In Praise Of: GRAN TURISMO 4

Somewhere on ILG Tracer Hand said he didn’t like it cos you basically had to grind thru races to make money to soup up cars to grind through races. That’s not wrong, but you don’t have to do things that way. And even if you do, that’s not necessarily bad either: imo racing games all reduce either to this or Mario Kart. It calls itself a “simulation” rather than a “game.” Which sounds like aspie code for “I don’t care how boring and repetitive I am.” I for one am all for it.

I’ve gotten back into the game in a big way over the past few months; it’s pretty old at this point. GT5 is on its way out, but I’ll never play it, as it’s on PS3, which I will never buy. It struck me that the game doesn’t have much depth (it is the same shit over and over again) but it has crazy breadth. So instead of just blazing through everything with MAXIMUMPOWER I’d try to drive all the cars in the game that are old, funky and kind of sucky instead of the big signature sportscars. And man, it’s a riot.

Thing is, the learning curve on this game is pretty steep. Learning how to brake into turns and downshifting and countersteering and all that is maddening. Some of the license tests are really devilish. Once you get that down, tho, it’s true, the game isn’t actually all that challenging. The AI drives very precisely but not very aggressively or creatively. It sticks to its line and handles all the corners capably – this is still an impressive programming feat, considering the number of tracks and the number of cars. The passing routine is garbage.

Beyond that, the difficulty varies widely and without reason. Some challenges you can blow away w/o much effort, other little things here and there will have you gnashing your teeth in frustration. There’s one Peugeot hatchback race where, for some reason, they’re all going 150 mph and turning on rails. The dirt and snow tracks are some kind of elaborate Beckettian joke, or an experiment like where rats shock themselves or something.

The prizes are bizarre: simple little series give you hugely powerful and expensive cars; other races that are miserably difficult give you historical curio cars that are undriveable in competition and in some cases have trouble getting up an incline. Some races require prizes from other series. Others have a field of opponents with one or two standout cars easily twice as fast as the rest of the pack. More than one series requires you to buy one particular car, to race a pack of that particular car, to win that particular car, again. There’s a lot about this game that doesn’t make a lick of sense. I don’t care. I love it.

But like I said: old goofy cars. For any race series you can grab a hot car that qualifies for it, dump a big turbo in it, and off you go, congratulations, a winner is you. But I’ve had a lot of fun picking up used cars – there are dozens of 70s and 80s Japanese and European cars in this game -- and tuning them up just enough to be competitive. Allow me to get super nerdy here: most of the time, I put in the drivetrain tune-ups (like an adjustable gear box) and racing suspension w/o changing the engine at all. This amps up both the autistic fiddlyness and the arcade-style drama. You spend a lot of time deep in the weeds, messing with gear ratios and ride height and spring tension and shit like that, then zipping around trying to bump some low-HP shitbox out to the front of the pack. You win by braking, shifting and turning, i.e. “driving,” not by pressing the right analog stick forward to go faster. Basically, the game has all kinds of ways to make every race fun, even though the whole GT métier doesn’t encourage it. Instead of being all “omg skyline l33t” you can be more like “how shitty a car can I put in here, and still win?” That’s a unique experience in games, I think.

Thank you for reading my essay on this wonderful game, THE END.

My main issue with GTIII and IV is the lack of any crash/damage physics. If I'm driving on a road on the edge of a cliff and an invisible wall separates my car from the abyss, that's not a simulation. Forza gets this a little more right than GT.

I just want a GT-type game that lets you play your own goddamn tunes over the engine noise. GT4's japanese OST was pretty good but not nearly as much fun as ExciteTruck is with that harry nilsson song from midnight cowboy in the background. and ridiculous crashes.

I play my own music with Forza all the time!

I'm still holding out on a 360 until they make it less expensive, less butt-ugly, and less likely to suddenly go kaput for no reason

My main issue with GTIII and IV is the lack of any crash/damage physics.

yeah this is a big problem. i've read one semi-plausibe internet theory that the reason more games don't have this is not programming but licensing: it's not that hard to code up some wrecked up cars, but the IP depts of the manufacturers are strict about wrecked and flipped over versions of their designs. maybe.

gff i loved your mini-essay on this game i will never be able to get into.

gff - yeah, really nice post - I enjoyed reading it. I've heard people complaining about the lack of damadge, but honestly it's something I never really notice, possibly because I always race in first person view and can't see my own car anyway. There is something weird about the way you bump off walls and cars, where it feels a little more like you are in a bumper car instead of an actual car, but on the other hand, do you really want to total your car going around the first corner when playing a game?

The thing about GT4 now is that that I have a harder time playing it, just because the graphics don't hold up compared to the newer games coming out, like Forza, PGR 3&4, DiRT or especially the new GT5P, which I just played for the first time tonight. I feel a lot less immersed just because the world & cars don't look half as good anymore, but then again, I'm a hopeless graphics whore.

In theory, one of the cool things about this gens games, is being able to have nice, challenging online races - so you get a break for dealing with sometimes too routine computer a.i. racers stuck in a groove. On the other hand, sometimes real people drive like assholes online.

^^^ has never played excite truck

do you really want to total your car going around the first corner when playing a game?

I don't. But if I have some scrapes during the match, I want to see them. If I slam into a wall and keep going, it should show.

Don't get me wrong, I liked GT3 a lot. It's just not my favorite rave.

but the IP depts of the manufacturers are strict about wrecked and flipped over versions of their designs. maybe.

Maybe this was true in the past, but I think they're opening up a bit about this.

Are they still harbouring the no-crashing in these games? Sheesh, talk about lame. Even NFS uses real cars with damage.

At least if they can't 'afford' the agreement to put damage on the cars, they could at least make them crash realisticaly instead of bumping around like dodgems.

I played so much II and III but never IV. II was really great b/c I was in (and dropped out of) college at the time and wasted a lot of time with it. III was also great but the depth of it all was too much, and I didn't really have 2-3 hours to blow at a time on a race that I might not win.

II was really great b/c I was in (and dropped out of) college at the time and wasted a lot of time with it.

i got about 40% through GT4, then gave up any semblance of progress to concentrate on solo lapping of the nurburgring. partly as it's the most satisfying course by a long way in any race game, and really well done in GT4; partly because of the drone-like quality of the opposition cars.

The worst thing about GTI was NORMAL CAR.

(by worst I mean hardest and most rage-inducing, esp. when you win and get the pink Trueno)

jeff said...
For those who may want to know definitively, the logitech G25 wheel works incredibly well with this. It shows up as a driving force pro, but the six speed box AND CLUTCH do work with the game as has been mentioned in comments elsewhere. Press the reverse button (typically triangle) once the race is underway and the clutch, although currently not analog, will work. If you miss shift the car lands in neutral until you correct it. Also, after getting hooked on rFactor for the PC to use the wheel, I was a little dismayed but the arcade feeling driving dynamics of GT5P versus what you get out of rFactor, GTR2, and the like. but after turning off ASM, TCS and such, its remarkably close to the same, realistic driving dynamics. If youre looking for a realistic sim, this is definitely getting damn close. Hopefully they'll iron out the lingering issues before GT5 is released, especially the clutch. and a final word - clutch and 6 speed box definitely houses Forza in a heartbeat, no matter what any fanboys say. its a totally different ballgame.

is this "our" jeff?

Not this one. I only have the cheap-o (relatively speaking) logitech driving force pro - but it does add a lot to the game. I've actually been playing a lot of GT4 the last few days. I think this thread made me ashamed of how little progress I'd made in the game (I only picked it up a year ago, or so). I think they kind of made a mistake by frontloading the game with so much kind of boring stuff - originally I got really REALLY fed up doing license tests and driving a fucking honda civic on the sunday cup over and over trying to earn enough cash to upgrade the car enough to do some other races and eventually win enough money to buy a decent car. Having finally purchased a Dodge Viper last night though - the game is becoming a lot more fun & I'm finally starting to make some progress - which feels good. Finally! The amount of content in this game is pretty fucking amazing / absurb.

all GT games are absurb

I think they kind of made a mistake by frontloading the game with so much kind of boring stuff

all GT games are like this but nailing those license tests are the only way to get good enough to win the later races i think

not to repeat myself, but the piddly econobox races at the beginning are much more fun than the high-HP races at the end. maybe with a wheel it's different, but at 150+mph the game is just straight-brake-turn-straight-brake-turn at infinitum, it feels like a really shiny connect-the-dots game.

i taught myself how to drive the game in with manual transmission (which i'd never bothered to try) by re-doing all the license tests, and it was hella exciting! but i'm, you know, nuts.

hey Jeff: need cash? head to Special Conditions: Capri Rally (easy). it doesn't take much of a car (your viper will do just fine) and you win a Toyota RCS rally car worth 260k. rinse, repeat.

early in the game, spend your money in the Used car shop I and II: plenty of 90s sportscars for not very much. remember to change the oil. the '89 skyline (in the Historical shop) is one of my favorite cars in the game, and costs about 11k. less than a set of tires!

Yeah, if you're not playing in manual, you're really not playing at all imo.

i love the gt series but i got halfway through gt4 and just hit a wall, where i wasnt able to finish any of the more difficult races. i ended up just doing all the endurance races instead, which i really liked.

this thread makes me want to buy gt5

One of the amazing things about playing GT5P vs GT4 is just how much better the graphics look in 5 already (at least at 1080p on my tv). It makes it easier just because everything looks so clear (like, looking down the track in 4 sometimes it's hard to tell if it's a left turn or a right turn coming up without looking at the mini map, but in 5 you can see everything so much clearer - it really makes for a much more pleasant experience). The other way it's better is in the menu system & presentation. 4 is kind of clunky (the way you switch between icon events), but in 5 the menu system is truly beautiful - it makes you appreciate the cars a lot more. It makes playing the game an almost elegant experience.

is this the best gran turismo?

dunno, it's the only one i ever played apart from 1 on PS1. GT3 got better reviews but i think it's the same game w/ fewer cars.

do you have FM2? i'd just play that. it has everything good about GT4, minus some irritating things, plus some great things, like damage, and more interesting race types. i don't think i could go back to an earlier GT iteration now.

Yeah, Forza ruined GT for me.

Forza 3 demo is up for XBOX Live, btw. Pretty nice!