Pit crews - Yes, cobragt there are fully animated pit crews! As you go into the pits a menu comes up on which you select the changes you want to make to your car, then as you pull into your spot the mechanics swarm over your car and you get a sequence of them fixing the car from different positions. When all is done, the car slams back onto the ground and you're off!
Rolling starts - Most of the races I have driven in so far have started with a rolling start. I have driven about 15 races and I have only had one standing start so far.
NOS - I have fitted nitrous-oxide to my Lancer TME and you can use 50 or 100ps shots (selectable before a race) you use it by pressing R1 and there's a level meter which shows how much laughing gas you have left. The extra speed you gain is pretty insane and although it's very fun it seems to be a bit unfair to the other cars on track as you completely trounce them with it.
Used car lots - There are two used car lots. A '90s' lot and an 'Old Timer' lot where you can pick up some real bargains. The cars aren't quite as interesting as they were in GT2, but there is still some interesting hardware to be had. I picked up a Mitsu Lancer VI TME (complete with steel wheels and black plastic door handles and mirrors) for 1,200,000Y and have since pushed it up to 360ps. Other interesting cars I have seen are the R34 GT-R in a flip-flop purple colour, a Stagea Autech 260RS, 80s Camaro and lots of other things which I don't really remember right now.
Backfire - Yes, the cars do backfire quite frequntly depending on the level of tuning you've done. You can hear the exhaust POP and the flames come out the exhaust. It looks particulary good when you're following a car with exhausts on either side at the back.
Dynamics - The handling in this game is awesome. You 'feel' the car so much more than in previous GT games. When you brake hard into the corner, the car dips forward in a very harsh manner and you can feel the front of the car raise under hard acceleration. If you puts the car onto the green-stuff and spin it, it is really difficult to get it back into a straight line again and you will lose a lot of time.
Time penalties - In some races such as the 'Rallye' ones, when you are against one other car, you will get time penalties when you hit the wall or the back of the other car. The penalties are 5 seconds (where you are limited to 50kmh) and I'm sure I had a 3 second penalty once too.
