Gran Turismo 5 Message Board older than one year ago

Gran Turismo 5 may be out in stores, but its creators don't consider their work complete just yet. Since its release, Polyphony Digital's racing game has already received a few updates, with more on the way. Series creator Kazunori Yamauchi explained to Famitsu that "it would be good to have one update every month."

Of particular note for car enthusiasts would be the expansion of the game's premium car offerings. Although the game launched with over a thousand cars, only one fifth of the vehicles are represented with "premium" models, which feature higher resolution textures, fully modeled interiors and undercarriages, and damage modeling. Yamauchi promised that new premium cars would be made available for download, but Andriasang notes that he failed to confirm whether or not the updates would be free.

Although the team is working on adding new features and updated models into GT5, there are a few items you shouldn't expect via patches: new cars and courses. "They may be added as expansion content," Yamauchi explained, "or we may leave it until the next title."

Producer shares upcoming update plans. Premium cars are on the way, but brand new cars may wait until GT6.

#kazunoriyamauchi In driving simulator Gran Turismo 5, there are over 1,000 cars. However, only around two hundred of them are premium. That, however, is going to change. More »

#hardware Improve your Gran Turismo 5 loading times—if not your lap times—by ripping out that stock hard drive in your PlayStation 3 and swapping in a solid state drive. You could cut your wait to race in half. More »

Gran Turismo is my absolute favorite racing game – the speed, combined with the realism of the graphics and the sound, really gets my heart pumping. My schedule gets really crazy, and it feels great to just be able to relax and enter this thrilling world of car racing.

I was so excited to be asked to perform music for the soundtrack. Combining music and technology has always been something I’m passionate about, and this was the perfect opportunity. It might seem incongruous at first – classical music and video games – but the more we delved into what we could do with the music, the more excited I got. Classical music reflects the same passion and intensity as racing, and hearing these musical pieces that have stood the test of time for centuries brings a whole new element to sensation of racing.

When I recorded the music for GT5 in the studio, I felt like I was racing on the track – it was really thrilling. I’m sure this music will bring more passion and excitement to the game when you play too.

About the soundtrack:

World-renowned pianist Lang Lang is known for his passion for new technologies and his constant endeavors to bring classical music to new audiences. Recently, Lang Lang recorded the classical music that appears throughout Gran Turismo 5. The official soundtrack features famous piano works by Chopin, J.S. Bach, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Joplin, Holst and Beethoven – all works being used in the various parts of the game. Prokofiev’s “Precipitato” appears prominently in its entirety in the first half of the opening sequence. Sony Classical will release the soundtrack digitally via all major service providers on December 14th and physically the week of December 20th.

Lang Lang says, “Gran Turismo is the most exciting racing game in the world and I have been a fan of it for many years. I feel honored to have this opportunity to connect with people who have never been in a concert hall before and show them that classical music is not just a part of history, but is actually very present and relevant today.”

A trailer featuring the many things that Gran Turismo's fifth installment has to offer.

Sick and tired of sitting through loading screens between races in Gran Turismo 5? If you've got yourself one of those classic "fat" PS3 consoles, slap a solid-state drive (SSD) into that puppy and watch the loading times plummet -- at least, according to a user named Phil over on the Beyond3D forums.

Taking two PS3s (the aforementioned "fat" with the game installed on a Corsair F120 SSD drive, and a Slim with the game installed on its standard SATA drive), Phil timed how long it took for the game to initially load up and checked out several different tracks' loading times in the game's Arcade mode. He found a sizeable, consistent drop in loading times. The biggest factor seems to be the architecture of the SSD itself -- it has no moving parts, so there are no mechanical heads moving around frantically to access the thousands and thousands of tiny, incremental files that make up the Gran Turismo 5 installation.

While SSD seems like it would be better for installing games compared to regular storage, the drives are costly and don't fit in the PS3 Slim. Factoring in the affordability of 2.5" HDDs, which the Slim accepts, the SSD solution seems more and more impractical -- despite the impressive loading times you see above.

Sony's pretty confident in its latest big release, Gran Turismo 5. The publisher shipped 5.5 million copies of the game to retailers worldwide since launching in late November, pushing the entire franchise's worldwide lifetime shipped numbers to just over the 60 million mark (61.41 million, precisely). Gran Turismo 5 debuted on November 24th and placed 8th on the NPD's software sales ranking for that month.

Sony and developer Polyphony Digital also noted their dedication to expanding the world of GT5 in the future. "Polyphony Digital Inc., will continue hereon to vigorously promote development of the Gran Turismo series, which can be expected to evolve even further through the PS3 platform and broadband network environment." Let's hope for more notable additions, like the recent introduction (v1.03) of tiered vehicle damage to online races.

#review There are two traditional options for racing game controllers: a gamepad and a wheel. The HKS Racing Controller is somewhere in the middle. But does that mean it's middle of the road? More »

#sony Driving simulator Gran Turismo 5 is finally out. People are buying it! And that's helping the series pass a very important checkered flag: the 60 million units sold one. More »

#opinion Sounds nutty. But let me explain! More »

#gt5 One of Gran Turismo 5's more hardcore features is the game's "B-Spec" mode, which lets you manage a car race instead of driving one. Soon, this feature will be coming to a PC (or Mac!) near you. More »

Those of you taking Gran Turismo 5's detailed vehicles onto the information superhighway will be glad to hear that the latest patch for the game adds selectable car damage. After downloading the patch, GT5's "My Lounge" section allows you to choose how much mechanical damage you're willing to suffer during online play, from "None" to "Heavy" ("Mechanical damage will be more severe, and can only be repaired by making a pit stop ... damaged parts will be indicated with on-screen icons"). The "Light" damage option means parts of your car can be damaged, but its health regenerates (no, we're not joking). It's not clear whether the update also adds cover for your cars to hide behind while said health regenerates.

The patch is available as of right now and it takes up approximately 150MB of HDD space -- Polyphony Digital has yet to detail any other fixes/additions the patch brings with it. If you spot anything else, feel free to drop us a line!

[Thanks Russ!]

#gt5 Car damage, a feature that has confused many of the game's owners since Gran Turismo 5's release a couple of weeks ago, has just gotten a lot less confusing, courtesy of a 149mb update released overnight. More »

Mechanical damage now features – though it's online only.

Two racing franchises go head-to-head with the Pagani Zonda R! Which game best masters the look and feel of Pagani's powerhouse? You decide!

Lots of exciting news in the Gran Turismo world today. First, starting today, you can now register for GT Academy, the ultimate chance to become a real professional race car driver using Gran Turismo 5, now available exclusively on the PlayStation 3. In case you hadn’t heard about this exciting competition, we’re not talking about a weekend racing school here. The GT Academy winner will ultimately go on to train with elite race car drivers in actual Nissan vehicles and race as part of a professional team…the ultimate dream. The actual GT Academy competition, in collaboration with Nissan North America, will start in the US on December 20 and will continue through January 23.

In the case that you just want to have some fun playing Gran Turismo 5 online and don’t think you’ll win GT Academy, all participants will earn free GT digital content just for playing. But if you do have some serious GT skills, you have a chance to win some cool GT prizing, including Logitech Driving Force GT steering wheels, Playseat racing rigs, GT5 posters, and more. Be sure to register for GT Academy first here on the official Gran Turismo web site! For more information on GT Academy, check out the official rules here. You can also join the GT community by following GT Academy on Facebook, and get the latest news and updates on the competition.

In addition to GT Academy, we’re unveiling a new Gran Turismo 5 trailer here on the PlayStation.Blog that showcases all of the many features of the game since there’s so much to show off, including, 1,000+ jaw dropping cars (plus select NASCAR cars and karts), an all-new Course Maker, dynamic weather system, an online racing community and more.

Many of you have seen the Kevin Butler Gran Turismo TV commercial that was unveiled here on the PlayStation.Blog by Peter Dille. Well in addition, this new 15-second TV commercial starts airing today, and features “Planetary (GO!),” the track from My Chemical Romance. If you’ve seen the GT5 launch trailer, or the GT5 opening cinematic, you’ll recognize the song, which is also from the band’s fourth studio album, Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys.

Thank you to those of you who have enjoyed GT5 and also given feedback to us on the game. We definitely appreciate the comments. Polyphony Digital will be releasing a patch soon which will include improvements to damage.

Look forward to seeing you all in GT Academy come December 20!

Thrustmaster reveals first images of its luxurious peripheral.

#clips Is this Gran Turismo 5, or a collision between car-shaped Thanksgiving Day Parade floats? More »

Look, you've waited 800 years for Gran Turismo 5 to arrive; don't you think you've earned the right to play the game the way God (and Kazunori Yamauchi) intended? We're speaking, of course, about playing the game using a beefy racing wheel created by the most suggestively named peripheral manufacturer on the planet: The Thrustmaster T500RS, which was recently teased on the company's official site.

Previously, Logitech's Driving Force wheel (which is currently available for the PS3) was the only peripheral to grab the Gran Turismo license, but judging by the aforementioned (GT5-branded) teaser, Thrustmaster managed to get its hands on it as well. According to Engadget, the wheel appears to be equipped with the same magnetic sensors built into the HOTAS Warthog flight stick, and is rumored to hit retail at around $500. Thrustmaster hasn't revealed any official details quite yet, but promises more information will surface during CES 2011.

#pricey Pictures have circulated of the new Thrustmaster T500RS, a high-end racing wheel for for Gran Turismo 5, but nothing's official yet and no one was clear on what it cost, until GT's creator piped up over Twitter. More »

#ps3 The underside of a Gran Turismo 5 racer reveals this curiosity: the logo for die-cast collectible maker AutoArt (lower side, center). More »

Think you have what it takes to be a real professional racer? If so, you'll want to enter in this year's GT Academy. The tournament challenges Gran Turismo 5 players to take on a series of online time trial events. Over the course of five weeks, players will compete to record the fastest lap times, and the top 128 players per region (four regions total) will move on to the second round, one step closer to the grand prize: an opportunity to join a real racing team and compete in a real race.

Registration begins next week, December 6th. But even if you're not a racing expert, you should consider registering just to score some digital swag. Each week, players that compete will get a free digital download, regardless of your ranking. So don't be ashamed to drive like a grandma on the virtual course. No one's going to judge you, we promise.

The arduous wait is finally over! Will Sony's monumental PlayStation 3 racer make you forget the time?

Platform: (PS3)

3 out of 5

Gran Turismo 5 is unconcerned with the progress made in the racing genre and video games at large in the six years since Gran Turismo 4 arrived on the PlayStation 2. Polyphony Digital’s newest racer has a scattered, grind-heavy career mode and inconsistent visuals, but the core driving experience is the closest you’ll get to driving nirvana on a console. The driving is so good that many of the annoyances with the way GT5 is built start to evaporate once you get your hands behind the wheel and start driving. Unfortunately, your patience might very well evaporate too whenever you have to deal with the game's cluttered interface.

I feel it's important to mention that I played GT5 primarily with a racing wheel. While the game is certainly playable with a controller, you'll begin to hit a wall on more technical courses once the cars get faster. The force feedback and information you're given through the wheel is excellent, and feels unique with each car. When you drive through a tight turn you’ll immediately know whether you’re in a front or rear engine car by the amount of over-steer that sets in as your wheel goes slack. Pavement, gravel, and grass all feel different and help indicate just what you can expect out of your next turn. This natural wheel grip sensation, combined with some zoom and shake effects in the modeled cockpit view as you brake and accelerate, really put Gran Turismo's driving on a pedestal when compared with just about any other racing game on the market.

 The premium cockpits are gorgeous, but the weather effects are generally poor. That visceral realism isn't always consistent in the cars themselves. Although the back of GT5’s box mentions there are over 1000 vehicles available in the game, only 200 of those carry the "premium" tag, which means they include a modeled cockpit and extra detail to their exteriors. If you're not someone that likes to race inside the car, that may not be such a big deal--but even among the 800 standard cars, the exterior quality is uneven. The worst-looking of these feel like touched-up ports of cars from the PlayStation 2 era. For me, though, the premium cars were more than enough, and the only real grievance I have with the standard cars is that they make up the majority of your racing rivals in each race.

Damage modeling is poor, bordering on unnoticeable, and even at higher levels with premium cars, the largest of crashes will only cause minor dings and deformities. At the most, bumpers or hoods will dislodge and hang a bit loose, but for the most part the crashes in Gran Turismo 5 are mundane affairs that feel and sound more like cardboard boxes bouncing into each other. What is noticeable, though, is the cost you’ll have to pay for structural damage that isn't visually persistent on your car between races. Chasis repair on many of the high-powered cars will run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Considering that you can buy a new car for that amount, it often leaves you wondering just what the hell Polyphony Digital was thinking when they decided to add damage into the game at all. While racing purists might not mind, the lack of consistent damage effects in GT5 takes you out of the realism that the cockpit and wheel combo so breathlessly creates.

This graphical inconsistency doesn't only exist with the cars but also with the tracks and the environment as well. The shadow and weather effects specifically seem extremely garish on top of otherwise clean and well laid-out courses. Shadows both in the car and outside have jaggy, aliased edges, and when combined with pixelated rain or snow effects, it'll make you want to jump out of that in-car view to something less in-your-face. Generally, though, the game looks sharp, and GT5 has some gorgeous night-time country driving that makes you consider your chosen car not for its speed, but for its headlight coverage. It looks especially nice when the game speeds up time so that dusk turns to night over the course of a race, and timed fireworks also add some fun to the nighttime sky. For the most part, the tracks in Gran Turismo 5 are fairly static, though incredibly detailed affairs. Almost all of the courses include unbreakable walls or extremely sturdy pencil fencing that feel like compromises in otherwise realistic locations. 

 The kart racing is more fun then you'd think. What Gran Turismo lacks in flourish it tries to compensate for with variety. You’ve got go-karts, American muscle, Japanese tuners, World Rally cars, NASCAR and everything in between. Only a Formula One license seems noticeably missing from the roster, but open-wheel cars are still there and become available once you get past level 20. A lot of the licensed racing is grouped into "special events," a section of your dashboard devoted towards training or goal-based racing. Some of these carry intro movies that explain a famous track or location you’re about to race in. For the most part they work well, but there are a couple stinkers. A dead-eyed and poorly animated Jeff Gordon, who introduces you to NASCAR, is a prime example. All that variety sometimes makes the game feel like it's been stretched too thin.

You’ll spend most of your time in A-Spec races, which are split up into various leagues from beginner to expert. You can also earn licenses by completing simple tasks such as bringing your car to a complete stop on time, or more difficult tasks, like completing a race without bumping into rival cars. Luckily most of them are not as necessary as in previous games. You’ll earn trophies in the license events, races, and special events, with gifted rewards available as you complete each full set of challenges. Experience points are also awarded and contribute to your level, which is used as a barrier for new events and cars. Around level 15, though, the leveling component becomes a serious grind. Each level takes a couple hours, and you’ll soon wish you could at least see what events come up later so you could plan your garage accordingly. Dropping half-a-million dollars on your favorite car sounds great, until you realize too late that it won’t be useful for your next dozen events.

As you move your way into more challenging races, you’ll soon learn that it’s not so much your driving skill that’s being tested as your ability to tune your car properly. You simply won’t be able to win certain cups without fiddling under the hood first. There’s not a whole lot of explanation to the tuning mechanics, and there’s no Forza-style auto-upgrade option to make things easy on yourself. Like most things in GT5, though, you’ll eventually figure it out and learn that under a clunky mess of menus is a flexible system for setting your car up however you want. Most of the upgrades are easy to comprehend--you pay your money and suddenly have a boost in your horsepower--but a lot of them can only be fully utilized if you manually move some dials. Eventually you learn these tuning systems too well, and since the majority of races don't include any sort of horsepower limit, it's very easy to enter races with overpowered cars and make the game a one-man race within the first 30 seconds. I spent most of the game playing this way, as the lackluster, wooden AI always seems to follow a set line without taking much thought for where your car is on the track. Though GT5 can get more challenging later on, most races are a test of personal endurance, not competition.

 Soft racing wheels really help you grip the road. If manual tuning as a necessity to progression scares you, take heart in this: I personally know very little about what goes on under the hood of cars. If anything can be said about the lack of arcade functionality in GT’s career mode, it’s that you’ll eventually become a more informed and better driver because of it. Other sticking points for people coming from an arcade background are the lack of a rewind function and fairly poor driving lines. The absence of a rewind function, which has become a common mechanic in driving games over the last few years, is going to hurt novices most. While the early races are fairly short affairs, you won’t see many single events under eight minutes after level 16 or so. Eight minutes is a long time to keep your concentration up at over 100 MPH. Given that it takes hours to move a single level in the late game, and that you usually only earn XP for placing at the end of the race, things can get frustrating quickly.

It’s especially unfortunate then that you can’t gain XP in the online races to spice things up a bit. Although I never had any problems finding races through the game’s lobby system, it was almost impossible to figure out what the requirements were for each race I joined. If the host didn’t take the time to create a proper title, it meant I had to join the lobby first, then view a separate menu to get the requirements. From there I usually had a short time to tune one of my cars to qualify or select from one of the suggested arcade cars. Although you can use a limited amount of favorite cars from your garage, you can’t favorite separate load-outs. To be honest, the menu system all throughout GT5 is bad. Exiting out of anything almost always requires a confirmation or extra key-press, and unusually long load times for simple menus can sometimes dampen the fun. 

 The GT dashboard is cluttered and requires a lot of unnecessary prompts. Included as part of the dashboard is some social networking functionality that allows you to share rides, photos, and Twitter-style short messages with your friends. I don’t know why you’d want a walled message board for yourself just for GT5, but it’s there if you want to shout at people you know who are also playing the game. A gifting feature comes in handy when you need to send cars to another person, since some races require specific cars to complete and often people need to trade between accounts. The photo mode in the game lets you take still shots of any of your cars lined up in various locations that you unlock as you progress. It’s extremely well done and gives you a virtual DSLR to take pictures with where you can adjust ISO and focus manually.

There’s also an AI-driven B-Spec mode where you give commands to a driver that levels separately from yourself. Essentially you watch a race in movie mode and have the ability to tell the driver when to pace up and down, and when to try to pass another driver. If it sounds boring, that’s because it is. The only positive to the feature is that it’s a great way to earn early credits. Once you have a decent garage you can put your driver in an overpowered car and go have some lunch or something. Even without commands he’ll likely win the race, and you might receive a special car or two for placing in first.

Gran Turismo 5’s core problem is that the broad scope of all these game modes diminishes the polish of the general product. There's no denying the feel of the actual driving, but everything else that makes up the game feels tedious and half-baked. I certainly wouldn’t recommend it for everyone, but for people who value an authentic driving experience, enjoy a bit of difficulty in their games, and are willing to look past a multitude of minor flaws, GT5 could very well satisfy your driving needs for years.

#gt5 This video shows a complete run of the Nürburgring's Nordschleife course, widely rated as the best damn race track in the world. On the bottom screen, a real driver, in real life. On top? Gran Turismo 5. More »

Not quite Pokémon numbers, Gran Turismo 5's launch week sales were still plenty enough to land the long-awaited racing sim firmly in first place atop Japan's bestsellers list for the week ending November 28. With 430,707 units sold (by Media Create's count) in its first four days at Japanese retail, GT5 is well on its way to recouping development costs that were estimated at $60 million a year ago and becoming a commercial success for Sony.

But slow down, tiger -- Yamauchi's latest "game" is still far from topping the series' standout entry, Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec, which has amassed lifetime sales of 1.89 million units in Japan (14.89 million worldwide), according to developer Polyphony Digital.

Back to the present: Sony also enjoyed a tremendous spike in PS3 hardware sales last week in Japan, with 68,840 units sold -- nearly a 140-percent increase from the previous week. Complete Japanese software and hardware sales for the GT5 launch week are listed after the break.

Do some damage to your prize automobiles in Gran Turismo 5! Premium cars take minor damage, Racing cars take the most!

#kazunoriyamauchi While Gran Turismo 5 finally hit stores after several delays and over five years in development, the game's studio isn't finished with the title by any means. More »

You didn't really think that work was finished on Gran Turismo 5, did you? Car-obsessed creator Kazunori Yamauchi has been fielding questions from fans on his Twitter feed (translated at GTPlanet), revealing that a variety of fixes are in the works -- but also shedding light on some features we'll probably never see.

Yamauchi confirms that his team at Polyphony Digital is working to implement mechanical -- not just cosmetic -- damage in GT5 sometime in early December. Less time-consuming fixes include nixing the game's odd-looking "blocky" shadows, adding more online functionality (the lounge is mentioned) and possibly offering the option to disable the HUD overlay. Work to support Logitech's G25 and G27 racing wheels in still underway, he adds.

As for what we won't be seeing, it sounds like face-tracking in GT mode and YouTube uploading of replays are out due to memory constraints. We'll also never get a chance to experience the cut "free roam" mode, in which players would have been able to drive around the gameworld, obeying traffic laws and stopping to get out of their cars to explore on foot. We imagine this was referred to internally as the "We Need Another Year of Development Time" mode.