Gran Turismo Sport - Thoughts so far ...
Forgive the double post, but this is a new topic. I thought about posting it in the GTP Classix Club thread, but as this thread gets the most traffic I decided to post here and will put a link in the Wednesday Cobras and Club threads (I didn't post it in the GTS section as it would quickly get swamped and is only really relevant to racers in our championships) This post will be about GTS - I hope that you will add your thoughts, comments and any facts to this thread. There is a bewildering amount of stuff on the GTS section of GT Planet and I thought it would be helpful to record our thoughts here, particularly in terms of how the new game will affect Sick's Race Room and our online racing plans for 2017. I was unable to watch the live stream, but watched the last half of the recording which included a Mazda MX5 race at "Tokyo Expressway" a short race at Brands Hatch and a five lap race with pit stop and driver change at the Nordschleife. Subject to time, I will watch the first half this weekend.
To recap - at the start of the year I thought it was likely that GTS would be released in time for Christmas 2016 so I planned GT6 race series up until the end of this year. I decided last October to wait until Black Friday / Cyber Monday 2016 before picking up a PS4 which I will hold back so my wife can let me have it for Christmas along with a copy of GTS or another racing title if reviews from you guys are unfavourable.
What we know so far
Cars 137 new or remodelled for GTS with full interiors
Locations 19 with 27 layouts - I am not sure how this compares with the number currently in GT6
1000 "Scapes" - landscapes / photo locations in which subject to space you can place an unlimited number of cars.
Livery editor with tabs for: Body, Side Mirror, Rear Wing, Wheel, Driver Number and Windshield Banner
FIA sanctioned online events with opportunity to represent Country and / or Manufacturer
The cars are split into groups of cars of equal performance: Gr1, Gr2, Gr3, Gr4 and N.
I read that 19 players can race at once (currently 16)
Thoughts / Speculation
I have long thought that an FIA Manufacturers Championship could only work if the cars were equal in performance - if there was any difference players would just pick the fastest car. They seem to have done this and have split the cars into groups. Group N is for road cars and a Mazda was spotted with N200 on. The guess is that N is split into several divisions e.g. 200, 300 etc. so that cars such as the Corvette and Focus will be placed with cars of equal performance.
It is my guess that no tuning will be possible of cars in FIA sanctioned events - this will ensure that cars remain equal in performance. It could also help with security of the game / prevent hacking.
Another guess is that the gearbox is automatically set to appropriate ratios to match the track that has been selected. This is pure speculation on my part, but if tuning is barred on FIA sanctioned events this would make sense. I didn't see any cars hitting the limiter on the fast straights and there didn't appear to be any difference in speed between the cars.
During the Nordschleife race there were a lot of collisions between cars and they didn't appear to be slowed in a realistic way by going off the track into gravel - this seemed like GT6 with edge grip set to low.
Collisions involving multiple cars triggered a full course yellow with a maximum speed limit of 60mph. After a short time this switched to green and the limit was lifted.
I realise that the players used to demonstrate the game are much better than me, but the cornering speeds did not look realistic - I presume that race soft tyres were used at Brands Hatch and the Nordschleife. At Tokyo Expressway the Mazda MX5's were used and they weren't cornering as if on rails - there was a certain amount of drift angle and the ability of the best drivers to turn in at the correct time predicting the trajectory of the car around high speed corners on a track with barriers was very impressive.
Classic road cars and historic race cars
None have been announced so far - maybe they are being held for GT7 or maybe PD are holding back on some of the Groups so that they can announce them nearer to the release date.
@sirjim73 is at the event in London today and has kindly promised to keep his eyes and ears open for us classic fans. There is a list in the GTS section of the site of who is attending today and many of them are uploading stuff to twitter or their youtube channels. Watch out for stuff posted by Sir Jim and
@CORRUPTEDDISC
New Steering Wheel
A new model of steering wheel from Thrustmaster was spotted yesterday - it is believed to be an official GTS wheel and looked very impressive - different from anything seen so far. The guess is that it is a high end wheel and probably a replacement for the T500RS.
Beta - a beta of the game was due to be released in the Spring as a free download - this appears to have been dropped and you will need to wait until 18th November (in the UK) to get a copy of GTS.
Limited Edition Copies - full details are on GTPlanet of limited editions available for the USA and Europe. There is an incredible looking "Group B Rally Mustang" available.
Conclusions
The Scapes mode and the livery editor sound great, but the lack of an announcement regarding classic cars is worrying and may mean that hardcore classic fans will skip this game and move to another such as Project Cars or Asetto Corsa or stick with GT6 until GT7 is released. One of my friends has already switched to Forza, but that is not an option for me as I cannot play with a hand controller and cannot justify the price of a new wheel.
PD seem to have done a great job with the creation of imaginary cars such as the Alfa Romeo 4C, but some of the Vision GT cars frankly look ridiculous on track. I understand that they have had to create imaginary cars in order to have 16 cars in the Manufacturers Cup, but I would much rather have had real cars. The new Mustang is utterly gorgeous, but also crazy - there were plenty of real Group B cars that PD could have chosen including the fabulous Ford RS200 - I don't think there has been a competitive rally Mustang since the days of Bo "Bosse" Ljungfeldt in the mid 1960's.
Please add your thoughts, questions etc - some of the people who read this thread such as
@eran0004 and
@IfAndOr are very knowledge and together we can sort through the mountains of information to find the nuggets.
. hopefully catch u next time !!! 
Not sure where my brain was at that point, making a cup of tea I think.
Struggled to take the rhythm in the qualification race, was perfect on the main one ! Lapping around 1:43:4xx, again I was sad to have nobody to fight with... 
👍 
