I thought I'd give my view on GT4 so those who haven't got it yet can see what to expect, plus I feel like extolling the beautiful game.
First off I'm a massive GT fan, and have played all of them extensively. This may cause some bias in my opinion, but then who cares.
The specs
GT4 Chinese version
UK PS2 with Messiah 2 modchip
Logitech Driving Force (Original wheel and pedals) on custom frame and with Lotus Elise seat
Widescreen TV and surround sound (Only Pro-Logic not 2 unfortunately)
I'll let out my overall view first. I love GT4, it's great, there have been some great improvements over GT3 and it looks awesome and it feels superb to drive.
Now the nitty gritty
Physics - They've always been very good, and now they're even better. However something I was never happy with in GT3 was the way cars flew in the air. They've really sorted this out in GT4, with the weight being perfectly conveyed to the driver and the behaviour when taking off over bumps, whilst in the air and when landing seems spot on to me. Brilliantly done PD. They've obviously polished the physics up as well, but it's in a subtle way (Well GT3 was pretty damned good anyway) but the overall results is so fluid and refined, oh I'm having difficulty defining it, but it feels oh so right.
Controls - Awesome as ever, I'm still resisting a DF Pro, but maybe in the future I will weaken and buy one. However on my DF the steering weights up nicely in turns, you can feel the bumps on the track, and the rumble strips. You can feel when you've got understeer, or when the front's gone light over a bump or jump. They've obviously spent a lot of time over the years sorting this out and if it is any different from GT3 (I've not back to backed it) it may well be subtle, but it feels right.
AI - Hmmm, still not impressed, I think maybe I need more time to study it, but this is still one of the weaker areas of the game. The AI does seem very insistent on sticking to it's racing lines, even when I'm there in it's way. This can also cause it to trip over itself, and you can see 2 or 3 cars going for the same bit of road when it's completely straight and they'd be easily OK to travel side by side for a bit and drag it out. However I have seen it make mistakes and do some very good overtaking on other AI and myself, it's a little variable perhaps, but still frustrating at times. They also seem very scared of corners, something which doesn't reflect well in the A-Spec points. For example give them a twisty track like Deep Forest and I can nail them all within a couple of corners, however within the same racing set, I can't touch them on the straights of Seoul! Go figure. Really they seem to be driving in Endurance mode all the time, preserving the tyres on the corners, when actually it's only a 2 or 5 lap race, so they could just nail it around and ignore the increased tyre wear, this would definitely give an improvement in the challenge of racing the AI.
Graphics - Fabulous. They shined, refined and honed all the cars models so they look superb. Obviously there are still limits to the resolution of the textures that can be handled on the PS2, but somehow PD have defied all the rules and come up with a set of cars that all look fantastic. The tracks have also been given a lick of paint too, existing ones look so much better than before, and the realisation of some of the new tracks (Nurburg Ring and Le Mans) is quite incredible. Oh and there's nice addition of progressive scan and 1080i resolution for those with expensive screens, plus the ability to fiddle with the colour and brightness balance. PD have really made sure there's every possibility to make the game look it's best on everyone's system. A nice addition is the backfire out of the exhaust. Looks spectacular, but maybe the effect is a little overused, as even mildly tuned NA cars do it, which personally I'd be a little surprised and worried if that happened in real life.
Sound - Not any massive leap on from GT3, maybe a little better realised for some cars. But I still don't hear that low rumbling grunt from a V8 that I'd expect. The wooshes of turbos, and straight cut racing boxes are all present and correct. The increased air noise also helps create a good impression of speed too. I love the fact that when I changed my stock exhaust for a racier one the noise got louder and lower with a great rasp to it on my Mazda Savannah RX7. Very cool. Surround effects seem to work nicely as well, although I can't really comment properly as I don't have full Pro-Logic II surround. Another item which is new is the crowd noises with cheering, horns etc all being heard at certain venues, adding a nice touch of atmosphere.
Music - Once you've turned the dreadful Japanese rock off, and turned on the good stuff (From Queens of the Stone Age, Kasabian, Aphrodite, Apollo 440, The Donnas etc) it's very good, maybe not as classic as some previous GT titles, but still well balanced, there's even the option for some classical tunes if you so wish. However the random selection of tunes does seem a little, well non-random, with some tunes being favoured a lot more than others.
Cars - The welcome addition for me has to be the Le Mans cars and the classics. The license test in the Sauber C9 around the NBR is something to behold. I've no idea how I'd get a gold on this, it's so fast you need every once of concentration otherwise it's start again. I do wonder at the choice of some cars, some of the more mundane cars (Things like the Citroen Xsara VTS, C3, Xantia etc when some real classic cars have been missed out like the Peugeot 205 GTi (Yes I'm biased as I have one), VW Golf GTi Mk2, Renault 5 GT Turbo. Or they could have included some really great new cars, like the Citroen C4, Seat Leon Cupra, Lotus Exige S2. But anyway this is always going to be the case that not everyone is satisfied, and I think they've done a superb job of getting the cars in that they have. Highlights for me Peugeot 205 T16 (Road and Rally) Ford RS200, Audi Quattro (80's), Bentley Speed 8, Jaguar E-Type, Volvo 240 (Just as it's such a mad type of car for this game), Lancia Delta Evo, my this list could go on for some time. And well done again for getting Porsche in via a backdoor with RUF. Now if only we could do the same for Ferrari, anyone fancy setting up a Fez tuning company selling the cars as our own branding?
Tracks - Well there are lots of new tracks, the notable favourites for me being the Nurburg Ring, Le Mans and the Infineon Raceway. All fantastically accurate (I've driven around both LM and NBR in real life) and massive fun to drive. Oh and there's bumps now too, ones that cause the car to twitch and bobble about and upset you in a corner, just like real life. The NBR feels as bumpy as it does in real life. More dreaded street tracks make an appearance (I'm not a lover of these), New York, Seoul and Hong Kong are new ones for GT, but Tokyo and Seattle make a welcome return (Perversely I like these ones). Maybe it's the way that the cars bounce of the barriers, or maybe there's just no real flow to them for me, but I just can't get on with the new city tracks, same goes for the Paris track. Too narrow and no room for error. However I do love the Monaco and Citi d'Aria, so maybe I'm just extremely fussy on this type of track. Many tracks have been updated too, Laguna Seca and Midfield for example, have been given a tweak and a pull which actually change your racing lines on certain parts of the track. And another nice touch is that the spectators are now in 3D and on the rally stages run back off the road after taking a photo, nice touch.
Other things - The loading times are very fast, impressive stuff. Still I wouldn't mind getting it to work on my HDD, just so it gives me more time to race around
The new interface works well and is intuitive to use.
There really is an awful lot of races to play with in GT mode, from the Beginner, Pro etc halls, to the Euro, Japanese, and US halls, to the individual manufacturer halls, plus the missions, to the incredible amount of licenses (Some of which are awesome - for example the full lap of the NBR behind the pace car in a Mercedes 190E Evo 2, or the full lap of the Le Mans track, or the un-chicaned Le Mans track in a 90's Nissan Le Mans car), as well as arcade mode, 2 player and LAN (Which people seem to have got working over t'internet). This will keep me very busy and happy for a very long time.
The pit crew are a nice little addition, adding another factor to the atmosphere of the racing.
New features
Photo Mode - Oh wow, where do I start, I love this so much. I'm a keen photographer anyway, especially of cars racing so this is bliss for me. The features which replicate a real camera when taking pictures are superbly realised, allowing maximum flexibility and artistic license. I simply love it, and the fact it can save to USB memory sticks. One of the best new features in GT4.
A-Spec points - OK, great idea, the harder the race is the more points you can get for winning, and the more features you can unlock, however, the amount of points is always very well balanced. For example, as in my point about the AI and corners above, if the race has a lot of corners, I'll easily win and get 80 A-Spec points. Fine. However on the Seoul track it's says, this is worth 80points, but there's not a hope in all the world that I'll be able to keep up with them on the straights, so I just can't win. Really that should've come up with 250 points. It can also happen that you get the odd car in a race that just kills everything, there was a Elise 111R that kept popping up and there was no way I could keep up with given the car I had. I've recently entered a classic car race and twice there was one car that disappeared off into the distance leaving the rest of us wondering if we'd all stalled. PD need to come up with a much better algorithm that takes into consideration top speed, acceleration, power to weight ratio, track type (Mainly straights or twisty) and better balance the opposition so when you are racing, you are racing a very close pack. One other comment I'd have is that you don't find out the A-Spec value of a race until just before you start. It would be better to show the A-Spec value of a race at the menu where you have the opportunity to go to the setup for the car and remove some parts and so increase or decrease the A-Spec value of the race. In fact it would be better than if PD could spec the opposition so it matched your currently selected car, so in a tuned race series the cars were tuned or detuned to give you a good race. However I digress.
B-Spec - OK can I reserve judgement on this. Initially I thought this was pointless as the AI was nowhere near good enough to race properly, however I have since found out that it needs training, so whilst I'm writing this I'm training it up. 5 races in and it does seem to be improving, and this will be a great feature to use for any of those circuits or races you can't be bothered or even want to race....OK in fact it has got a lot better and is now winning me races. I like this feature then, just give it some time kids, it's a bit conservative at first......Actually I love it, I can get the PS2 to complete a few of the races I don't like while I eat my lunch, watch the beautiful graphics and generally get on with my life. Cheers PD for giving me the ability to leave GT4 for a bit, whilst actually letting it progress.
I also like the fact it goes back into GT mode when the game is reloaded instead of the main menu like GT3, nice time saver.
The garage is also nicely put together with some good sorting filters. The diary of what you have raced, bought etc is also a nice detail.
Bad things (Well there had to be some)
Rallying mode - So far I've only done the rally license tests, but it seemed like someone had left the tools in the boot as all the cars seem to swing around wildly at the back. The only way to get around was to crawl around and be very careful, which didn't seem in keeping with the on road experience in GT4, or the rallying in GT3. Somewhat disappointing and it wasn't pleasant. Maybe when I get my hands on rally car and can set it up this might improve.
AI - As I've said it's not great. For example, I was in front of a 205 T16 on a straight and he obviously had the legs on me, loads of room to overtake as I was well over to the left, but he insisted on barging into me as if I wasn't there. What's that all about. However I have also seen some great racing of the AI, and had a good few laps with it as well. The behaviour does seem very variable. This may well improve as I move through the game, but so far I'm not 100% convinced. B-Spec AI does indeed seem to learn from it's experience. I've just been training it with my tuned RX7 in a race I know I could easily win in A-Spec mode, and after about 5 or 6 gos, it's actually won. This may well be documented in the manuals that come with the game, but my Chinese reading ability is as good as my ability to beat Michael Schumacher in a Formula 1 car.
2P Garage Race - Apparently it's not possible to race garage cars in 2P. What! Unbelievable yes I know, but this is a big big thing for PD to miss out. Maybe this will be reinstated for the PAL version, but I wouldn't hold my hopes up.
I've had it crash once after a mission, but that could be due to the fact it's a chipped UK PS2, so I'd pay no mind to this.
OK enough bad stuff.
I could go on for a lot longer, and to be honest if you've made it this far through my rant then you're doing well. There is an awful lot to this game, make no mistake.
In Summary - Super 9/10, now I'm going back for some more. There's just one problem, how am I going to find time to finish decorating my hall?
(The is just my humble opinion, I have every right to change my view on further playing and reflection, please don't shoot me, shout at me or whatever. I've only spent too much time writing this to share my experience with those who haven't got GT4 yet.)
First off I'm a massive GT fan, and have played all of them extensively. This may cause some bias in my opinion, but then who cares.
The specs
GT4 Chinese version
UK PS2 with Messiah 2 modchip
Logitech Driving Force (Original wheel and pedals) on custom frame and with Lotus Elise seat
Widescreen TV and surround sound (Only Pro-Logic not 2 unfortunately)
I'll let out my overall view first. I love GT4, it's great, there have been some great improvements over GT3 and it looks awesome and it feels superb to drive.
Now the nitty gritty
Physics - They've always been very good, and now they're even better. However something I was never happy with in GT3 was the way cars flew in the air. They've really sorted this out in GT4, with the weight being perfectly conveyed to the driver and the behaviour when taking off over bumps, whilst in the air and when landing seems spot on to me. Brilliantly done PD. They've obviously polished the physics up as well, but it's in a subtle way (Well GT3 was pretty damned good anyway) but the overall results is so fluid and refined, oh I'm having difficulty defining it, but it feels oh so right.
Controls - Awesome as ever, I'm still resisting a DF Pro, but maybe in the future I will weaken and buy one. However on my DF the steering weights up nicely in turns, you can feel the bumps on the track, and the rumble strips. You can feel when you've got understeer, or when the front's gone light over a bump or jump. They've obviously spent a lot of time over the years sorting this out and if it is any different from GT3 (I've not back to backed it) it may well be subtle, but it feels right.
AI - Hmmm, still not impressed, I think maybe I need more time to study it, but this is still one of the weaker areas of the game. The AI does seem very insistent on sticking to it's racing lines, even when I'm there in it's way. This can also cause it to trip over itself, and you can see 2 or 3 cars going for the same bit of road when it's completely straight and they'd be easily OK to travel side by side for a bit and drag it out. However I have seen it make mistakes and do some very good overtaking on other AI and myself, it's a little variable perhaps, but still frustrating at times. They also seem very scared of corners, something which doesn't reflect well in the A-Spec points. For example give them a twisty track like Deep Forest and I can nail them all within a couple of corners, however within the same racing set, I can't touch them on the straights of Seoul! Go figure. Really they seem to be driving in Endurance mode all the time, preserving the tyres on the corners, when actually it's only a 2 or 5 lap race, so they could just nail it around and ignore the increased tyre wear, this would definitely give an improvement in the challenge of racing the AI.
Graphics - Fabulous. They shined, refined and honed all the cars models so they look superb. Obviously there are still limits to the resolution of the textures that can be handled on the PS2, but somehow PD have defied all the rules and come up with a set of cars that all look fantastic. The tracks have also been given a lick of paint too, existing ones look so much better than before, and the realisation of some of the new tracks (Nurburg Ring and Le Mans) is quite incredible. Oh and there's nice addition of progressive scan and 1080i resolution for those with expensive screens, plus the ability to fiddle with the colour and brightness balance. PD have really made sure there's every possibility to make the game look it's best on everyone's system. A nice addition is the backfire out of the exhaust. Looks spectacular, but maybe the effect is a little overused, as even mildly tuned NA cars do it, which personally I'd be a little surprised and worried if that happened in real life.
Sound - Not any massive leap on from GT3, maybe a little better realised for some cars. But I still don't hear that low rumbling grunt from a V8 that I'd expect. The wooshes of turbos, and straight cut racing boxes are all present and correct. The increased air noise also helps create a good impression of speed too. I love the fact that when I changed my stock exhaust for a racier one the noise got louder and lower with a great rasp to it on my Mazda Savannah RX7. Very cool. Surround effects seem to work nicely as well, although I can't really comment properly as I don't have full Pro-Logic II surround. Another item which is new is the crowd noises with cheering, horns etc all being heard at certain venues, adding a nice touch of atmosphere.
Music - Once you've turned the dreadful Japanese rock off, and turned on the good stuff (From Queens of the Stone Age, Kasabian, Aphrodite, Apollo 440, The Donnas etc) it's very good, maybe not as classic as some previous GT titles, but still well balanced, there's even the option for some classical tunes if you so wish. However the random selection of tunes does seem a little, well non-random, with some tunes being favoured a lot more than others.
Cars - The welcome addition for me has to be the Le Mans cars and the classics. The license test in the Sauber C9 around the NBR is something to behold. I've no idea how I'd get a gold on this, it's so fast you need every once of concentration otherwise it's start again. I do wonder at the choice of some cars, some of the more mundane cars (Things like the Citroen Xsara VTS, C3, Xantia etc when some real classic cars have been missed out like the Peugeot 205 GTi (Yes I'm biased as I have one), VW Golf GTi Mk2, Renault 5 GT Turbo. Or they could have included some really great new cars, like the Citroen C4, Seat Leon Cupra, Lotus Exige S2. But anyway this is always going to be the case that not everyone is satisfied, and I think they've done a superb job of getting the cars in that they have. Highlights for me Peugeot 205 T16 (Road and Rally) Ford RS200, Audi Quattro (80's), Bentley Speed 8, Jaguar E-Type, Volvo 240 (Just as it's such a mad type of car for this game), Lancia Delta Evo, my this list could go on for some time. And well done again for getting Porsche in via a backdoor with RUF. Now if only we could do the same for Ferrari, anyone fancy setting up a Fez tuning company selling the cars as our own branding?
Tracks - Well there are lots of new tracks, the notable favourites for me being the Nurburg Ring, Le Mans and the Infineon Raceway. All fantastically accurate (I've driven around both LM and NBR in real life) and massive fun to drive. Oh and there's bumps now too, ones that cause the car to twitch and bobble about and upset you in a corner, just like real life. The NBR feels as bumpy as it does in real life. More dreaded street tracks make an appearance (I'm not a lover of these), New York, Seoul and Hong Kong are new ones for GT, but Tokyo and Seattle make a welcome return (Perversely I like these ones). Maybe it's the way that the cars bounce of the barriers, or maybe there's just no real flow to them for me, but I just can't get on with the new city tracks, same goes for the Paris track. Too narrow and no room for error. However I do love the Monaco and Citi d'Aria, so maybe I'm just extremely fussy on this type of track. Many tracks have been updated too, Laguna Seca and Midfield for example, have been given a tweak and a pull which actually change your racing lines on certain parts of the track. And another nice touch is that the spectators are now in 3D and on the rally stages run back off the road after taking a photo, nice touch.
Other things - The loading times are very fast, impressive stuff. Still I wouldn't mind getting it to work on my HDD, just so it gives me more time to race around
The new interface works well and is intuitive to use.
There really is an awful lot of races to play with in GT mode, from the Beginner, Pro etc halls, to the Euro, Japanese, and US halls, to the individual manufacturer halls, plus the missions, to the incredible amount of licenses (Some of which are awesome - for example the full lap of the NBR behind the pace car in a Mercedes 190E Evo 2, or the full lap of the Le Mans track, or the un-chicaned Le Mans track in a 90's Nissan Le Mans car), as well as arcade mode, 2 player and LAN (Which people seem to have got working over t'internet). This will keep me very busy and happy for a very long time.
The pit crew are a nice little addition, adding another factor to the atmosphere of the racing.
New features
Photo Mode - Oh wow, where do I start, I love this so much. I'm a keen photographer anyway, especially of cars racing so this is bliss for me. The features which replicate a real camera when taking pictures are superbly realised, allowing maximum flexibility and artistic license. I simply love it, and the fact it can save to USB memory sticks. One of the best new features in GT4.
A-Spec points - OK, great idea, the harder the race is the more points you can get for winning, and the more features you can unlock, however, the amount of points is always very well balanced. For example, as in my point about the AI and corners above, if the race has a lot of corners, I'll easily win and get 80 A-Spec points. Fine. However on the Seoul track it's says, this is worth 80points, but there's not a hope in all the world that I'll be able to keep up with them on the straights, so I just can't win. Really that should've come up with 250 points. It can also happen that you get the odd car in a race that just kills everything, there was a Elise 111R that kept popping up and there was no way I could keep up with given the car I had. I've recently entered a classic car race and twice there was one car that disappeared off into the distance leaving the rest of us wondering if we'd all stalled. PD need to come up with a much better algorithm that takes into consideration top speed, acceleration, power to weight ratio, track type (Mainly straights or twisty) and better balance the opposition so when you are racing, you are racing a very close pack. One other comment I'd have is that you don't find out the A-Spec value of a race until just before you start. It would be better to show the A-Spec value of a race at the menu where you have the opportunity to go to the setup for the car and remove some parts and so increase or decrease the A-Spec value of the race. In fact it would be better than if PD could spec the opposition so it matched your currently selected car, so in a tuned race series the cars were tuned or detuned to give you a good race. However I digress.
B-Spec - OK can I reserve judgement on this. Initially I thought this was pointless as the AI was nowhere near good enough to race properly, however I have since found out that it needs training, so whilst I'm writing this I'm training it up. 5 races in and it does seem to be improving, and this will be a great feature to use for any of those circuits or races you can't be bothered or even want to race....OK in fact it has got a lot better and is now winning me races. I like this feature then, just give it some time kids, it's a bit conservative at first......Actually I love it, I can get the PS2 to complete a few of the races I don't like while I eat my lunch, watch the beautiful graphics and generally get on with my life. Cheers PD for giving me the ability to leave GT4 for a bit, whilst actually letting it progress.
I also like the fact it goes back into GT mode when the game is reloaded instead of the main menu like GT3, nice time saver.
The garage is also nicely put together with some good sorting filters. The diary of what you have raced, bought etc is also a nice detail.
Bad things (Well there had to be some)
Rallying mode - So far I've only done the rally license tests, but it seemed like someone had left the tools in the boot as all the cars seem to swing around wildly at the back. The only way to get around was to crawl around and be very careful, which didn't seem in keeping with the on road experience in GT4, or the rallying in GT3. Somewhat disappointing and it wasn't pleasant. Maybe when I get my hands on rally car and can set it up this might improve.
AI - As I've said it's not great. For example, I was in front of a 205 T16 on a straight and he obviously had the legs on me, loads of room to overtake as I was well over to the left, but he insisted on barging into me as if I wasn't there. What's that all about. However I have also seen some great racing of the AI, and had a good few laps with it as well. The behaviour does seem very variable. This may well improve as I move through the game, but so far I'm not 100% convinced. B-Spec AI does indeed seem to learn from it's experience. I've just been training it with my tuned RX7 in a race I know I could easily win in A-Spec mode, and after about 5 or 6 gos, it's actually won. This may well be documented in the manuals that come with the game, but my Chinese reading ability is as good as my ability to beat Michael Schumacher in a Formula 1 car.
2P Garage Race - Apparently it's not possible to race garage cars in 2P. What! Unbelievable yes I know, but this is a big big thing for PD to miss out. Maybe this will be reinstated for the PAL version, but I wouldn't hold my hopes up.
I've had it crash once after a mission, but that could be due to the fact it's a chipped UK PS2, so I'd pay no mind to this.
OK enough bad stuff.
I could go on for a lot longer, and to be honest if you've made it this far through my rant then you're doing well. There is an awful lot to this game, make no mistake.
In Summary - Super 9/10, now I'm going back for some more. There's just one problem, how am I going to find time to finish decorating my hall?
(The is just my humble opinion, I have every right to change my view on further playing and reflection, please don't shoot me, shout at me or whatever. I've only spent too much time writing this to share my experience with those who haven't got GT4 yet.)
![[SS]Ares](/forum/data/avatars/m/41/41943.jpg?1111315846){kind=avatar}
👍
Great review 👍
