Gran Turismo Sport: General Discussion

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Samus
What is? Standing starts? Yes I know that is entirely my point, it could have been done on the hardware, they chose not to when it came to offline racing. A design decision. Well they did initially with GT5 then mostly patched it out.
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Think standing starts in offline races would make things more boring in GT6, then it likely would be even easier to get to first position. A good choice to limit it IMO and also good that for online racing where things are closer that option is available.

I'm quite interested to see what they got done for sound and AI for this game, they largely didn't seem to bother in GT6 and something like sound has probably in development for over 5 years now. Hope they can manage to raise the bar in all departments.
 
Saidur_Ali
Think standing starts in offline races would make things more boring in GT6, then it likely would be even easier to get to first position. A good choice to limit it IMO and also good that for online racing where things are closer that option is available.
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Well Indeed, without better AI no matter what they chose offline races wouldn't have been much better. However, at least with standing starts you can, if you choose, weaken your car and do it in such a way that you'll just perform equally with the AI around the lap and hopefully have something resembling a close race, with equal lap times.

With the GT6 catch up events even if you do de-tune your car all you're doing is making it slow enough that you will catch the leader on the last lap rather than the first or second. You'll still rather easily fly past because you must be faster than him by virtue of the fact you've had to drive 2-5+ seconds a lap faster to catch up in the first place.

Again though, poor AI is not something you can blame on the PS3. That is down to PD, again.

I'm quite interested to see what they got done for sound and AI for this game, they largely didn't seem to bother in GT6 and something like sound has probably in development for over 5 years now. Hope they can manage to raise the bar in all departments.
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Well that of course goes without saying.
 
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Saidur_Ali
Think standing starts in offline races would make things more boring in GT6, then it likely would be even easier to get to first position. A good choice to limit it IMO and also good that for online racing where things are closer that option is available.

I'm quite interested to see what they got done for sound and AI for this game, they largely didn't seem to bother in GT6 and something like sound has probably in development for over 5 years now. Hope they can manage to raise the bar in all departments.
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I don't really see it as a good choice to limit something just to hide the fact that something else isn't as good as it should be.
 
Samus
Well Indeed, without better AI no matter what they chose offline races wouldn't have been much better. However, at least with standing starts you can, if you choose, weaken your car and do it in such a way that you'll just perform equally with the AI around the lap and hopefully have something resembling a close race, with equal lap times.
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Plus perhaps if they had left standing starts in they wouldn't have also seen it fit to program the field to deliberately slow down until you caught up with the leader.
 
Tornado
Which was always particularly weird, since PD knew about its various programming idiosyncrasies before probably anyone else and Kaz still shouted from the heavens how awesome it was; even all the way up to two days before the game was dumped past its first "hard" release date.
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Not seeing anything wrong with what he has said regarding PS3.
Samus
Well Indeed, without better AI no matter what they chose offline races wouldn't have been much better. However, at least with standing starts you can, if you choose, weaken your car and do it in such a way that you'll just perform equally with the AI around the lap and hopefully have something resembling a close race, with equal lap times.

With the GT6 catch up events even if you do de-tune your car all you're doing is making it slow enough that you will catch the leader on the last lap rather than the first or second. You'll still rather easily fly past because you must be faster than him by virtue of the fact you've had to drive 2-5+ seconds a lap faster to catch up in the first place.

Again though, poor AI is not something you can blame on the PS3. That is down to PD, again.


Well that of course goes without saying.
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Not sure you can do much close racing with AI that give way. Something has to give at the end of the day, don't think there really is any games with decent AI and physics on PS3.
ImaRobot
I don't really see it as a good choice to limit something just to hide the fact that something else isn't as good as it should be.
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They need to make the game as enjoyable for the players with what they have. I think it would become super easy if they had standing starts, probably be first by first corner in most races.
 
GTPorsche
That wouldn't be a thing if they programmed rolling starts correctly.
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Well I'm pretty sure PD know how a real rolling start works and could have programmed it like that if they wanted, the 10-30 second gap was again surely another bizarre design decision.

Saidur_Ali
Not sure you can do much close racing with AI that give way. Something has to give at the end of the day, don't think there really is any games with decent AI and physics on PS3.
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You can do a heck of a lot better than you can with the catch up format. With the standing starts you can make your car lap at roughly the same time as the leader, and race with them for the lap. Yes, you'll more than likely pass them on the corners and be passed on the straights and whilst it's still rubbish I content it's still better than handicapping your car so you only lap 4 seconds a lap faster than the leader rather than 8 and catch him slower.

In GT6 if you handicap your car so it laps at the same rough time as the leader you'll never win or have a decent race because you'll forever be the 20-30 seconds behind that you started.

But then as @Tornado says that doesn't happen anyway because the AI will slow down on purpose to let you catch them. This combination of systems make offline racing in GT6 almost impossible to enjoy.

As for other PS3 games none may be perfect, we're years away from that on any platform, I can't think of a game with worse AI than GT.
 
Saidur_Ali
Not seeing anything wrong with what he has said regarding PS3.
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Of course you don't.

Saidur_Ali
They need to make the game as enjoyable for the players with what they have. I think it would become super easy if they had standing starts, probably be first by first corner in most races.
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As if programming the AI to purposely slow down to let you catch up didn't already do the same thing.
 
Saidur_Ali
They need to make the game as enjoyable for the players with what they have. I think it would become super easy if they had standing starts, probably be first by first corner in most races.
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Then surely, a better implemented AI would make things more enjoyable, wouldn't it? They should work with what they have, you're correct, but that shouldn't be an excuse as to why something shouldn't be better implemented, or why some of these design decisions are "ok." They pretty much just put a band-aid on a bullet hole.

Adjustable settings, very much like Pcars, would go a long way, I think.
 
Samus
You can do a heck of a lot better than you can with the catch up format. With the standing starts you can make your car lap at roughly the same time as the leader, and race with them for the lap. Yes, you'll more than likely pass them on the corners and be passed on the straights and whilst it's still rubbish I content it's still better than handicapping your car so you only lap 4 seconds a lap faster than the leader rather than 8 and catch him slower.

In GT6 if you handicap your car so it laps at the same rough time as the leader you'll never win or have a decent race because you'll forever be the 20-30 seconds behind that you started.

But then as @Tornado says that doesn't happen anyway because the AI will slow down on purpose to let you catch them. This combination of systems make offline racing in GT6 almost impossible to enjoy.

As for other PS3 games none may be perfect, we're years away from that on any platform, I can't think of a game with worse AI than GT.
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Think they did a better job on GT PSP with the AI being more competitive but probably more easier with simpler physics even on a considerably less powerful system. That's probably why they had standing starts in that game IIRC.
 
Saidur_Ali
Think they did a better job on GT PSP with the AI being more competitive but probably more easier with simpler physics even on a considerably less powerful system. That's probably why they had standing starts in that game IIRC.
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I can't for the life of me recall where I read it, but don't AI use simpler physics in general?
 
Saidur_Ali
They need to make the game as enjoyable for the players with what they have. I think it would become super easy if they had standing starts, probably be first by first corner in most races.
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Yes, it's called programming better AI. There are several other racing games on PS3 with standing starts, they all manage to give you a decent enough race of it unless you overpower yourself or are a virtual Hamilton.

Like I said, no racing game has amazing, life-like AI in terms of speed and intelligence, we're not there yet. Plenty have done a lot better job than PD though. Even the games without qualifying that start you in last, they don't start you 30s behind the leader.

GRID 2 for example was flawed in many ways but I can say with absolute certainty I had more fun racing offline than I did GT6.
 
Samus
Yes, it's called programming better AI. There are several other racing games on PS3 with standing starts, they all manage to give you a decent enough race of it unless you overpower yourself or are a virtual Hamilton.

Like I said, no racing game has amazing, life-like AI in terms of speed and intelligence, we're not there yet. Plenty have done a lot better job than PD though. Even the games without qualifying that start you in last, they don't start you 30s behind the leader.

GRID 2 for example was flawed in many ways but I can say with absolute certainty I had more fun racing offline than I did GT6.
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GT PSP was really competitive IIRC to win races, I remember using the F2007 and having to try really hard to win and AI was pushing me all the way literally.

On PS3 they aim for 60FPS, have a lot higher car detail and likely more complex physics so AI must be a lot tougher to get right. Anyway I wonder if GT6 would sell as well if it had competitive AI but lot worse graphics and ran at a lower frame rate and resolution and had even more simplistic physics.
 
GT5 (initially) had standing starts and the AI was more competitive than GT6's. Arcade mode even had difficulty sliders and standing starts (I think), though I never personally used them so I don't know how well they worked.
 
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I would be real, real curious to hear in a couple more years removed from GT6 Kaz say in an interview that the AI was a product of limited system memory due to advancements made in physics or something like that. We're used to seeing graphics, framerate and features like weather and day/night get slashed, but they rarely talk about AI.
 
Tornado
Which was always particularly weird, since PD knew about its various programming idiosyncrasies before probably anyone else and Kaz still shouted from the heavens how awesome it was; even all the way up to two days before the game was dumped past its first "hard" release date.
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Interesting articles. In the first he appears to praise the increased resolution and power of the PS3, but "Yamauchi says that while development is fun, it's also very difficult." doesn't sound like a total endorsement :D
In the second, is he saying that only 80% was being utilized because of the complexity of the PS3?
 
glassjaw
I would be real, real curious to hear in a couple more years removed from GT6 Kaz say in an interview that the AI was a product of limited system memory due to advancements made in physics or something like that. We're used to seeing graphics, framerate and features like weather and day/night get slashed, but they rarely talk about AI.
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I think GT6 was struggling a lot regarding RAM. Loading this web page on Firefox probably takes similar amount of RAM that GT6 has total available for everything. Anyway I think it is both memory and processing power limitation regarding AI. Naturally if they target other things to be better and faster, that means to make AI on similar level, it will need more processing power and memory but also there will less resources available so I assume compromises like that are made for them reasons.

PS4 has quite a weak CPU so it will be interesting to see how good a job they manage. I wonder if they they will make use of GPU computing. Reading this and knowing now that PD helped nVidia out, then won't be surprised if they do make use of it.
 
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glassjaw
I would be real, real curious to hear in a couple more years removed from GT6 Kaz say in an interview that the AI was a product of limited system memory due to advancements made in physics or something like that.
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I doubt it. The biggest problem with GT6's AI was they were simply too slow (in terms of awareness they were competent enough I thought - not that smart, but not that dumb either). Crucially though they weren't slow all the time - the rubber banding in the game showed they were capable of going (suddenly and unusually) quickly as well as slowly. Which suggests that their lack of competitiveness was by design (presumably to have mass market appeal), rather than due to technical limitations. Other games have shown that advanced physics, and fast, agressive AI are both very much possible.
 
TRGTspecialist
I doubt it. The biggest problem with GT6's AI was they were simply too slow (in terms of awareness they were competent enough I thought - not that smart, but not that dumb either). Crucially though they weren't slow all the time - the rubber banding in the game showed they were capable of going (suddenly and unusually) quickly as well as slowly. Which suggests that their lack of competitiveness was by design (presumably to have mass market appeal), rather than due to technical limitations. Other games have shown that advanced physics, and fast, agressive AI are both very much possible.
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I'd say the accessibility starts with the short race format even, 3 to 10 laps. Actually, the problem lies with the "if you ain't first you are last" goal setting but I'm repeating myself here.
The adversary pace keeps the scaling challenge (I think if I search this very forum I'll find people asking which car to use for Like the Wind).

This is an aspect where I agree they could offer a less rigid proposal to users.
Allow from the start to set lap numbers and average pace (with the minimal set by them), like PCars does. Or just judge performance in a better way.

---

Anyway...

It is friday in Geneva.
 
Saidur_Ali
I think GT6 was struggling a lot regarding RAM. Loading this web page on Firefox probably takes similar amount of RAM that GT6 has total available for everything.
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Thing is, PD and every other developer knew the limitations before they started making games, it didn't change. It also hadn't changed between release of GT5 and GT6, so to use the "we ran out of RAM" excuse is rather flimsy. What they perhaps should say is "we prioritised the RAM on graphics and didn't allocate enough to AI". That would be closer to the truth.

Grand Prix Legends had good physics and AI with a system requirement of a Pentium 2 and 64Mb of RAM.

As the old saying goes it's not what you've got, it's how you use it.
 
Samus
"we prioritised the RAM on graphics and didn't allocate enough to AI". That would be closer to the truth.
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I have no need for hyper-realistic, in-focus interiors.

When you're driving a real car, particularly at high speed your focus is hundreds of metres down the road,
your eyes do not focus on the interior of the car.

I find the interior views of GT6 to not be anywhere near realistic in what you see in reality and have little to no real use in the game
 
Samus
Thing is, PD and every other developer knew the limitations before they started making games, it didn't change. It also hadn't changed between release of GT5 and GT6, so to use the "we ran out of RAM" excuse is rather flimsy. What they perhaps should say is "we prioritised the RAM on graphics and didn't allocate enough to AI". That would be closer to the truth.

Grand Prix Legends had good physics and AI with a system requirement of a Pentium 2 and 64Mb of RAM.

As the old saying goes it's not what you've got, it's how you use it.
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Their trade offs seems the most successful by far.
 
TRGTspecialist
I doubt it. The biggest problem with GT6's AI was they were simply too slow (in terms of awareness they were competent enough I thought - not that smart, but not that dumb either). Crucially though they weren't slow all the time - the rubber banding in the game showed they were capable of going (suddenly and unusually) quickly as well as slowly. Which suggests that their lack of competitiveness was by design (presumably to have mass market appeal), rather than due to technical limitations. Other games have shown that advanced physics, and fast, agressive AI are both very much possible.
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Perhaps, but then it's also possible Polyphony wasn't feeling confident enough in the AI they were able to achieve with system constraints. So they said screw it, we're in too deep at this point, we'll make everything a glorified time trial. I'm not sure lack of competitiveness translates to mass market appeal. Customizable competitiveness, sure. Giving the player a choice of difficulty levels would be the populist choice. I can't imagine they deliberately took the route they did without some kind of bottleneck somewhere. I hadn't played a game with such, uh, irrelevant AI since Rage Racer on the PS1.
 

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