GRID Autosport First Impressions

[Speedster911]

The penalty system is based on any 'advantage' you may have gained. If you go wide, but no advantage is gained over the opposition, then no penalty is applied.

Also, if an advantage is gained, but it it very small, then the penalty is very small too. If you cut a large portion of track at full throttle, then your penalty will be much larger.

If I go wide, I always lift off the throttle at the point of going off track, to try and reduce any advantage.

The way you guys have implemented it is simply brilliant. Clearly demonstrates a well thought-out approach.

Can't wait to see what the future holds. 👍

 

[mister dog]

Also i had a rubber banding test; you remember how in GT6 the rabbit will slow down on the last lap so you can have that 'exciting finish', well i was doing a street race on hard in GAS, managed to work my way to second and i was about a second behind the leader with 4 laps to go. I drove like a bat out of hell taking corners a lot faster than the AI normally would but i couldn't close up on him. 4 laps on the limit and i stayed second 👍

Great stuff that you have this happening sometimes. (not all the time tough )

 

[prisonermonkeys]

There's obvious rubber banding in drifting if you set the difficulty to very easy. The AI drivers will regularly score over 1,000,000 points in the knockout rounds - unless they race you, in which case they will only score about 250,000-350,000 depending on the circuit.

 

[ShiftingGears]

Bought it yesterday. Good first impressions.

 

[mister dog]

There's obvious rubber banding in drifting if you set the difficulty to very easy. The AI drivers will regularly score over 1,000,000 points in the knockout rounds - unless they race you, in which case they will only score about 250,000-350,000 depending on the circuit.

Well drifting AND on very easy... i guess those 7 year olds won't notice

 

[prisonermonkeys]

Well drifting AND on very easy... i guess those 7 year olds won't notice

My dislike of Tuner events is well-documented. So I turned the difficulty all the way down, and worked my way up level 9 first, so I could unlock the Grid series events normally, instead of grinding through the Tuner events to get them.

 

[mister dog]

My dislike of Tuner events is well-documented. So I turned the difficulty all the way down, and worked my way up level 9 first, so I could unlock the Grid series events normally, instead of grinding through the Tuner events to get them.

To be honest i mainly focused on the other disciplines so far, but i'm sure a tuner championship on hard will be a welcome interlude once in a while in someone's career. I'm still glad it's in there for the diversity.

 

[VXR]

Going to give my first impressions based on my first hour with the game, which saw me adjust settings, make a car for online and compete in my first career event.

When I first loaded the game, I went through the options menu and was pleasantly surprised to see such in-depth audio controls and easily customisable controls, so I could mimic Forza to make the switch between games seamless. I then loaded up the Online section and made my own starter Golf. Whilst some of the livery patterns weren't my exact taste, there will likely be something for everyone. I was highly impressed by the wheel choice, with lots of attractive rims. I didn't get to race as my tea was ready and then a car accident in the next street that got out of hand was an hour's entertainment!

After that, I jumped into my first career race. Despite buying the game primarily for the touring cars, I went with an offer from Razer in Street Racing. I've set opponent difficulty to medium, x5 race length and only ABS on with manual sequential gears. I chose to do a ten minute practice and really laid into the Golf for ten minutes. Crashed heavily a couple of times in broad four-wheel drifts, but if was highly impressed by the crash damage. Great work from Codemasters there. After the tame deformation of FM5 and GT6, it was a welcome sight. I liked the way the car fights with damage, which I had set to full.

My first race was therefore 20 laps of San Fran short. Starting at the back, with only the objective of sixth, I was pretty quickly in that position and fighting to fourth by the end of the first lap. Admittedly I thought medium might have been too low for an experience console racer, but the fight for the top four places were decently challenging. After a silly crash on the 13th lap, I had steering that pulled left to deal with. That's by the by, but I was really, really impressed by the vice added to the car this damaged caused. The steering started to wobble, brakes would lock despite ABS and on lap 15, I dropped to 3rd after the car veered suddenly to the right. I assume this was the tyre giving out and the car jerked violently. I managed to claw back first and won. After 20 laps, my first impressions couldn't be any better.

The handling is very playful and highly enjoyable and has the consistency you need. The damage is fantastic. Graphically it's first rate for the 360, too. Plenty of detail in the environment and cars and a solid frame rate. One touch I was really tickled by was the way the crowd on the last corner cheer loudly if you come into the turn in a broad slide.

Just want to congratulate the Codemasters guys for a brilliant product and one I'm over the moon to have purchased.

 

[Rafael F]

Wow, I just tried drifting, it's awesome, first time I can drift with a steering wheel.
Nice job on drift handling codies! Also the tire sound and smoke are great 👍
The sounds guys deserve a medal

 

[Morgoth_666]

I just got around to my first drifting event to finish my first seasons in all disciplines myself. It was actually quite easy to do it(and I'm quite terrible at drifting). I'm sure it's not "realistic" but it sure was a hell of a lot more enjoyable than drifting in GT6 has been for me. After 10 minutes of failing and learning in practice and 3-4 attempts at qualifying I was able to qualify first. Won my first-round match but the game crashed when I tried to exit the replay just as it was restarting. After quitting I came close but lost the match, but decent enough points and moved on.



I can confirm there is certainly rubber-banding in the races to at least some degree. It's generally not too obvious though, and much better implemented than whatever GT6 is trying to do.

I have seen a couple of odd lap times when the faster cars fell way back, would sometimes end up setting fast lap over a second quicker than what I or Ravenwest could muster which doesn't generally happen otherwise. Now this could be rubberbanding or just them pushing really hard to catch up I suppose, though they do seem to be very good at catching up when you think they must be about to lose 30 seconds from where you saw them go off(but I've noticed they are good at rejoining quickly when off too). They also seem to have a habit of coming back to me when they're well ahead late in long 5X races but that could be due to a variety of factors as well.

But when I decided to spend some time working on my wheel settings I did so in a custom race with long practice. I kept tweaking right up to the 3 lap race at Hockenheim. I then pulled over and parked at the start, fiddled, then drove slowly. I'm not sure if I pushed at all on lap 3 but my fastest lap managed to be 10 seconds faster than theirs and I gained nearly 30 seconds over the 3 laps while weaving and messing about off-throttle and being genrally slow, against the same AI level I can barely catch on a great run.

 

[anim8r_uk]

I just got around to my first drifting event to finish my first seasons in all disciplines myself. It was actually quite easy to do it(and I'm quite terrible at drifting). I'm sure it's not "realistic" but it sure was a hell of a lot more enjoyable than drifting in GT6 has been for me.

We had the guys in from Drift Allstars to help with the handling. The first handling model they played, they said was all wrong. After spending a lot of time with the handling team, they finally got it right. The Drift guys themselves said it felt like they were actually in the car (minus G-forces etc). They were very happy with the handling in the end.

Have you tried it with 900 degrees wheel rotation yet? I haven't but I've been assured that it's awesome

 

[Morgoth_666]

We had the guys in from Drift Allstars to help with the handling. The first handling model they played, they said was all wrong. After spending a lot of time with the handling team, they finally got it right. The Drift guys themselves said it felt like they were actually in the car (minus G-forces etc). They were very happy with the handling in the end.

Have you tried it with 900 degrees wheel rotation yet? I haven't but I've been assured that it's awesome

It does seem to have a great balance between ease-of-oversteer and ease-of-control. I didn't try it with 900 however. I just(after 4 seasons) got to customizing my wheel settings from the defaults(well, I had added some linearity to the defaults earlier). For racing, 900 doesn't seem to work very well so I limited my GT3 RS to 450 degrees and It's lovely. I'm pretty bad at drifting in general so 900 is a bit scary with all the times I needed full lock. I'm sure it would be a hoot to try it, maybe I'll give it a go one of these days.

Oh yeah, what's up with the sponsor challenge "drive 19.0 miles in a drift event?" Is that even possible? I also noticed that it used my score from practice as my best drift score so that record is like 9 million now. Does practice mileage count towards those distance goals in drift events?

 

[Imari]

I finally may have figured drifting out. After losing however many rounds I finally won one. Not by much, but it feels pretty good.

It's nice when you get a flow going, although I still could be a lot better.

 

[prisonermonkeys]

I finally may have figured drifting out.

It's easy - get as close to the markers as possible (both the orange and yellow ones), then squeeze the handbrake as you turn in, and jam down on the accelerator as you give it opposite lock.

The points are calculated based on the length of the drift plus the proximity to the cones. The angle, which is indicated by the semi-circle at the bottom of the screen, acts as a score multiplier, though I haven't figured out the exact rate. So long as you have the accelerator down and the car at an angle as you pass the cones, it's easy to rack up 1,000,000 points in a single pass over the Autosport drift course, even without the points multiplier.

 

[Imari]

It's easy - get as close to the markers as possible (both the orange and yellow ones), then squeeze the handbrake as you turn in, and jam down on the accelerator as you give it opposite lock.

The points are calculated based on the length of the drift plus the proximity to the cones. The angle, which is indicated by the semi-circle at the bottom of the screen, acts as a score multiplier, though I haven't figured out the exact rate. So long as you have the accelerator down and the car at an angle as you pass the cones, it's easy to rack up 1,000,000 points in a single pass over the Autosport drift course, even without the points multiplier.

Yeah, but I needed 1.6 million plus on every round to score the win. I thought about putting it on very easy as you have, but decided to stick with very hard and just lose my way through them if necessary and make up for it on the other rounds.

I'm pleased that drift rounds aren't now an auto-loss for me. Still likely to not be high points scoring, but anything helps when fighting for championships.

 

[prisonermonkeys]

Just stick it on hard - you only need about 1.0-1.2 million per round.

 

[1241Penguin]

I've done a touring car race and I just have to say that the AI is brutal. Sometimes their driving is so ridiculous it actually gets frustrating. It's the polar opposite of GT AI.

I'm not sure whether this is a glitch or not but I've been exploiting this; should you get a penalty, and you are forced to slow down, if you change a gear, the speed restriction is gone.

 

[Imari]

Just stick it on hard - you only need about 1.0-1.2 million per round.

Nah, my goal is to beat the whole game on very hard. It's doable, I can win each season (so far anyway) I just have to be OK with not winning every single race.

 

[88GTA]

I've done a touring car race and I just have to say that the AI is brutal. Sometimes their driving is so ridiculous it actually gets frustrating. It's the polar opposite of GT AI.

I'm not sure whether this is a glitch or not but I've been exploiting this; should you get a penalty, and you are forced to slow down, if you change a gear, the speed restriction is gone.

Are you sure it is not just a very short penalty? The penalty system is much more advanced than GT6 so if you just barely go over the line, the penalty will also be very short. Try taking a really big shortcut and see if you can still change gear to get out of the penalty.

 

[Spitfire77]

I have WRC3 (the 2013 one), and it's very good. It had terrible reviews, but I think it's what a rally game should be. The career mode is really quite fun too. The physics feel good as well. I like it more than Dirt 3, which I also have.

I had WRC3 enjoyed it and now have WRC4 (the UK version can be found cheap online)- in WRC4 the physics are slightly improved, the graphics are slightly improved (not great but good), the sounds are for sure improved, overall a great rally game. My only complaint is there are only special stages (shorter stages) though they are fun.. I want longer (10-15min or more) stages. It gets to the point where you memorize them fairly easy, and in a pure rally game that is kinda a let down. Even if the stages were randomly generated or something of that nature and it took longer to load I would not mind..

Sorry back to Grid Autosport now..

 

[1241Penguin]

Are you sure it is not just a very short penalty? The penalty system is much more advanced than GT6 so if you just barely go over the line, the penalty will also be very short. Try taking a really big shortcut and see if you can still change gear to get out of the penalty.

I see. And I thought I was being clever.

 

[Morgoth_666]

Yeah the penalty system is pretty smart like that. Actually, I'd like to really praise the penalty system in GAS. I've been pretty harsh on the Codies penalties in the past as they were often very silly and would penalize you harshly for things like putting one wheel a couple inches over the outside line exiting a corner.

I realize this is slowdown penalties instead of drive-thrus so it's easier to be flexible, but it works really well. If you slow down and don't gain, you don't get a penalty. If you gain a little, you get a short penalty. If you cut badly, you get nailed hard.

It's not perfect and there's a couple spots where it seems to let you cut a bit and others where it's a little touchy(there's a hairpin that seems too sensitive at Sepang that the AI also basically forces you to cut if you try to pass on the inside, and it really doesn't like you going at all wide on the last long corners at the Algarve tracks. But overall it's probably the best I've seen as far as recognizing what is cheating and what isn't. Which is good since you can't turn it off!

 

[VBR]

Can anyone tell me what the Force Feedback is like?

I absolutely hate with a passion all Codemasters games, mainly because of the awful FFB effects. It's by far the worse I've ever felt in any game or sim. Is GAS any different?

 

[Awong124]

Can anyone tell me what the Force Feedback is like?

I absolutely hate with a passion all Codemasters games, mainly because of the awful FFB effects. It's by far the worse I've ever felt in any game or sim. Is GAS any different?

FFB feels fine in this game. There's nothing wrong with the FFB in the F1 games either.

 

[Spitfire77]

Can anyone tell me what the Force Feedback is like?

I absolutely hate with a passion all Codemasters games, mainly because of the awful FFB effects. It's by far the worse I've ever felt in any game or sim. Is GAS any different?

Going from GT5 to Dirt3 and back it always took me a bit to adjust to the FFB - Both would feel wrong at first. Same goes with GT6 to Grid AS, at first it felt awful, but after a few days and getting the wheel settings right, it feels good. The thing is, I have not had any desire to put GT6 back in so can't comment on that. I also had the same issue going from GT6 to WRC4 and back as they are also way different.

To each their own.. but if you do get a copy to try it out, start with multi turn on, 100% saturation and bump the linearity up to 5-7 if you are used to playing GT6 in 900deg or higher mode. The FFB feels limited if you decrease the saturation. As for the wheel strength, vibration, and weight.. that depends on which wheel you use.

But at least in this game with my DFGT if I let go of the wheel on the straights it does not go ape 🤬

 

[GTracer98]

Here's a thing I've noticed that is quite irritating. If a driver spins out and crashes, your engineer will tell you that. The problem is that he will continue telling that every time you pass the spot where that driver spun even if he's already driven away or retired. So, if a driver crashes on lap one you will have to hear your engineer telling you that for the rest of the race...

 

[Imari]

Here's a thing I've noticed that is quite irritating. If a driver spins out and crashes, your engineer will tell you that. The problem is that he will continue telling that every time you pass the spot where that driver spun even if he's already driven away or retired. So, if a driver crashes on lap one you will have to hear your engineer telling you that for the rest of the race...

I do hate when he gets stuck telling you something.

"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."

I know. SHUT UP.
Wanted: A button on the steering wheel that activates one of those comedy boxing gloves on a spring aimed right at Sherman. Or Sherman's testicles.

Part of me does wonder however, how much of the entertainment is derived from Sherman being an annoying ****. There's only so many things I can do at once, and driving AND ranting is about my limit, so I have nothing to spare for being irritated by anything else in the game.

 

[Speedster911]

I do hate when he gets stuck telling you something.

"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."

I know. SHUT UP.
Wanted: A button on the steering wheel that activates one of those comedy boxing gloves on a spring aimed right at Sherman. Or Sherman's testicles.

Part of me does wonder however, how much of the entertainment is derived from Sherman being an annoying ****. There's only so many things I can do at once, and driving AND ranting is about my limit, so I have nothing to spare for being irritated by anything else in the game.

We can take turns.

 

[mister dog]

I do hate when he gets stuck telling you something.

"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."
"At the moment, you're ten points ahead of Monster."

I know. SHUT UP.
Wanted: A button on the steering wheel that activates one of those comedy boxing gloves on a spring aimed right at Sherman. Or Sherman's testicles.

Part of me does wonder however, how much of the entertainment is derived from Sherman being an annoying ****. There's only so many things I can do at once, and driving AND ranting is about my limit, so I have nothing to spare for being irritated by anything else in the game.

Put speech on 0 and have yourself a Kimi sigh of relief. On the downside you'll have to miss that sexy assistant calling you by your name in the menus.

 

[VBR]

FFB feels fine in this game. There's nothing wrong with the FFB in the F1 games either.

That tells me all I need to know, & I'll be avoiding this game like the plague just as I do all CM games.


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