I would not mind if GT 7 won't have human-like AI.
I had mentioned before that if GT7 has polite cruise missiles such as in Toca and the GTRs, that would suffice. But I really want the character of GT6's bots to carry over. There has been quite a discussion in Samus' bot A.I. analysis thread of their lackluster performance. But what has been glossed over has been the very good aspects which gets coaxed out of them if you use a lesser performing car in some of the later races, and as KamilCader posted, doing infinite lap races in Arcade Mode can wake the bots up too. My most gratifying races were those in which I raced towards the finish line with two or three bots nipping at my heels, which I had to race my lugnuts off to remain ahead of - and sometimes I still lost!
So a couple of thoughts on offline racing, because some of us just don't care for online. The skill levels are frequently much too lopsided, either miles behind a pack of leaders, or blowing away a bunch of kids, not to mention the crapshoot it is at times to find a clean room. Or the hassle of making and keeping schedules. What's more, there are quite a few gamers who have poor or no broadband access at home. There are a number of reasons single player offline needs to be up to snuff.
So, two points. There is a certain rhythm to a good race, with cars spreading out a bit into clusters of comparable racers. This is less significant in short two and three lap races, but I'm hoping there is a GT Pro Mode in GT7, and in it, longer races, the minimum being five laps. The karting, I'm not as enthusiastic about, but for car races, definitely. 5, 6, 7, 10, 12, 15, 20 lap races or more as you progress through the "season." It would be good to see the bots fighting each other like they do on occasion in GT5 and 6, and to feel like you're in a real battle for the lead as you make your way through the field. Pitstop strategy for the bots should be sensible too, for those races requiring pits.
Secondly, the intensity should pick up as the race progresses. Say you pass a couple of bots and they don't like it, and they try and keep up with you. It shouldn't be that you end up with a pack hounding your bumper endlessly, but often in real world racing, a driver ends up being chased through the field by someone they passed. And then on the final two laps, the pace should intensify, until on the last half of the final lap, the cars are going flat out, and there's a real battle for a podium finish.
I've been won over to the side advocating difficulty level in GT7, but it should only affect the scale of the race and consistent lap times, so the only difference is in the total time of the race.
And to involve something else in this line of reasoning, PD needs to make sure that there are enough cars in all classes for a full field of cars in every race, and a good variety of tracks to host them. Single make races are one thing, like SCCA's Miata Cup Series, but let's say there's a Compact Sports Car Series, suitable for light cars of 100-ish HP in the vein of the Miata, Cappuccino and so on. These should all be liveried in some way, not necessarily draped in some of the wild graphics applied to some of the WTCC or FIA GT cars, but something. And this is a point at which PD needs to hire a few graphic artists who can design a tasteful livery, because their designs so far have been rather lame. Tracks could be built using Course Maker and touched up by the modeling team, to suit the kinds of race locations enthusiast leagues operate.
Bump this up to 150-180hp or so, with cars along the lines of the Ford Focus, a bunch of Hondas, Mitsubishi Eclipse, Hyundai Tiburon and Velocitor, Chevy Cobalt and the like. Liveries begin to get a little more flamboyant, and the cars feature bodykits.
And on up the line until you reach pro racing leagues. I want as many leagues featured as possible, and if they can't license a league like the dreaded Formula 1, create fantasy leagues based on them. I want the full range of FIA GTs represented. I want to see full blown BMW and Mercedes, Aston Martin and Jaguar, Saleen and Ford GT, RUF/Porsche, Ferrari and Lamborghini race cars fighting each other. I also want to see an Asian League of some kind that would give us an arena to use cars like the Cizeta and Spirra, which should make great race cars. And of course, there need to be race locations appropriate to the league. So if NASCAR returns, and I expect it will, there need to be a number of oval tracks these guys can race on. If you can't license more locations, make fantasy ones. The same for DTM, FIA, WTCC, whatever. We need a bunch of tracks suitable for the league to race on. A lot of recycling can be done using the legacy tracks like Deep Forest, Trial Mountain, Apricot Hill... Midfield... Seattle....
Kaz, please make this happen. You'll be a hero.
