S5 License Test- Should I Throw in the Towel, Or...

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j4mmin42

j4mmin42

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I'm at about a 90% completion right now, with a few Red Bull races, the final Goodwood event, and a couple of other special event golds (moon missions, cone challenges, eww) left to earn yet. Last night I spent the better part of 2-3 hours on the S5 test, and even with the help of *that youtube video* and some forum reading, I just can't seem to "stick it". Currently sitting at .8s from gold, and at the end of the session I was going faster than my shadow, but couldn't pull off a clean lap.

Between the couple of hours I spent getting bronze and the session last night, I think that first chicane has screwed me up a thousand times. Grrr...

Anyway, I'm taking a break from the test for awhile, maybe permanently- what about you all, what helped you to earn gold in this test, or did you give in and give up?
 
j4mmin42
I'm at about a 90% completion right now, with a few Red Bull races, the final Goodwood event, and a couple of other special event golds (moon missions, cone challenges, eww) left to earn yet. Last night I spent the better part of 2-3 hours on the S5 test, and even with the help of *that youtube video* and some forum reading, I just can't seem to "stick it". Currently sitting at .8s from gold, and at the end of the session I was going faster than my shadow, but couldn't pull off a clean lap.

Between the couple of hours I spent getting bronze and the session last night, I think that first chicane has screwed me up a thousand times. Grrr...

Anyway, I'm taking a break from the test for awhile, maybe permanently- what about you all, what helped you to earn gold in this test, or did you give in and give up?
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Keep practicing & you will get gold eventually.
From the way you're describing it, you're still making progress & you aren't that far away from doing it. 👍
 
S_Bridge
Keep practicing & you will get gold eventually.
From the way you're describing it, you're still making progress & you aren't that far away from doing it. 👍
Click to expand...


Thanks for the support, heh- it's been on my mind today, and I may just try to tackle it again tonight with a fresh set of eyes. And some luck. I just want to get to that :cheers: moment ;)
 
j4mmin42
I'm at about a 90% completion right now, with a few Red Bull races, the final Goodwood event, and a couple of other special event golds (moon missions, cone challenges, eww) left to earn yet. Last night I spent the better part of 2-3 hours on the S5 test, and even with the help of *that youtube video* and some forum reading, I just can't seem to "stick it". Currently sitting at .8s from gold, and at the end of the session I was going faster than my shadow, but couldn't pull off a clean lap.

Between the couple of hours I spent getting bronze and the session last night, I think that first chicane has screwed me up a thousand times. Grrr...

Anyway, I'm taking a break from the test for awhile, maybe permanently- what about you all, what helped you to earn gold in this test, or did you give in and give up?
Click to expand...


It depends what you want from the game and what you enjoy. I haven't got 100% complete and probably never will - if I think it's going to take too much time I just skip it - that includes golding the Moon missions and a few others. Personally my gaming time is limited so I don't want to use it up when it could be spent racing online with friends, practising or setting up for races or testing cars / developing new championships.

Try what @Jbaffoh said - do something else and come back to it.
 
I few years ago i set myself the rule that when playing a game "e.g. entertainment and winding down from work to relax)
The moment it felt like a chore i dumped it. It also helps if you care 0% about achievements. I remember playing anno 1404 and actually enjoying getting some of them but others (play 500hrs, do the same trade 1000 times) were just a drain on my free time and electric bill.
I decide when i've 100% completed a game, not the developer :)
Much easier to go back to as well, In restarted GT5 several times to build myself and bobs back up which i enjoyed, i think my %complete for 5 was about 15-20%, in my world i've completed it about 7 times over!
 
j4mmin42
I'm at about a 90% completion right now, with a few Red Bull races, the final Goodwood event, and a couple of other special event golds (moon missions, cone challenges, eww) left to earn yet. Last night I spent the better part of 2-3 hours on the S5 test, and even with the help of *that youtube video* and some forum reading, I just can't seem to "stick it". Currently sitting at .8s from gold, and at the end of the session I was going faster than my shadow, but couldn't pull off a clean lap.

Between the couple of hours I spent getting bronze and the session last night, I think that first chicane has screwed me up a thousand times. Grrr...

Anyway, I'm taking a break from the test for awhile, maybe permanently- what about you all, what helped you to earn gold in this test, or did you give in and give up?
Click to expand...

What helped me get gold was really pushing the car to the max (so much so that you'll feel like you're losing control) and cutting as many corners as possible, that includes taking bends and curves at certain angles to ride the less distance possible. Ascari isn't impossible, and if you know how to manipulate the car you'll do good.

For example. It's not always good to be constantly accelerating or braking. Sometimes its good to just drive the car with the momentum it has. When you don't accelerate the car steers a lot better. That was the trick I used to really take those corners really tight. Sometime the game suggested me to take the corner a gear lower that I was riding but I was able to ignore that because of this premise and thanks to it, went a lot faster than the game suggested me to go.

It's all about knowing the track, the car and yourself as a driver.

Also all aids off, seriously. Leave just ABS 1 on.

Sometimes you need that oversteer and understeer.

Remember that usually you're just taking some turn in a wrong way. Watch some replays of some friends of yours or someone on youtube to get an idea of more or less the proper racing line. But don't try to emulate it. Try to make it even better if anything. Make it yours. Usually when you're struggling and you're close to gold it's because you're missing a crucial turn or something. It's all about this "a-ha" moment where you find what you've been doing wrong all along, modify it, and get that gold easy.
 
Thanks for all the responses :)

Ironically I did take the night "off" and completed some other events- BUT I got stuck for a few hours on the IA-1 Mission, lol. It does seem like a lot of the events are either cake or very tough...anyway, I did manage to beat it eventually, and I am planning on trying the S5 test soon enough to see if I'm ready for it.

When I was having trouble with the IA 1 mission, it seemed like a lot of people have complained about the DS3 not being as sensitive-steering as the wheels are. For those that have used both, do you find that a racing wheel leads to better lap times? Now that everyone will be dumping their G27's for the newer PS4 compatible ones, it seems like a good time to buy in lol.
 
The best advice I can give is practice. Practice each turn seperately, until you know the best way to handle it.

Also, turn your driving line on if it isn't already, but don't follow the braking line, only the turn-in. Some corners you can break really late on, others you need to brake really early for. Also, there's at least one turn I remember that it's fastest to just powerslide around in 2nd or 3rd gear than to keep grip. So experiment with that a bit.
 
j4mmin42
I do keep driving line off. I'll turn it on when I try the test again
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I did it with it off. And I didn't need to look up any videos either. I did this one in like an hour I remember. All I did was use the part of the track that is worn as a starting driving line (it's a bit better than the one GT gives you sometimes) and modified it from there. You can do this in any track really. But usually that's how I go about perfecting my lap times.
 
The herding of the sow. Well the best advice I can give is to brake early into the corners & use the grip for the old pigs power to drag her through the corners. If you are on the brakes too long she will just slide, so its best to get your entry speed right. It will come to you & after you get it the first time it will just take a couple of laps to repeat it. It isn't nearly as irritating as the AI-1 mission.
 
I'm usually faster with the line turned off (back in the day, we never got driving lines ;) ), mostly because the braking line really screws with me- I have the same problem with ghost lines. But, maybe there is a corner or a series of corners that I'm not finding the fastest line thru- so, I might as well give it a go once or twice. Who knows.

This IA-1 mission was extremely tough for me. I couldn't manage a fast enough time using the GTR as a "bumper" in the last corner, so I had to go fast enough to pass him on the 2nd-to-last for a gold time.
 
Ghost lines are good if they don't obstruct the view. But unless you're trying to beat the fastest 2-3 on your friends list, turn them off.

Brake early, nail the apex, and get out asap. The biggest vices are braking late, carrying too much speed around the corner, and therefore accelerating too late. You'll surprise yourself when you gain 0.500 while feeling excruciatingly slow through the turn, but getting a better exit line and earlier acceleration.

You'll be surprised which corners you can pick up a full second if nailed properly.

People shun these tests and other TT's. Yet I know of no better way to learn.

The only drawback is when you approach online racing as a TT, which you can restart after blowing one sector. That's not a good strategy when you have 20 more laps to run, LOL.

But for perfecting sectors with certain cars, I think they're the best learning tools.

You will be a faster racer overall if you persist and obtain gold in all the seemingly unnecessary crap in the game. I learned something from every dumbass challenge, and am far better prepared for any future challenges because of them.
 
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I finally passed the gold time...
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I don't get what's so hard about that one. I got silver on my first shot(1 second slower than gold time) and got gold with a nice margin on the second try. To me the difficuility of the lisence tests is way to low, I golded pretty much all of them on the first or sometimes second try.
 
I think that its the fact that they gave you a Bugatti which is a car that suffers of lot of understeer and on top of that you have to get a gold time in a track with quite a lot tight corners that in design are pretty unique and not seen a lot in other tracks.

The track itself is pretty technical too so it isn't exactly a easy track to ace from the get go if you don't have proper practice or the skills down yet to handle a car like the Bugatti.

Everyone has their own challenges to overcome tho. I didn't struggle with this one but I hated the nighttime big willow race with the alfa romeo.
 
interpunct
Everyone has their own challenges to overcome tho. I didn't struggle with this one but I hated the nighttime big willow race with the alfa romeo.
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That's true. I actually beat that S-5 one @ 2:12.449 (target 2:14). To me, none of these challenges are anywhere near as hard as golding everything in past games, but that's just me... (and probably the fact that i didn't have a wheel until GT5)

My nightmare in this game: Senna's Lotus 97T at Brands Hatch (last TT of the tribute). It was specially frustrating because i quickly got within a couple of decimals to get gold, and then took 3 nights to shave it off. 125 Shifter Karts in the GT Arena are also tricky, but like you said, everyone's got their own challenges.
 
Here's the thing- when I went into this challenge, I was lapping at around 2:23 consistently. For the past 5 GT titles, I've played (and won) using push-button throttle, but about midway thru my career in GT6 (call it maybe 65% completion) I switched to trigger throttle/brake and push-button shifting...and the Super license tests were some of the first events I did in this format.

With that in mind, 2 weeks later I had gotten down to consistent 2:15's. Another 3 or 4 days, and I am now about a second under the gold time, with some consistency. :) So, yeah, I would say things are definitely looking up. Maybe by the time GT7 comes out I could hope to be a competitive driver, new controller layout notwithstanding. hahaha.
 
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interpunct
I think that its the fact that they gave you a Bugatti which is a car that suffers of lot of understeer
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This gets said over and over and over and over and over but I disagree wholeheartedly each and every time. The Veyron (as it's represented in this game--I've never driven the real thing) exhibits phenomenal turn-in capability compared to like-weighted vehicles at the same speeds, but there's the catch, other vehicles in its weight class can't reach the speeds it's capable of and it doesn't do that great a job of making its speeds known, so the people who say it understeers are actually over-driving it into corners. Hell, the default alignment values don't even seem to rear their ugly heads in the case of the Veyron as they do other 4WD road cars (their camber is zeroed-out but rear toe is the same +0.60).

Pick up a Veyron from the dealership (after backing your gamesave up on an external drive, in case you're not inclined to possess a Veyron otherwise), leave the oil unchanged, slap on Comfort tires (the Sports Hard tires provided offer unrealistic grip for the overwhelming majority of cars they're selected for) and take it for a spin around a low-speed technical track (Ascari isn't a bad choice) with the SRF that was forced on during the license test disabled and drive the car while keeping your speeds in check. Brake appropriately and note the car's willingness to pull itself into and out of apex. Remember, it's 4150lbs with nearly 1000hp.
 
TexRex
This gets said over and over and over and over and over but I disagree wholeheartedly each and every time. The Veyron (as it's represented in this game--I've never driven the real thing) exhibits phenomenal turn-in capability compared to like-weighted vehicles at the same speeds, but there's the catch, other vehicles in its weight class can't reach the speeds it's capable of and it doesn't do that great a job of making its speeds known, so the people who say it understeers are actually over-driving it into corners. Hell, the default alignment values don't even seem to rear their ugly heads in the case of the Veyron as they do other 4WD road cars (their camber is zeroed-out but rear toe is the same +0.60).

Pick up a Veyron from the dealership (after backing your gamesave up on an external drive, in case you're not inclined to possess a Veyron otherwise), leave the oil unchanged, slap on Comfort tires (the Sports Hard tires provided offer unrealistic grip for the overwhelming majority of cars they're selected for) and take it for a spin around a low-speed technical track (Ascari isn't a bad choice) with the SRF that was forced on during the license test disabled and drive the car while keeping your speeds in check. Brake appropriately and note the car's willingness to pull itself into and out of apex. Remember, it's 4150lbs with nearly 1000hp.
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You're right--it turns in like a loaded dump truck at 150 mph
 
Jbaffoh
You're right--it turns in like a loaded dump truck at 150 mph
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Of course it's not exactly a hairpin, but I've crossed under the Bilstein banner on the Nordschleife at 220 on Comfort Mediums and had to brake for the downhill section rather than the left-hander. Mind you I was paying more attention to what was ahead of me rather than my speedometer, but I don't think I was terribly far under 150 (if at all) for that kink--and I didn't even have the lateral grip available from the default Sports Hards.

People like to pick on the Veyron, and I'll be the first to admit it's absurd (I like small cars with small engines and skinny tires more than anything else), but it's fun to push and more competent than people give credit. Don't tell me that it's too hard to control on Racing Softs with 1400hp and slammed to the ground either, because the car--or the way that it's modeled in the game, anyway--isn't to blame there.
 
I was never a fan of the car to begin with- the concept of a big luxury car that does 250+ mph is just not appealing- and, imho, the car (at least the way it was modeled in GT^) is a very "vanilla" sensory experience; It's just not captivating. Combine that with a tendency to be too fast for it's own good when on a road course and a high curb weight, and it leads to a car with a very narrow handling envelope in the corners- especially your corner entries. Add a lack of decent engine noise (I know, subjective) and this one tested (and beat) my patience enough to prevent me from wanting to buy one in-game.

I appreciate it for what it is, but it's just not for me personally.
 
I was lucky enough to get gold on the second try on S-5. Just keep trying and you will get it soon 👍
 

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