Enthusia - Better Racing Than GT4?

  • Thread starter Thread starter luchi
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Of course GT4 doesn't have the best racing. GT3 didn't, GT2 didn't, GT1 didn't. But GT4 has the best *driving*, and that means more to me. Sure it's great to have good wheel to wheel racing, but good driving definitely comes first.

Formula One doesn't have the best wheel to wheel racing, but it is still the best circuit motor racing series because it has the best drivers and the most impressive cars. To draw a parallel, GT4 doesn't have the best racing, but it is still the best motor racing game.
 
luchi
2. Several people have posted replies saying that its up to the player to have the discipline to limit the performance of their car when entering an event. I completely agree but its worth pointing out that in Turismo mode you never always know who will enter the race against you. I could enter a race with a car thinking it should be a good match only to find that it is way better than the AI cars entered. This is yet another reason why I favour arcade mode (which is anything but arcade like in nature). I choose whatever car I like and can set the game to pick cars worse than, equal to or better than my car. Then when the game has loaded, I can access the quick setup menu and make last minute changes to my car to make it less or more competitive. Its a lottery when it comes to guessing your opponents in Turismo mode. I've had races where I've entered a competitive car and been thrashed by another car. I then decided to purchase that same car in order to race on a more even level, only to find that the same car did not enter the race when I re-raced it. The result was me having the best car on the grid and thrashing the opposition. I applaud player discipline but I feel that Turismo does very little or nothing to encourage it.
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I totally agree with the bolded section. My roommate and I have been talking about this. For example, in NCAA Football 2005 we both find that the All-American difficulty setting is too easy, and Heisman is too hard, but this game has sliders, where you can adjust individual difficulties (either easier or harder) to customize the game to your ability, so that you can make it easier or harder for different things. i.e., we are both bad at kicking and pass defense and offense, but we are way too good at running offense and running defense, but we can change the sliders to make kicking and passing easier, and running more difficult, its perfect. Why can't we do this in GT? It wouldn't be that difficult. Why not let the player pick how many A-Spec points they want to contest? That would be the best option I think. If I want a 10 point race, I pick that, if I want a 150 point race, I pick that. So maybe I start with 10 point races, then I get good at those, I crank it up a little bit, and so on. That would totally fix the situation in my opinion.

EDIT: Well, it just went and bolded the entire excerpt. I agree with the stuff about picking/adjusting the opposing line-up.
 
Its probably worth pointing out at this stage that I've never claimed to have played Enthusia and that my observations are based entirely on what I've seen in video form.

A colleague of mine was in Japan a while back and had the chance to play it at the Tokyo Game Show. He came back very impressed (although its worth pointing out that the game was played at TGS using steering wheel, pedals and so on).

I think the title of my initial post summed it up when I asked whether Enthusia would provide a better racing experience than GT4. Some of the things I've seen suggests that it would, although all of this means nothing if the driving itself is lacking.

With regards to the driving model on Turismo, I've personally been of the opinion that the game is very "safe". I've played GT4 with manual gears and no driving aids at all times and with many cars it still feels like there are unknown forces that are helping it stay under control. Of course with many cars this is not the case, such as the Corvette Stingray Coupe (C2) '63, which is probably the hardest car to drive I've come across so far.

Regardless of whether my beliefs on this matter are true or not, what I do know is that GT4 provides one of the finest console driving experiences, evident by the fact that I regularly play in time trial mode, possibly more so than in Arcade or Turismo modes. I'm more than happy to pick a car and push it as far as I can on an empty race track.

Its just a shame that Turismo mode doesnt do enough to build on this. My best driving always occurs in Time Trial or Arcade Race modes, whereas Turismo mode is an ongoing chore that ranges in difficulty from easy to impossible with each race I enter.

Anyway, whilst I'm here I have a couple of issues I want to raise based on my very brief play of the PAL version of GT4. I'm still waiting for my own copy but had a quick look at a friends. Anyway, here goes: -

1. The Japanese version of the game has a commentary track that can be heard during replays or demonstrations. I was hoping that this would be translated into English for the PAL version but it seems they've removed the commentary altogether. Is this true? It would be a big disappointment if it was. Can anybody here with the USA version tell us whether they have commentary? I'm suspicious that because the PAL version is for all European territories (rather than on some occasions where some countries get exclusive PAL verions) they may have decided to remove the commentary in order to get out of recording it in four to five different languages.

2. I've heard about the inclusion of memory card battles in split screen but it seems that the player does not have access to their garage when playing in single player, in time trial or arcade race modes. If this is true then its another big disappointment. There are several cars that in stock form were unimpressive but when upgraded and tuned made for a lot of fun to drive. It will be a shame that I won't be able to use those versions of cars in time trials or in well balanced races in arcade mode.

Still, I'm looking forward to getting my hands on the Chaparrals.......
 
Soman
2.
In GT4 PAL you can use your tuned garage cars
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Soman, can you confirm that tuned garage cars are available in either time trial or race within arcade mode?

From what I saw, it looked like tuned garage cars were only available in split screen (and possibily in LAN mode, not that I'd know).

Thanks.

The loss of commentary track is a real shame, because the impression I got from the Japanese version was that every car had a commentary track, giving the player information on the history of their chosen car.
 
Well, as my copy of Enthusia shipped today via airmail (one week) I wanted to ask if perhaps somebody from HK or so still has the game? Any impressions?
 
Hun200kmh
The release date in Japan is March, 17th, so I guess we will have to wait two more days ...
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Hmm my copy shipped today, so I guess that people from HK should get it, as PlayAsia is in HK...
 
In my opinion Forza and Enthusia aren't worth a second thought, I like GT4 mostly because of wide selection of cars and alot of options for them and a lot of nice tracks, its not really the intense racing I would hope for but does good in a driving respect and generally is better for comparing times on courses than racing others anyway. Nicest aspect is the whole Racing RPG style play, I mean its just great to buy small cars, gain money buy and win rarer cars etc, I'm satisfied with all of that and it just gets better with each version. If I want the intense racing, full simulation physics, damage etc, I will just play a PC game, I mean really there are racing sims out there now with hundreds of cars, hundreds of tracks, full fields of cars sometimes into the 50's or 60's if your computer can take it, and all the options you can want and because of mods are forever expanding till a completly new version of the sim is made. Plus they also contain all the ferraris, porsches, and lamborghinis you could ask for. For me GT4 fills in the car enthusiast genre, I mean really the other two aren't coming close to having 700 cars, PD's taste isn't too bad either alot of nice models here and the addition of the old GroupC and new lemans prototypes really adds to the variety plus unlike GT3 the cars no longer have that overall generic steering feel and differ alot, and the sense of speed in the hood cam is amazing. Despite having the few unracable cars I like those cars because its the first time anyone has ever put cars like those in a game, is the history of cars, who would want to race a motor carriage anyway, you can count the grass in it. I don't think Forza or Enthusia will touch GT, many said Project Gotham racing was going to compete with it, eh nope.
 
Just been looking at the car list for enthusia and it seems to have a few additions on the european front to those in gt4.

Saab 9-5
Volvo V70R
Audi allroad quattro
Audi A8
Audi A4
MB G500L
MB C32 Amg
MB CL55 Amg
MB S600L
VW New Polo
VW tourareg
Aston Martin db5
Range Rover
Jag X-Type
 
supergoop
Enthusia will be out in Japan March 17th (today), right? Does anyone have a first impression of the retail copy yet?
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Yes, I've played it. See my post "GT4 vs Enthusia vs GT-R" for more.

If anyone has specific questions regarding Enthusia I can probably do my best to answer those as well.
 
As I have stated in other threads......Every time a racing game trys to be GT its a huge let down. And whats even more shocking is for a GT message board to pick apart everything "bad" about GT is really odd. Figure people that would come to a site dedicatd to a game....would in fact LIKE that game in spite of its short comings. Yes the game is not perfect.....but NO there is no other racing game like it. Lets just enjoy these games for what they are. I so sick of getting my hopes up about "GT killers" to be just disappointed.

If you want a 100% go to the track!

With that said I am looking foward to Enthusia, and I'm sure I will get tons of enjoyment out of it. What I will not do is try and compare it with the KING, cause there is no point :)
 
Everyone who uses the copout, "If you want more realistic then get in a real car", can PISS OFF. Seriously, you are useless to the advancement of simulation. 👎
 
Kolyana
I agree with your points 1 thru 4.

The HP bar to me sounds a little ... abstract and "gamey"; give me real-world physical behavior and damage modelling any day. Yes, I don't object to 'points of for poor racing", but then I think that's better handled in your point describing how Enthusia points are earned and used. Yes, it seems to me that GT4's point system is borderline useless.

Can I also add that going to an event where the entry requirement are cars <3400mm ... and then going through every single manufacturer and car that "looks short" trying to find one suitable for that race is one glorious pain in the bum and the perfect example of how to completely waste an hour with tedious and repetitive button pressing ... sure the event could list those cars that match the entry requirements even if I don't own one?

I love your idea of selecting a car once you're at an event. I'd like to expand on that slightly and say that the entire garage system is somewhat weak. It's such a nicely polished game i so mnay ways, and then I walk into my garage and get this awful *list* of cars I have to sort through, filter, cycle from page to page and so on ... UGH ... I'd love to be able to walk into a garage environment ala PGR and literllay walk around my vehicles, view their stats and perhaps even take photos right then and there ... there is no reason why this couldn't be done, really.

The whole "You're in this car" system in GT4 seems counter-productive to smooth game play.
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I would have liked gt4 if they had put in less cars and given it realistic damage. apparently its impossible without wrecking the cars...:indiff: but enthusia sounds very out there where racing is concerned. this hp meter jus tsounds stupid. i'll buy it if it has good physics and lambo's, and ferraris.
 
Gek54
Everyone who uses the copout, "If you want more realistic then get in a real car", can PISS OFF. Seriously, you are useless to the advancement of simulation. 👎
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Though I admire your passion, you come of quite smug. So allow me to paste something that I wrote in another thread to help explain.

"there is a fine line between 100% sim, and "feels like you are really driving"
If GT (or any other game for that matter) was 100% sim, you would not feel like you are driving the car. Case in point, if I hooked up a camera to my car, as well as remote steering and throttle devices. It would be damn hard to drive my car remotly. And I drive my car every day! The reason? well I dont get the full sense of speed with no peripheral (sp?) vision, cant feel G's, even with FF I wouldnt feel the road the same as a real car, no depth perception to gauge turns and other obsticles, and not as much visual information in general (resolution).

So without having all these elements, to make a true sim would be a waste. PD are genius in that when you are driving the car (though not 100% accurate) it does FEEL like you are in fact driving that car....and thats whats important.

NO one has been able to match them in this area yet. And if game companies try and be "more sim" than GT, imo will make their game worse not better."


You are ignorant if you think a game can be 100% sim and still playable on a TV/monitor.

You are usless to the advancement of playable games that actually feel like you are driving the car 👎
 
hes right no game will ever be like driving you can see a track on a tv screen like you can in real life trust me. But you can tell the companies that really went to PD and gave them information about the car and did testing. I think we can all agree and im not saying this because Im a BMW guy but the BMWs in this game were obviously looked over by the GT4 developers. BMW May have paid to have the cars featured i dont know but you can tell. each ones sound is different and accurate also they handle more realistically compared to some cars. There are several cars in the game like this but every BMW and ive driven all of them is realistic.
 
flynn
You are ignorant if you think a game can be 100% sim and still playable on a TV/monitor.
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No you are ignorant to think one could not adjust their senses to operate a full fledge sim. Several types of vehicles from cars to air planes are successfully controled by remote. All it takes is for you to adjust your preception of your senses. I would be more scared of low framerate rather than low resolution. I dont need to make out a peble on the road to succesfully manuver a car. There are many industrial simulators out there that can be operated with the same success as their real life counter parts. Only the weakminded would not be able to adjust to a full fledged sim. Every sim developer tries to push for more realistic physics. What is holding them back is dumbasses like you who need their hand held in order to make it around a track with out smashing into a wall. The more realistic sims like RBR, Rally Trophey, GPL, Papy's Nascar, GTR, LFS have only met minimal success becuase the mainstream wants to full throtle around corners and dispises the need for slowing down. Dont complain when people are not satisfied when physics get dumbed down, its obvious they can take a more realistic sim if they are finding the current ones lacking and dont complain about other sims being too realistic for you. If you peaked your skill level then kindly move out of the way for the rest us real simheads.
 
you should just go hide in a corner. for one, you cant adjust your senses...that is physically impossible. Games although giving the illusion of being 3d are only 2d. you cannot have the type of depth perception in a game that you can have in real life there is no way around it. You obviously are very slow because youd realize that you really cant make out whats coming up next unless you know the track. At speeds that next turn can be there faster than you can blink. If you ever do a lap at the nurburgring and you only blink 14 times then your concentrating and if thats not "adjusting your senses" for you than i dont know what is. This game is designed to sell not train. id say about 95% of the members of this message board could not comprehend the concentration and skill and precision it takes to drive a real racecar and be fast in it. This games physics are about as real as a mainstream racing game will ever get. But it still lacks countless variables when driving on the track to make it a truely exciting racing game.

A game cannot and never will be 100% realistic/sim and be playable on our current technologies monitors.

You cannot feel the track there fore you can only count on what your eyes see to guide you. When the car reacts you wont know it till its likely too late. They exxagerate things in the games to make it easier to spot. but you will never be able to see through a corner or feel that dip in the middle. With nothing but your eyes to guide you, you will never be able to be completely realistic. There are no subconcious corrections that are just made by your brain as your body feels the car react to the track.

If you dont know what your talking about its best you just dont speak.

People that complain about a game being to realistic either never drove a car or never drove a car at track speed.

Please do me a favor and refer to your own sig before posting again.
 
Ball325
you should just go hide in a corner. for one, you cant adjust your senses...that is physically impossible.
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Yes, you can adjust your perception of reality in response to the senses you are allowed to experience no mater how limited they might be. This is how blind people are able to negotiate a room with sonar.

Games although giving the illusion of being 3d are only 2d. you cannot have the type of depth perception in a game that you can have in real life there is no way around it. You obviously are very slow because youd realize that you really cant make out whats coming up next unless you know the track.
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With this logic people with one eye would not be able to drive in real life on roads they have not ever driven on. For some reason one eyed people are given driver's license and seem to successfully drive where ever the hell they want. Also you are saying that when you drive a track for the first time in any videogame you hit every wall at every turn. I would not be surprised if you were that dim.


At speeds that next turn can be there faster than you can blink. If you ever do a lap at the nurburgring and you only blink 14 times then your concentrating and if thats not "adjusting your senses" for you than i dont know what is.
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I am not sure what you are trying to communicate here. So if I blink 15 times on the Ring then I am not concentrating? I just got gold on the S16 and I would bet I blinked more than 14 times.

This game is designed to sell not train. id say about 95% of the members of this message board could not comprehend the concentration and skill and precision it takes to drive a real racecar and be fast in it. This games physics are about as real as a mainstream racing game will ever get. But it still lacks countless variables when driving on the track to make it a truely exciting racing game.

A game cannot and never will be 100% realistic/sim and be playable on our current technologies monitors.
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I agree that the processing power is a limitation but fearing the mainstream can not play a realistic sim only means the dev failed to produce enough instruction and training to the user. Mainstreamers are why GT games have license tests.

You cannot feel the track there fore you can only count on what your eyes see to guide you. When the car reacts you wont know it till its likely too late. They exxagerate things in the games to make it easier to spot. but you will never be able to see through a corner or feel that dip in the middle. With nothing but your eyes to guide you, you will never be able to be completely realistic. There are no subconcious corrections that are just made by your brain as your body feels the car react to the track.
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I can feel the track with a TFF wheel. Why would I not be able to see through a corner or a dip in the middle? I can see many dips and see through several corners in GT4, they are not invisible. I have maneuvered a radio controlled car with only being able to view its motions from a mounted camera and it was quite easy, limited yes but none the less I was successful in moving it where I wanted to and at high speeds (45mph) around a track.


If you dont know what your talking about its best you just dont speak.

People that complain about a game being to realistic either never drove a car or never drove a car at track speed.

Please do me a favor and refer to your own sig before posting again.
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I think you were trying to say, "People, that complain about a game being too unrealistic, have not ever driven a car or have not ever driven a car at track speed." I hope you are still in English classes.

What exactly is "track speed"?
 
so many idiotic statements I dont know where to begin...

First of all your personal attacks prove you are an immature lil kid. (probably no older than 22? let me know if I am correct)

Now lets move on to me gutting your ignorance....

Several types of vehicles from cars to air planes are successfully controled by remote.
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Sure....and its HARD as hell, it takes months of experience, and anyone who does it will be the first to tell you its nothing like really flying IN a plane (for example). They dont attach a camera on a 747 to train a pilot on flying a 747 jacka55. Thats why they use sims. And Sims might I add that are no where near 100% The purpose of a sim is to not recreate reality....its to recreate the experience. These are 2 totally different things. I mean damn this is like simulation 101 crap. I learned this stuff first year when developing virtual reality for medical companies.

I would be more scared of low framerate rather than low resolution. I dont need to make out a peble on the road to succesfully manuver a car.
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ok so you also dont need to see whats up the road a few hundred feet while going 150mph+? yep thats realism....give me 5 vertical pixels to see a turn down the road.
There are many industrial simulators out there that can be operated with the same success as their real life counter parts.
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Thanks for proving my point. These industrial sims (which I have used) have everything you need for a true sim. They simulate G's from hydrolics, wrap around peripheral screen, insane high resolution, and shutter glasses for depth perception. And even then they tell you its no where near a 100% accurate sim.

So untill you have about 2 million to get a setup like that in your house....keep your mouth shut dummy.
Only the weakminded would not be able to adjust to a full fledged sim
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lol has nothing to do with being "weakminded". If a sim is 100% its just that. And would take no getting use to. Case in point. If there ever was such a thing as 100% that simulated EVERYTHING perfectly. I wouldnt need a "strongmind" to drive that car.....I would be able to hop in and go, and it would feel completely natural. Of course I would need to practice to drive the car fast just as in RL, but driving the car itself would feel natural and I would not need to get used to that.. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A FULL FLEDGED SIM.
The more realistic sims like RBR, Rally Trophey, GPL, Papy's Nascar, GTR, LFS
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No its cause a lot of these games lack depth and more importantly MARKETING.
you really have no clue as to the way the world works.

as a side note I did play GTR (german release) I found it MUUUUCH easier to control the cars than in GT4. Game is great and I love it.....but if you think thats a TRUE sim (as you like to say) you are way off.

becuase the mainstream wants to full throtle around corners and dispises the need for slowing down
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Yeah I guess I would be pissed if I were you to....cause it sounds like you have a defective GT4 there.....cause on my game I cant drive full throttle into turns.

But hey big man....if GT4 is not good enough for your PC gaming snobby ass. why are you here? Also I would love to see some of your lap times in GT4.....if its so easy for you I'm sure you must have some amazing times. Why dont you share them with us? Hell I will take it a step further....name a game that you feel squashes GT4 is realism, and I will race you in it. Lets see who wins.

Yes, you can adjust your perception of reality in response to the senses you are allowed to experience no mater how limited they might be. This is how blind people are able to negotiate a room with sonar.
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Ok great so all I have to do is stop driving a real car for about 10 years and MY mind will recreate everything for me....WOW what a bad example you gave. Hell I might as well take it a step further and take out one of my eyeballs so that in years to come my mind can recreate depth perception. wait wait wait.....I will remove my cerebellum so I cant sense G's in RL

You really have no idea at all about anything and should stop right now.

A blind persons brain is FORCED to use its other senses cause it has no CHOICE. And even with the minds ability to adapt a blind person still has to use a walking stick to go anywhere. And any kind of "free roaming" they can do is based on years and years of adapting. NOT something you can do to recreate G forces in a game or depth perception.

After reading all your ingnorance, I can see now why you dont like GT4.....ITS BEYOND YOU.


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