Not really. I'm not an esports guy myself but once you reach a certain level of skill only human opponents are a challenge. GT has to keep focused on multiplayer to stay relevant. The good news for us offline racers is that GT7 was clearly designed to cater to both and all of the many updates to come will improve both experiences.
I think there is a distinction between online multiplayer and eSports. I love the online stuff on GT Sport, you can jump straight into a race with the best matchmaking I've seen in a racing game. eSports is the elite stuff which focuses on the best 40-50 players and gets a disproportionate amount of coverage compared to anything else, for a series that has been built on a solid fanbase of casuals and general car enthusiasts I think that can be off-putting.
I'd argue casual multiplayer (open lobbies) and competitive multiplayer (sport mode) are the real distinctions that need to be made with Gran Turismo's online portion.
I love me some drift lobbies, i admire Sport mode but it's not my thing. I do love watching the FIA races though.
It shows nothing of the sort. It shows that Fanatec has a DD model (and they've been selling direct drive wheels in various forms for some time), and that they've signed a marketing partnership with PD. There's nothing to suggest that the DD wheel is any sort of requirement from Polyphony's side, and a lot to suggest that this is the sort of flagship wheel that Fanatec would like to present.
To be fair, it's a mildly upgraded version of functionality that was first in GT5.
When two large companies choose to work together you don't need to dig through the weeds for ulterior motives. It's money. They want to make money. Partnering with GT means that Fanatec sells more units. Partnering with Fanatec means that Polyphony gets a cut of wheels sold specifically for their game through the licensing fees, and it's good optics for the type of game they want to sell.
Apart from the plenty of reasons not to abandon the people who bought it on PS4, and plenty of reasons just to make GT8 as a PS5 exclusive.
Oh no! A Fiesta! That's clearly unrealistic, a Fiesta could never be faster than a Ferrari!
I feel like the biggest problem racing game eSports has is real world racing. You look at the most popular eSports games, they're almost exclusively fantasy games that offer something to viewers you can't get elsewhere. Sure if you break it down the core of some fantasy games have some basis in reality, but they still offer something viewers can't get with any real world equivalent. The only one I can think of is FIFA but two caveats there - firstly, it's the most popular sport in the world and secondly, it does have that fantasy element with fantasy teams. It still does just about offer something you can't get watching real world games.
Those are all good points. Another factor may be accessibility. If someone doesn't have the hardware such as a good PC and a wheel, they may never have an interest in something they themselves can't engage in.
Translation "I don't like people having fun in non-super restrictive races".
1.This can happen in real life.
Speak for yourself please.
They did that already in GT5 almost a decade ago. It was a good way to farm credits but thats it.
This is spot on and while I understand offline mode are important to many I really hope PD goes deep into the online aspect. Racing against other people and competing is such a rush, and while I appreciate offline mode and will use it to polish up my skills, racing In leagues and with friends will be my main focus!
Its not even problem with ford fiesta being faster than ferrari but rather that even when cars have similar lap time because of totaly different chatacteristic you will have different brake points and thats will bring just mayhem in multiplayer game. I have no problem with pp separate online mode with tunning enabled but hope pd has some common sense and keep other modes similar as in gt sport as they nailed multiplayer in this game.
I want to achieve the same goal but in the opposite way. I always want more options to create a lobby. Let me put ride height limit, downforce values, engine position, tire compound for each car I'm allow entering with... etc,etc. For example, in Sport when with friends you can follow certain rules, you can match very different cars in the same race with surprisingly close performance.
I mean adding more weight and taking away power to drop the car into a lesser category than it would be normally.
I remember the days in GT5 lobbies when you could limit Performance Points, drivetrain types, limit specific car classifications (LMP's for example), create one-make races by selecting cars out of your own garage, and even more not pictured.
And the great thing is, there is still room for improvement! Allow us to limit vehicles to certain countries, decades, or even allow us to separate cars with simple categories like 'Muscle' or 'Sport'. Bring back shuffle mode!? Add more 'party modes' like cat n' mouse? It has so much potential.
Let me tell you about the wonderful world of time attack where they actually allow a modified Integra to lap faster than a GT2RS! So sacrilegious, they should never allow something so ridiculous to happen in a game. Real life is so unrealistic.
...remember shuffle racing? 🥺 It was so simple yet so much fun. And they almost always had great lobbies.
this things happen regardless of free or fixed tuning.
