Indeed. They shouldn't have special events for weather and time cycling, they should be random throughout the whole game. Having 'rainmaster' events where it's magically programmed to always rain is silly. Night racing less so, as that is and can be planned but they still certainly didn't take advantage of what they had in the GT6 events I played.
It seems to have become a common theme of GT5 and GT6. Not making full use of what they have.
I just don't know how people are happy to essentially play the same game over and over. Fire up GT7, buy a car for 20,000 credits, get your B license and then do the Sunday Cup on Autumn Ring Mini. Except the aforementioned games that are locked in their content like the F1 games I don't know any other game that does that. I don't play Call Of Duty but despite everyone saying they're all the same i'm pretty sure you don't play each one with the same characters in the same environments.
I disagree, but for a couple of fundamental reasons.
The problem with Gran Turismo is not it's design at it's core (keep in mind that almost every racing game follows the same GT1 root of starting with X credits to purchase X car and evolve in an RPG style progression, examples like Grid 2, Forza games, Simraceway, Test Drive, NFS from ... possibly Porsche and so on). Having that particular design model is not broken as per se, what is broken is the way PD corner themselves up in how to update it, best example of this was the xp system in GT5, which was shamefully copypasted from FM games and serve no purpose either for the game design, the progression system and the game economy.
In FM games the XP system worked because it was the experience barrier between faster and faster cars, forcing the player to grind more points in order to have enough driving experience and open up further sections of the game. In GT games there is the the license system which simulates such grind, but makes it faster by turning the game in trials to teach the player in how to handle the driving characteristics of the cars that will be used in further sections of the game, is a brilliant design, is smart and intuitive because it effectively level up the players in the shortest way possible.
Now, the big problem with GT games like 5 and 6 by far is simply it's structure, because of the online play being completely new to the series they had no idea in how to implement it, it was awfully implemented in GT5: P, it was more competently put together in GT5 and ultimately basic in GT6. Having an online component in the game compromises the single player experience since all the seasonal events served to complement the career mode, but they are shovel in after the game the career mode is finished and the game just is not affected by it (i.e. the Sebastian Vettel Challenge).
An Autum ring race is necessary to introduce the most basic principles of cornering to new players, a Sunday Cup is necessary to showcase the differences between corners, tracks and elevation changes. What online communities often forget is that GT6 is an entry level driving simulator, not a hardcore (mind you) simulator, people who might be shifting from games like NFS, burnout on in my case NFS III needed to see such example to understand the game, so that's not the problem.
The problem is having all these assets, all these systems and not having anything useful for them. The Lunar Rover missions were a prime example of how disoriented the design of the game is. GT6 did great by introducing the mission races, the coffee breaks and the license test into the system, that is the right way to do it, what is broken is the career races themselves.
Rainmasters race and midnight races should exist, what it shouldn't exist is not randomized races later in the game, I agree that after certain points in the game there should be randomized functions to make the most of the game systems, PD though that by doing it into the Endurance races it might work but it doesn't make the races better, it just pad them and since the endurance system was technical broken it make the latter section of the game a huge mess.
Career modes in GT5 and GT6 games are broken, but not because their system don't work but because their assets are not used accordingly. The have 3 main regions for car manufactures, they should do separate events or regional series which are an aside from the career mode, but design a Cr. system (or use the current system) in which such races are nearly mandatory, say a BMW special series to gain x amount of credit to buy a car to compete in X race to beat the best car in that race (GT4 did this almost flawlessly), some seasonal events should be put into the career mode to complement it rather than making them an online event only (for example a few seasonal having the prototype FT1 or the M4, it should be an event updated into the career mode, having one make race of FT-1s and the time trial to earn the car).
I agree that they should hire a game designer to work out these systems rather than having however is in PD to work it out, the core system is not broken but it's implementation is.
Imagine this, a GT game in which there are tunner events by having x list of cars to meet x list of requirements, have a wagon race line in GT2 but this time featuring cars like the RS6 and so on, have time trail series in Chamonix normal and snow, and a different car for each time the race is driven, but alter it's conditions, and then have a complete randomized one. The grinding is not severe as the game uses it's own system to make the game more varied, extend the use of FF, FR, MR and so on. If races of GT3 and GT2 cars are introduced, there should be to a point in which the randomized weather kicks in and the minimum amount of laps is 20 or 25, making the game even more varied.
As I see it, is not a failure in design but a failure on implementation, and that's where GT6 is really broken, a solid core concept with a broken implementation.
I don't like GT games to loose their identity, because everyone uses an XP system for example doesn't mean that it should be a standard, hence why I was so pleased in how the stupid XP system was ditched from GT6 a-spec, it might work for b spec but it has no business existing into the a-spec realm, games should persevere some identity and keep themselves away from becoming generic.
Finally, developers can be assholes, they can be full of themselves but the whole point for them is to come up with a competent design, I don't get the hate for Kaz at this point, yes he produces the game but he solely doesn't make the game. Humility is inconsequential to mechanical design, mechanical design solely depends on the creativity of a person, not it's attitude (See
Peter Molyneux and the fable games, which were never good from the first one and was so blinded by it's own delusional conception of the game that ended up making the games even more stupid, his only job was to design, produce and develop the game and he didn't, he just PR a delusional construction of a game rather than actually doing it
). If they fail to acknowledge the flaws in the game is their problem but I don't see why they should be apologetic about it.
And to it's defence (yeah, burn me you silly people) he is just a guy that often do trackdays, talk about cars, talk about racing and do racing (endurance racing) apart from producing a game, as far as we know the second in charge might be overlooking the whole planing and production process while KY is either at Germany, or England, or Spain or Brazil doing racing or whatever, not related to any of the GT games, other than announcements (because he is the CEO of PD) I don't see him doing much in the sense of game design or game planing, given whatever dates set by Sony. Having him doing all that and also the other sidetrack thing he does with his life ended up making him care less about GT games by distance himself from it, leaving other people in charge of planing and production leaving us with ... this. KY is guilty though of not hiring more staff that controls the whole planing and production of the game, it needs an associate producer who can get in charge of stuff properly, it needs a game design advisor who can tell the game planer what will and will not work, they need that kind of workfoce, not what everyone around here says that "hur PD should hire more people hur hur", that's not the solution, a strong sense of planing is required which is what PD needs to produce the game properly, not by hiring more people but by having more people to help out with the design of the game. This worked perfectly for Forza Horizon, Playground games and former people from Codemasters, not because they need a whole studio to complement with the design but because they had a couple of planners that saw the FM system, saw how the games worked and had experience on the matter and design the game work on it's own.
(My apologizes, this was atrociously worded apart from being a wall of text)
