It’s been one of the worst kept secrets in the game for the last 6 weeks, but today the final round of GT Academy’s online qualification section gets underway with players at the wheel of Nissan’s fearsome new hybrid LMP1 car around the Le Mans circuit it will shortly be calling its home.
This is the part where the competition gets serious and players will need to have completed and submitted a valid lap in each of the previous three rounds during the ranking registration period for each round (the first two weeks of availability) and then agree to the Academy’s terms & conditions before they can turn a wheel in anger.
Round 4: Event Details
Availability: 2/6/2015 07:00 UTC – 16/6/2015 06:59 UTC
Prizes:
Gold (3’37.000) 900,000 Cr.
Silver (3’42.000) 400,000 Cr.
Bronze (4’05.000) 200,000 Cr.
Any completed lap of any kind will award you the car in Gran Turismo 6, so again pay attention to those irritating traffic cones which will instantly disqualify you should you give them even the merest of nudges. To learn more about the official rules and regions for GT Academy 2015, click here.
GTPlanet’s GT Academy forum contains hints, tips, video and discussion on how to improve lap times from players and Academy finalists of the past – and a good place to keep an eye on where the benchmark times are – so be sure to head over there to stay on the ball. Good luck!
Win a Trip to Abu Dhabi
Don’t forget – if you’re living in U.K., France, Belgium, the Netherlands, or Germany, you’re eligible to win a free, all-expenses-paid trip to GT Academy 2015 Race Camp at Abu Dhabi! It’s free to enter; just click here and complete the quiz.
See more articles on GT Academy 2015.
Starting to get in a groove with this car, but the racing line/cone rules are just bonkers. 20-plus laps to get two that counted. Going to be happy with gold at 3:36-ish. Even having been around this track more times that I care to admit (GT4, GTR, GTR2, now GT6…) and knowing the lines and braking points, my 49-year-old reflexes aren’t going to get 10 seconds quicker in the next week. Is anyone driving in cockpit view?
Nice to see the cut corner bug is still present. Ford chicanes, had just one wheel go over, lap invalidated.
Wow. I really want to like this car- fast, lots of power, GREAT sound! However, near impossible to see out of (bumpercam for me…), and that SHAKE! Many laps ruined by a shake pulling a wheel off course while just going straight on Mulsanne. Hmmm. I would say this is a fail- I have FFB at 1/1 on my G25 and it still shakes way too hard. I hope the real car drives better, otherwise I feel very bad for the drivers. Downforce also seems very inconsistent- I can go flat in 3rd (maybe faster?) through Porsche but have lift/brake hard for Tetre Rouge? Changeover between I thought this thing had amazing aero? I know also I am not alone in thinking the cones seem to be IN the line instead of just off?
are Kaz and Nissan having a quarrel? Did PD troll them with this event and car? am I missing something? where have 50 plus years of innovation come and gone, and how were they translated into programming this event? were the engineers drunk, or did Seth Rogen hack the Q&A dept?
Since my signup is invalidated anyhow for being Canadian, home to countless copies of this game sold,
ok staying classy!
/end
I apologize for my rant, I decided to play it and get a 350th ranking time of 3:34:600 with it,
I actually grew to love this round, determined to link up the corners for the win. I think PD wants to discipline us to be better drivers on this circuit and not cut the end like savagages.
I had the wheel torque and sensitivity as 2 & 2, and disabled all aids.
3.33.170 with DS3 , ranked 157th in the UK … can go faster also
Finally struck gold with this car … sadly with controller.
Nevertheless, the more you drive it and get to know it it’s actually quite nice :)
3:36.2 for me :)
Less than thousand Gold times O_o!!!
Ran 3:37,45 lately (silver) and i’m in 1119(roughly) place. Wow to the top runners, coz this one is one h*** of a car! Going for gold and skip it for good :D FFB is killing me, respectively killin my arms uff.
The car is one huge fast piece of bovine fecal matter!
Basically everything about it’s mechanical settings are just terrible and suspension stiffness is absolutely pathetic!
mooooooo! mooooooooooooo!
translation: I totally agree!, my neighbor’s old Dodge reliant K car could pass the cones in better time.
This car is interesting…. sounds great but definitely required some adjusting to get to gold… exit speed looks to be really important on this one…
Also WTF is with the force feedback …. does it really shake that much in real life at 250kmh ??? On the G27 I had to bring settings down to Torque 7 Sensitivity 4… so that my shoulder wouldn’t get ripped out…
I really want to like this car…. BUT each time I drive it I think…. hmm a Nissan contract would be nice.(wishful thinking)… but put me behind a Toyota TS030 over that clunky thing …. or better still the new Porche (the sign at Le Man’s triggers it)…well it will be interesting to see how competitive it is in real life…
Good luck to everyone trying for GTA.. (unless you are from Australia in which case may your luck be limited to a time slower than mine ) :)
Got a 3:35 gonna try again tomorrow for a 3:30 (Ran current time while half sleep).. But My goodness the boundaries for GTAcademy are ridiculous, I think it took me 25 invalid laps to get my first time and the fact that someone was able to run a 3:24 in this car is even MORE ridiculous! Then again, The number 1 time had a wheel. How is it driving with a racing wheel? I run alright times for having a controller, but it seems like the guys with the 900 degree steering wheel cockpit always seem to dominate the time rankings. Are those wheels that good?
“completely undrivable, worst car ever, too ugly”… no wonder i ranked under 100 with a lazy 3:34 after 2 or 3 clean laps… relax guys, find the sweet braking spots, easy in, wide turns… and don’t blame the car, it’s clearly not the problem.
Changed my approach, patience not aggression. Got it down to a 3.33.3
It’s a bit bumpy… But it’s still good!
I hate this car already, its ugly, it doesn’t go true corners!
only 1 good thing nice engine sound!
Whoa, what a car. I don’t know what to make of it. Nailed a 3.35.313 on the 2nd clean lap. Was 1 second up on my time going into the Porsche curves and ran two tires over the grass…invalidated.
I really like the design of the car. Made a 3:35.754!
This… what ever it is is UGLY!
It is sooo not a GT-R. They should call it a GT-F(wd).
I do like the GoPro sound effects though, from the front outside view. The wind noise impossible to hear what the engine and transmission are doing… git yo butt back in the cockpit ;)
One more day of failure is all I got left in me to gold… sooo not the pro. Least I got a nice credit reward for silver… whatever…
It’s best especially using the DS3 to win the car, take it somewhere else and learn it before taking Le Mans on again. It takes a specific kind of driving(like a backwards 911) to extract the best from it and Sarthe is a terrible teacher.
Just remember, slow in, fast out. The cars all about corner exit. StopturnBANG.
Even with my super craptastic lack of DS3 skill silver is really pretty easy by just being careful and taking your time with the corners and making sure to get the beast slowed down enough to not plow the turns. I don’t expect gold to be any real sort of problem once I pull out the wheel later. Holy cow the reports are right about the bouncing though. You can hardly see the track clearly at times due to the shaking on Mulsanne.
Happy bumping car. Sacked in the car. Never come back. Enjoy!
What?
Maybe…The car is very bumpy. Kept crashing. Don’t want to bother trying to complete a lap even if the car is free. Every else enjoy the car?
I think he/she is trying to communicate that Mario Kart is never this hard . Although whatever this attempt at a sentence is , it might always just be gibberish
Driving this car with the controller, nor did i drive very fast i didn’t enjoy either..
…. but i heard the Nissan guy and Jay Leno discuss this exact car… and it does has some kind’a traction control, therefore tyre wear should not be as wild as it was in my case :’D
Bet it’s gonna understeer massive in the wets.. but I hope I’ll stand corrected :)
Got in. Got Gold. Got out. Let’s see what this car is….
After oil change, 634hp Front engine, Front Wheel Drivetrain for Le Mans 24 hours…Yeah, that’s not very smart of the guys at Nissan. Tire Wear is going to kill them. So when you’re watching Le Mans and the commentators are noting the problems the Nissan LMP is having with their front tires, somebody better be there waiting to pick up that phone…
If I’m wrong and it works out just fine, I’ll be quite surprised.
Last night I maxed out the Scirocco touring race car and put in some laps at LeMans expecting this. It sucked. I hate FF cars for the most part and already knew this one wasn’t going to be fun.
Oh well, I wasn’t really planning on putting much into this this year anyway.
In my experience with this car. I experienced what everybody else did unpredictable into turns and wobbly in the straights and very very bouncy. After invalid lap after invalid lap I noticed I’m getting use to the car and actually predicting what the car was going to do. I ran a 3:34.2 so far. I’m comfortable to the point I feel like wanting to actually push the car. What is really ridiculous is getting invalid laps notification when you are no where near a cone or off the track. I was on the track and it keeps invalidating my lap. Come PD this isn’t how it’s done.
Hah yeah… 2 of my wheels barely graced the white line… BOOM!! Invaliated
Well,I think it’s a new kind of restriction for this year’s gt academy.The standard seems to be stricter and stricter as the event moves forward.During round 2 in Brand’s Hatch,they already set up cones around every corner,and in round 3,you get disqualified if you go a little bit off road on the long straight.Well,as this trend appears after the accident of Jann,so I think in order to prove that drivers from GT are not reckless,PD has to do this t9 get back the trust of the supporters.
At first I thought it was me, but, after hitting cones or going off course a few times, I switched to the bonnet cam hoping to better understand the boundaries of this car…and I’m pretty sure the game is misreporting the car being over the lines in at least a few spots along the course. I got the “invalid lap” notification at least twice when I was right on the driving line…presumably nowhere near the edge of the course. I have yet to lay down a valid lap (out of maybe 10 attempts). Didn’t have this problem at all during the earlier rounds.
I can’t drive from behind, usually prefer cockpit but frame rate is so bad and interior view is way to restrictive in this car to play from anything but the full or bonnet cams.
I have been playing Gt3-4-5 and now GT6, but this is the worst car ever driven. First of all there is need the strength of 10 arms to hold the steering wheel, the car jump on the road, goes right, left, is completely undriveable, when it brakes seems to be with the boat on a stormy sea. I tried 3-4 times then I get tired and get back to driveclub and project cars.
that is brillaint but the TT itself lets round 4 down, to strict with the run off & cones. you take the natural racing line out of “Arnage” cliping the curb, you get D’Qed. you take the natural racing line coming out at the “Porsche Curves” you get D’Qed. Crazy
My poor T500RS, I feel like Im taking a hammer to it. Does anyone with a T500RS know how to tune it for this event?
for sure, the penalties are pretty draconian.If you ever watch the real race, every single car out there would be dq;d by PD. As for the car, I just didn’t like anything about it.
OMG!! What an awesome event! This will separate the boyz from the men for sure,, yes, keeping the car on the track, away from cones and the “DQ” lines is absolutely brutal but WOW,, when you keep your wits about yourself, do your best to not become infuriated for all the RESTARTS and finally lay down a lap that stashes the car in your fleet,, WOW what a feeling of accomplishment. Get that done (my first clean lap after 8 or 10 attempts was a 3:37.16 = SILVER),, then you can settle in,, keep your wits about you,, recognize this one isn’t for the weak of heart and try, try, try to nail a GOLD. There will be MANY who will throw their controller across the room, want to slam their wheel to the floor,, but hang in there kids,, this is an AWESOME event and fitting for the ACADEMY FINAL ROUND. Good on ya PD,, well done!!
No Calsonic livery. :(
But, the car looks like a challenge, and that should be fun. Can’t wait to see what I can do with it.
Was hoping for the Calsonic & Manchester City liverys but in reality not surprised there’s only the red works livery.
Why they cant just invalidate the lap when you hit a cone instead of making you restart is beyond me (#AnotherSillyPDGameplayMistake)
Probably because of the cones. They didn’t program cones and other on-course items to respawn after hitting them.
My guess is people were doing the same thing I did last year at Silverstone… first turn I would go and push the cones into the position I wanted them at my break points or to aim for for my line, then I’d run my laps.
Also, the respawn thing.
dont tell me its that hard. oh i forgot its PD we are talking about.
The DS3 guys have this easier. the trick to the car is left foot braking it. The car turns a lot better with the gas on than off too…
It drives very interestingly.
well, if you are unable to use two pedals with two feet, you are not a good driver :D
To counter your claim that the DS3 guys have it better, no we don’t. The car barely turns as it is with a controller and yes it stops turning for braking too, mainly because it’s a FF drivetrain. And the top times in the world are steering wheels, mainly those huge 900 degree cockpits. Where’s the majority of the DS3? Barely under the gold time and most of them are silver and bronze. So yeah, your claim is invalid. It was a struggle and a half with a DS3 same as it ever was.
I like the car, but I find it hard to get accustomed to. My first 6 laps were all invalid, then I got the silver time, and after some more laps finally reached gold 3’36.+. It’s hard to be fast with it, because I can’t really predict its behavior in corners.
I’m surprised how well it is doing on the track though. I guess it simply needs some more training to override the expectations of a classic MR-prototype behavior. ;)
wow , having read these comments about the car being wonky at the wheel, I am considering passing round 4 altogether. I don’t feel like burning out my T500 on this unoptimized session.
Turn your FFB settings all the way to minimum and start from there.
I feel like im the only one that loves this. My first 3 or 4 laps were invalid. But then the 4th was a 3:35 then I got a 34 then a 33 then a 32 then about 10 more 32s then a few 31s and now im at a 30.5 which was 13th when I logged out. World leader has a 26.8 … aliens. -_-
The car won’t turn properly…and there seems to be some additional invisible width to hit the cones.
Is it me or does this car just bounce around the entire course? I find it completely obnoxious. I’m wicked tired, so I didn’t even attempt to run a real hot lap. I just did enough to collect the car. People who use the DS3 controller are lucky when it comes to this event, I believe. The force feedback is insane with this car & track combo. If I don’t get Gold within a few laps whenever I decide to try the event, so be it. I’m a 40 year old, disabled guy. I don’t think Nissan was exactly hoping to cram my butt into one of their cars.
I broke my hand a few years ago, so I’ve got some empathy. I’ve changed my wheel FFB settings to 8 (Torque) and 5 (Sensitivity) and it’s far less fierce – give it a try.
I watched some of the preview video yesterday from LeMans and noticed the car was really bouncing around. Wondered if it was a bug or something.
Yes and i found it unsettling
@Famine My settings are currently at 7/4 — so it should produce slightly less torque than your settings. Still, I just find it bouncy compared to most LMPs or Group Cs taken on Le Mans. There is an obscene amount of rear toe applied to the race car that we are gifted when we complete a lap. If we are running our Round 4 hot lap with the same exact settings, I wonder if that has anything to do with it. I guess I should take my gifted car out of the garage and run an Arcade Mode lap or 10 around La Sarthe to see if the car feels the same as it does when running in GT Academy.
I didn’t complete the Spa one yet (away from my PS3)
This means i’m not eligable now to qualify for the Academy? (I’m in an eligable and small country).
It said it’s avaidable from may 19 to june 16th.
I have never read that i can’t get a time after the first two weeks.
It has been in the terms and conditions since the start and in the game each event also has a “Rankings Registration Period” above the “Event Availability Period” that tells you when you must submit a valid time. Round 3’s closed at 0659 UTC this morning – as evidenced by the flashing red “Closed” message.
I disagree with Famine, at least the US terms and conditions say nothing about “Rankings Registration Period” – it only says you must complete the qualifying rounds 1-3 before you are able to register for the final round, nothing about completing them during the “rankings open” period.
It even says the “The Contest begins on June 2, 2015 and ends on June 16, 2015 (“Contest Term”) and that “Contestants must then log into their PSN account, and successfully complete four (4) progressive rounds of qualification racing included in the OQM within the Contest Term. Contestants must complete all previous rounds before the subsequent round will be unlocked.”
I missed out on the first round “rankings open period” by a couple days, but have been able to complete and unlock each round.
As for why they have a rankings period that closes on the early rounds, I just suspect they do not need to crowd their servers with rankings data on early rounds that has no bearing on final qualification.
One more update, the same question was asked on the GTacademy facebook page and they confirmed you can enter and complete the previous rounds any time
This is not realistic: the car didn’t make it to 3’37 during the recent test session at LeMans, not even close to 3’50 (slower than an LMP2)…anyway, I’m gonna give it a try!
I managed around a 3:35.??? on Le-Mans.
His point is that the car isn’t an accurate representation of this car irl.
The recent test day was just that. The car (probably) didn’t lay down representative times.
Why can’t they make the cars that did hit those times and better faster (the TS030 ran 3’26s if I remember correctly)? It feels a little biased to me but I can’t wait to try the car out
The car in game probably IS more representative of the real life capabilities than lap times from a wet, interrupted, first shakedown Le Mans test day using tires designed for 4 stints (Nissan has no Le Mans quali-specific tires this year).
Not fair to compare the test day of the first competitive event for a radically new LMP1 design vs very well sorted LMP2s… Nissan has stated the car should outpace LMP2 cars, which would put the game times right on.
Thank you famine!
They weren’t on qualifying tires like everyone else and also, to finish first at Le Mans you must to first finish! They’re focusing on endurance first.
Okay, so i got the gold after about 20 invalid laps (stupid boundaries), and right after i exited the race… my system froze… i had to shut it off hoping nothing would get messed up. Well, i got back into the game to find that my record time was saved, but i didnt get any credits OR the car… so i went back in… got another gold time (new record) and what do you know… still no prizes. Im quite upset about this… anybody have any suggestions?
Looks like you’ll have to purchase the car? Unless you made a recent back up file on USB…Then you could delete the current saved data on your PS3 and then restore your user file from the USB stick. Of course, you’ll lose everything accomplished between now and whenever you made that latest backup.
I thought about the backup but the earliest backup file was created after all this happened, so it was a no go. And i checked the dealership but the car wasnt in nissan or nismo… hoepfull PD will add it in later :/
I got gold with a 3:35.082. Took about 2 laps to get used to the incredibly strict out of bounds areas.
I’m using a DFGT and the track and car were beating my wrists and arms up. I don’t think I’m goin to be doing this competition too much more.
I think the car sounds pretty good. Love the downshift and off-throttle pops of the exhaust.
Great car, but the front wheel drive just RUINS this amazing car.
Or its yet another awful PD Base setup.
Managed a gold time of 3:36.521 after three attempts. The key with this car is gentle acceleration out of corners and take a slightly wider line than normal to avoid those stupid cones! On a wheel this car gets annoying because as it picks up speed the car jumps around A LOT. Oh well, at least I have the car for myself to refine it and hopefully make it decent.
Stupid cones….
I can already see the incoming disappointment and complaints about the track not being Circuit of the Americas or Yas Marina.
What’s funny is that if you run a silver time you were already quicker than any of the drivers were in the car on the Le Mans test day, where the cars quickest a lap was a 3:43.
This thing is super unnatural to drive. The suspension seems to be lifted out of Fred Flintstone’s daily driver and the time sacrificed not being able to rotate the car through the corners is really a killer. The car is like a pendulum changing directions.
I agree with you. The stock setup on this car is just horrible to drive.
Oh, and idk why on earth this car has a 5 speed gear box, but the torque produced at the top of 1st gear when it should be in low to mid 2nd gear creates a lot of wheel spin, and when the car spins it’s wheels it plows. I have no idea what they were thinking by not having a 6 speed.
yessss!!! Le mans!!! I think that we are gonna beat the real times from last sunday… Are they looking for new pilots por the race? ;)