Gran Turismo 5 Spec II

[MarketTantrik]

lol its not that though. In fact with GT's spot on car physics and tighter controls, its a bit on the easy side. You almost always know how your car is gonna behave while you turn/brake/accelerate. Heck I can do 10 laps around Suzuka and have all lap times fall within 1 second of each other. Can't say that about F1 CE or FM.

 

Havent played much GT 5 yet so cant comment on that, but if GT4 is any indicator then Forza 2's driving and physics engine is the best in the business by more than a country mile. In F2, your car's performance actually varies as the laps count down due to tyre degradation and bump damage, but if you really have the driving instincts, you can pretty much nail the lap times and bring them down by taking advantage of the changing grip and handling over the course of a race. Forza 2 also has wicked AI, something the GT series has traditionally lacked in. All-in-all GT4's driving engine was good but not quite there yet.

 

To put it another way, Forza 2 is more organic while GT4 was plasticky. Hoping GT5 is able to surpass Forza 2 in the physics and AI departments.

[CarbonCore]

I haven't played Forza 2. I was talking about first Forza game on Xbox.

 

Btw Prologue is available on Japanese store now, and it is not accepting my card :cry5:

[vinitwins]

@MT: "Havent played much GT 5 yet"

 

i haven't played it at all - the demo is no longer available on psn! where/when did you get your hands on GT - CC's console?

 

 

 

V

[MarketTantrik]

^^ Yup. At your house.

[MarketTantrik]

^^ Which is why I made the comparison with GT 4.

[CarbonCore]

rofl yesterday's Famitsu score turned out to be fake :rofl2: .Famitsu hasn't even reviewed the game.

 

http://www.gamer.tm/news.php?id=1861

[MarketTantrik]

^^ No kidding :shock3:

[MarketTantrik]

cant compare a game that came out in 2007 on the 360 with one that came out in 2004 on the PS2....its an unfair comparison....compare GT4 to the Forza1....GT4 smokes FM

 

No harm in comparing the previous benchmark with the current benchmark while star gazing about the future benchmark.

[CarbonCore]

im gonna await for the EU/US release of GT5P....tuning will be a bitch with jap menus

 

 

 

peace

 

There's no additional tuning in Prologue, it is same as Prologue demo or GTHD. You can change color/tires/traction etc, but thats about it. No other customization.

[CarbonCore]

Makes life easier for us import gamers

[CarbonCore]

They might add it later with future updates. PD said they will release an update on 25th Dec which will add online play, plus future updates will add damage physics.

[CarbonCore]

London track on real world map..

 

 

You can see the Trafalgar square at the bottom inside the track curve.

[CarbonCore]

IGN's Prologue Preview

 

http://ps3.ign.com/articles/841/841279p1.html

 

What's the difference between the two copies of the Japanese version of Gran Turismo 5 Prologue that IGN picked up earlier today? Let's explore!

 

One comes on a Blu-ray disc while the other comes as a bunch of bits and bytes downloaded from Sony's PlayStation Store to your PlayStation 3 hard disk.

 

One was bought with a credit card. The other, with credits from a digital wallet that we charged using one of those new 5,000 PlayStation Network cards released by Sony to Japanese shops today (different from the PlayStation Network Tickets released through convenience stores earlier this year, these are actual cards, similar to the cards offered for Xbox Live and Wii... that's right, you can collect them and store them away in your privatest of places).

 

One cost 4,480 yen. The other, 4,500 yen.

 

It may come as a surprise, but, despite Sony's official MSRP of 4,980 yen, the retail version of GT5 Prologue was actually the cheaper of the two versions for us! And it's even cheaper when you consider that many retailers in Japan have customer rewards programs giving 10% back in store credit. Take that into account, and we got the retail version for about 500 yen less than the download version, and walked home with a case, an actual disc, a set of bonus Gran Turismo stickers (presumably to apply to the white model system), and the assurance of no hassle in the event that our PS3 of choice should spontaneously explode (hopefully without the Prologue disc inside).

 

We'd have mentioned the paper instruction manual as well, but it's really just a short guide to the controls with no mention of the rest of the game. Regardless of which version of the game you get, the real Prologue manual is viewable in digital form through the game itself.

 

There's some added convenience in having the game exist as a download on your PS3, of course. Those with the disc version have to insert the disc every time they want to play, whereas the download version is accessible at all times from the XMB interface.

 

From what we can see, the differences come to an end there. Physical disc or not, both versions of the game appear to run off the the hard disk. When you first start up the Blu-ray version, the game undergoes a ten minute install procedure, resulting in a save file totaling 4,727 megabytes. This is much larger than the 1,877 megabytes required for the initial download of the digital version, apparently due to the inclusion of downloadable GT.tv content with the disc version from the start (you can actually delete these download files to clear up space if you like).

 

No matter which version of GT5 Prologue you get, we're sure you'll like what you see once you've started off the game. It shouldn't come as a surprise given who made it, but Prologue looks like a must-buy for car and race lovers.

 

Load up the game, and instead of a title screen, you're taken directly to your My Page screen, which gives you access to your garage for changing your current ride, car dealers for purchasing new cars, options for changing the various in-game settings, and two race modes, event and arcade. This hub screen also shows off a calendar and the weather in various parts of the world, all against some gorgeous realtime background scenery depicting your vehicle in realistic settings.

 

Initially, you have 3,500,000 credits in your purse, making only a few cars accessible. Once you've picked up a cheap car, you can work your way through race events, earning cash and unlocking more events as you progress. Events include single races and time trials, along with "missions" which require that you clear objectives like passing 15 cars in a single lap on the Daytona track.

 

For a full list of officially announced cars and tracks, check out our story from yesterday. See the Ferrari F599 midway through the list? Just 35,000,000 credits away! Some cars, including the Nissan Skyline Coupe Concept, don't have a monetary value attached to them, so we're not sure how to go about getting behind the wheel.

 

While obtaining your car of choice looks like it could end up taking up a good amount of time, the announced tracks are all available from the start. We've played, a couple of them in the past, including the Eiger Nordwand course in the original Gran Turismo HD Concept demo, and the Suzuka Circuit course, from the recent Prologue demo. The Prologue demo also included an eyes-only glimpse at the Daytona course, so it's nice to at last be able to drive on it, although it will probably be more thrilling in a fast car. Sure to cause the biggest sensation, though, is the London course, thanks to its narrow roads and tremendous amount of trackside detail.

 

In Prologue's default state, outside of the events, you're limited in how you can actually put all these tracks to use. The game ships with arcade race and time attack modes. Full online race support will be added through a Christmas Day update.

 

But forget the actual racing part of the game. If you just want a car and racing reference, Prologue may be what you're looking for. Most of the dealers accessible off your My Page have news feeds that are continuously updated with the latest announcements and press releases. As mentioned above, the GT.tv mode has four pieces of free HD content built in from the start, with more on the way this month before paid downloads begin in late January.

 

The coolest bonus for racing fans, though, comes right before you race. For most tracks (London is the exception) you have access to a "course guide" option, an HD video tour of the course, its surroundings, and, occasionally, related race events. These tours are set to Gran Turimo-style jazz, with streaming text at the bottom of the clips providing a bit of background history on the course.

 

Unfortunately, the video component of the game has the same problems from the demo version: no background downloading for when you download clips, and limited playback controls. A forward or rewind feature would be nice for some of the longer clips (especially the Fuji Speedway circuit clip which has some hawt race queen segments).

 

Aside from the oversights in the video portion of the game, the Prologue interface is rock solid. It may be because the entire thing is stored on the hard disk, but navigating back and forth between menus, car selection, and races is quick, with only a bit of loading when you first select to enter a race and an even shorter wait when going back to the menus. And the interface doesn't cut corners. You've got full detail views of cars as you select them, and even a full-screen video loop of tracks during the track selection.

 

In addition to polishing up the interface to perfection, Polyphony appears to have continued making improvements on the game engine since the demo's release a couple of months back. The technical improvements are obvious. The Suzuka Circuit doesn't have all the screen tearing and frame drops from the demo version. When in the cockpit view, the shadows crossing the dash are cleaner, and the rear view and side mirrors display a more accurate reflection of the track. The cockpit view also has a more animated driver, who reaches down to change gears.

 

Suzuka is actually the least visually impressive of the tracks. For best effect (if you find yourself in the presence of someone who time slipped here from the 1987 and thinks Rad Racer is the pinnacle of racing graphics), we'd suggest the London track, whose narrow roads, flanked by tall buildings, provides the perfect opportunity for the game's HDR lighting system to shine. Or, if you missed the whole Prologue demo and are coming off last year's Gran Turismo HD Concept demo, the Eiger Nordwand track is the way to go, as it's been updated to full GT5 Prologue spec in the year interim, now complete with properly animated spectators, dynamic lighting, and better track side detail.

 

There's no doubting that this is, by far, the finest looking racing game around, but there are still a few technical shortcomings. The London track in particular suffers from some pretty noticeable screen tearing. Some of the effects used in replays look a bit unpolished as well. These will hopefully improve for the main GT5 game. Or, maybe Polyphony will go crazy with the downloadable content and actually update the graphics engine gradually.

 

We've only sampled Prologue through a few races and events so far, but it already seems like a production worthy of the Gran Turismo name -- at least as much as the Japan-only Gran Turismo 4 Prologue was prior to the full GT4's release. Is it worth forty bucks? We'll have to work through the events and try out online play later this month to determine that for sure.

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[CarbonCore]

CVG Previews Prologue..

 

Here's the real reason you bought a PlayStation 3

 

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=177496

 

Gran Turismo 5: Prologue is some way off, but tearing around the famous Suzuka course in a Nissan GT-R with the lastest playable version of Sony's Real Driving Simulator makes us want to hibernate to pass the time until its launch, like children who go to bed early on Christmas Eve in anticipation of the treats to come the next morning.

 

To say we're fans of Polyphony's racing series in an understatement. Playing GT HD was amusing enough (despite it being the tightest, skimpiest demo offering in the history of videogames), but instead of impressing us, it left us with a worry that the next generation of Gran Turismo would do little more than add a few extra pixels to the resolution. We were wrong to worry.

 

The newer version of the game we've played is only a very small portion of what Sony's cooking up, but for racing nuts and series fans, it's pretty astonishing. If there's anyone out there that, even after Heavenly Sword, still needs a reason to justify the £400 notes they splashed out on that big shiny box, this will most certainly be it.

 

Playing GT5 feels like putting on your best suit and going for a no-expense-spared meal at The Ritz. Everything about it is lush. It's elite. It's the most upper class of racing game ever. And we're not just talking about the stunning graphics or super-satisfying handling of the cars.

 

The menu screens have a sheen - that extra touch of class - that forces home the fact that this is no budget project by some random garage developer. This is a proud team's work of art. Even the chilled, jazz-style music that backs the menus sounds like the kind of tracks you'd probably expect to hear playing quietly in the background in a five-star hotel lobby.

 

Enough about the menus though, because it's all about the drive. We've been thrashing around in seven cars in the new version of the game, ranging from the woefully average Daihatsu OFC-1, to the far more aggressive, utterly satisfying Nissan GT-R and we love it. Everything feels so brilliantly fine-tuned that, when sitting in the right car, there's immense satisfaction to be had every time you pull the perfect racing line and throw a car around a bend on the edge of its limit.

 

GT5 is still totally simulation, but it now feels so much more playable than the previous version of the game we played. This is far tighter. The cars are obedient, have a good sense of speed and the most realistic feeling of weight and traction of any racing game.

 

The version we have boasts the same performance options of the GT HD demo - ABS, stability management and a traction console - as well as a choice of racing and non-racing spec tyres, which means you can set up the game to feel how you want.

 

The only thing that drastically hinders this game from being everybody's dream simulator is the continuing lack of a damage model. You have these fantastic, photo-realistic visuals, insanely detailed car set-up options and amazing physics - but slam into another car and you bounce off each other like solid wooden blocks.

 

What makes it extra astonishing is that you get this solid-as-a-rock frame-rate without the loss of detail that most other games endure when they want to hit the 60fps mark. The cars look incredible. Picture perfect even. All the detail is there, right down to the lines in the plastic covering the headlights. There are 16 of these high-poly bad boys on the course at once, but the frame-rate remains unshaken.

 

Proper race geeks will be pleased with the new in-cockpit view in GT5, too. It places you right in the driver's seat, and the cockpit detail is, again, perfect to the real thing. All the buttons and dials of the real car are there, and all the dials are fully operational. You can see the driver steering and changing gear, and even leaning side to side slightly as you power into corners.

 

Loads of racing games have used the power of the current super-consoles to get all the shapes right in their cars. But the real difference in GT5 is the way these cars are lit. Fire up GT HD right now and watch a replay. See how flat the lighting is?

 

Since it put out that demo, Sony has upped the shine levels and enhanced the sunlight blooming effect. Nothing is overdone - so they're not wax-covered mirrors - but scenery reflects subtly and realistically off the polished paintwork, and the glare of the sun creates a blooming effect that you see a little of as you go through the GT HD demo's tunnel.

 

The game could look even better when it finally arrives in 2008. You've got the taster package - GT5 Prologue - to come. This will have a hefty 50 cars and choice of five tracks. It'll also have 16-player online to race against which should be incredible, but we hear Sony is having problems getting that to work in UK, but we're sure they'll have it ironed out in time for release.

 

We've already got our best racing wheels clamped to the table and braking points on the brain, because GT5 can't arrive a second too soon. We'll see you on the starting grid.

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[KnackChap]

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:shock3: :shock3: :shock3: :shock3:

[Snake]

JESUS CHRIST!!!

 

:shock3: :shock3: :shock3:

 

I guess thats enuf

[vinitwins]

sigh... you need a good wheel to really enjoy GT!

 

 

 

V

[MightySkate]

For anyone who's played this version of GT5, do you see any visible improvement over GT5 HD?

Because when i played GT5 HD, the cars edges and the environment were full of jaggies.

[CarbonCore]

Looks like this time around, there will be penalties for bumping into other cars, riding the barriers and cutting corners. There's no damage physics yet but this is a welcome change.

 

From the manual..

 

You can't bump cars from behind, push them off track, cut corners or bump into barriers. If you do, you'll either slow down too much or get a 4 second penalty.

[vinitwins]

not fair - the only way to win is to spin everyone off the track

 

 

 

V