Review of Gran Turismo 6: A lesson in humility
I want to preface this review by stating that I have been a Gran Turismo player since day 1. I received GT1 as a Christmas present close to launch, and have since picked up every title pretty much on launch as well. I would read through the manuals, buy as many cars as I could and tune them to highest potential. The racing was always secondary, it was always about the cars, and that was fine. Playing countless hours of the same races over and over again, just to grind out enough money to buy and tune the next car. Through repetition, you learned how to race, you learned the subtleties and nuances of your favourite vehicles, and when you saw these vehicles in the GT titles that followed, you immediately bought those cars. You learned that there was more to cars than their aesthetics, cars had a feel to them, and it was through that feel that you learned why they called GT a “Driving Simulator”.
I want to preface this review by stating that I have been a Gran Turismo player since day 1. I received GT1 as a Christmas present close to launch, and have since picked up every title pretty much on launch as well. I would read through the manuals, buy as many cars as I could and tune them to highest potential. The racing was always secondary, it was always about the cars, and that was fine. Playing countless hours of the same races over and over again, just to grind out enough money to buy and tune the next car. Through repetition, you learned how to race, you learned the subtleties and nuances of your favourite vehicles, and when you saw these vehicles in the GT titles that followed, you immediately bought those cars. You learned that there was more to cars than their aesthetics, cars had a feel to them, and it was through that feel that you learned why they called GT a “Driving Simulator”.
This was great, GT1, GT2, GT3, they all had the same
atmosphere and while there were other racing titles out there, none had the
prestige and clout that Gran Turismo had.
Though out from the shadows emerged Forza. I’m sure most people like me saw it and
scoffed just like we did when Project Gotham came out. Microsoft trying to release something
comparable to GT? Good luck with that. But they kept at it, adding more and more
content, most notably to me, the paint feature.
Here, not only could you buy and tune a car, but you could personalize
it with whatever sort of paint job you wanted.
I owned an xbox, so I bit the bullet and grabbed Forza Motorsport at the
start of summer. GT4 never stood a
chance. The game was gorgeous, and while
there was less courses, cars, and the racing in and of itself was less
polished, the attention to detail and the level of personalization was
astounding.
This was the end of the ps2 era, GT4 was, in my opinion, a
disappointment, even with all the new content.
It was lacking, it was not the definitive King of the Ring of racing
games any more, there was an upstart on a rival console doing things a little
differently, and after four titles, a little change in the formula was probably
what GT needed. Don’t get me wrong,
aside from the graphical issues that GT4 had, it was still the superior game,
the AI was unmatched, as was the content, but the lead it had over the
competition had shrank substantially.
Enter the PS3, which I ended up buying in late 2007 hoping
that a new GT title would shortly follow, meanwhile, Forza 2 launched in mid
2007, a stellar follow up to the first title in the series, and with no GT
title to rival it on ps3, it was now the prettiest girl in the room. 2008 gave us GT5: Prologue, an uninspired
view as to what the crew had been doing for the last three years, and compared
to what the other guys were doing, was, in my opinion, a joke. 2009 had come and still really nothing on the
horizon about a new GT title, meanwhile, Forza announced a third title to be
released in the Fall. So since 2005,
Forza had released three full games across two generations of consoles, while
GT had released one game and a tech demo.
As a GT fanboy, I started to worry, what was Polyphony
doing? Was the franchise on its way out
without so much as a goodbye? But alas,
news came of GT5 having a late 2010 release date. Finally, after five long years, a full GT
title touting over 1,000 cars and over 70 tracks. I was ecstatic, we were finally getting out
current gen Gran Turismo and it was going to be bigger and better than ever
before, but as we got closer to release, we started to find out about “Standard
and Premium” cars, which wasn't a huge deal, but kind of a disappointment. Regardless, upon launch, there was no doubt
the GT5 was king of the ring, there was still no paint customization like
Forza, but the content was unmatched.
On-line was coming together, there was post release updates and support,
and Polyphony really put their heart and soul into the game, that much was
clear. Meanwhile, the other guys were
working on their newest title, Forza 4, and while they only had a measly 500
cars and 26 tracks, the game was shaping up to be something pretty special, and
boy was it. A simply stunning game
graphically and they had gone to great lengths to improve not only the handling
of the cars, but that of the AI too. The
game had it all, the sight, the sound, the feel, and the customization. While GT was still top dog, I couldn't help
but stare at what the other guys were doing with a bit of jealousy.
It did seem that the two horses in this race had become
equals in a sense, no longer could one tout the features of one over the other
to win an argument, they were both great games in their own regard. Which brings us to today.
Gran Turismo 6, was announced and was met with what I can
only call confusion. It was to be
released on ps3 only with no plans of a ps4 version. My only logical reasoning was that they had
finally cleaned up all the standard car models, added a few tracks, and I had
hopes of GT finally allowing me to paint up my cars. Upon news of its imminent launch, I pre-ordered
and eagerly awaited. What happened in
the following months was announcement after announcement that made this game
seem like it was just GT5 all over again.
Nothing innovative, nothing really new or impressive, just what seemed
to me like Polyphony finding a way to sell all the leftover resources for one
last hurrah on the ps3 before devoting their efforts to GT7.
I wasn't far off with that assumption. Upon release, I got home, installed the game,
and got ready for invest hours that night into the title, needless to say, it
only took about a minute to realize that this game was simply not going to live
up to its potential. Don’t get me wrong,
I'm not saying that it’s a bad game, none of the GT titles are “bad” games, it
just seems that GT4-6 hadn't lived up to their potential and were suffering
from a substantial problem with “ego”.
It all started when GT6 told me to buy a car, even though I
started with 30,000 Cr. They felt the need to spend most of it on a Honda Fit,
a car that I would eventually need sure, but not the car that I wanted to use
as my starter. For 30k, I could have
bought a great MX-5 (my typical starting car) and got just as much use out of
it as the Fit, but all in all, a much better car for racing purposes. The next problem I had was with the general
layout of the main screen, there is no organization to it. Some races over here, some races over there,
garage at the far end of the screen, etc.
It just felt like no thought went into it at all. When I think of what a current GT menu screen
would be, this is what I envision:
The game starts up with its
usual fanfare, and upon reaching your main screen, you are looking upon a
room, a fair size, clean, while some nice jazz is playing over the hi-fi. Pressing
direction buttons one way or another will have your perspective face a
different aspect
of the game. At the top of the screen,
it shows all of the necessary icons, garage, tune, race, on-line, photo,
licenses, etc. Pressing left or right
allows you to switch between these
selections, each time, changing your perspective inside the room, with some
sort of symbolism
reflecting the option you currently have selected. When on the garage option, you see the car you are currently
driving in all its splendour, but when you select
the garage icon, the screen shows you opening a door, the screen goes
black. A
few moments later, you enter a new room, this time large, well lit, and at the
start of
the game, empty. This is your garage,
this is where you select your racing machine, this is where you walk amongst your
collection of cars, whether to admire or to select your vehicle, this is where it happens. Let it be known that I’d still want a
convenient list
option available for quick selecting vehicles, but I feel that the environment
and atmosphere should be available
to us. As you progress through the game,
you can customize your “home
base”, putting pictures you take in picture mode onto the walls, changing colour schemes, etc. Make the game feel as classy as the music
that flows through
your speakers.
Beyond the uninspired menu, the game in and of itself is
rather bland. The AI and the way the
races are set up makes it feel like I'm just going through the motions. Nothing is particularly difficult, and
everything seems so vacant. The AI has
no personality it seems, if I bump an AI player, they don’t get angry, they don’t
try to get revenge, they just do everything in their power to maintain their
line. I don’t know if they had
programmed some sort of emotion in past GT titles, but it felt like the AI
drivers had a human element to them. Now
I know the bread and butter is the on-line aspect of the game, but you have to
go through the single player (unless you want to spend real $) in order to get
the cars and capital for on-line racing, but let’s keep in mind that the first 4
GTs had no on-line, and they always felt like full games, on-line would have been
nice, but it wasn't detrimental to the success of the franchise, there was
still plenty of fun to be had playing against the computer. I don’t know if we as a group have changed,
or if the culture of gaming as a whole has changed, but to put one aspect of
the game over another isn't the direction that I feel gaming should go. The whole experience should be enjoyable and
well made, not “tacked on” like I feel that they did with the single player
aspect of the game.
As it stands now, it is unfair to judge GT6, as when you
look at the evolution GT5 took between launch and today, it’s like comparing
apples and oranges. However, based on
what the game is now, and what the competition is doing, I think it is fair to
say that Polyphony can’t expect us to purchase their games based on hype
any more. They need to really put
together something special again, something that makes us look at it and
definitively say that they are the King of the Ring once again, that all other
racing titles are farts against thunder when looking upon the spectacle that is
Gran Turismo.
There was a time when Gran Turismo could afford to have an
ego. They were men amongst boys, but the
boys have grown up, and GT seems stuck in its ways. It’s time for change, it’s time for Polyphony
to realize that you have to evolve and separate themselves from the pack, and I
don’t doubt that they can, but they need to look outside of the insular world
they've created. The competition has
gone to great lengths to take the throne, and it would behove Polyphony to take
even bigger steps to retain it. Second
place will always work harder and industry leaders tend to rest on their
laurels, Polyphony needs to recognize that trend and put forth the effort
required to not be left behind. Gran
Turismo was once a system seller, nowadays, it’s just another title with a
number on it, a franchise that I love, but fear does not love me back.