Are race cars too easy to drive?

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Mr. Boy

Mr. Boy

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ham_vet001
I've driven a good number of purebred race cars in GT5 now, and almost all of them feel easy to drive without aids and with hard racing tyres. Even oldies like the 330 P4 and Mark IV GT40 (which supposedly have very little downforce) handle almost perfectly and have loads of grip. I finally got the Ferrari F10 today as well and it has much more grip than any F1 car from rfactor mods. Do you think Polyphony modeled these cars correctly? Or do you feel the tyre modeling is flawed in some way?
 
Try driving them at their limits. I'd say it can be tougher to get everything out of the car. Everything needs to happen that much quicker. At the limit, there's not as much room for error as there is with a street car. If you brake late in a street car, you just understeer a bit towards the outside of the corner. In the race cars, you will go off, and hard.
 
Try driving the Ford GT race cars, or the group C cars without aids.
 
I hear this a lot, people saying the race cars are too easy to drive. That's usually because they're 5 seconds off the pace and aren't pushing it because they think they're already going fast. There's not much challenge pushing a high-grip, low-weight race car at a moderate pace. Anyone can do that in any game.

Doesn't matter what game, GT5, GTR Evo, rFactor, etc. The F1 cars are nice to drive...until you start getting within 3 seconds of the lap record.
 
I'm with ya there TBR. I actually found that the race cars in Live For Speed are REALLY hard to drive at the limit. The faster you go, the difficulty goes up ten fold. Very tough to drive on the edge, but when you nail it, you know it quickly, and it feels good.
 
Louie_Schumii
Have you tried turning the driving aides off?
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Did you read the OP? In the very first line, he said: "I've driven a good number of purebred race cars in GT5 now, and almost all of them feel easy to drive without aids and with hard racing tyres."

Personally I haven't found them particularly easy to drive, at least not unrealistically so. The ones I've found easiest are the ones I'd expect to be easy, like the Super GT and DTM cars which are all about downforce and don't have massive power outputs for their weight, but the 88C-V is just too fast for me most of the time (I can rarely concentrate enough to drive it without dying). Admittedly I haven't driven any of the birthday, sorry, classic Le Mans cars because I just haven't gotten round to buying/winning any yet but I'd imagine that if their racing hards are the same as a modern car's racing hards, you'd probably be better off running them on sports tyres to get close to the actual levels of grip they should have, maybe? Just a thought.
 
TBR 427
I hear this a lot, people saying the race cars are too easy to drive. That's usually because they're 5 seconds off the pace and aren't pushing it because they think they're already going fast. There's not much challenge pushing a high-grip, low-weight race car at a moderate pace. Anyone can do that in any game.
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This. Exactly this. It's something I've had difficulty explaining to some of my NASCAR buddies that like to watch it on television but have no interest in trying it in a simulation and consequently can't and don't understand the finer technicalities of motorsports.

They see an F1 car being light and with loads of downforce and figure it's like a race car with training wheels that's so simple that any newb could do it, and I suppose once somebody adapts to the steering wheel and all that they could cruise around a track in it, but that isn't the same as pushing it to the very limit like F1 drivers do every moment of every race weekend. If you can take a certain corner at 80 MPH in a certain car, and then you cut the weight in half and add thousands of pounds of downforce, it would be even easier to handle that corner at 80 MPH, but you shouldn't be taking it at 80 anymore and instead should be taking that corner a lot faster.
 
neema_t
Did you read the OP? In the very first line, he said: "I've driven a good number of purebred race cars in GT5 now, and almost all of them feel easy to drive without aids and with hard racing tyres."

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Point taken my good sir. But the OP and some of the other posts after mine are quite hard to read because of the bright background and/or are too long winded to give a properly thought out answer.

But in short - as covered by the other posts in this thread - most of the cars talked about will be manageable to drive until you start looking at cutting half a second here or there from your lap-time.
 
IceMan PJN
This. Exactly this. It's something I've had difficulty explaining to some of my NASCAR buddies that like to watch it on television but have no interest in trying it in a simulation and consequently can't and don't understand the finer technicalities of motorsports.

They see an F1 car being light and with loads of downforce and figure it's like a race car with training wheels that's so simple that any newb could do it, and I suppose once somebody adapts to the steering wheel and all that they could cruise around a track in it, but that isn't the same as pushing it to the very limit like F1 drivers do every moment of every race weekend. If you can take a certain corner at 80 MPH in a certain car, and then you cut the weight in half and add thousands of pounds of downforce, it would be even easier to handle that corner at 80 MPH, but you shouldn't be taking it at 80 anymore and instead should be taking that corner a lot faster.
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this

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To me standard cars are easer to drive. Toyota Minolta is most boring car I ever drove, but Pugeot 908 PDI - pure awesomeness - it's so alive!
 
The classics at least have an issue of in game they are given way too much grip....cars like the P4 or the Ford MKIV makes little to no downforce to start with(MKIV actually makes lift: http://www.mulsannescorner.com/aerodatabasefordgt4067.html), and since GT5 doesn't make any distinction between tire between cars, they are essentially running on modern slicks....
 
IceMan PJN
This. Exactly this. It's something I've had difficulty explaining to some of my NASCAR buddies that like to watch it on television but have no interest in trying it in a simulation and consequently can't and don't understand the finer technicalities of motorsports.

They see an F1 car being light and with loads of downforce and figure it's like a race car with training wheels that's so simple that any newb could do it, and I suppose once somebody adapts to the steering wheel and all that they could cruise around a track in it, but that isn't the same as pushing it to the very limit like F1 drivers do every moment of every race weekend. If you can take a certain corner at 80 MPH in a certain car, and then you cut the weight in half and add thousands of pounds of downforce, it would be even easier to handle that corner at 80 MPH, but you shouldn't be taking it at 80 anymore and instead should be taking that corner a lot faster.
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Agree mostly. An F1 car driven at a good pace will not have the downforce or tyre heat required to drive it at a fast/close to the limit pace. A bit of a paradox but this is the way it is more or less.
There is footage from Topgear of RH in the Renault F1 car and he cannot even drive fast enough to utilise the downforce or tyres effectively. I'm sure he knows how to drive a car well but still struggles with these incredible machines.
On topic - I can't say I find the race cars difficult but they are by no means a walk in the park to control. They require lots of focus and a lot of skill to drive fast. I've used the stealth F1 in many a race but have always had to be on form to drive it well, if I'm having a bad day or I'm tired, forget it!
 
That's it. Race cars may feel easy because they just respond so well to any input. But driving to the limit is simply much harder because of how 'thin', or risky, the limit becomes at those speeds, if you know what I mean.
As mentioned above, get a good lap in with a race car, then try to shave 0.5s off ( something the license tests have always shown to be feasible). I bet most of us need to hit 'restart' a few times due to off track collision adventures...
Just blows one's mind to think the Vettel's, Alonso's and Hamilton's of the world pull it off in reality....
 
shem
Agree mostly. An F1 car driven at a good pace will not have the downforce or tyre heat required to drive it at a fast/close to the limit pace. A bit of a paradox but this is the way it is more or less.
There is footage from Topgear of RH in the Renault F1 car and he cannot even drive fast enough to utilise the downforce or tyres effectively. I'm sure he knows how to drive a car well but still struggles with these incredible machines.
On topic - I can't say I find the race cars difficult but they are by no means a walk in the park to control. They require lots of focus and a lot of skill to drive fast. I've used the stealth F1 in many a race but have always had to be on form to drive it well, if I'm having a bad day or I'm tired, forget it!
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Exactly! older cars should take a real challange to race them on the edge. even the super gt's. Yes they have a lot of downforce but when you are going to push them to the limit, touch that limit and eventually past that limit it will be much more intense to race them.

Back in time: The green hell, there was a man who set a laptime for this track wich never has been broking to date. Even his teammate was 7+ sec of his pace. Everybody knows who that man was, and if you don't google it!

So anybody could get around a track with a porsche 911gt2 but would noever be able to set a quick time when not having expirience.
 
I think the race cars are easy to drive because the racing tires in GT5 is too perfect.

real life slicks demands a more delicate touch due to their grip drop off at high slip angle and smaller performance envelope at which they are at their peak. I find the racing tires in GT5 are really forgiving and for the racing soft last way too long when you consider the insane grip they gave.

Some oldie racing cars also wasn't represented entirely, especially the aspect of date suspension design and tire technology, case in point, I won the XJ13 and on the ring, on sport hard it is almost mclaren F1 fast, granted it was the lemans winning car at the time but it is after a dated chassis design, with very little aero downforce and nowhere near modern stiffness, so it shouldn't be that easy to drive fast.

A well sorted modern racing car shouldn't be hard to drive under the limit, but I find even cars like the Stock Cars a bit tame, making the nurburgring seasonal event a little underwhelming compare to what I'd expect.

(AND yes I run without any aids.)
 
X1 is by fat the easiest when cornering. Once you laid your hand on it, you will not be disappointed.
 
Kevin****Theory
X1 is by fat the easiest when cornering. Once you laid your hand on it, you will not be disappointed.
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Hell I was disappointed! Because if the future of racing has nothing to do with throttle modulation and brake modulation. I'd rather watch Tron light cycle battles!
 
Kevin****Theory
X1 is by fat the easiest when cornering. Once you laid your hand on it, you will not be disappointed.
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JJ72
Hell I was disappointed! Because if the future of racing has nothing to do with throttle modulation and brake modulation. I'd rather watch Tron light cycle battles!
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So you wouldn't mind posting pictures of your 3 golds in the X1 challenge, then?

I mean surely, a car with no need for throttle control or brake modulation is easy as pie to handle when going for the golds...
 
Hehe if cars where REALLY that easy to drive we all be making millions as little STIG's now would we ? You can drive a car fast comfortably but to go really fast that is a totally different ballgame.
Try some online races in PC simulations or in proper ps3 leagues and come back to us again on the forums telling it is easy :P

To the guy above about the Nascar and Formula 1, those people that thing it is easy by judging what they see on TV have no clue whatsoever. Formula 1 one of the most difficult cars to drive and be competative with.

There is one saying that sums it up:

IF YOU FEEL YOU ARE IN TOTAL CONTROL, YOU JUST AIN'T GOING FAST ENOUGH !
 
Sincx
IF YOU FEEL YOU ARE IN TOTAL CONTROL, YOU JUST AIN'T GOING FAST ENOUGH !
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👍
You have to start pushing till the stage when the car controls you!
Just like in Soviet Russia...
 
alucard0712
To me standard cars are easer to drive. Toyota Minolta is most boring car I ever drove, but Pugeot 908 PDI - pure awesomeness - it's so alive!
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Drove that car last night for the first time... I didn't know some of those tracks had so much green space. :crazy:
 
Sincx
Formula 1 one of the most difficult cars to drive and be competative with.
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Every rally driver would like to have a word with you, filthy-bitumen-road-user. :sly:

Is there a way to select online from ALL the cars in the game that can be used? This would open up stock-only race series, unless someone wants to buy EVERY SuperGT500 or Nascar or whatever in a race series. That would mean that nobody could get away with just whacking a turbo and softs onto the car and thinking they're 'good'.
 
I'm not so sure about a real F1 car being easy to drive slowly:
 
Verbal
I'm not so sure about a real F1 car being easy to drive slowly:
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Frankly they just chose the worst circuit possible to test a F1 car, the stowe circuit (if you can call that a circuit) is just as fast as the pitlane in F1, F1 cars ain't design for cornering at these tight radius (generally wide and long racing cars ain't), and at those speed aero is hardly working as well.

on a fast circuit, to drive a F1 (or any single seater) at 80% isn't that hard if you excuse the physical demands.
 
RacingManiac
The classics at least have an issue of in game they are given way too much grip....cars like the P4 or the Ford MKIV makes little to no downforce to start with(MKIV actually makes lift: http://www.mulsannescorner.com/aerodatabasefordgt4067.html), and since GT5 doesn't make any distinction between tire between cars, they are essentially running on modern slicks....
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Exactly. Tire technology was far behind horsepower back then, and unfortunately the game does not model those tires at all (it would be hard to do). So yes you're essentially running classic race cars on modern slicks.
 
TBR 427
Every rally driver would like to have a word with you, filthy-bitumen-road-user. :sly:

Is there a way to select online from ALL the cars in the game that can be used? This would open up stock-only race series, unless someone wants to buy EVERY SuperGT500 or Nascar or whatever in a race series. That would mean that nobody could get away with just whacking a turbo and softs onto the car and thinking they're 'good'.
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Completly agree with you on Rally racing, that on itself is a totalyl different ballgame. For me Rally is the top of the top of the top then comes Formula 1 :)
 
Too easy?! Minolta Toyota on full racing softs and low downforce at the ring. 225 mph wheel on the grass in this tail-happy monster that ends up developing 950BHP!!! Thats not easy... it's wild, and I love it... Just need another 4.9 million for a 787B and I will be happy...

*And thats without my 100 hp extra turbo for the Minolta if I feel really stupid/insane/confident...
 
MrMulsanne
Too easy?! Minolta Toyota on full racing softs and low downforce at the ring.
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nahhhhh.........I say Minolta toyota on rain tyres and soaked suzuka lapping under 2 minutes. :dopey:
 
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