Which of the tracks in GT3 really do exist?

[Jez]

I must add my compliments on some amazing legwork to find the maps for Seattle and Rome, AMAZING!
Did we find out if Tokyo is a genuine route or not?

 

[F1man]

Well It does exist I might do a little bit more research tonite.

 

[Zacabeb]

A few months ago, I did a bit of research on the Ferris wheel in Special Stage Route 11 after having succeeded in exiting the boundaries of the track. I found that it is called Cosmo Clock 21 and is in Yokohama.

Now I made a search for a map and so far I have only found this crude one of the area. It's from the Yokohama Convention & Business Bureau and in PDF format. It does not provide much reference for comparing the layout of the track, but it does point out some landmarks.

http://www.city.yokohama.jp/me/ycvb/english/access/p5060.pdf

Addition: After having compared the track to actual maps of Yokohama, I have found that the track does not correspond to the real layout of the area. Most of the track ends up out in the water if overlaying its footprint on the actual map. The orientation of the Bay Bridge relative to the Ferris wheel is also incorrect.

I am not sure whether the layout is entierly fake or if it is based on actual streets, and the landmarks deliberately put in the wrong place. After all, a slightly different version of SS Route 11 was present in the original GT, which lacked these landmarks altogether.

 

[Jez]

Keep going!! The truth must be out there!

 

[pedrodaman]

here it is

 

[gumpy]

I would like to rain on the part regarding SSR11.

I believe it is a fantasy track and here is why.

There is a green sign above the main straight of SSR11 which says New River City 1.8km.

There is a green sign above the main straight of SSR11 II which says New River City 1.8km.

I don't believe this is possible that New River City is 1.8km in both directions.

 

[280steveX]

this SSR11 track, SCC mag had an article about ppl street racing & using a bridge in the Wangan area, maybe Wangan Midnite game is related.

ya'll research is badass.

 

[Speeding drifter]

how about tokyo???

 

[Speeding drifter]

oops nm!!!

 

[Z E V]

Well it is entirely possible that there are road signs in Tokyo that are in English since it is my understanding that learning English as a second language is mandatory in Japan, and there is the fact that the Japanese have to use English keyboards. (There are 46 letters in the Japanese alphabet for native words, and another 46 letters in the alphabet for foreign words, and over 10,000 individual ideograms [try fitting that on a keyboard{hence japan still uses paper filing systems over databases}])
And as to the sign saying New River City 1.8km that is probably because they just can’t make individual road signs for all parts of all tracks, it is too time consuming to do them all but most of all individual road signs would eat up too much texture memory which the PS2 has a known deficiency of. Would you rather have accurate road signs and bad frame-rates?

 

[Z E V]

I know for a fact that Midfield does exist in the form of a track known as Infield Raceway. Sony changed the name to avoid licensing issues and also changed the track layout by stretching it out to increase the average speed on the track since the average speed at Infield is 70-80MPH. I read this in an issue of Car and Driver or Motor Trend in which the journalist drove an Acura NSX on the real Infield track, and then drove an Acura NSX in Midfield in GT3. He said the car handling was remarkably similar to real life

 

[Duke]

*bump*

There seems to be some new interest in this thread. In fact, maybe I'll sticky it for a while.

 

[sejtur]

Thanks!

 

[11646]

Originally posted by neon_duke
As far as I know, it is a configuration of roads, based on real neighborhoods but with a fair amount of liberty taken on how they go together.

Maybe I'll try to find a map of Seattle in the vicinity of the new stadium, and try to lay it out.


In my copious free time...

I live in Washington, so I should know, and it is exactly what you thought, a bunch of configured roads.

 

[aesthetics808]

try searching for something about wangan for ss 11 and ss 5 tracks.the wangan is a freeway system where they actually race in japan.its also round shaped and connects to itself i think.hope that helps.

 

[justin_g]

PD has taken liberties with the scenery at "Super Speedway" if it is supposed to be Twin Ring Motegi - where you can see the wind towers at the big turn in GT3 would be right on top of the road course!

 

[(G)]

Concerning the chichane at Seattle: If that street is wide enough, they could just have placed barriers on the street to create it. From what I saw on the track, that seems to me to be how they made it.

 

[OfUnknownOrgin]

I think that the superspeedway is based off Bristol motor speedway. from the pic, you can see that Bristol has much more stands than the Super Speedway, but i think the track in GT3 was based off it.

here's a map of Bristol Motor,

no, Im not a Nascar freak

 

[OfUnknownOrgin]

Justin G could be right, this is just what I think

 

[oscarfulz]

werent there windmills on Super Speedway? or was it Test Course? or was it Both???

 

[sgruenbe]

I didn't even know that super speedways existed outside the US.

For the longest time I thought Super Speedway was a flatter version of Darlington Raceway.

Very interesting . . .

I would guess, however, that Japan's Super Speedway was originally built with Darlington in mind.

 

[sgruenbe]

Here's a map of Darlington Raceway. The two tracks look darn near identical.

Darlington, however, is 1.366 miles.

The Super Speedway is 1.491 miles.

 

[OfUnknownOrgin]

I got this off the Bristol MS website , I think it's the same logo from GT3

EDIT!: I just found the same logo here at speedway motor sports

I could very well be wrong

 

[sgruenbe]

Yeah, there's no way that Super Speedway is based on Bristol.

Bristol is the quintessential short track -- just over a 1/2 mile, ridiculously high-banked. Top speeds in NASCAR are around 140, I believe, upon entering a corner.

Super Speedway in GT3 is DEFINITELY (as an earlier post indicated) based on the Twin Ring "Super Speedway" track that's in Motegi, north of Tokyo. See the track here: http://www.twinring.jp/english/experience/course.html

What I'm saying is that this real-life track was probably heavily influenced by the design of Darlington Raceway.

 

[norabder]

I found out what bridge that is in Special Stage Route 11 its the Yokohama Bay Bridge(tower) that connects Yokohama and Tokyo.
From the pictures I could find one side had Cranes like in the game but I don't know which. Also there is a Ferris wheel that is next to the bay. So that fits where the area is. not 100% on exact location though. I'll have to play some more and try to find more landmarks.

 

[OfUnknownOrgin]

I admit defeat. I thought something was wrong when I looked at the track records and times were only 15 secs, while I pull 28's in an F1

 

[ALPHA]

Does anyone still have the video of driving around Tokyo on for the R246 Track?

In finding out about if Apricot Hill or Autumn Ring is real, I remember in GT2 that Apricot Hill was called something like Palm Strip, although it has no palm trees in the license tests that said Palm strip they went to Apricot Hill.

Or was Palm strip just a dead track?

 

[daan]

here's a map of Tokyo that I found

 

[ALPHA]

I found a nice picture gallery for Route 246 it can be found here:
http://www.sotobori.com/route246b/

And I found this aerial picture of Seattle.

 

[MWSweet]

A long time ago when GT2 first came out I read an interview in one of the video game magazines where the designer of GT said that Red Rock and Apricot Hill were real tracks that once existed but were no longer around. He also said that Grindlewald is a real road track still occasionally used in Switzerland. I always had my doubts about these statements because he said Apricot Hill was supposed to be the now closed Plum Mountain track in Belgium. Many web searches have never found me any evidence that there is/was a Plum Mountain in Belgium. Then out comes the March 2004 Road and Track with an article on a race at a track named Lime Rock. Notice the name similarities?

A quick web search found this track in Connecticut, and it is clearly not the same as Apricot Hill, but there are some features that are so similar that I do not think it is coincidence.

Here is a link to the track map.