Gran Turismo 7 still a "simcade" / arcade or simulator ?

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Can someone explain to me why so many people call Gran Turismo a simcade/arcade and not a simulator even though the name says "simulator" in it?
 
actually, i see someone posted this question not too long ago, so if a mod sees this, please delete this thread.

 
Because according to people who play a lot of the most realistic games available, the physics are too forgiving or whatever.
It's made the term simcade get a negative tonation to it, while it really doesnt have to.
I am curious where, according to the black/white thinkers, a game crosses the line from simcade to sim.
It all seems a bit silly to me.
 
Most sim racers would say Gran Turismo is not a fully fledged simulation.

They consider stuff like i-racing, R-Factor, Assetto Corsa, and to a lesser degree Project Cars (and its sequel), proper racing simulations.

GT doesn't have a sophisticated enough physics model, damage model, tyre deg and grip model, or a complex suite of set up options, to be considered a proper sim...and the accuracy of the track models is off by comparison.

Those sims take real life tracks and then laser scan them, adding a degree of accuracy that isn't in more casual games.

Now, if you were to play GT 7 with no assists at all, with a wheel and pedals, then it definitely takes skill and patience.

But, to the real sim racing aficionados, it is a sim - cade.
 
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Well. I've spent more time on real tracks than in any game or simulator combined. I can tell you this. Those so-called simulators (i.e. rFactor Pro, Cruden, or similar) are not really that close to the real thing, not to mention things like Assetto Corsa, iRacing, rFactor 2, etc. They have some similarities here and there (especially the replication of tracks), but that's about it. The very act of driving is quite different from real life track driving.

Track driving could be essentially summed up as this; To get faster lap time, you're reacting to the information fed to you. In real life, the butt feeling (the g force sensor) is the second most important source of information, well behind the most important source, visual, but also well ahead of other sources, like vibration, steering/pedal feeling, sound. So it's like 60% visual, 30% butt feeling, 5% steering, 4% pedal, 1% sound. But when you're on a simulator, you have either zero butt feeling or completely wrong butt feeling created by motion simulator (like D-Box, VRX, etc). It also lacks vibration, pedal feeling as well (by having either nothing or completely wrong simulation). As such, driving on a sim is like reacting to 95% visual, 4% steering and 1% sound, which is completely different from real life driving. Furthermore, those steering feeling and the behavior of car (to your input) are quite off as well.

This is the reason why top tier sim racing drivers don't perform very well on real tracks on their first try (and vice versa). They do better than regular newbie, but that's about it (i.e. nowhere close to serious/competitive amateurs or pro drivers). IMO, if you want to get a fast enough lap time on certain track and car (within 1% from the best possible lap for the same car/track), you typically need some basic skills AND some experience on that particular track with that particular car (around 100 laps). If you already have the required basic skills, then having a lot of experience on sim racing could cut down the amount of required laps to 70%, which is not much of gain (30 laps).

However, if you don't have the basic skill already, you need some experience/time to build that skill. That's usually some thousand laps (if you're a fast learner) or some tens of thousand laps (if you're not) for each tier of cars (roughly in this order; slow FF, slow FR, fast FR/MR, GT3; and each next level requires the basics from all lower level). Having a lot of experience on sim racing does not speed up this process dramatically (so you can't expect -99.9% or -99%, or even -90% time reduction). Although it indeed cut down some amount of required laps (something like -30%, -50%), but you still need thousands not hundreds. This is still a big enough hurdle for most people, because you need to spend roughly $300 for each hour of seat time when you're driving a cheap/slow FF car, and each time you progress to the next level, the price would go up three fold (mind that you need thousands of hours of experience overall just for the basics required for entry level race cars).

Anyway, you could divide racing games into two types. One of them could provide you those time reduction when you got a lot of experience on them (i.e. most sim racings), and the other one doesn't give you those time reduction no matter how much experience you have (i.e. from Mario Kart to Forza Horizon). Gran Turismo belongs to the former camp, and I don't think there is a meaningful difference among the games belong to the former camp, when it comes to the degree of time reduction.
 
Without even getting into the physics model too much, GT misses or simplifies some stuff that it shouldn’t:

  • Engines can’t stall.
  • No engine start/stop.
  • Clutch has no bite point (on and off switch).
  • No tire pressure.
  • Track temperature is irrelevant and unavailable.
  • PIT stops are fully automated with zero drama.
  • Cockpit view options are beyond poor, no FOV, seat position, tilt, seat height or screen wheel on/off options.
  • PIT strategy is reduced to when to PIT. No access to fuel amount you start with, break changes, etc.
  • Fuel amount you have seems to have no impact on the weight and balance of a car.
  • Mechanical damage model is poor.
  • Lack of qualifying in offline races.

Those are some of the reasons that prevent it from being seen as a “simulator” by some.
 
Anyway, you could divide racing games into two types. One of them could provide you those time reduction when you got a lot of experience on them (i.e. most sim racings), and the other one doesn't give you those time reduction no matter how much experience you have (i.e. from Mario Kart to Forza Horizon). Gran Turismo belongs to the former camp, and I don't think there is a meaningful difference among the games belong to the former camp, when it comes to the degree of time reduction.
I totally agree in most of what you say wasenhorn but I disagree in your Horizon-statement. Some of the best car-physics I`ve ever raced is Forza Horizon, think H4 is my fav. The amount of information (ffb) you`ll given from the tires vs tarmac here is state of the art.

Any game can off course claim to be a sim in some degree and they are moore or less. But a "true driving simulator"? Far from.
Reminds me of GTR & GT Legends, both claimed to be simulators. Man, I`ve opened their physic-files and what I found was shocking & dissapointing. There was absolutely no signs of skills, knowledge or realism there. And I know who made the files and were they went on later, to what games.
 
In engineering, when you use a model to describe a phenomenon, you know there are some models which are more accurate than others, but you don't always use the most accurate model, because the less accurate models may not only have enough accuracy, but also have much lower computational demands in simulation.

Gran Turismo 7 is a racing title developed primarily for consoles. One of these consoles is the PS4, which has a hardware based on an ancient octacore AMD Jaguar CPU and an equally ancient GCN-based GPU. Given the limitations, corners will be cut. That being said, the simplifications employed by Gran Turismo tend to be such that the experience of driving the car is mostly preserved.

Assetto Corsa has no such limitation. Its community is primarily on PC and Kunos does not give a **** about the console versions. On the other hand, the accuracy of most mods for AC cannot be verified. I don't know who made them, which background they have, what testing they did. Most modders are amateurs, and most pirate modders focus only on getting the model into the game and using the physics from a "close enough" car.

It's a bit like comparing SNES9x to higan in the emulation scene. higan was extremely, obsessively accurate, but this accuracy came with high hardware requirements and unusual file structures. SNES9x on the other hand runs on toasters and 99% of people can't tell the difference between the two emulators.

"Real" sims like rFactor 2 and Assetto Corsa have their place, but they're not made for the mass market, and they don't aim to. They're more accurate. But whether something's good or not depends on the application and user expectation. If games like F1, Gran Turismo and Forza Motorsport offer adequate simulation of the experience of driving a car, that's enough for most people.

That's why I refer to sims by depth instead of realism.
 
"Real" sims like rFactor 2 and Assetto Corsa have their place, but they're not made for the mass market, and they don't aim to. They're more accurate. But whether something's good or not depends on the application and user expectation. If games like F1, Gran Turismo and Forza Motorsport offer adequate simulation of the experience of driving a car, that's enough for most people.

That's why I refer to sims by depth instead of realism.
Do you believe this? I`ve seen their physic-files so I do not think too high about these "sims"
 
Gran Turismo is a console game first and foremost. It is designed so that everyday people can pick up it up and play it with little issue. So it has and will continue to hold that line of "simcade" and there is nothing wrong with that.
 
Gran Turismo 7 is a racing title developed primarily for consoles. One of these consoles is the PS4, which has a hardware based on an ancient octacore AMD Jaguar CPU and an equally ancient GCN-based GPU. Given the limitations, corners will be cut. That being said, the simplifications employed by Gran Turismo tend to be such that the experience of driving the car is mostly preserved.

Assetto Corsa has no such limitation. Its community is primarily on PC and Kunos does not give a **** about the console versions. On the other hand, the accuracy of most mods for AC cannot be verified. I don't know who made them, which background they have, what testing they did. Most modders are amateurs, and most pirate modders focus only on getting the model into the game and using the physics from a "close enough" car.
An older version of ACC runs ok on the PS4, same can be said for Project Cars, GT most likely simplifies to be approachable.
 
Is Gran Turismo an Olympic sport? I never hear this mentioned in these debates. Can't say that about iracing or acc. It is certainly is something gt has in its corner.
 
Well. I've spent more time on real tracks than in any game or simulator combined. I can tell you this. Those so-called simulators (i.e. rFactor Pro, Cruden, or similar) are not really that close to the real thing, not to mention things like Assetto Corsa, iRacing, rFactor 2, etc. They have some similarities here and there (especially the replication of tracks), but that's about it. The very act of driving is quite different from real life track driving.

Track driving could be essentially summed up as this; To get faster lap time, you're reacting to the information fed to you. In real life, the butt feeling (the g force sensor) is the second most important source of information, well behind the most important source, visual, but also well ahead of other sources, like vibration, steering/pedal feeling, sound. So it's like 60% visual, 30% butt feeling, 5% steering, 4% pedal, 1% sound. But when you're on a simulator, you have either zero butt feeling or completely wrong butt feeling created by motion simulator (like D-Box, VRX, etc). It also lacks vibration, pedal feeling as well (by having either nothing or completely wrong simulation). As such, driving on a sim is like reacting to 95% visual, 4% steering and 1% sound, which is completely different from real life driving. Furthermore, those steering feeling and the behavior of car (to your input) are quite off as well.

This is the reason why top tier sim racing drivers don't perform very well on real tracks on their first try (and vice versa). They do better than regular newbie, but that's about it (i.e. nowhere close to serious/competitive amateurs or pro drivers). IMO, if you want to get a fast enough lap time on certain track and car (within 1% from the best possible lap for the same car/track), you typically need some basic skills AND some experience on that particular track with that particular car (around 100 laps). If you already have the required basic skills, then having a lot of experience on sim racing could cut down the amount of required laps to 70%, which is not much of gain (30 laps).

However, if you don't have the basic skill already, you need some experience/time to build that skill. That's usually some thousand laps (if you're a fast learner) or some tens of thousand laps (if you're not) for each tier of cars (roughly in this order; slow FF, slow FR, fast FR/MR, GT3; and each next level requires the basics from all lower level). Having a lot of experience on sim racing does not speed up this process dramatically (so you can't expect -99.9% or -99%, or even -90% time reduction). Although it indeed cut down some amount of required laps (something like -30%, -50%), but you still need thousands not hundreds. This is still a big enough hurdle for most people, because you need to spend roughly $300 for each hour of seat time when you're driving a cheap/slow FF car, and each time you progress to the next level, the price would go up three fold (mind that you need thousands of hours of experience overall just for the basics required for entry level race cars).

Anyway, you could divide racing games into two types. One of them could provide you those time reduction when you got a lot of experience on them (i.e. most sim racings), and the other one doesn't give you those time reduction no matter how much experience you have (i.e. from Mario Kart to Forza Horizon). Gran Turismo belongs to the former camp, and I don't think there is a meaningful difference among the games belong to the former camp, when it comes to the degree of time reduction.
Thanks for this write-up. Very fascinating and insightful read!
 
Simulador é basicamente exige um processamento de dados cuja física torna qualquer outro jogo sobre corrida algo a parte, é completamente diferente pq há a simulação da força G e iso por si só já exigiria toda capacidade de processamento desses consoles
 
Simulador é um terreno completamente diferente de um Simcade pq o processamento de sua física quanto a força G por si só já extrapolaria a capacidade de processamento dos processadores desses consoles
 
Gt7 for me is a simcade:
It is more realisting than need for speed, burnout, juiced or project gotham racing
It is not obessed with physics like iracing, assetto corsa, rfactor, automobilista or nascar 2003

Is gt7 fun? Can you enjoy the other titles?
For me the answer to this is "f... yes!"
 
It could have been moving towards the simulator class, but that would limit its appeal if it is not as accessible to the masses.

Plus we all know the bug ridden nature of the latest GT title and worrying lack of development/ quality control...
 
Gran Turismo 7 lacks some characteristics to make it a full "simulator".
Bare in mind that the inclusion of some of the mentioned titles (PC, PC2) as simulators is not consensual.
What takes to make it a full simulator also varies from person to person (f. ex. some people believe that your only camera/view available should be cockpit/helmet, like iRacing), Bluedice mentions a bunch of stuff, some important, others not so much, IMHO.
For me, the main problem to GT be even considered a candidate to simulator, is the all car setup system. Firstly there are tunes that do the completely opposite the way it works on real life (simply high rake, brake balance all the way to the back, the car would simply block the rear wheels the moment you breath to the pedal, in the game you get a controlled car rotation), no asymmetrical suspension setup (come on, you put ovals in the game and make you run symmetrical setups?!), no tire pressure setup, no radiator/brake coolinng openings, and so on...
Also some other oddities, like every car as the same fuel capacity, no matter is an old mini or a GT3, you can't set the starting fuel... There is no standard telemetry usage / export, the damage model doesn't exist, there is no permanent damage...

All this little things make this not being acceptable as a simulator
 
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