Gran Turismo 5

[RobCallow]

I know a few of us have brought GT5.

What do you all think about it?

I personally can't see why it has taken soooooooo!!! long to launch.

I like the fact they have the Topgear test track on it and the Karting in the special stages is great!!

[Stuart]

Don't think I'll bother. The gestation period seems ridiculous although I understand some of the rally modes are quite something. Online gameplay has been slated and that, surely, is a key facet of any 'proper' game now days.

Maybe let me know how you get on?

[Daniel]

im not too impressed if i'm totally honest, as picked up why has it taken over 2000 days from GT4 to now for a handfull of improvments.

firstly though i'll say what i like about it, the karting was a brainstorm absolutley love it and it is a right giggle that left me looking on ebay for a real kart! and they finally have proper tyre screeches, tyre smoke and rev bounce on the limiters. and that is all unfortunatley.

now the bad bits. the shadow work inside the cockpits is a joke, nothing but diagonal blocks. found out that only 'premium' cars have cockpits! wtf is that all about! next downer on my list is the really stupid 'experience' points that you have to achieve before you can do certain events or buy certain cars. the damage again is a joke, i purposly crashed my premium lambo at 180mph and what did i get? a bumper slightly falling off... i was expecting a total write off.

so to summerise, pardon my french but it's total bollocks as much as i love the GT franchise and spent many years growing up playing the series of games i think it's time to move on and actually experience the real deal a bit more. long live GT1 - the best of the bunch.

EDIT: also, whats the deal with the dudley moore piano intro music!

[Safety_James]

Ive been waiting for this for ages on the PS3. Been using F1 2010 and think thats superb however the more i read about GT5 the more im feeling less likely to buy it...

Worried that I may consider going to buy an Xbox 360 and getting Forza 3 instead..

[Tonynos]

After downloading the update then waiting 30 minutes to install the 8gb on the hard drive to speed up loading times I'm pretty disappointed how long everything takes to load. First thoughts were this is really good, especially the go karts and the camper vans on the Top Gear track.
After playing it again today for a couple of hours I'm starting to get bored with it already. I haven't tried it with the steering wheel yet so I might have to get it out and see if I can get into it with that.

[RobCallow]

Had a little play with the driver manager today don't really see the point!!

I'm with you on the loading times Tony takes forever to load a track!

[RX7]

I'm a bit 50/50 with it, here's why:

The Goods:
The graphics (excluding the weird blocky shadows) are genuine jaw dropping and can be mistaken for the real thing, they really are that good. Playing the night race on the Tuscany track in a 600BHP Lambo with fireworks going off in the sky and a mixture of hills and not knowing which way the track was going (I turn the map off and driving line off you see) was genuinely tense !!
The huge variety of stuff to do eg licences, special events, the racing, dedicated photo mode etc etc.
The Premium cars look stunning and have very good representations of the cockpits, agree with Dan that its disappointing that not every car has them. However the cars I wanted eg RX7s, R32 Skyline etc all have them so for me this wasnt too bad.
The handling has also been beefed up and the cars feel like they have weight behind them especially when braking going hard down a hill.
It has the Re-Amemiya RX7........nuff said

The Bads
The loading times mentioned, even with the 8gb install.
The usual dodgy AI problem that ignores you very often or seems to brake miles before the corner. Forza got this so right.
The damage model is laughable, after being used to Forza which punishes you even if you rub another car this was a joke.
The complicated menu structure ! Has anyone found trying to join an online game easy
The handling can be a bit understeery on the stock cars with stock mods. I know I havent driven my car hard on a track but I would suspect it could get round hairpin corners even at 20mph without understeering !!

Overall I'm impressed but shocked at how little its moved on. There have been 2 Forza games in the time its taken to get out and these have really pushed the bar. I think Gran Turismo being the 'Real Driving Simulator' has lost some of the sparkle of the early ones.

Hopefully a number of things will be updated or fixed in patches but wont hold my breath.

[RX7]

What was funny though was when I bought the Re-Amemiya RX7, the one from the Touge vids.

I showed Em who said 'Its got one of those hand display things like you have and its mounted properly' !! She means the Apexi Commander and I said yeah the mounting bracket costs

[Stuart]

The white one mate?

Ooooooo......that may be worth buying it What are the tuning modes like?

[RX7]

Stu, its this one mate:

Think it used to be a very pale blue colour to start with.

An awesome car.