- 4,209
- Wasilla, AK
As you may or may not know, last October I got hold of a copy of Tokyo Xtreme Racer 3. And, just to prove that all those don't-sue-us-if-you-crash-and-die "keep it on the track" disclaimers don't work, I became fascinated by that kind of racing that can only be done properly on the street, Japanese-style highway racing (don't worry mods, I still don't race in real life, there are other reasons I avoid it). Cliffs for those who don't know, I myself am not sure if this is how it really worked because I've never actually been to Japan: racers cruise along a route, be it the C1, the Wangan (though that one probably wasn't used for this type of racing in real life), whatever, searching for other racers. When one racer flashes his high-beams at another, that's a challenge to battle. If the challenge is accepted, then the drivers start racing and when one driver manages to outrun the other successfully, or push the other to give up, he's won it. If there's a fork in the road and the two drivers take different paths, it ends in a draw.
But remember how it can only truly be done on the street? And also how going really, really fast on the street is illegal? And dangerous (the Mid Night Club disbanded after a race against some drunk bikers ended with fatalities)?
That's where this idea comes in. We have a fairly realistic racing game, and if they ever do add free-roam it'll probably have at least one highway somewhere, so why not start a league for it in Gran Turismo? Thing is, though, getting it right would require a lot of planning. I.E. how much realism should we go for, and in what ways? How do we avoid overcrowding of popular routes and underutilization of others? How do we prevent it from becoming full of kids in max tuned hypercars and race cars bouncing off the barriers, while still allowing those who can control such cars properly to use them? How do we discourage overly rough racing without banning people over moves some professional sanctioned motorsports would allow? I created this thread to get those details hammered out, so if/when a Gran Turismo game adds onilne free-roam (presumably on the PS4, at the very earliest), we can "hit the ground running" so to speak. We can start with issues of routing and route utilization and go from there.
-Grandfather clause: should routes featured in a TXR title be automatically included, even if they interfere with others?
-Splits: in earlier TXR titles, the C1 route included Route Y, which branched off from it along the lower east side of the route and rejoined on the north side, with a road running between them farther north along the east side. In which circumstances should such splits be tolerated? This ties in with the grandfather clause above and with the next question, about route length.
-Route length: what should the minimum length for a route be before it has to be made a part of another route? What about maximum length? Should the entire 40+ miles of, say, Wangan B Westbound be all one route or should it be broken up into smaller sectors? What about truly huge routes like that 100+ mile ring road around London, if that were to be included?
-Should routes all be circuitous, or should point-to-point routes be allowed?
-How to keep the routes in use? Should we register racers to one specific route each? If teams are formed (and they almost certianly will be), should we require all their racers to register to the same route? How can we encourage drivers to use their home route while still allowing them to venture off it?
-It is a very real possibliity that some routes, especially famous routes like C1, Wangan B, and possibly Shin Kanjou, to use Tokyo as an example again, will become so clogged with racers that it will become difficult to race on them. Meanwhile others in the same city, or other entire cities, will be almost completely empty. How strictly should we limit the number of teams and "wanderers" (independent drivers) on each route? Should we limit them seperately or just put a limit on the number of drivers that can be registered to a route?
-And how should we calculate the limit for number of cars per route? Should we use straight-up length or lane-miles?
-For the purpose of calculating lane-miles, should express lanes, exit lanes that haven't exited yet, shoulders wide enough to drive on, etc. be included or excluded? In other words, should lane-miles include only lanes you can cruise in, or should it include parts of the road that can be dodged into to avoid traffic or make a pass during a race?
-And what about the reversible lanes of some freeways?
-Speaking of which, should the system of approved roads be set up so that there is are no dead-ends, so a driver can fully explore the system without having to make a u-turn or drive on a non-route road? Hard to verbalize, so I hope I explained it well.
-As for point-to-point routes, should we require all of them to have bypasses to allow drivers to return to the starts of their home routes without travelling on other "racing" roads?
-If the answer to the above question is yes, should undivided surface roads be allowed for the purpose of putting loops at the end of, or making loops with, highways and divided roads that dead-end or become undivided without connecting to another such road?
-And what about surface street routes where a driver could potentially end up in the oncoming lane during a race? Should that oncoming be included in our lane-miles calculation?
-Now on to matters of policing and housekeeping. I propose a licensing system whereby drivers and teams will be subject to PP limits, and some sort of money system. The PP limits would involve some sort of licensing & testing sytem, ensuring that people don't try to race cars they don't handle. I propose a system whereby a driver has to submit a video of themselves running/lapping the route they plan to register for. They must supply a car of appropriate PP and submit a video of themselves lapping or running the route the register on. They must beat a reference time based on the PP level they're applying for, set to ensure they drive more or less at 10/10ths while still being able to back off when conditions require. If the run takes significantly less than 10 minutes, they can fill the rest of that time with street hooning for extra credit. And it must be done in an online lobby, with traffic enabled if possible. During all this time there must be no harsh contact with traffic, other players, visible walls, or invisible walls if the car would've come into harsh contact with one of the above anyway. A limited exception could be made for certain extenuating circumstances, for example, a player trying to be a cop chases the driver and tries to run him or her off the road. However, if the police, player or NPC, do show up, the player has to lose them with the camera still rolling. Meanwhile a monetary system should be put in place as well - perhaps a player could be given some starting cash based on their main in-game financial status and the PP level they're approved to race at, then awarded monetary prizes for winning races. These two things should prevent the exclusive use of max tuned and/or exotic cars, ensuring drivers have to work their way up, while also keeping obnoxious kids in gold hypercars from ruining everything. Of course, a Forza-style system of being able to donate credits to people will make this about a million times easier.
-Meanwhile, a player police force will keep the use of street-illegal race cars in check by chasing them on sight.
-But then, how do we ensure competition? If one team on a route is only qualified for, say, 300 HP tuned cars, and the other is good to go for 850 HP exotics, each team will only race against itself. There might be some independents caught in the middle somewhere.
-Domestic markets. Should the cars usable on a given map be restricted to those that can be bought in or legally imported to that country, making those "illegal" subject to the same chase-on-sight rule as race cars? For example, the only Skylines available to drivers in U.S. environments would be R33 GTR, very early R32, and anything older than that.
-Draws: if a driver is far behind and takes a different path at a fork, should that count as a loss to prevent a losing driver from trying to save face by taking a different turn? Should the whole "instant draw" thing be rethought and a review of the race used to determine the winner?
-Dirty driving: Come on, it's street racing, it's not going to be GTP-OLR clean. And I'd even go so far as to say a modicum of aggressive driving should be allowed. So how do we prevent things from getting to rowdy? Perhaps a hybrid of votekick and steward's review whereby a sufficiently ill-tempered driver can be penalized or booted from the league?
And I've probably forgotten some. Discuss away!
But remember how it can only truly be done on the street? And also how going really, really fast on the street is illegal? And dangerous (the Mid Night Club disbanded after a race against some drunk bikers ended with fatalities)?
That's where this idea comes in. We have a fairly realistic racing game, and if they ever do add free-roam it'll probably have at least one highway somewhere, so why not start a league for it in Gran Turismo? Thing is, though, getting it right would require a lot of planning. I.E. how much realism should we go for, and in what ways? How do we avoid overcrowding of popular routes and underutilization of others? How do we prevent it from becoming full of kids in max tuned hypercars and race cars bouncing off the barriers, while still allowing those who can control such cars properly to use them? How do we discourage overly rough racing without banning people over moves some professional sanctioned motorsports would allow? I created this thread to get those details hammered out, so if/when a Gran Turismo game adds onilne free-roam (presumably on the PS4, at the very earliest), we can "hit the ground running" so to speak. We can start with issues of routing and route utilization and go from there.
-Grandfather clause: should routes featured in a TXR title be automatically included, even if they interfere with others?
-Splits: in earlier TXR titles, the C1 route included Route Y, which branched off from it along the lower east side of the route and rejoined on the north side, with a road running between them farther north along the east side. In which circumstances should such splits be tolerated? This ties in with the grandfather clause above and with the next question, about route length.
-Route length: what should the minimum length for a route be before it has to be made a part of another route? What about maximum length? Should the entire 40+ miles of, say, Wangan B Westbound be all one route or should it be broken up into smaller sectors? What about truly huge routes like that 100+ mile ring road around London, if that were to be included?
-Should routes all be circuitous, or should point-to-point routes be allowed?
-How to keep the routes in use? Should we register racers to one specific route each? If teams are formed (and they almost certianly will be), should we require all their racers to register to the same route? How can we encourage drivers to use their home route while still allowing them to venture off it?
-It is a very real possibliity that some routes, especially famous routes like C1, Wangan B, and possibly Shin Kanjou, to use Tokyo as an example again, will become so clogged with racers that it will become difficult to race on them. Meanwhile others in the same city, or other entire cities, will be almost completely empty. How strictly should we limit the number of teams and "wanderers" (independent drivers) on each route? Should we limit them seperately or just put a limit on the number of drivers that can be registered to a route?
-And how should we calculate the limit for number of cars per route? Should we use straight-up length or lane-miles?
-For the purpose of calculating lane-miles, should express lanes, exit lanes that haven't exited yet, shoulders wide enough to drive on, etc. be included or excluded? In other words, should lane-miles include only lanes you can cruise in, or should it include parts of the road that can be dodged into to avoid traffic or make a pass during a race?
-And what about the reversible lanes of some freeways?
-Speaking of which, should the system of approved roads be set up so that there is are no dead-ends, so a driver can fully explore the system without having to make a u-turn or drive on a non-route road? Hard to verbalize, so I hope I explained it well.
-As for point-to-point routes, should we require all of them to have bypasses to allow drivers to return to the starts of their home routes without travelling on other "racing" roads?
-If the answer to the above question is yes, should undivided surface roads be allowed for the purpose of putting loops at the end of, or making loops with, highways and divided roads that dead-end or become undivided without connecting to another such road?
-And what about surface street routes where a driver could potentially end up in the oncoming lane during a race? Should that oncoming be included in our lane-miles calculation?
-Now on to matters of policing and housekeeping. I propose a licensing system whereby drivers and teams will be subject to PP limits, and some sort of money system. The PP limits would involve some sort of licensing & testing sytem, ensuring that people don't try to race cars they don't handle. I propose a system whereby a driver has to submit a video of themselves running/lapping the route they plan to register for. They must supply a car of appropriate PP and submit a video of themselves lapping or running the route the register on. They must beat a reference time based on the PP level they're applying for, set to ensure they drive more or less at 10/10ths while still being able to back off when conditions require. If the run takes significantly less than 10 minutes, they can fill the rest of that time with street hooning for extra credit. And it must be done in an online lobby, with traffic enabled if possible. During all this time there must be no harsh contact with traffic, other players, visible walls, or invisible walls if the car would've come into harsh contact with one of the above anyway. A limited exception could be made for certain extenuating circumstances, for example, a player trying to be a cop chases the driver and tries to run him or her off the road. However, if the police, player or NPC, do show up, the player has to lose them with the camera still rolling. Meanwhile a monetary system should be put in place as well - perhaps a player could be given some starting cash based on their main in-game financial status and the PP level they're approved to race at, then awarded monetary prizes for winning races. These two things should prevent the exclusive use of max tuned and/or exotic cars, ensuring drivers have to work their way up, while also keeping obnoxious kids in gold hypercars from ruining everything. Of course, a Forza-style system of being able to donate credits to people will make this about a million times easier.
-Meanwhile, a player police force will keep the use of street-illegal race cars in check by chasing them on sight.
-But then, how do we ensure competition? If one team on a route is only qualified for, say, 300 HP tuned cars, and the other is good to go for 850 HP exotics, each team will only race against itself. There might be some independents caught in the middle somewhere.
-Domestic markets. Should the cars usable on a given map be restricted to those that can be bought in or legally imported to that country, making those "illegal" subject to the same chase-on-sight rule as race cars? For example, the only Skylines available to drivers in U.S. environments would be R33 GTR, very early R32, and anything older than that.
-Draws: if a driver is far behind and takes a different path at a fork, should that count as a loss to prevent a losing driver from trying to save face by taking a different turn? Should the whole "instant draw" thing be rethought and a review of the race used to determine the winner?
-Dirty driving: Come on, it's street racing, it's not going to be GTP-OLR clean. And I'd even go so far as to say a modicum of aggressive driving should be allowed. So how do we prevent things from getting to rowdy? Perhaps a hybrid of votekick and steward's review whereby a sufficiently ill-tempered driver can be penalized or booted from the league?
And I've probably forgotten some. Discuss away!
Even though it's one of the simplest in terms of visuals (but perhaps one of the best in the rain?), it is one of the most immersive tracks for me. It's pretty sweet being in a pack of 5 or 6 cars, crossing the bridge at 240mph, and seeing another pack flying by the other way....that kind of stuff turns me on 
