get knocked back a bit to even out the tyre wear front to rear.
I'm tempted to say that the RC F Gr.4 is a good all rounder, a jack of all trades that you can default to if you had to pick a manufacturer for a season for which you're unsure of what lies ahead. The reason I can't say that is that, despite the GT3 cars fitting the bill and the Gr.4 car handling well, the latter is just SAH-LOOOOOOW in practice; I recall Vic of all people driving his RC F Gr.4 being harassed by my Cayman GT4 around Nürburgring GP during Week 205 when we tested the 86 Gr.4. The RC F just couldn't compare to the mid engine menace in the corners, and it's not like it pulled away at all in the straights, partially due to the slipstream it was providing the Cayman. That doesn't sound like much of a knock against the RC F in writing, until you realise that the Cayman is one of, if not the slowest car in Gr.4 with BoP applied in a hot lap scenario; it has much less power and weighs so much more than the RC F with BoP applied. It's essentially a 5 speed toy going up against a 7 speed Kaijuu. That such a thing can more than harass the RC F around a track then, is as atrocious as saying a paintball gun has the same stopping power as an AR-15. Why is the RC F so slow? HOW can it be this slow with those numbers and that good a driving feel?
To be more thorough in my test, I ran the Cayman against my peers mostly running RC Fs this week, and I overtook them all within two laps of Willow Springs before setting the fastest lap of the race. I might have thrown the entire race away, but don't let that distract you from HOW FREAKING SLOW the RC Fs were. It's almost like the "F" in RC F stands for "failure".
It made for some tremendous one–make races, but the RC F is proof that, to make a good race car, it's better to start with a good base that requires minimal work than to throw expensive parts at a bad base.
- 6,656
- Hanover/Germany
- alexpkas
Where's my Huracan review?The RC F Gr.4 is what you get when you throw good parts onto a bad car.
It has phenomenal brakes. It's arbitrarily blessed with a 7 speed gearbox in the same category where Corvettes and NSXes have only 6 speeds. The suspension soaks up bumps and kerbs to the point where they almost aren't felt. The tyres on this car actually feel properly aligned; a rarity in this game. They'll bite on trail braking and corner entry, and the inside tyres aren't the first to give up mid turn. Plus, slides in this car can even be easily corrected with just a flick of counter steer. Hell, I even recall at one point in the game's life when the powers that be blessed the RC F with OP straight line speed via Balance of Performance. Unfortunately, all that is thrown at a fat, ugly car with a half assed prototype interior and a lopsided 54:46 weight distribution, largely owed to having a hulking 5.0L V8 up front.
The end result is as mixed a bag as they come. Due to the Gr.4 RC F being based on the 2016 RC F GT3 prototype, it not only shares the awkward interior still featuring an out of place clock, but it also inherits the prototype's even more awkward 2nd to 3rd gear shift, which makes the car feel like it choked on its own engine oil. With the gears that close and an engine that peaky, you'll be making that shift many times across several tracks. But, just like the RC F GT3, the RC F Gr.4 is a very neutral, stable, and predictable drive otherwise, one that earns and begets a reckless amount of trust from its driver, and shouldn't require too much time to get to know. The front end bites in wonderfully on corner entry, so much so that the rear end starts hinting at a slide in the tighter turns, helpfully rotating the car as a whole into a corner, and the car even puts down power really well for an FR. But, on the flipside, it does struggle a little with high speed sweepers owing to that heavy front end, and you'll have to make the front tyres scream slave labour to squeeze that cornering prowess out of them. I like my RC F Gr.4 with -1 front brake bias for that extra biting edge into a corner, but I suspect for longer races, that will have to get knocked back a bit to even out the tyre wear front to rear.
I'm tempted to say that the RC F Gr.4 is a good all rounder, a jack of all trades that you can default to if you had to pick a manufacturer for a season for which you're unsure of what lies ahead. The reason I can't say that is that, despite the GT3 cars fitting the bill and the Gr.4 car handling well, the latter is just SAH-LOOOOOOW in practice; I recall Vic of all people driving his RC F Gr.4 being harassed by my Cayman GT4 around Nürburgring GP during Week 205 when we tested the 86 Gr.4. The RC F just couldn't compare to the mid engine menace in the corners, and it's not like it pulled away at all in the straights, partially due to the slipstream it was providing the Cayman. That doesn't sound like much of a knock against the RC F in writing, until you realise that the Cayman is one of, if not the slowest car in Gr.4 with BoP applied in a hot lap scenario; it has much less power and weighs so much more than the RC F with BoP applied. It's essentially a 5 speed toy going up against a 7 speed Kaijuu. That such a thing can more than harass the RC F around a track then, is as atrocious as saying a paintball gun has the same stopping power as an AR-15. Why is the RC F so slow? HOW can it be this slow with those numbers and that good a driving feel?
To be more thorough in my test, I ran the Cayman against my peers mostly running RC Fs this week, and I overtook them all within two laps of Willow Springs before setting the fastest lap of the race. I might have thrown the entire race away, but don't let that distract you from HOW FREAKING SLOW the RC Fs were. It's almost like the "F" in RC F stands for "failure".
It made for some tremendous one–make races, but the RC F is proof that, to make a good race car, it's better to start with a good base that requires minimal work than to throw expensive parts at a bad base.
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