PD's Biggest Mistake with GT Sport

[LeGeNd-1]

As we all know, Sport Mode is a bit of a roulette with bad drivers and rammers, whether accidental or intentional. Now not everyone can drive 100% clean all the time, especially in a competitive environment. Accidents do happen. Also not everyone who plays the game immediately becomes an expert, so a few corner overshoots here and there is to be expected of beginners. But the point of mistakes is you learn from them and be better next time. But even in high SR rank races (I've only gone up to A, don't know about S), there are still people who consistently ram others out of the way and just generally be a ****, even the faster drivers who can clearly win races without resorting to playing bumper cars.

Why? Well, we all want to win. That's the point of a race isn't it?

But Sports Mode winnings are abysmal (compared to GT League Blue Moon Bay for example). You get no bragging rights except self satisfaction. And aside from the elite few who have a shot at eternal glory and win the FIA Championship, the rest of us is literally just making up numbers in PD's servers. So why do some people just want to win at all costs? Me personally a well fought 2nd or 3rd with clean side by side racing for a whole race is much more satisfying than ramming everyone in front and winning by a mile.

I've just had a thought about this and basically, the problem lies with GT Sport's trophies. Especially the "Win 91 races to equal Schumacher". There's an in game achievement for this too, but that only goes up to 20 wins IIRC, so it's not as big of a problem. Now when you tie a trophy like that to platinum, you are going to inspire a whole lotta people to have a win at all costs mentality. Even trophy walkthrough websites and videos encourage dirty driving. Of course, there will always be people like this in any game, but a trophy like that encourages it AND they will keep doing that until they get that 91 wins (which is a ridiculous number).

On the flipside, what do we have to encourage clean driving? Two barely useful videos, a Sportsmanship Rating that is easily manipulated, a paltry clean race bonus, and nothing else really. Heck, we don't even get ANY compulsory Driving School events or Missions that require you to race clean. In fact, hitting the AI cars doesn't even disqualify you anymore in the driving tests (in GT5/6 that's instant fail).

So what we have, is an online heavy game with a steep learning curve, a competitive environment, fueled by a seemingly impossible trophy and nothing to dissuade dirty driving tactics. You wonder why there is so much crashers? As usual it's PD/Kaz logic fail.

IMO, simply making the trophy earnable in custom lobbies as well as Sport races would go a LONG way to alleviating dirty driving. Trophy hunters can get it much easier without causing grief in private lobbies. Newbies might crash a few times at first but they will improve (or leave the game out of frustration). That leaves perpetually dirty drivers/griefers/trolls, who will all just play demo derby amongst themselves in SR E rooms...and eventually they will all get tired and leave the game too. In a few months, we will have a much higher quality, much cleaner pool of racers left 👍

 

[Robben]

Do people really care that much about trophies?

I play the game to enjoy racing.

I agree with your points about driver training - there really should be a compulsory tutorial section about clean driving and overtaking, racing lines etc with practical trials.

 

[bmxmitch]

Do people really care that much about trophies?

I play the game to enjoy racing.

I agree with your points about driver training - there really should be a compulsory tutorial section about clean driving and overtaking, racing lines etc with practical trials.

Yes they do!
Especially the young ones who only play games for trophies (yes, that's a thing apparently)

And I think it's mainly a problem with younger racers, as they seem to be more inpatient and only care for wins. Or more like, if you see a chrome car popping up in your mirrors, you better watch out

 

[dzumaalcapone]

Do people really care that much about trophies?

Some people do. I have a friend (who thank god doesn't play GTS) who goes for platinum in every game. Even if it means picking up flowers in the game for 40 hours or something as silly that.. Fact that there's so many trophy guides out there proves that he's not alone. Some people even choose games by how easy it is to get the platinum.. I think I only have one from Beach Buggy Racing

The harder part about GTS platinum should be the 65 poles you gotta get. Unless you're one of the fastest dudes out there it's really about how graceful matchmaking is.

 

[Robben]

Yes they do!
Especially the young ones who only play games for trophies (yes, that's a thing apparently)

And I think it's mainly a problem with younger racers, as they seem to be more inpatient and only care for wins. Or more like, if you see a chrome car popping up in your mirrors, you better watch out

Some people do. I have a friend (who thank god doesn't play GTS) who goes for platinum in every game. Even if it means picking up flowers in the game for 40 hours or something as silly that.. Fact that there's so many trophy guides out there proves that he's not alone. Some people even choose games by how easy it is to get the platinum.. I think I only have one from Beach Buggy Racing

The harder part about GTS platinum should be the 65 poles you gotta get. Unless you're one of the fastest dudes out there it's really about how graceful matchmaking is.

Strange. I get a little sense of pride when the message pops up that I won a trophy but I don't go after them... they are incidental to me.

 

[yas]

Indeed, agreed on most points. Driving school used to be hard because of avoiding predictable AI drivers. Now they are unpredictable and you don't get punished for playing hard on them, so it actually easier to use them as walls.
Those AI rammers in single player now make it quite hard to impossible to have a clean race and they destroyed the Clean Race bonus by reducing it quite heavily, so why bother at all. So if a player only plays Sport mode he'll generally be more eager to play clean, but if you play Single, then you'll naturally bring some of the havoc with you.

 

[TeWheke]

The Missions should've had a much bigger emphasis on driving cleanly, there are too many where you have to be extremely aggressive to be successful which might seem good from a difficulty point of view but basically encourages you to drive as dirty as possible. They should've toned down the number of cars you are required to overtake in a short space of time and instead penalise or DQ you a lot more for contact.

Clean race bonus should be 200% in all modes too (unless it's a mission where you are required to be clean).

 

[kjeldsen]

Spring Cleaning

 

[bmxmitch]

Driving school used to be hard because of avoiding predictable AI drivers. Now they are unpredictable and you don't get punished for playing hard on them, so it actually easier to use them as walls.

I still don't understand why PD removed the penalty system in Missions and other events.
It's just a training camp for divebombers now...

 

[Ecghteow]

They managed to get me to race online. Something the ps3 incarnations (the occasional clean Nascar-race asside) or pcars didn't manage to. So can't be that bad.
That being said, mandatory schooling missions on how to pass cleanly and being passed cleanly would be pretty neat.
I think those trophies should not 've been tied to sportmode though. Way too much enticement for people of a certain mentality to mess up the experience for others.

 

[azrilnazli]

GTS is still for kids , and they play like a MOBA game. I stopped playing online gts long time ago and just enjoy offline.

 

[Robben]

GTS is still for kids , and they play like a MOBA game. I stopped playing online gts long time ago and just enjoy offline.

Err, no it's not. I don't think I could go back to an offline GT now... there is nowhere near the same buzz or excitement racing against AI

 

[baldgye]

... But even in high SR rank races (I've only gone up to A, don't know about S)....

... a Sportsmanship Rating that is easily manipulated...

If its easy to manipulate the SR system, why aren't you SR-S?

I agree with your sentiment, but this whole post boils down to the fact that you're not racing with very clean drivers. So if the system is easy to manipulate, get the highest SR possible and have fewer problems with other drivers.
You won't solve the problem with the game design being heavily focused on winning, but you will have a more enjoyable online experience.

 

[kilesa4568]

PD's Biggest Mistake with GT Sport?

Sorry but you cannot blame PD for the assholes "ruining" their game because they want trophies.

Yes, he can. If those trophies weren't there or were at least expanded into other race forms, there wouldn't be the dog eat dog attitude you see from a lot of people trying to attain them.

If I see a trophy pop up on my screen, it gets an "oh, OK" off me and I instantly forget about it. I bought the game to race. Not get virtual meaningless trophies. They're borderline OCD material.

 

[Miguelinho]

I can confirm (as with many SR S members here) that SR S is not that much better, they're just smarter with how they do it which is more frustrating.

 

[mendosa05]

And not a single trophy for respectful driving...

I find the trophies link back to the days of game completion.

Since games are so open these days, the idea of trophies (to me) are a way of completing a game.
I play very few games these days that 100% isn’t a problem and keeps my interest a little more (unless the grind is too big then I leave it). Doesn’t really bother me either way. I have some games at 100% and many at 50/40/30%.

 

[tofuhero]

It's always perplexed me how the mode that the game is named after is treated as such an afterthought by the way the game is structured. The license tests teach you how to drive, but don't teach you how to race. And certainly don't teach you how to race cleanly. Those sportsmanship videos are a joke. I've learned more about racing rules, techniques, and etiquette from watching one video on YouTube than GTS provides. And the last time I looked at the trophy for unlocking Sport mode, it was less than 50% of people who played the game. That seems like a failure to coax, convince, and incentivize people to race online. And the people that do try Sport mode are thrown to the wolves. I just don't understand how a game with an online focus ended up this way.

But this lack of Sport focus extends in to most other areas of the game as well. Why don't we have a race history available with tons of stats about our performance? The only graph of data over time we have is miles-per-day? Who cares about this?? How about a graph of per-sector performance over all sport races? Or a tool that shows where your problem areas are on tracks? They have so much data on every race that we can use to improve our racing, but we don't get to see any of it. How about a sector attack mode where we can just work on a single sector or even a single turn over and over with helpful data? And why are there not Circuit Experiences for the new added tracks so that everyone has a basic handle on them instead of people flying all over the place like on Monza? I just don't understand Kaz's thought process here.

 

[azrilnazli]

Err, no it's not. I don't think I could go back to an offline GT now... there is nowhere near the same buzz or excitement racing against AI

I have another alternative on competetive eSport but on PC.

www.iracing.com

I treat gts as my offline contents. And surprisingly, any Japanese or Aussies Ive met in iRacing, is far more cleaner than in GTS.

 

[CliveH]

PD with the FIA endorsement seem to be given people the wrong impression and building peoples expectations. It's just a video game at the end of the day!

 

[banckzy]

It's always perplexed me how the mode that the game is named after is treated as such an afterthought by the way the game is structured. The license tests teach you how to drive, but don't teach you how to race. And certainly don't teach you how to race cleanly. Those sportsmanship videos are a joke. I've learned more about racing rules, techniques, and etiquette from watching one video on YouTube than GTS provides. And the last time I looked at the trophy for unlocking Sport mode, it was less than 50% of people who played the game. That seems like a failure to coax, convince, and incentivize people to race online. And the people that do try Sport mode are thrown to the wolves. I just don't understand how a game with an online focus ended up this way.

But this lack of Sport focus extends in to most other areas of the game as well. Why don't we have a race history available with tons of stats about our performance? The only graph of data over time we have is miles-per-day? Who cares about this?? How about a graph of per-sector performance over all sport races? Or a tool that shows where your problem areas are on tracks? They have so much data on every race that we can use to improve our racing, but we don't get to see any of it. How about a sector attack mode where we can just work on a single sector or even a single turn over and over with helpful data? And why are there not Circuit Experiences for the new added tracks so that everyone has a basic handle on them instead of people flying all over the place like on Monza? I just don't understand Kaz's thought process here.

I don't know about you but I went on scapes for the first time today and the amount of detail they've put into that.... they should've just reduced that (sacked it off completely imo) and spent more of that time/space on sport mode

 

[PJTierney]

I've just had a thought about this and basically, the problem lies with GT Sport's trophies. Especially the "Win 91 races to equal Schumacher". [...] Now when you tie a trophy like that to platinum, you are going to inspire a whole lotta people to have a win at all costs mentality.

While that may be true, it is entirely possible to complete this Trophy without resorting to pushing people off the track and abandoning the fundamentals of clean racing. I know because I did it myself:



While I did have to lower my rank a few times* to get matched up with easier opponents (I was B/S before this, and am back up to B/A right now with 99 wins), I did actually race in those events and gave my opponents the respect they deserve:



I'm not saying that everybody who is going for this Trophy will do this, but it is entirely possible to both race clean and get closer to that Platinum Trophy

Do people really care that much about trophies?

I play the game to enjoy racing.

To quote something I posted elsewhere:

Trophy acquisition and goal progression is part of how I enjoy most games. I like the challenge of working towards a goal that the developer has placed within the game, and Trophies/Achievements provide one of those challenges. I am not a ”trophy hunter” who ignores everything else for the sake of completing those challenges, but when I truly enjoy a game I like to go for 100% completion.

That is not to say that I wasn’t enjoying Gran Turismo Sport before this however. I have had many enjoyable hours improving my lap times in Qualifying, getting closer to Pole Positions and Victories, increasing my DR/SR and having good battles with worthy opponents etc..

After a certain amount of time (usually around 50 hours or so) I feel that I have experienced everything a game has to offer, and pay more attention to the Trophy lists in an attempt to get 100% completion. By getting a Platinum trophy in a game I feel like I have competed everything that the developer felt was worth experiencing in a game, and it gives me an additional challenge after the initial honeymoon stage of a game’s life*. Unfortunately, some Trophies are designed or implemented in such a way that they can take a very long time to complete, but I do them regardless [because I enjoy the challenge].

[...]

* It should be noted however that I have been playing this game for almost a year, as I was in the Closed Beta. It’s not like I have “blitzed” this title in a few months, as I had put in many hours of gameplay before its retail release and as such the “discovery stage” of a game (where I am figuring out the systems, mechanics, physics etc.) was already complete for me before Day 1.

*This can be done in an entirely "safe" manner by quitting out of races early. It's possible to drop DR/SR without upsetting other players on-track.

 

[Robben]

I don't know about you but I went on scapes for the first time today and the amount of detail they've put into that.... they should've just reduced that (sacked it off completely imo) and spent more of that time/space on sport mode

This! Over 1000 scapes locations ffs... why?

 

[TT92]

............... the problem lies with GT Sport's trophies.

Hear! Hear! I completely agree with all your sentiments here.

I am currently rated AS and acording to the online stats am in the top 1%. I am also a trophy hunter ;-) I have ( just in racing games) Platinum with GT5, GT6, PCARS, PCARS2, Dirt Rally, Assetto Corsa and only have the online stuff to do for GT Sport. I also have over 250 online races under my belt so am very well aware of what goes on >:-(

I am struggling to cleanly get my required wins at the top levels and will be forced to downgrade myself and try in lower ranked lobbies. So basically this means PD is forcing me to abandon my "clean race" ethics and be as dirty as the rest and, of course, win at all costs ;-) And before anyone says "Why not just get better/faster" I also believe in sticking to the track limits and not some of this blatant corner cutting that goes on *all* the time. So yes, I am at that stage where I am saying "If I can't beat 'em, I will join 'em."

So yes, PD/Kaz have made a major mistake with structuring the trophy system the way they have and it is encouraging dirty driving.

I wont even go into how broken the safety rating system is >:-(

 

[Robben]

Hear! Hear! I completely agree with all your sentiments here.

I am currently rated AS and acording to the online stats am in the top 1%. I am also a trophy hunter ;-) I have ( just in racing games) Platinum with GT5, GT6, PCARS, PCARS2, Dirt Rally, Assetto Corsa and only have the online stuff to do for GT Sport. I also have over 250 online races under my belt so am very well aware of what goes on >:-(

I am struggling to cleanly get my required wins at the top levels and will be forced to downgrade myself and try in lower ranked lobbies. So basically this means PD is forcing me to abandon my "clean race" ethics and be as dirty as the rest and, of course, win at all costs ;-) And before anyone says "Why not just get better/faster" I also believe in sticking to the track limits and not some of this blatant corner cutting that goes on *all* the time. So yes, I am at that stage where I am saying "If I can't beat 'em, I will join 'em."

So yes, PD/Kaz have made a major mistake with structuring the trophy system the way they have and it is encouraging dirty driving.

I wont even go into how broken the safety rating system is >:-(

Please just race slowly or better just quit when reducing your ranking so as not to ruin others' races

 

[cleanLX]

PD's Biggest Mistake with GT Sport...
I'm with @yas - AI drivers. They are unpredictable, do not follow any typical racing line, over brake into corners when you are close behind, slam the brakes mid corner when you are close behind, ram you, use you as a wall in corners, cut down on you on corner exit, push you off the road etc etc. .... and you don't get punished for reciprocating the favors.
And how does that prepare us to compete in a sporting manner?

Those AI rammers in single player now make it quite hard to impossible to have a clean race and they destroyed the Clean Race bonus by reducing it quite heavily, so why bother at all. So if a player only plays Sport mode he'll generally be more eager to play clean, but if you play Single, then you'll naturally bring some of the havoc with you.

PD's Next Biggest Mistake with GT Sport...
People.
Especially people turned loose on a system with little to no repercussions.
We all know that unsportsmanlike conduct in the real world gets you banned from competition. Sometimes a few events, sometimes a season, sometimes life.
I saw more than one kid get banned from hockey, and no one gave his parents money back... reality... deal with it.
People and... trophies... I mean really? What does it say about people/society when they think a virtual trophy means jack ****.
Give us all a flippin' break.
How many of these "trophy" hunters actually have a physical trophy that they earned through true competition (not participation trophies) ?
If you expect people/society, whom place any value on a virtual trophy, to act in an honorable manner that reflects real life within a game... I think that puts you into a class of people know as delusional.

 

[baldgye]

While that may be true, it is entirely possible to complete this Trophy without resorting to pushing people off the track and abandoning the fundamentals of clean racing. I know because I did it myself:



While I did have to lower my rank a few times* to get matched up with easier opponents (I was B/S before this, and am back up to B/A right now with 99 wins), I did actually race in those events and gave my opponents the respect they deserve:



I'm not saying that everybody who is going for this Trophy will do this, but it is entirely possible to both race clean and get closer to that Platinum Trophy




To quote something I posted elsewhere:



*This can be done in an entirely "safe" manner by quitting out of races early. It's possible to drop DR/SR without upsetting other players on-track.

While that's a fair enough point, I feel like Lewis Hamilton and Sebastian Vettel could say the same about getting 4 F1 Drivers World Championships...

The time and skill needed to achieve that trophy without lowering your DR substantially is pretty silly.

I am struggling to cleanly get my required wins at the top levels and will be forced to downgrade myself and try in lower ranked lobbies. So basically this means PD is forcing me to abandon my "clean race" ethics and be as dirty as the rest and, of course, win at all costs ;-) And before anyone says "Why not just get better/faster" I also believe in sticking to the track limits and not some of this blatant corner cutting that goes on *all* the time. So yes, I am at that stage where I am saying "If I can't beat 'em, I will join 'em."

What?
You believe in your own arbitrary rules strongly enough for them to be more important than your own code of ethics?

 

[cleanLX]

~ I am also a trophy hunter ;-) ~

I am struggling to cleanly get my required wins at the top levels and will be forced to downgrade myself and try in lower ranked lobbies. So basically this means PD is forcing me to abandon my "clean race" ethics and be as dirty as the rest and, of course, win at all costs ;-) And before anyone says "Why not just get better/faster" I also believe in sticking to the track limits and not some of this blatant corner cutting that goes on *all* the time. So yes, I am at that stage where I am saying "If I can't beat 'em, I will join 'em."

So yes, PD/Kaz have made a major mistake with structuring the trophy system the way they have and it is encouraging dirty driving.

I wont even go into how broken the safety rating system is >:-(

Making my point.
Nothing against you @TT92 , it's just where people/society are at. I thank you for your honesty.

 

[zuperkiwi]

I got the 91 wins without ruining anyone's race.
Blame the players who race dirty, do not blame PD or the trophy.

FYI: there's no need to drive dirty in order to lower your rating. Just quitting a race right after qualifying will do the trick

 

[Spurgy 777]

Yes, he can. If those trophies weren't there or were at least expanded into other race forms, there wouldn't be the dog eat dog attitude you see from a lot of people trying to attain them.

If I see a trophy pop up on my screen, it gets an "oh, OK" off me and I instantly forget about it. I bought the game to race. Not get virtual meaningless trophies. They're borderline OCD material.

I think you are severely underestimating people’s attitudes and motivations when it comes to online racing. Whether or not you get trophies for winning, there are lots of people who don’t give a 🤬 about anyone else and will just shove people out the way to win. Winning is the only motivation a lot of people need to race dirty, which is why online public lobbies suck for all racing games other than GTS and iRacing.

I have another alternative on competetive eSport but on PC.

www.iracing.com

I treat gts as my offline contents. And surprisingly, any Japanese or Aussies Ive met in iRacing, is far more cleaner than in GTS.

iRacing drivers will obviously be cleaner, not only is there heavy damage but it also costs a lot of money so people will take it more seriously.

 

[NoFinClue]

....

Please just race slowly or better just quit when reducing your ranking so as not to ruin others' races

I'd rather they didn't nerf their ratings to join the bad drivers for easy wins in any manner. Its already hard enough in the lower tiers.