But i don't need clarkson to tell me that cars in turismo drive realistically. Cars i have driven in real life actually drive similarly to the game. Which can't be said for a majority of the games out there.
In your opinion. Don't state that as fact. I can assure you, there are many, most likely the majority, who would disagree with you there. There are also the little things, such as the bugged aero, reversed suspension tuning, dodgy tire model, lack of air pressure adjustment and brake upgrades that point to GT5 being not necessarily as realistic as you stated.
In my opinion.
so forza 3 was a complete game eh? brilliant. just brilliant.
For the most part, yeah. Couple of bug fixes, shift animations etc. But I bought the game on release and didn't notice any massively altered game mechanics from updates during playing it for 2 years so I reckon it was pretty complete from the developers.
On a different note, it's interesting that you keep mentioning Clarkson, a man who now does the intro and is involved heavily along with other Top Gear theming throughout Forza 4. It's maybe because T10 actually ran with the licence or more likely had the time to implement it better. To add to that I dislike my words being twisted, I never menetioned man hours or budget, I simply stated that the first big update that wasn't just bug fixes has taken half a development cycle of a Forza game to be released.
Unfortunately for PD, time is not measured in man hours or budget, time is measured in years, weeks, days, hours, minutes, seconds. Forza 2 was released early on in the 360s life, PD spent the majority of it's target consoles lifespan working on a game that when released was still rushed, unfinished and has taken a year to patch, debug and fix. It is most likely the case that GT5 may well be the only GT game we see on the PS3, but then the consoles will move on, the goal posts will be moved and they will have to start again. With any luck, they might have even finished patching GT5 by the time the next Playstation is released.
GT5 sold well because it is essentially from a well loved almost certainly cult franchise, but it is by far the worst release of the series yet, in both polish and finish in my eyes. None of the Forza series have been 'bad', various reviews and overall metacritic scores will back this up, and the consistency and evolution looks set to continue with FM4. No doubt when the planets align, and everything is just so GT5 comes good for the briefest of moments and shines beautifully through the shady murks of it's own painfully average mediocrity, and it is better than Forza for these experiences.
Unfortunately the rock solid and frequently enthralling experience that is the Forza series has increased my intolerance for 'quirky' game design and I have less time for putting up with unfinished or (most used phrase in the thread) half-assed content so for the moment my PS3 (bought specifically for GT5, I hasten to add) lies dormant waiting for the completion of GT5. Or the second coming of Jesus, whichever comes first.