- 55
- Eleven-Seven
My two cents, while we're on the topic of the general competitiveness of the events, from the perspective of a pleb who enjoys racing and esports.
As far as racing categories, I think this is something I'm willing to concede. If PD wants to use this as a showcase of the game in addition to a competition I think that's fair, as long as the “showcase” elements don’t usurp the competition, which can be debated but i don’t think it truly has. It certainly WOULD be more competitive if every race were one-make in the x2014 or something similar, but as a viewer it’s nice to see a varied field of cars with various strengths through the various categories race together (the balance within these categories and general competitiveness is something i’ll touch on in a bit.)
I am disappointed there weren’t more and/or longer races, as all the drivers that made it this far worked very hard to get there, and while I think the ticket to Monaco is plenty reward for the effort (I know i would be happy with it at least), PD brought them there to race and it’s a shame to see guys’ competitions over when all 30 of them are good enough to compete for the championship on their own.
That being said I can’t argue too much with the length of the event. I’d definitely like to see 3-4 hour livestreams, but with a couple thousand live viewers (not bad numbers at all, but again not much compared to the CS, League, Rocket League streams with years of growth behind them) I think they are looking to having more on-demand viewers, and something around the 2-3 hour mark is probably where to shoot for considering that. 3-4 races is still a pretty good day’s worth, even if I think some of them could stand to be just a bit longer.
About the fairness and competitiveness, first the qualifying. This I’m fine with given everyone had the same window of opportunity. As a driver I prefer to have a longer qualifying session of course but at least it’s fair nonetheless.
As for the balance within categories this is something that will always be an issue as long as there isn’t free selection or one-makes, just that the degree is up to PD to balance BoP. Even if the field is as balanced as can be the various tracks will still give an edge to certain manufacturers given their disposition towards accelerations, speed, handling, etc. The solution is standardization across the board, but I don’t think balance is that bad to be an insurmountable obstacle (possibly with the exception of N500 but I’ve never raced them online so I couldn’t tell you for sure).
The general point I’d like to make, though, is that i’ve been a sports fan long enough to know that the champions aren’t always the best, and the best aren’t always champions. This is especially true in racing where dozens of people are fighting it out for the same position simultaneously, someone deserving is bound to lose out. This is particularly true since our competitors are coming into the championship where all the points will be earned over one weekend rather than over the course of a whole season. So while whoever becomes champions in both cups will have certainly earned it I’m sure there will still be quite a few who can claim to be the best at the end of the day, and they’ll get the chance to prove it in the coming seasons and events.
So don’t let the Worlds being imperfect dampen your enjoyment of the racing we’ve had so far (which has been excellent I think) and will have and just give whatever feedback you can, I’m sure PD is open to tweaking the format to make future events better. And overall just appreciate that we get to see the best GT drivers the world has to offer duke it out for a modern art piece for their apartment.
As far as racing categories, I think this is something I'm willing to concede. If PD wants to use this as a showcase of the game in addition to a competition I think that's fair, as long as the “showcase” elements don’t usurp the competition, which can be debated but i don’t think it truly has. It certainly WOULD be more competitive if every race were one-make in the x2014 or something similar, but as a viewer it’s nice to see a varied field of cars with various strengths through the various categories race together (the balance within these categories and general competitiveness is something i’ll touch on in a bit.)
I am disappointed there weren’t more and/or longer races, as all the drivers that made it this far worked very hard to get there, and while I think the ticket to Monaco is plenty reward for the effort (I know i would be happy with it at least), PD brought them there to race and it’s a shame to see guys’ competitions over when all 30 of them are good enough to compete for the championship on their own.
That being said I can’t argue too much with the length of the event. I’d definitely like to see 3-4 hour livestreams, but with a couple thousand live viewers (not bad numbers at all, but again not much compared to the CS, League, Rocket League streams with years of growth behind them) I think they are looking to having more on-demand viewers, and something around the 2-3 hour mark is probably where to shoot for considering that. 3-4 races is still a pretty good day’s worth, even if I think some of them could stand to be just a bit longer.
About the fairness and competitiveness, first the qualifying. This I’m fine with given everyone had the same window of opportunity. As a driver I prefer to have a longer qualifying session of course but at least it’s fair nonetheless.
As for the balance within categories this is something that will always be an issue as long as there isn’t free selection or one-makes, just that the degree is up to PD to balance BoP. Even if the field is as balanced as can be the various tracks will still give an edge to certain manufacturers given their disposition towards accelerations, speed, handling, etc. The solution is standardization across the board, but I don’t think balance is that bad to be an insurmountable obstacle (possibly with the exception of N500 but I’ve never raced them online so I couldn’t tell you for sure).
The general point I’d like to make, though, is that i’ve been a sports fan long enough to know that the champions aren’t always the best, and the best aren’t always champions. This is especially true in racing where dozens of people are fighting it out for the same position simultaneously, someone deserving is bound to lose out. This is particularly true since our competitors are coming into the championship where all the points will be earned over one weekend rather than over the course of a whole season. So while whoever becomes champions in both cups will have certainly earned it I’m sure there will still be quite a few who can claim to be the best at the end of the day, and they’ll get the chance to prove it in the coming seasons and events.
So don’t let the Worlds being imperfect dampen your enjoyment of the racing we’ve had so far (which has been excellent I think) and will have and just give whatever feedback you can, I’m sure PD is open to tweaking the format to make future events better. And overall just appreciate that we get to see the best GT drivers the world has to offer duke it out for a modern art piece for their apartment.
