Car of the Week | Honda NSX Type R '92
- Thread starter XSquareStickIt
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- 6
- singapore
- K31thc0m
- K31thc0m
Single-Player Challenge
Road Atlanta: 1:33.348
Lake Louise Short: 1:04.765
Colorado Springs: 1:31.592
Total time: 4:09.705
if you beat me at colorado springs, good for you. the bumps made the experience terrible unlike the other two circuits, which i found more enjoyable.
Road Atlanta: 1:33.348
Lake Louise Short: 1:04.765
Colorado Springs: 1:31.592
Total time: 4:09.705
if you beat me at colorado springs, good for you. the bumps made the experience terrible unlike the other two circuits, which i found more enjoyable.
- 1,743
- Singapore
- XSquareStickIt
The original NSXes, the NA1 and NA2, are cars that I've sort of feared being featured on COTW, because they're my childhood heroes, and I love them immensely. Hell, I have a section of my display cabinet almost entirely dedicated to the NSXes. They're legendary cars that others have covered much better than I could, and even on a subjective front, I don't think I could ever do the cars justice.
In GT7, the NA1-R makes a very strong argument for itself as the perfect sports car. Its achingly beautiful looks hasn't aged a day, and anyone who says a V6 can't sound good hasn't been near an NSX. Its NA engine is rather gutless unless it's screaming for its life, and yet, having to shift up almost feels like a tragic event with the 5 speed manual. The car is soft by modern standards, yet so naturally responsive with its overall light weight of 1,230kg (2,712lbs) and its low, unladen front end. On both corner entries and exits, it's so playful, yet so gradual in its playfulness, really letting drivers choose how much slip angle they want into and out of corners. And I especially love how, from the outside, the only visible changes of the Zenki NSX-R from the base NSX are the Enkei wheels and stripped out interior; none of that nonsensical boy–racer garbage that later Type Rs seem obligated to have, and there will always be a part of me that wishes the Type R ethos had stayed unchanged from the Zenki NSX.
I don't think I can retell the story of the NSX better than others already have, so I'll just dump here the excellent videos that the YouTube algorithm has bestowed upon me, and I hope you'll find the same value in these that I did.
savagegeese has an hour–long documentary on the original NSX, even scoring interviews with the car's original engineers, and Uehara Shigeru himself!
Kurosawa Motoharu, a.k.a. Gan–san, trashes the NSX-R around the Nordschleife in 1992.
In GT7, the NA1-R makes a very strong argument for itself as the perfect sports car. Its achingly beautiful looks hasn't aged a day, and anyone who says a V6 can't sound good hasn't been near an NSX. Its NA engine is rather gutless unless it's screaming for its life, and yet, having to shift up almost feels like a tragic event with the 5 speed manual. The car is soft by modern standards, yet so naturally responsive with its overall light weight of 1,230kg (2,712lbs) and its low, unladen front end. On both corner entries and exits, it's so playful, yet so gradual in its playfulness, really letting drivers choose how much slip angle they want into and out of corners. And I especially love how, from the outside, the only visible changes of the Zenki NSX-R from the base NSX are the Enkei wheels and stripped out interior; none of that nonsensical boy–racer garbage that later Type Rs seem obligated to have, and there will always be a part of me that wishes the Type R ethos had stayed unchanged from the Zenki NSX.
I don't think I can retell the story of the NSX better than others already have, so I'll just dump here the excellent videos that the YouTube algorithm has bestowed upon me, and I hope you'll find the same value in these that I did.
savagegeese has an hour–long documentary on the original NSX, even scoring interviews with the car's original engineers, and Uehara Shigeru himself!
Kurosawa Motoharu, a.k.a. Gan–san, trashes the NSX-R around the Nordschleife in 1992.
- 6
- singapore
- K31thc0m
- K31thc0m
looks like someone REALLY loves the nsx 😳😳😳
- 16,316
- Melbourne
- ScottPuss20
- CheetahsMeow
I didn't know you were into model cars. That's a great selection you have there.The original NSXes, the NA1 and NA2, are cars that I've sort of feared being featured on COTW, because they're my childhood heroes, and I love them immensely. Hell, I have a section of my display cabinet almost entirely dedicated to the NSXes. They're legendary cars that others have covered much better than I could, and even on a subjective front, I don't think I could ever do the cars justice.
- 1,743
- Singapore
- XSquareStickIt
Ever since the 3rd generation, "FD3S" RX-7 ended production in 2002, rumours, fan renders, and outright clickbait articles purporting a grand return of a Mazda rotary sports car have swarmed the niche fan community incessantly. While the four door, four seat, and criminally underrated RX-8 did succeed the RX-7 in name and driving feel, it never had the laser focus, bleeding edge performance, stunning svelte looks, or cultural significance that the FD was so beloved for, leaving some to believe that the legendary 7 had no true successor. In 2015, Mazda took a look at that that storm of speculation and discourse and thought, "Y'know what? Ima have a piece of that action, show 'em how it's done for poops and giggles", and revealed at the Tokyo Motor Show, a "Rotary Sports Concept" known as the RX-Vision.
Of course, in the 13 years since the FD bowed out of the Japanese market, cars, and the world at large, had changed almost beyond recognition. Cars had arguably gotten so fast to a point that high tech computer wizardry had become a requirement to not only keep them on the road, but to get the most out of them on the track. Thus, pure, lightweight, simple, and affordable sports cars à la the RX-7 have been edged out of the market by technological juggernauts, with many companies even beginning to experiment with hybridisation to prepare for an eventual transition into a carbon neutral future, resulting in an influx of bloated, heavy, and isolating computers on wheels. The RX-Vision then, shocked TAS2015 attendees upon its unveiling both with its beauty and what said beauty seemed to promise; it was low, it was wide, it was svelte, and it hadn't a single screen in the spartan cockpit, seemingly promising the return of a pure sports car just like the FD RX-7 used to be. One could even argue that the RX-Vision looked less like its own thing and more like an FD RX-7 pulled out of a time machine and adapted for the climate of 2015: the goggles–shaped rear light cluster sheathing four round brake lights is the most obvious shared design element, but even the RX-Vision's headlights, while required by modern laws to be static, have running lights in the shape of panel gaps suggestive of the sorely missed pop–up headlights of the RX-7. Heck, the analogue gauges in the RX-Vision would almost look nicked straight from a Zenki FD in the early nineties if the tach didn't read up to an eyebrow–raising 10,000rpm! It really did seem like Mazda were dead serious about bringing something in the spirit of the FD RX-7 into the modern era; something that would be focused on just the driving thrills while actively purging from it any frills, and such a notion was proper cause for celebration both for rotary sports car fans and driving enthusiasts in general.
However, despite all the direct callbacks to my childhood hero and dream sports car, the RX-Vision has always looked a little... off, to me. The part that sticks out to me the most—quite literally—is the stupidly long bonnet of the RX-Vision. One of the main selling points of a Wankel Rotary engine is that they're very compact for their power output, so why the heck does the bonnet of the RX-Vision look long enough to swallow a V12 longitudinally? What's under there, what's that space used for? Designer Maeda Ikuo has proudly stated in GT Café that this long hood, short deck style was an intentional design decision, giving the car great proportions and putting more load on the rear tyres, but I respectfully disagree with him. If load on the rear was really so important, I'd really rather they just made a rear mid–engined car instead, fully acknowledging that Mazda seems oddly adverse to producing RMR cars for some reason. One of the things that made the RX-7 so beloved was that it was a very "pure" and "honest" sports car—there was nothing on it that didn't serve a purpose, and the cars had a very simplistic, yet organic beauty to them because of that. The RX-Vision by contrast, was not only a hollow styling exercise, but one that looked like a fat, disproportionate person wearing a designer dress to me. Yes, the dress itself is achingly beautiful, but the thing underneath contorting, stretching, and giving it shape, I just can't for the life of me find attractive in the slightest, and the whole package just seems a waste.
Now, this is a personal pet peeve of mine, but I really wish the RX-Vision had a third brake light in the middle, even if it'd mostly be blocked by the rear spoiler in its lowered position (and I highly doubt this is legal anywhere). The spoiler bisecting and obscuring the rear lights may at first appear to be just a styling item, but in a blink–and–you'll–miss–it moment during the car's reveal, a video package did show the spoiler raising up and out of the way of the lights, and designer Maeda Ikuo has stated in an interview that the spoiler deploys automatically. It's a bit of a shame that the spoiler is completely static in GT7 in its lowered and obstructive position. I've genuinely never understood why spoilers and wings nowadays need to pop up and down. It's just unnecessary mass and complication. I'll deal with the drag penalty at legal speeds and save on the mass, thank you very much. Rear wings are cool, I want to see them, and anyone who thinks they're uncool are pots calling kettles black. Also, remember how I praised the RX-Vision earlier for not having a single screen in the cockpit? Yeah, that might be a bit of a problem, considering the fact that the thin stalks protruding from the doors hold nothing but cameras. They might want to look into that before putting the car into production, and while they're at it, maybe they can also add in door handles and a fuel inlet.
In 2022, seven years after the RX-Vision was initially revealed, Toyota unveiled a good looking, long hood, short deck FR GT3 racer called the GR GT3 Concept, and the folks at Japanese Nostalgic Car quickly connected the dots, similar roof and door cut lines, and proportions to the RX-Vision GT3 Concept that was added to Gran Turismo Sport in 2020. Now, I don't even want to fantasise about knowing what goes on behind closed doors of car design at a corporate level, but this lines up a bit too well with my gut feeling of "The RX-Vision is very unlike the Mazda I know", making me believe that the RX-Vision was never born specifically to be a Mazda to begin with, but rather as a shared platform. I know the auto industry is in a bad place right now, and the clock is ticking on the internal combustion engine, but as a Mazda fan, I don't know if I want a rotary sports car that has to compromise and share platforms with something it was never meant to be. To be clear, I'm not against platform sharing at all; I just think that the rotary sports car is too ingrained into Mazda's identity to share with and be compromised for some other make, even if Toyota and Mazda (along with Subaru) seem to be buddy–buddy in real life.
I don't give praise to Polyphony Digital often, but they've done an absolutely fantastic job in capturing the essence of the RX-Vision in GT7. Designer Maeda Ikuo has stated both in interviews and in the GT Café that he designed the surfaces in such a way that light dynamically dances across the car as the viewer moves around it to make the car appear more as though a living creature and not just a machine, and while a good approximation of this can be experienced without ray tracing, this dynamic light dance absolutely comes alive in GT7 with ray tracing enabled. It genuinely tickles my inner child taking the RX-Visions to Scapes with spectacular lighting, such as the Tokyo National Art Center, and just... moving the car around, much like a child would a toy car in his hands.
While the wheels and plastic trim pieces look black most of the time, at certain angles, they give of a slight candy apple reddish tint, and even that has been captured and replicated faithfully in GT7. It's not very noticable with the original body colour of Soul Red because they pair so well with said paint, but that reddish tint starts to really stick out and look awkward when the car is repainted in anything other than red, or when one messes around with colours and temperatures in photo mode to get the car looking a certain way.
On the technical side of things, Mazda are cautiously tight–lipped about any specs of the RX-Vision, refusing to spare us fans even morsels of information. We only know that the SkyActiv-R engine is the "main power unit", and that it's an FR. Despite Mazda's deliberate wording that leaves open the possibility of hybridisation, the RX-Vision's only power source in GT7 is its screamer of a Rotary Engine, interpreted by Polyphony Digital to be a naturally aspirated 4–Rotor that revs to 9,500rpm, producing a peak of 517HP (386kW) at 8,800rpm and 489.2N⋅m (360.8lbf⋅ft) at 7,500rpm. If you think PD were super generous with those power figures, wait till you see how little the RX-Vision weighs according to them: a mere 1,290kg (2,844lbs); 60 kilos (132lbs) lighter than the RX-8 Spirit R and just 20 kilos (44lbs) heavier than the RX-7 Spirit R Type A. These figures put the RX-Vision's performance somewhere around those of the C6 Corvette ZR1, Ferrari 458, and the NC1 NSX; all of which familiar names and flagships the FD RX-7 could go toe–to–toe with in the early nineties.
While the SkyActiv-R engine's power curves and noise do make it extremely similar to the R26B 4–Rotor of the 787B, a very pleasant surprise greeted me when I got into the car from the garage: it made actual 787B noises! This is a big deal to me because I've complained about PD not having a real 787B to scan and record back when I reviewed the 787B in GT Sport, resulting in the digital 787B—and anything else derivative and accepting of its 4–rotor—sounding decidedly unlike the real 787B, including the RX-Vision GT3 Concept. In other words, the "base" RX-Vision sounds more like a racecar than even literal racecars on startup! Despite this, the sound of the base RX-Vision has been notably muffled from its GT3 counterpart during actual gameplay, itself already slightly muffled from the sound of the faux 787B. Some have expressed that the piercing wail of the 787B's 4–Rotor is grating to listen to, and even I have to concur with that sentiment. The RX-Vision's sound, having gone through so much muffling, is perfectly fine to listen to even for long periods of time, all while still sounding highly distinct. It has struck the perfect balance in my opinion, especially if one can suspend their disbelief and not question how something with this much character and volume can ever hope to make production in today's car climate.
The benefits of not having to exist in the cruel and spiteful world are readily apparent from the right bucket seat of the RX-Vision, as the A–pillars are impossibly thin by stringent modern standards, allowing for an incredible view out front. The RX-Vision also doesn't have to print 0–100km/h times nor pass noise and emissions regulations, so the car can be geared naturally for its power curves and mass. Driving it is such a breath of fresh air and a stark reminder of just how ludicrously compromised modern cars are. 2nd and 3rd gear in the RX-V's sequential gearbox are very close to each other to keep the rev happy Rotary unabashedly screaming unhindered by noise regs, and the car will continue to pull all the way in 6th gear, topping out at redline around 320km/h (199mph) in clean air without even a hint of wanting to function as an overdrive highway cruising gear. Just like the 787B, the RX-Vision has ample mid–range punch normally uncharacteristic of NA Rotary Engines, and when mated to such close gear ratios, the RX-Vision is never left without an answer for any complex of corners. I do however concur with Obelisk and RX8 in saying that the RX-Vision has a bit too short of a final drive ratio for the speeds it feels otherwise capable of. It's not a big deal most of the time, but it does feel like squandered potential in the highly specific scenario of a top speed slipstream battle against other cars, or even copies of itself.
Of course, with performance numbers far surpassing that of the FD RX-7, the suspension setup of the RX-Vision has accordingly been tightened up to be less playful and more immediate. The RX-Vision shows no perceptible pitch and roll on its default Sports Hard tyres from the inside and out, and it's almost racecar immediate in its response to driver inputs. Its stiff suspension, incredibly lightweight body, and meagre downforce values combine to result in a car that reacts to every minute crease and crevice of the road surface, transmitting them all to its driver with such clarity that it even comes across visually in bumper cam, making the RX-V feel extremely raw and constantly on the edge, easily upset by an imperfect public road, beating up its driver visually in lieu of physically through the digital divide. It really does remind me of tuner cars from the 90s with how on edge and unrefined it feels in its pursuit of performance, no doubt worsened by the very modern 20–inch steamroller wheels. That stiff suspension setup can also be problematic even on an obsessively smoothed over racetrack: with a staggered 245–285 tyre setup and a rear weight bias from the long hood, short deck body style, the RX-Vision can struggle to put weight over the front tyres to get the long nose to bite into an apex, which is a problem only highlighted more by the fact that whoever is in charge of setting up fictional cars at PD just loves giving them stupidly tight differential setups, meaning that the laden, grippier rear end of the RX-Vision is always trying to keep the featherweight front end from turning and biting into a corner. On trail braking, there's a very prominent moment wherein the car awkwardly stops wanting to turn, the steering wheel judders, and the front tyres scrub with no leadup nor warning whatsoever, and it's a similar story on corner exits as well, where the rear end will suddenly break loose without warning on power, despite the malleable and predictable nature of the NA engine. What this translates to in practice is a very unpredictable and counter–intuitive car to drive; I find myself braking early for corners just to avoid having enough brake input to lock up the LSD when it comes time to pitch the car into the turn, and on corner exits, I'm always tiptoeing on the accelerator pedal, waiting, anticipating the stupid diff to bust the rear end loose. I keep TCS on at 1/5 when driving the RX-Vision not only because I appreciate the safety net, but also because the TCS light coming on out of a corner as I roll on the accelerator pedal is the only warning I'd get for the RX-Vision wanting to re–enact the last downhill run of Takahashi Keisuke versus God Foot.
Despite the "Vision" in its name, the RX-Vision is, in fact, not a Vision Gran Turismo car, meaning the car can be upgraded and adjusted. One might think then, that the car's rather glaring faults can be fixed, but I'm sad to report that, aside from the gearing, none of the RX-V's prominent faults can be tuned out. While a "fully" customisable suspension kit can be bought for the RX-Vision, the springs can't go soft enough to give clear, stable Vision on Sports Hard tyres, with minimum natural frequencies of 2.30/2.50Hz F/R. For some context, a C6 ZR1's stock values are 1.8/2.0Hz F/R, and that's hardly a soft car to begin with. There are no aero parts for the RX-Vision at all in GT Auto, meaning that the car is just stuck with its default downforce values for life. While the car does produce meaningful downforce as–is according to its spec sheets, it doesn't feel enough to counteract the lift the body naturally generates, as the car feels vague, floaty, and even snappy at high speeds, making some high speed corners and kinks either extremely precarious to take at speed, or just flat out impossible to negotiate without slowing to an extent where that becomes dangerous in itself. It's impossible to brake on the high line for the aggressively banked T1 of High Speed Ring Reverse without introducing the rear quarter panel to some armco, and it WILL snap loose without fail, controller or wheel alike, on the final left kink on Deep Forest's home straight. I'm merely speculating when I say this, but I really think the long hood, short deck body style is to blame for all this lift, as the air along the roofline of the car has to dip sharply to meet the boot lid of the car, creating a region of low pressure where the rear window is. It's why so many Le Mans racer have "long tail" versions, right? To feed higher pressure, less turbulent air to their rear wings for high–speed stability? Maybe this wouldn't be such an issue if we could put a towering rear wing on the RX-Vision to match its roofline à la the GT3 Concept, but despite the racecar already being in GT Sport prior to the release of GT7, none of that trickled down to the base car at all for some unfathomable reason.
For a million credits, I would certainly hope for more customisation options and a much better drive. The C6 ZR1 and any of the AMG GTs are just better cars in every regard, and good luck trying to convince your average petrolhead to not buy a Ferrari 458 and instead shell out more than thrice the Credits for a Mazda. Heck, I'd rather spend more on swapping in a racing 4–Rotor to an RX-7 or RX-8, and end up with cars that boast much more customisability visually and mechanically, to say nothing of the unreal fuel efficiency that racing engines have in this game.
The RX-Vision struck me as odd when I first laid eyes on it, and PD's interpretation of it only solidified those doubts into pure disdain. I'm just glad that Mazda has seemingly moved on from the pure styling exercises and made something much more balanced looking and no less beautiful in the Iconic SP.
The RX-VISION is a car in which I placed my car designer life on the line.
I worked on it from the standpoint of really making the dream sports car I have in my mind.
And one of the most important things for a sports car is its fundamental structure.
Historic cars that are still popular and beautiful to look at today all have exceptionally great proportions.
So the first thing we worked on for the RX-VISION was also the structure.
A textbook FR (Front Engine Rear Drive) with a long nose, and the ability to place proper load on the rear wheels.
In the final stages, we extended the front nose about 150mm from the structure we had originally designed,
the part from the front doors up to the front wheel center.
In the very end we made it a slightly unbalanced proportion...
But at that moment we got a lot of traction on the rear wheels, and thought "This will work!"
That slight unbalance is the hook. It's the secret to making someone go "Hmm".
The other secret is the reflection of light.
If you look at the RX-VISION as you circle it, I think you'll notice that the light's reflection moves around like a creature.
Cars are like family or friends to those who are into them.
And it's a very rare industrial product that runs around on its own.
That makes cars have the same type of existence as animals running around in the wild, or an athlete running on a field.
And when you think of it that way, I also want cars to be something that looks beautiful and truly alive in nature.
And for that you need a "sense of life."
So when thinking about what is the sense of life, that will put cars at one with nature,
we tried to express life in the car with the light's reflections and their beauty on tje car's body.
And those are the type of shapes that are instilled in the RX-VISION.
Sarah:
Thank you for that great story, Maeda-san!
Maeda Ikuo:
The pleasure was all mine. If we meet again, I hope we can talk more about cars and design.
When producing the RX-VISION, I had a long running desire to make the RX-VISION a GT3 car and compete in the Le Mans.
I'm a car designer, but I have a soft spot for motorsports.
The first movie that I spent my own allowance on to go see in a theater, during elementary school, was about the 24 hours of Le Mans.
I still remember being really excited to see the fantastic battles between cars like the Porsche 917 and Ferrari 512S.
It made me want to race at the Le Mans in the future, and it also was what got me to strive for a job involving cars.
Mazda won the Le Mans,
and that event naturally connected to that scene of the Le Mans that I dreamed of as a child.
But I want to have everyone take interest in todays motorsports scene, not just events of the past like the 787B.
I strongly hope to add a new page to Mazda's motorsports.
In that respect the GT3 version of the RX-VISION was a car that I really wanted to make happen,
and I was able to do that first in Gran Turismo virtually.
This is something I created with the strong conviction, "that this will be a real car in the future."
And I personally want to drive the Sarthe circuit in this car.
Sarah:
Thank you for that great story, Maeda-san!
Maeda Ikuo:
The pleasure was all mine. If we meet again, I hope we can talk more about cars and design.
Of course, in the 13 years since the FD bowed out of the Japanese market, cars, and the world at large, had changed almost beyond recognition. Cars had arguably gotten so fast to a point that high tech computer wizardry had become a requirement to not only keep them on the road, but to get the most out of them on the track. Thus, pure, lightweight, simple, and affordable sports cars à la the RX-7 have been edged out of the market by technological juggernauts, with many companies even beginning to experiment with hybridisation to prepare for an eventual transition into a carbon neutral future, resulting in an influx of bloated, heavy, and isolating computers on wheels. The RX-Vision then, shocked TAS2015 attendees upon its unveiling both with its beauty and what said beauty seemed to promise; it was low, it was wide, it was svelte, and it hadn't a single screen in the spartan cockpit, seemingly promising the return of a pure sports car just like the FD RX-7 used to be. One could even argue that the RX-Vision looked less like its own thing and more like an FD RX-7 pulled out of a time machine and adapted for the climate of 2015: the goggles–shaped rear light cluster sheathing four round brake lights is the most obvious shared design element, but even the RX-Vision's headlights, while required by modern laws to be static, have running lights in the shape of panel gaps suggestive of the sorely missed pop–up headlights of the RX-7. Heck, the analogue gauges in the RX-Vision would almost look nicked straight from a Zenki FD in the early nineties if the tach didn't read up to an eyebrow–raising 10,000rpm! It really did seem like Mazda were dead serious about bringing something in the spirit of the FD RX-7 into the modern era; something that would be focused on just the driving thrills while actively purging from it any frills, and such a notion was proper cause for celebration both for rotary sports car fans and driving enthusiasts in general.
However, despite all the direct callbacks to my childhood hero and dream sports car, the RX-Vision has always looked a little... off, to me. The part that sticks out to me the most—quite literally—is the stupidly long bonnet of the RX-Vision. One of the main selling points of a Wankel Rotary engine is that they're very compact for their power output, so why the heck does the bonnet of the RX-Vision look long enough to swallow a V12 longitudinally? What's under there, what's that space used for? Designer Maeda Ikuo has proudly stated in GT Café that this long hood, short deck style was an intentional design decision, giving the car great proportions and putting more load on the rear tyres, but I respectfully disagree with him. If load on the rear was really so important, I'd really rather they just made a rear mid–engined car instead, fully acknowledging that Mazda seems oddly adverse to producing RMR cars for some reason. One of the things that made the RX-7 so beloved was that it was a very "pure" and "honest" sports car—there was nothing on it that didn't serve a purpose, and the cars had a very simplistic, yet organic beauty to them because of that. The RX-Vision by contrast, was not only a hollow styling exercise, but one that looked like a fat, disproportionate person wearing a designer dress to me. Yes, the dress itself is achingly beautiful, but the thing underneath contorting, stretching, and giving it shape, I just can't for the life of me find attractive in the slightest, and the whole package just seems a waste.
Now, this is a personal pet peeve of mine, but I really wish the RX-Vision had a third brake light in the middle, even if it'd mostly be blocked by the rear spoiler in its lowered position (and I highly doubt this is legal anywhere). The spoiler bisecting and obscuring the rear lights may at first appear to be just a styling item, but in a blink–and–you'll–miss–it moment during the car's reveal, a video package did show the spoiler raising up and out of the way of the lights, and designer Maeda Ikuo has stated in an interview that the spoiler deploys automatically. It's a bit of a shame that the spoiler is completely static in GT7 in its lowered and obstructive position. I've genuinely never understood why spoilers and wings nowadays need to pop up and down. It's just unnecessary mass and complication. I'll deal with the drag penalty at legal speeds and save on the mass, thank you very much. Rear wings are cool, I want to see them, and anyone who thinks they're uncool are pots calling kettles black. Also, remember how I praised the RX-Vision earlier for not having a single screen in the cockpit? Yeah, that might be a bit of a problem, considering the fact that the thin stalks protruding from the doors hold nothing but cameras. They might want to look into that before putting the car into production, and while they're at it, maybe they can also add in door handles and a fuel inlet.
In 2022, seven years after the RX-Vision was initially revealed, Toyota unveiled a good looking, long hood, short deck FR GT3 racer called the GR GT3 Concept, and the folks at Japanese Nostalgic Car quickly connected the dots, similar roof and door cut lines, and proportions to the RX-Vision GT3 Concept that was added to Gran Turismo Sport in 2020. Now, I don't even want to fantasise about knowing what goes on behind closed doors of car design at a corporate level, but this lines up a bit too well with my gut feeling of "The RX-Vision is very unlike the Mazda I know", making me believe that the RX-Vision was never born specifically to be a Mazda to begin with, but rather as a shared platform. I know the auto industry is in a bad place right now, and the clock is ticking on the internal combustion engine, but as a Mazda fan, I don't know if I want a rotary sports car that has to compromise and share platforms with something it was never meant to be. To be clear, I'm not against platform sharing at all; I just think that the rotary sports car is too ingrained into Mazda's identity to share with and be compromised for some other make, even if Toyota and Mazda (along with Subaru) seem to be buddy–buddy in real life.
I don't give praise to Polyphony Digital often, but they've done an absolutely fantastic job in capturing the essence of the RX-Vision in GT7. Designer Maeda Ikuo has stated both in interviews and in the GT Café that he designed the surfaces in such a way that light dynamically dances across the car as the viewer moves around it to make the car appear more as though a living creature and not just a machine, and while a good approximation of this can be experienced without ray tracing, this dynamic light dance absolutely comes alive in GT7 with ray tracing enabled. It genuinely tickles my inner child taking the RX-Visions to Scapes with spectacular lighting, such as the Tokyo National Art Center, and just... moving the car around, much like a child would a toy car in his hands.
While the wheels and plastic trim pieces look black most of the time, at certain angles, they give of a slight candy apple reddish tint, and even that has been captured and replicated faithfully in GT7. It's not very noticable with the original body colour of Soul Red because they pair so well with said paint, but that reddish tint starts to really stick out and look awkward when the car is repainted in anything other than red, or when one messes around with colours and temperatures in photo mode to get the car looking a certain way.
On the technical side of things, Mazda are cautiously tight–lipped about any specs of the RX-Vision, refusing to spare us fans even morsels of information. We only know that the SkyActiv-R engine is the "main power unit", and that it's an FR. Despite Mazda's deliberate wording that leaves open the possibility of hybridisation, the RX-Vision's only power source in GT7 is its screamer of a Rotary Engine, interpreted by Polyphony Digital to be a naturally aspirated 4–Rotor that revs to 9,500rpm, producing a peak of 517HP (386kW) at 8,800rpm and 489.2N⋅m (360.8lbf⋅ft) at 7,500rpm. If you think PD were super generous with those power figures, wait till you see how little the RX-Vision weighs according to them: a mere 1,290kg (2,844lbs); 60 kilos (132lbs) lighter than the RX-8 Spirit R and just 20 kilos (44lbs) heavier than the RX-7 Spirit R Type A. These figures put the RX-Vision's performance somewhere around those of the C6 Corvette ZR1, Ferrari 458, and the NC1 NSX; all of which familiar names and flagships the FD RX-7 could go toe–to–toe with in the early nineties.
While the SkyActiv-R engine's power curves and noise do make it extremely similar to the R26B 4–Rotor of the 787B, a very pleasant surprise greeted me when I got into the car from the garage: it made actual 787B noises! This is a big deal to me because I've complained about PD not having a real 787B to scan and record back when I reviewed the 787B in GT Sport, resulting in the digital 787B—and anything else derivative and accepting of its 4–rotor—sounding decidedly unlike the real 787B, including the RX-Vision GT3 Concept. In other words, the "base" RX-Vision sounds more like a racecar than even literal racecars on startup! Despite this, the sound of the base RX-Vision has been notably muffled from its GT3 counterpart during actual gameplay, itself already slightly muffled from the sound of the faux 787B. Some have expressed that the piercing wail of the 787B's 4–Rotor is grating to listen to, and even I have to concur with that sentiment. The RX-Vision's sound, having gone through so much muffling, is perfectly fine to listen to even for long periods of time, all while still sounding highly distinct. It has struck the perfect balance in my opinion, especially if one can suspend their disbelief and not question how something with this much character and volume can ever hope to make production in today's car climate.
The benefits of not having to exist in the cruel and spiteful world are readily apparent from the right bucket seat of the RX-Vision, as the A–pillars are impossibly thin by stringent modern standards, allowing for an incredible view out front. The RX-Vision also doesn't have to print 0–100km/h times nor pass noise and emissions regulations, so the car can be geared naturally for its power curves and mass. Driving it is such a breath of fresh air and a stark reminder of just how ludicrously compromised modern cars are. 2nd and 3rd gear in the RX-V's sequential gearbox are very close to each other to keep the rev happy Rotary unabashedly screaming unhindered by noise regs, and the car will continue to pull all the way in 6th gear, topping out at redline around 320km/h (199mph) in clean air without even a hint of wanting to function as an overdrive highway cruising gear. Just like the 787B, the RX-Vision has ample mid–range punch normally uncharacteristic of NA Rotary Engines, and when mated to such close gear ratios, the RX-Vision is never left without an answer for any complex of corners. I do however concur with Obelisk and RX8 in saying that the RX-Vision has a bit too short of a final drive ratio for the speeds it feels otherwise capable of. It's not a big deal most of the time, but it does feel like squandered potential in the highly specific scenario of a top speed slipstream battle against other cars, or even copies of itself.
Of course, with performance numbers far surpassing that of the FD RX-7, the suspension setup of the RX-Vision has accordingly been tightened up to be less playful and more immediate. The RX-Vision shows no perceptible pitch and roll on its default Sports Hard tyres from the inside and out, and it's almost racecar immediate in its response to driver inputs. Its stiff suspension, incredibly lightweight body, and meagre downforce values combine to result in a car that reacts to every minute crease and crevice of the road surface, transmitting them all to its driver with such clarity that it even comes across visually in bumper cam, making the RX-V feel extremely raw and constantly on the edge, easily upset by an imperfect public road, beating up its driver visually in lieu of physically through the digital divide. It really does remind me of tuner cars from the 90s with how on edge and unrefined it feels in its pursuit of performance, no doubt worsened by the very modern 20–inch steamroller wheels. That stiff suspension setup can also be problematic even on an obsessively smoothed over racetrack: with a staggered 245–285 tyre setup and a rear weight bias from the long hood, short deck body style, the RX-Vision can struggle to put weight over the front tyres to get the long nose to bite into an apex, which is a problem only highlighted more by the fact that whoever is in charge of setting up fictional cars at PD just loves giving them stupidly tight differential setups, meaning that the laden, grippier rear end of the RX-Vision is always trying to keep the featherweight front end from turning and biting into a corner. On trail braking, there's a very prominent moment wherein the car awkwardly stops wanting to turn, the steering wheel judders, and the front tyres scrub with no leadup nor warning whatsoever, and it's a similar story on corner exits as well, where the rear end will suddenly break loose without warning on power, despite the malleable and predictable nature of the NA engine. What this translates to in practice is a very unpredictable and counter–intuitive car to drive; I find myself braking early for corners just to avoid having enough brake input to lock up the LSD when it comes time to pitch the car into the turn, and on corner exits, I'm always tiptoeing on the accelerator pedal, waiting, anticipating the stupid diff to bust the rear end loose. I keep TCS on at 1/5 when driving the RX-Vision not only because I appreciate the safety net, but also because the TCS light coming on out of a corner as I roll on the accelerator pedal is the only warning I'd get for the RX-Vision wanting to re–enact the last downhill run of Takahashi Keisuke versus God Foot.
Despite the "Vision" in its name, the RX-Vision is, in fact, not a Vision Gran Turismo car, meaning the car can be upgraded and adjusted. One might think then, that the car's rather glaring faults can be fixed, but I'm sad to report that, aside from the gearing, none of the RX-V's prominent faults can be tuned out. While a "fully" customisable suspension kit can be bought for the RX-Vision, the springs can't go soft enough to give clear, stable Vision on Sports Hard tyres, with minimum natural frequencies of 2.30/2.50Hz F/R. For some context, a C6 ZR1's stock values are 1.8/2.0Hz F/R, and that's hardly a soft car to begin with. There are no aero parts for the RX-Vision at all in GT Auto, meaning that the car is just stuck with its default downforce values for life. While the car does produce meaningful downforce as–is according to its spec sheets, it doesn't feel enough to counteract the lift the body naturally generates, as the car feels vague, floaty, and even snappy at high speeds, making some high speed corners and kinks either extremely precarious to take at speed, or just flat out impossible to negotiate without slowing to an extent where that becomes dangerous in itself. It's impossible to brake on the high line for the aggressively banked T1 of High Speed Ring Reverse without introducing the rear quarter panel to some armco, and it WILL snap loose without fail, controller or wheel alike, on the final left kink on Deep Forest's home straight. I'm merely speculating when I say this, but I really think the long hood, short deck body style is to blame for all this lift, as the air along the roofline of the car has to dip sharply to meet the boot lid of the car, creating a region of low pressure where the rear window is. It's why so many Le Mans racer have "long tail" versions, right? To feed higher pressure, less turbulent air to their rear wings for high–speed stability? Maybe this wouldn't be such an issue if we could put a towering rear wing on the RX-Vision to match its roofline à la the GT3 Concept, but despite the racecar already being in GT Sport prior to the release of GT7, none of that trickled down to the base car at all for some unfathomable reason.
For a million credits, I would certainly hope for more customisation options and a much better drive. The C6 ZR1 and any of the AMG GTs are just better cars in every regard, and good luck trying to convince your average petrolhead to not buy a Ferrari 458 and instead shell out more than thrice the Credits for a Mazda. Heck, I'd rather spend more on swapping in a racing 4–Rotor to an RX-7 or RX-8, and end up with cars that boast much more customisability visually and mechanically, to say nothing of the unreal fuel efficiency that racing engines have in this game.
The RX-Vision struck me as odd when I first laid eyes on it, and PD's interpretation of it only solidified those doubts into pure disdain. I'm just glad that Mazda has seemingly moved on from the pure styling exercises and made something much more balanced looking and no less beautiful in the Iconic SP.
I genuinely think PD has given the RX-V too much speed and too little handling. It's obvious to say this in hindsight, but I think if a Mazda Rotary sports car was in production today, its most natural rivals would be the A90 Supra and the RZ34 Fairlady, both of which hover around the 550PP range—some 70PP below where the RX-V currently sits.
I did try my hand at assuaging the RX-V's awful tendencies, and while it is a bit of cheat to lower speed to get the car to handle better, I think I did pretty well, albeit also making the car a little soulless in the process. I think 400HP and 1,380kg (3,042lbs) are more realistic figures for a production car today; both power and mass are below those of the aforementioned Supra and Fairlady, and cruising at Japan's speed limit of 100km/h has the engine doing almost 3,000rpm in 6th gear. Flat out, it's good for around 270km/h (168mph) in clean air. And, of course, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to give the car the manual gearbox it deserved.
I don't know why I did this. I guess I just really wanted to say that I tried everything I could to make the RX-V work. I don't tune often, but I'd like for anyone still reading to give my setup a try and share with me their thoughts on the setup.
Wheels are 19–Inch items (one inch down from the default), at default offset and width.
I did try my hand at assuaging the RX-V's awful tendencies, and while it is a bit of cheat to lower speed to get the car to handle better, I think I did pretty well, albeit also making the car a little soulless in the process. I think 400HP and 1,380kg (3,042lbs) are more realistic figures for a production car today; both power and mass are below those of the aforementioned Supra and Fairlady, and cruising at Japan's speed limit of 100km/h has the engine doing almost 3,000rpm in 6th gear. Flat out, it's good for around 270km/h (168mph) in clean air. And, of course, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to give the car the manual gearbox it deserved.
I don't know why I did this. I guess I just really wanted to say that I tried everything I could to make the RX-V work. I don't tune often, but I'd like for anyone still reading to give my setup a try and share with me their thoughts on the setup.
Wheels are 19–Inch items (one inch down from the default), at default offset and width.
RX-Vision '15:
Maeda Ikuo:The RX-VISION is a car in which I placed my car designer life on the line.
I worked on it from the standpoint of really making the dream sports car I have in my mind.
And one of the most important things for a sports car is its fundamental structure.
Historic cars that are still popular and beautiful to look at today all have exceptionally great proportions.
So the first thing we worked on for the RX-VISION was also the structure.
A textbook FR (Front Engine Rear Drive) with a long nose, and the ability to place proper load on the rear wheels.
In the final stages, we extended the front nose about 150mm from the structure we had originally designed,
the part from the front doors up to the front wheel center.
In the very end we made it a slightly unbalanced proportion...
But at that moment we got a lot of traction on the rear wheels, and thought "This will work!"
That slight unbalance is the hook. It's the secret to making someone go "Hmm".
The other secret is the reflection of light.
If you look at the RX-VISION as you circle it, I think you'll notice that the light's reflection moves around like a creature.
Cars are like family or friends to those who are into them.
And it's a very rare industrial product that runs around on its own.
That makes cars have the same type of existence as animals running around in the wild, or an athlete running on a field.
And when you think of it that way, I also want cars to be something that looks beautiful and truly alive in nature.
And for that you need a "sense of life."
So when thinking about what is the sense of life, that will put cars at one with nature,
we tried to express life in the car with the light's reflections and their beauty on tje car's body.
And those are the type of shapes that are instilled in the RX-VISION.
Sarah:
Thank you for that great story, Maeda-san!
Maeda Ikuo:
The pleasure was all mine. If we meet again, I hope we can talk more about cars and design.
RX-Vision GT3 Concept '20
Maeda Ikuo:When producing the RX-VISION, I had a long running desire to make the RX-VISION a GT3 car and compete in the Le Mans.
I'm a car designer, but I have a soft spot for motorsports.
The first movie that I spent my own allowance on to go see in a theater, during elementary school, was about the 24 hours of Le Mans.
I still remember being really excited to see the fantastic battles between cars like the Porsche 917 and Ferrari 512S.
It made me want to race at the Le Mans in the future, and it also was what got me to strive for a job involving cars.
Mazda won the Le Mans,
and that event naturally connected to that scene of the Le Mans that I dreamed of as a child.
But I want to have everyone take interest in todays motorsports scene, not just events of the past like the 787B.
I strongly hope to add a new page to Mazda's motorsports.
In that respect the GT3 version of the RX-VISION was a car that I really wanted to make happen,
and I was able to do that first in Gran Turismo virtually.
This is something I created with the strong conviction, "that this will be a real car in the future."
And I personally want to drive the Sarthe circuit in this car.
Sarah:
Thank you for that great story, Maeda-san!
Maeda Ikuo:
The pleasure was all mine. If we meet again, I hope we can talk more about cars and design.
