Real life has been pretty hectic for me this week, and hence why I couldn't join the rest for this week's COTW races
However, seeing the chosen car for this week, I really wanted to at least have a quick go and quick (yeah right...) review.
Nissan Skyline GT-R V・spec II (R32) Quickie Review
Under the microscope and in the limelight this week is the R32 GT-R, the first in the now holy trinity of Godzillas, and the generation of Skylines that brought back the holy "GT-R" badge after over a decade and a half of absence. And not just any R32, either. It's the cream of the crop, the latest of the R32s, the 1994 V・spec II.
The sports cars of the early 90s Japanese economy bubble is well documented, and each manufacturer had their own sports car that became legendary in their own right. Me personally, I'm firmly a FD RX-7 guy, and also a NSX guy on particularly unfaithful days. The GT-R just never was my cup of tea. I've always found it too bland looking, too heavy, and too much focused on straight line speed and not the bits to keep that speed in check. My opinion doesn't make the car mean any less to petrolheads around the world, however. Between the seemingly endless tuning potential of its legendary RB26DETT engine, its sheer exclusivity factor in never being meant for export outside Japan, and its exaggeration-like true stories of how it dominated every discipline of racing it partook in, the R32 GT-R is never short on adoration by motoring fans worldwide.
I was hoping I could share a bit of that joy by falling for the R32 this week, but I came away somewhat disappointed, as I had expected to be. Confirmation bias, perhaps?
If I had to describe the driving experience of the R32 in one word, it'd be "dull". The engine sounds dull. It revs dull. Throttle response is dull. Steering feel is dull. It looks dull. It comes almost exclusively in dull colours. Even its special, limited colour, Midnight Purple, is dull. This car is the textbook definition, the textbook example of what a "sleeper" car is. Dull as all hell, but goes like a missile.
Granted, its acceleration won't be wowing anyone by today's standards, but back in the early to mid 90s, this sort of off the line launching capabilities is gut punching quick. This car is unbeatable on a standing start in the 90s. The NSX is "only" rear wheel drive. The WRX and Evo are both in their infancy in the early 90s. The FC RX-7 is
totally destrolished on all fronts by the might of this GT-R, not just the straights. First gear in the R32 tops off at almost 80km/h, and 2nd goes well over 120. It's honestly not even a competition on the standing launch front.
However, I feel that that's where the GT-R gains all of its adoration from, because the car simply feels "meh" after you get out of 2nd. Because the gearing on the R32 is so high, 3rd onwards feels very by the numbers, nothing amazing, nothing breathtaking. The gearing disadvantage of 3rd to 5th in the R32 brings out a rather ugly fact about the RB26 engine in this car: it has a very narrow powerband, in my opinion. It's not an engine you can lug, it's not a car you can simply stab at the throttle in the wrong gear and expect it to pick up, like today's cars. Powerband I feel is from 6k to 7.5k rpm. This engine has such vast amounts of nothing from 8 to 8.5k that it actually pulls better if you short shift it, even from 4th to 5th, even with its long and wide spread gearing.
Where I found this engine a delight however, is strangely not on the straights, but in the braking zones for the corners. This engine, while having no torque up top, is very rev happy, oddly enough, and is strangely receptive to over revving on downshifts (this sentence makes sense in some weird universe out there, I swear). You can really downshift early in this car, and the car stops so much better when you do. Not only does it sound great, but it even breaks the rear of the car somewhat loose, helping you rotate into apexes better. Heck, if the corner is slow enough and if you dare try it, dropping into first at 80-ish km/h feels like harpooning an anchor into the asphalt, and the rear end gets so lively and playful I can't help but to crack a smile every time I do it. Each downshift is such an event, and every tight corner is such a long awaited moment of glee because of dropping down to first gear.
In fact, this car feels like it has to be, is meant to be, and wants to be driven this way, like a drift car. I didn't realise it from the driver's seat, but when looking back at replays, I was entering almost every corner at an odd yaw angle, contrary to the consensus that the ATTESA AWD system disallows drifting. Granted, I wasn't smoking tyres kind of drifting, but the angles still look weird as heck in photos, nonetheless. You need to monitor and adjust your yaw angle on turn-in, and there is every possibility of overcooking it, especially on downhill corners where even less weight is on the rear tyres. Brock's Skyline at Bathurst in particular, I simply cannot get right in this car, as the comparatively light rear end always seems to want to swing out on braking.
That said, on corner exits, this car feels... like a front wheel drive sedan. The fronts do all the work in dictating the direction of travel, and wrestles the rear end into following along. There's no drama, there's no feedback, nothing at all, from the rear. The rear end feels very much like dead weight to me, which comes as a huge surprise because I thought this thing was rear wheel drive most of the time, with the front axles kicking in only when the car detects it needs the extra traction.
Watching the rather curious "FRONT TORQUE kg-m" meter on the dash however, it acts so much like a turbo gauge I at first thought it was just that at the start: a turbo gauge. It raises to the maximum when I stab on the gas with the stock power in a straight, dry road. At no point did it seem to leave the car in rear wheel drive mode. I'm not sure if this is the case with the real car, or if PD has yet again inaccurately replicated gauge behaviour (
mumble grumble FC and FD turbo gauges mumble grumble). I can see evidence for both cases, however. The driving dynamics seem to suggest a full time AWD mode to me, yet at the same time, the gauge itself seems horrendously inaccurate to me: even partial throttle maxes out the front torque gauge in the dry, and somehow downshifting blips it as though it were a turbo gauge.
Unlike a turbo gauge however, it doesn't instantly dip if you let off the gas:
Either the ATTESA AWD system is confusing as heck, or PD really screwed something up here.
Because of this car's own heft, and how it seemingly simultaneously understeers and oversteers on corner entry, this car chews its tyres up at a horrendous rate. The first thing that struck me when I took a corner in this car is just how front heavy it is. Of course, that's just how sedans are, and the vanilla Skyline body and chassis was designed first and foremost to be a practical, sensible, everyday sedan. The GT-R is just a load of go fast bits, clever programming, and hefty expectations dumped onto its hapless shell, so it's only understandable it's so horrendously nose heavy. It has to be said though, that the R32's chassis rigidity is quite remarkably strong for its time, in spite of its humble origins. The car always felt limited by lack of tyre grip and excessive body roll rather than body flex in the corners, and tyres and suspension is are way easier fixes than stiffening the chassis of your car.
Not only the tyres - this car is very heavy on fuel consumption as well. 5 laps of Bathurst at racing pace saw the R32 drink 20 litres of fuel (at 1x fuel consumption). For comparison, a larger displacing 3 litre 6 cylinder 1992 NSX-R drank 17 for the same 5 laps (and was faster too, to boot). Couple the tyre wear and fuel consumption rates with the R32's Achilles' Heel, brake fade, and you have a car that is very quick for about five minutes, if even that, before it starts to fall apart on its driver. Thoroughly unimpressive in my opinion. I think I've had to scale back my braking points in the R32 after 3 laps of Bathurst, about 7 and a half minutes of running it (at 1x tyre wear with the default Sports Hard tyres), because the tyres were simply dying. And this isn't even taking into account brake fade, because this game doesn't simulate that.
While I wasn't wowed by the R32's driving dynamics, I did wonder if the R32 really was that bad, or if all cars from that time are just as bad. Hopping into a 1992 NSX-R, I quickly made a mess of myself, and I realised just how biased I was because I loved the NSX, and was more ready to make excuses for its similarly appalling driving, like "but it's
fun because it's so light!", or "oversteer is more correctable than understeer!". However, with my mishaps in the NSX fresh in my mind, I drove the R32 again, and what struck me was just how little drama there is, provided you know its limits and conscientiously keep your driving within its limits, as once S.S. Skyline starts understeering, there really is no getting it back. It is a very pleasant drive at 9 tenths, which is completely fair for a sports car. Despite the GT-R's tradition on relying on cutting edge technology and smart computers, the R32 never once felt like it was ever holding your hand; the driving experience was raw and visceral as they come, and I could still work up a sweat wrestling this thing around a track. It is the absolute happy medium between the analogue and the digital, and I think no other car, other than the R32, R33, and R34 managed, or even attempted, to balance on that fine knife edge.
Stylistically, I've just never been drawn to the GT-Rs. They all look very ho-hum, barely distinguishable from the bland Skyline sedans on which they're based. This car looks so boring, it made me loathe shooting it for this review. I have never seen any car so devoid of shape, creases, or personality moreso than the R32. If you asked a three year old to draw a car, they would probably inadvertently draw an R32, simply because it's so... featureless. It has a way of looking so impossibly flat in photos, it makes shooting a chore.
I suppose the unassuming looks, the wolf in sheep's clothing, is appealing to some. Don't get me wrong; I like me a modest car, but there's a very clear cut line between modest and boring, and the R32's styling, or more accurately, lack thereof, is firmly on the side of boring. I'd be lying however, if I wouldn't stop, stare, and drop my jaw on the ground every time I come across one in real life though. I think the GT-R only looks good to those who know what it is and what it's capable of. This being a style I was never drawn to, I'm not sure if it being the most understated in its holy trinity of Skyline GT-Rs is a good or bad thing. I do appreciate its comparatively smaller size compared to the R33 and R34, however, and the stamped-in "SKYLINE" on the rear bumper is an oddly satisfying touch. The upgraded BBS wheels the V・spec II comes stock with is nothing short of salivating, too. Why don't all sports cars come standard with these wheels?
I get it. It's a monster of a car when tuned. It's meant to be tuned. It's screaming to be tuned, as evidenced by it's high revving, nothing-up-top, understressed and too strong an engine, and by its tall as a mountain gearing that will suit a 600BHP highway cruiser. But why should I as a customer have to fix the product I bought brand new? The RX-7 is every bit as "meant to be tuned". So is the NSX. So is the Impreza. Those are cohesive, fun packages bone stock, which is why I like them more than the GT-R. Honestly? I think 95% of this car's value is in its engine. The GT-R feels broken and crippled brand new, bone stock. I feel like I've only bought half a car. It's why stock examples of these cars are so incredibly hard to come by, and why unmolested specimens of these cars cost so darn much. I'm surprised PD even managed to find a showroom condition one of these to model for this game. Must have been in a Nissan Museum or something.
I think I understand its appeal, but the R32 really isn't for me. The R34, with all its refinements in handling and the same engine, maybe. But the R32...
ehhhhh.
