Gran Turismo 7 AI behavior analysis

[Nigrick]

I have a long history with Gran Turismo. This is one of my all-time favourite game franchise and I really love and appreciate the passion that comes into making this game. It's not flawless, and many will agree that one of the biggest issues is AI. We forced to play rabbit chase with moving obstacles, and I was hoping that it will change in GT sport, but after analyzing the first sneak peek of the gameplay I made a conclusion that nothing had changed. And I was right.

So, I decided to do the same thing with the only available gameplay of GT7. And to my surprise, I saw a glimpse of hope. I will demonstrate a few examples and will include GIF so you can see it for yourself.

1. Notice how aggressive the Porshe is overtaken the leader of the race - Aston Martin. That is something I can't recall from the previous title because the leader is always far ahead.

2. Another example of aggressive behaviour where Aston is bumping into the Porshe, fighting for the optimal line to enter the corner.

3. In GT sport all the opponents feel like they are slower than you on straight lines. It's very easy to chase the opponent by slipstreaming him. Here we see that Aston is actually getting away.

4. Another issue from previous game entries is that AI is usually just following each other like a train, and very rarely fights for the position. Here we can see the battle for the position that is happening behind players car.

5. Another interesting detail hiding in the player's input metrics. Notice how unnatural the gas indication behaves. Solid hold on 10% for a few seconds and then suddenly a few 70% gas hits... This makes me think that we are actually inside the AI-controlled car! If it's true, the game is doing a good job making you think that it's a human player.

 

[o000o]

Well it's nice to be able to back up an optimistic explanations in an elaborate way like this. Though foe straight line part, does rubberband only qualify for those that are behind you or it does for the front part? You mean for GT Sport the AI im straight line is slower even if their car is superior to yours?

 

[Nigrick]

Well it's nice to be able to back up an optimistic explanations in an elaborate way like this. Though foe straight line part, does rubberband only qualify for those that are behind you or it does for the front part? You mean for GT Sport the AI im straight line is slower even if their car is superior to yours?

I meant that when you are driving the same class cars, usually opponent is slower and not accelerate as fast as you are. But this is my subjective judgment of course.

 

[Shingo_civic]

Honestly to me the AI seemed slow as usual from that little that we saw in the trailer. They seemed to brake to early before the corners like in the past games...i don't know, let's hope that in the final version of the game it will be way more competitive like in other games such as Rfactor 2 where is able to keep up even with experienced drivers.
If the AI remains like it is now,better they remove the offline part of the game honestly, it's not fun like that.

 

[ferhound]

They should partner with Tesla for the AI program that would be an interesting take. I wonder how many cpu cycles of the PS5 chips would take to use their autonomous self driving program multiplied by the number of opponent cars.

 

[o000o]

Honestly to me the AI seemed slow as usual from that little that we saw in the trailer. They seemed to brake to early before the corners like in the past games...i don't know let's hope that in the final version of the game it will be way more competitive like in other games such as Rfactor 2 where is able to keep up even with experienced drivers.
If the AI remains like it is now,better they remove the offline part of the game honestly, it's not fun like that.

GTS' sound showcase long before release also weren't that good.

 

[Nigrick]

They should partner with Tesla for the AI program that would be an interesting take. I wonder how many cpu cycles of the PS5 chips would take to use their autonomous self driving program multiplied by the number of opponent cars.

I'm pretty sure that self driving cars using quite different algorithms, so you can't really implement them in the racing game.

 

[ferhound]

I'm pretty sure that self driving cars using quite different algorithms, so you can't really implement them in the racing game.

Of course! Im not talking about a direct port of the code but maybe "translate" it.
In any case both companies could benefit.

 

[AfraidRacer]

Not convinced. Tool Assisted Speedruns are a thing. Certainly hope so though!

 

[RacingFan1]

Sorry OP, I think it's a bit of nonsense to draw so many conclusions from such little gameplay and from an early beta.

 

[o000o]

Sorry OP, I think it's a bit of nonsense to draw so many conclusions from such little gameplay and from an early beta.

Both positive and negative conclusions, or only for positive conclusions that is draw so many conclusions? (as being negative about anything is unfortunately more acceptable).

 

[Silver_Wolf]

I do not personally see much hope for a change in the AI behaviour, everything in that regard has been in place for a while in the series and
unless someone has actually told PD it's weak they will not change it.

This disappoints me because part of the reason my interest slowly waned. was not being able to do video's against the AI.

Remember that was a showcase video so of course they will try to make things look competitive and actual racing going on to make the video a bit more interesting viewing, let's see what further footage brings.

 

[Nigrick]

I do not personally see much hope for a change in the AI behaviour, everything in that regard has been in place for a while in the series and
unless someone has actually told PD it's weak they will not change it.

This disappoints me because part of the reason my interest slowly waned. was not being able to do video's against the AI.

Remember that was a showcase video so of course they will try to make things look competitive and actual racing going on to make the video a bit more interesting viewing, let's see what further footage brings.

Lets not forget that gt sport was focused on online racing mostly and it was natural not to dedicate too much recourse for the single player content, such as fixing ai. But GT 7 is advertised as “back to the original formula” and this is giving me hope that they will make single player enjoyable and will spend some time on improving AI.

Sorry OP, I think it's a bit of nonsense to draw so many conclusions from such little gameplay and from an early beta.

This is the best part of GT community - carefully inspect and analyze every bit of info we are getting, because we love the game and want it to be better. Of course there is a ton of wishful thinking, but I don’t see what is wrong with this. There is a plenty of toxic people already, without any knowledge of game development, that could only see that bad and don’t bring anything useful to the table.

 

[ScottPuss20]

If PD skimp on the AI, it's going to kill the vibe and make the experience quite boring. They cannot stuff it up.

 

[SlowGrayAudi]

In all likelihood the AI is gonna be just as ****** as it has been for the last 20 years.

As ive said before.

PD needs to borrow someone from Kunos to do their AI.

Also rolling starts and putting us mid pack is a pathetic excuse to try and make it challenging. Its just frustrating and shows how lazy they are about their AI development

 

[GTR365]

I love this analysis topic as my Gran Turismo history dates to the Clinton administration, GT still is the only game I play and my racing consists almost exclusively of AI opponents.


I did not answer your poll because my desired reply was absent, i.e., 'Undecided'. Concerning your offering of answers, I feel that your choices could be expanded ('Not concerned' might be a choice) and that the qualification on your second choice is unnecessarily derogatory possibly mitigating participation.


Let's discuss your post.

1. The Porsche pass for position does look promising. AI vs AI battles seem to be few in GTS.

Your gif is brief, so I reviewed the GT7 release video. I was interested in the behavior of the Aston after surrendering the position. The driver did seem to close the door to the following, onboard driver whose user name seems to indicate a human driver. I cannot assess if this move was programmed with that intention. This might have been the Aston's best recovery path regardless of proximity and attitude of a following driver. The whole affair does seem scrappier than I've witnessed before between AI competitors.

Your observation about P1 AI not being separated so far from P2 AI also is noteworthy. I am exasperated by GT forcing me to choose a car to contest with just one rabbit. I welcome the chance to race several more equal performers rather than having three laps to battle past 14 slugs just to catch sight of the leader.

Regarding AI vs AI battles, I also feel that a 16-driver race in GT League is 15 vs me. I see far too many incidences of AI side by side "action" resulting in no real battle for position (whether logical or spatial) but instead a two wide rolling roadblock preventing my progress over an already artificially short race duration. I hope that gifs 1 and 2 portend to more realistic AI driver engagement.


2. The contact between the Porsche and the Aston does seem like a revision of AI vs AI behavior.

Call me a purist, if you like, but I prefer to maintain the attitude that racing is a non-contact activity. However, bumping is expected when drivers approach the limits of their abilities, of the car's performance and of the track conditions. Contact happens. If this is representative of our GT7 future, I welcome this change.

This interaction seems harmless, but I invite you to reexamine it. This opens up a discussion about the realism of contact with AI cars which I have experienced. This shunt appears substantial yet the cars' displacement and attitude adjustment are minimal, almost as if they are train cars on rails. This seems just as GTS behaves currently; quite disappointing. I would predict the real world result of this encounter, both cars under braking with the intention to turn right with the trailing car's left front colliding with the leading car's right rear to be both cars losing relative pace at best and a double spin at worst. The Aston slows noticeably, but temporarily, relative to the other two cars nearby but the Porsche simply motors on largely unaffected. I have been negatively impacted following AI contact (all driver aids disabled) while the other car keeps movin' on. I hope for more realistic consequences for situations like this.


3. Car speed of AI drivers vs human driver is another worthy topic.

I also note that the P1 driver pulls away while the P4 car following the human driver closes up just slightly possibly leading to a conclusion that the Mazda lacks power. We know neither the slipstream effect for GT7 nor the relative speed capabilities GT7 attributes to the cars in this gif. I find AI cars to be not particularly easy targets due to slipstream effect although this has varied between game updates.

I find straight-line speed of AI competitors in GTS to be rather inconsistent. Often this seems to vary directly, with limits of magnitude, with the car I select. The relative straight-line speed of AI cars also seems to be the lone differential effect of my selection of the skill parameter in a GT League Arcade race. Better skill level seems to result in faster cars not in more capable drivers.

Having raced the Premium > Blue Moon Bay event many times, featuring its long durations of extended close car proximity, I have noticed discrepancies in relative AI position vs relative AI speed. I have had what I later confirmed to be adequate closing or eclipsing speed yet could not catch or clear an AI car. I also have witnessed AI errors, which have varied with successive game updates, when I am near while the car drives flawlessly when away from me. It's as if GTS cheats to make racing artificially harder; every pass needs to be a career defining moment.


4. AI vs AI competition needs improvement progressing to GT7.

I really hope that we can see more battles instead of the follow-the-leader obstruction we face playing GTS. No race features compelling action each corner, but it seems as if GTS AI drivers put forth no effort against any driver but me. I have viewed replays so that I might know how these drivers perform when I am not in their vicinity. I look for their Vmax on straights whose terminal corner is prone to overtakes. Are they faster when near me? Do they brake later? Can they carry more speed through the corner? How do they battle other AI drivers?

I often feel that, in my presence, they take defensive lines which should result in an incremental addition in lap time particularly in the sector in question yet they progress through the section as if on what I would consider an optimal path. My attempt at an out of phase alternative line causes me to lose so much time that I am unable to pass. This seems artificial. Their behavior is not predictable compared to human opponents.



I hope I haven’t overthought your topic. Let's hope that your conclusions are correct. Some of us truly desire more realistic AI competition.

 

[GTR365]

(Internet issues led to double post)

 

[MroczMR]

I found this:

To be honest it doesn't look that bad in GT Sport if you set Pro AI in Custom Race. But it needs a little bit improvements. This video is great for comparing GT Sports AI (on hardest difficulty) with GT7 and having Assetto Corsa's AI as an another object of analysis.



The main thing i hate about GT Sports GT mode is that you can't change AI difficulty in events. It would be much better to drive with the hardest AI. I hope that will change in GT7 (with additional improvments to AI)

 

[KinLM]

Why bother trying to perfect AI when it’s easier than it has ever been in our whole history to race against other real people

 

[Dave A]

Why bother trying to perfect AI when it’s easier than it has ever been in our whole history to race against other real people

Because not everyone enjoys or wants that.

 

[Silver Arrows]

Why bother trying to perfect AI when it’s easier than it has ever been in our whole history to race against other real people

Because as much as people like to think that the silver bullet for anything is online racing, the fact of the matter is that Polyphony's party trick this time around is an actual single player suite and not something that was bolted onto the game in post launch updates. Moreover, the AI in GT games has been woefully inadequate for years, and has been especially bad since GT5, yet it hasn't been fixed or altered in any meaningful way (except to make AI drivers more prone to mistakes, in my experience) because Polyphony still believes that difficulty should come from a JRPG style of scaling, where any sort of power or handling advantage in a car is basically a free pass to get your credits.

Maybe most importantly, it's a circular relationship between offline AI, and racing etiquette online. Think about it - considering that GT7's being touted with a full single player suite, most people are going to be going through that before making any significant inroads into online play. Considering that GT's AI has been braindead and slavishly devoted to the racing line for years, and shows no fight or competition, it breeds into players that the AI is simply a speed bump on their way to victory, and the fact that the series, for the longest time, never punished players for such dirty behavior in any way, tells players that GT's single player AI, as it stands now, is meaningless, and is meant to be treated like ****. So when online players, in the case of GT Sport, are only told to watch two three minute videos on etiquette before they can go race, and their only actual punishment is the (frankly, utterly meaningless) dropping of Safety and Driver score, then how the hell do you *not* expect bad racing etiquette, corner cutters, and divebombers to populate lobbies like they have been for the entirety of GT Sport's life, and won't be the same problem in GT7?

 

[MroczMR]

Maybe most importantly, it's a circular relationship between offline AI, and racing etiquette online. Think about it - considering that GT7's being touted with a full single player suite, most people are going to be going through that before making any significant inroads into online play. Considering that GT's AI has been braindead and slavishly devoted to the racing line for years, and shows no fight or competition, it breeds into players that the AI is simply a speed bump on their way to victory, and the fact that the series, for the longest time, never punished players for such dirty behavior in any way, tells players that GT's single player AI, as it stands now, is meaningless, and is meant to be treated like ****. So when online players, in the case of GT Sport, are only told to watch two three minute videos on etiquette before they can go race, and their only actual punishment is the (frankly, utterly meaningless) dropping of Safety and Driver score, then how the hell do you *not* expect bad racing etiquette, corner cutters, and divebombers to populate lobbies like they have been for the entirety of GT Sport's life, and won't be the same problem in GT7?

Wise words... I have safety rating "S" in GT Sport mode and try to be cleanest driver ever in online racing, but when I am playing offline GT Mode i don't care about this and sometimes even shunt AI on corners... They just robots for me.

On the other hand, i do respect AI Drivers in Assetto Corsa Competizione and even GRID for example

 

[Shingo_civic]

They need to make an AI like this where you can actually race them even if you are a fast driver

 

[Nigrick]

They need to make an AI like this where you can actually race them even if you are a fast driver

Wow! This is what I'm talking about. A really good example here.

 

[tonybarnaby]

No GT game in history has ever been known to have even competent AI. The original games were the best option compared to all out arcade games like ridge racer and the like, but the AI has never done much besides get in your way. I don’t see any reason that will change now. Most players who buy these games want to win every race. Making a legit challenging AI would alienate a lot of the fan base. I’d welcome all the challenge we can get, but when I play GT games I know what I am going to get, and right racing is never one of those things. The game is fun for sure, but I can’t imagine the day a GT game allows us to close in on a car 2 seconds ahead and narrow that gap over the course of 6 laps like ACC allows.

 

[ArR29]

It's hard to analyze the A.I with a very short footage. We need a proper gameplay. If the A.I can keep up their pace for more than 5 laps I'd count that as a huge improvement. A.I in GT is way too passive and they don't seem to want to race with the player.

 

[Lux Klonoa]

No GT game in history has ever been known to have even competent AI. The original games were the best option compared to all out arcade games like ridge racer and the like, but the AI has never done much besides get in your way. I don’t see any reason that will change now. Most players who buy these games want to win every race. Making a legit challenging AI would alienate a lot of the fan base. I’d welcome all the challenge we can get, but when I play GT games I know what I am going to get, and right racing is never one of those things. The game is fun for sure, but I can’t imagine the day a GT game allows us to close in on a car 2 seconds ahead and narrow that gap over the course of 6 laps like ACC allows.

Yeah, I don't think any casual players, of which make up the majority of GT's sales, will want the kind of racing seen in that ACC video above. I know I don't, kind of.

That said, though, it's never a bad idea to have options for the AI/difficulty. That way, you'll please almost everyone. The traditional GT AI for the casuals/noobs, and the ACC-like AI for the hardcore.

It remains to be seen if PD can pull it off, though.

 

[MroczMR]

Yeah, I don't think any casual players, of which make up the majority of GT's sales, will want the kind of racing seen in that ACC video above. I know I don't, kind of.

That said, though, it's never a bad idea to have options for the AI/difficulty. That way, you'll please almost everyone. The traditional GT AI for the casuals/noobs, and the ACC-like AI for the hardcore.

It remains to be seen if PD can pull it off, though.

This is what I am talking about. Just gave us difficulty options (like it used to have 2 options for driving physics).
It can be even 2 options. Classic and Advance or something. With unlocked qualifying.

 

[o000o]

No GT game in history has ever been known to have even competent AI. The original games were the best option compared to all out arcade games like ridge racer and the like, but the AI has never done much besides get in your way. I don’t see any reason that will change now. Most players who buy these games want to win every race. Making a legit challenging AI would alienate a lot of the fan base. I’d welcome all the challenge we can get, but when I play GT games I know what I am going to get, and right racing is never one of those things. The game is fun for sure, but I can’t imagine the day a GT game allows us to close in on a car 2 seconds ahead and narrow that gap over the course of 6 laps like ACC allows.

No GT game in history has ever been known for certain feature in GTS, which is sound or livery editor before.

Yeah, I don't think any casual players, of which make up the majority of GT's sales, will want the kind of racing seen in that ACC video above. I know I don't, kind of.

That said, though, it's never a bad idea to have options for the AI/difficulty. That way, you'll please almost everyone. The traditional GT AI for the casuals/noobs, and the ACC-like AI for the hardcore.

It remains to be seen if PD can pull it off, though.

Bring back GT1/GT3's practice and qualifying for each race. They're probably removed only to add fake difficulties against A.I, you must start at the very back all the time.

 

[MroczMR]

Bring back GT1/GT3's practice and qualifying for each race. They're probably removed only to add fake difficulties against A.I, you must start at the very back all the time.

Yeah. I hope it will come back with added difficulty settings.