Simple ways to make GT5 significantly better...

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ka-mai

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dilkah
Like most pple here, I have been grinding away at the A and B spec versions of GT5 hoping the PSN will come back one day :-)

I have around 300 cars and am on L32 and L33 respectively for the A and B specs.

The biggest problem when you are at this sort of level of the game is lack of money and a good set of opponents to race in offline mode. Its just a bore to grind away at the same races (whether in B spec or A spec) to get the 200k needed approx min to spec up any half decent car.

The main pull for anyone at my level to keep playing is to tinker with and enjoy the cars. Grinding literally for days to get even one of the 20m credit flagship cars is just dull and unnecessary.

So the first thing I would do would be to "open" the game for anyone who reaches level 35 or so. Ie stop the silly need for money at this stage. Either that or increase the rewards for races in line with the +10% system they have in place for the increase in points between level ups, say, past L27 this could come into play.

Next I would make a section for practice races, where you would be able to select track and car to drive and also any combination of cars as oponents. The race would be saveable and changeable for future tinkering and testing. This way you could pit yourself against suitable levels of other drivers to keep things fresh.

Next, I would make the reward for each race as a function of PP and time taken and place. Higher PP for a slow race would result in less income, but offset by how much you beat the 2nd place driver if you win the race... So winning a race by a large margin in a less powerful car would result in a much bigger payoff. This aspect is just tinkering with variables to achieve a variable reward, but would spice up the game no end.

Finally, I would allow the user to return to the setup page for the car (Auto Parts section) directly from the start race menu OR within the car setup page and to return to the race from the parts purchase page. It's VERY tedious keep going through many layers of menus to get back and forth between these! It detracts from making subtle tweaks to cars; rather than make a small tyre purchase change or add a better exhaust, etc, just to increase a little, it encourages the tendancy to add everything in one go and spoils the fun of incrementally spicing up a car.

These are wholly reasonable and simple implementations to program.

Currently the poor combination of races/car choices and silly menu ergonomics, stops ultimate longevity in offline mode.

Final thought... there are probably 75% Japanese cars in the game but check out how many races in offline mode allow you to use them?

Any comments anyone, other ideas to SIMPLY transform this game?
 
Yes, buy Shift 2, get the Pagani Huayra and forget about GT5. Solved all my problems and frustrations with GT5 👍
 
It eould be nice if you can select a other car in the pre-race, so you dont have to go all the way back to get a better diffetent one
 
ka-mai
Aha.. Yes i forget sometimes that GT5 is not the only game in town :-)
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:sly:

Seriously, I have been desperately looking for ways to keep GT5 interesting when I ran out of things to do and the grind reared its ugly head (much sooner than in any of the preceding GTs). It doesn't look like PD are listening to us, so you might as well go find the fun elsewhere while waiting for PD to come up with GT5 Spec II that has all the content that should have been in the initial release.
 
brambos
:sly:

Seriously, I have been desperately looking for ways to keep GT5 interesting when I ran out of things to do and the grind reared its ugly head (much sooner than in any of the preceding GTs). It doesn't look like PD are listening to us, so you might as well go find the fun elsewhere while waiting for PD to come up with GT5 Spec II that has all the content that should have been in the initial release.
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I just love the engine so much. There is so much subtlety here with the different cars/setups, etc. I won't stop playing soon. I'm just frustrated with the "little things". Seems like PD don't have long term players in their test facility otherwise these problems would have been resolved months ago.

I fear you are right. Moreover, I doubt PD will implement ergonomic improvements in future builds. Ive played GT since V3 and a lot of the simply solved issues are still with us.
 
I would really like the online lobby and the lounge to include the ability to tune your car while you are still on the track. It's so annoying to back out to pit road, and then to the lobby, tune, back to pit road, then to the track. Really PD, too many steps to change the downforce lol.
 
Rico_S
Somehow, suddenly, this thread transform its function itself to promote Shift 2...
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LOL so let's Shift it back to Gran Turismo 5!

Another thing PD could implement is paying for gas. At the end of a race, the game could subtract from your winnings the amount of gas you used, at current prices of course. Psych!

For real: I think it would be cool if you had an option to auto-tune cars. Say you wanted a setup for cornering. You could go to the tuning screen and somewhere you could click on Auto-tune and select from balanced, straightway, cornering, drifting, etc. Yes I know it would make the game easier but that's the point. Just an idea. Don't flame!
 
If they let me use ALL of the options in practice mode, and payed me 1000Cr per practice lap of the Ring, scaled down by track length on the others, I'd have no complaints about the grinding.

Either that or they could hire anyone who doesn't currently work for PD to design the game's flow, as they must have 100% of the global population who think it's done well working for them already.
 
Tonnie073
It eould be nice if you can select a other car in the pre-race, so you dont have to go all the way back to get a better diffetent one
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You CAN. Use the little garage icon in the very bottom right. Warning: you can't change oil or add parts that way (you can adjust the settings, though, like tranny, aero, etc. if they are already installed).
 
Morgoth_666
If they let me use ALL of the options in practice mode, and payed me 1000Cr per practice lap of the Ring, scaled down by track length on the others, I'd have no complaints about the grinding.

Either that or they could hire anyone who doesn't currently work for PD to design the game's flow, as they must have 100% of the global population who think it's done well working for them already.
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Lol. I have thought this too about the practice laps being rewarded. Though I would think around 10k a lap would be about right :-) - then you can enjoy your test laps all the more! Generally there should be more ways to generate cash; I liked the ability to be able to sell cars in gt4 and then rewin them.

I like your comment about the population working for PD who think it's well designed! Haha. Very good :-)
 
I could go on for days about the shortcomings of GT5...lol. One thing that I rarely see mentioned but is a bigger and bigger headache the further you get into the game is both organizing your garage and moving through different menus and sections of the game. Randomly off the top of my head:

1. Why have tuning and maintenance in different sections when both are essentially the same thing? Combine them into one menu (the Garage?) so we don't have to wait for the silly load and unload time entering each menu.

2. While you're at it, why not add a button that says something along the lines of "Perform all available upgrades" or better yet, make it so you can set up your own personal upgrade checklist and have the game ask "would you like to perform your standard upgrades?", so by hitting one button you can do everything instead of having to scroll through the same menus over and over and over to modify hundreds of cars. It might only take 5 minutes to do this now, but 5x400 is 33 hours of my life I'll never get back that could easily be done with one button. As a minimum, why do we have to hit a button 5 or 6 times to install one part?

3. Give us a way to organize the garage to suit our own personal preferences. I'd love to be able to have 5 or 10 different sub-garages if you will, containing for example GT500 cars, GT300 cars, FF cars, 550 pp cars etc. or any type of cars I choose to put in there. So when you go online to race and have 3 or 4 minutes to find the right car, pick the right gear ratios etc. you don't have to scroll through entire garages trying to remember what PP a car was at or what HP it was at, or if it's Premium or Standard etc.

4. Access to your garage from the practice section..I would have thought this was a no-brainer.

5. Oil changes at the track...also a no brainer, given how important oil changes are to final hp in endurance races.

6. More info on the car within the garage. How long since last oil change? How long since engine/chassis rebuild? Saving best lap times for each vehicle within the garage for easy reference. Multiple saved settings available for at least transmission but entire setups would be great too so if you go to a particular track you hit one button and everything converts over to that setup.

As I said, I could go on for days..lol.
 
Quicker pitstops- At the moment refuelling takes too long. If you manage to drain the tank midway through the race you can be stuck in the pit's for a very long time.

Fix silly mistakes. The X2010 has two major mistakes in a pit stop. The wheels go through the bodywork (I think other closed wheel cars have the same problem) and the fuel tank attaches to the rear bodywork over the wheel, but when the car is dropped of it's jacks it floats in mid air.

Glitching trees in replays. There are only a few, but they really detract from the quality of the game.

Tone back the drafting. At the moment it's like your using F1's DRS system, or Nitrous Injection.

Fix the tyre compounds. Racing Hards have less grip than Racing softs, but also wear out faster. Slick tyres are faster than Intermediates or Wet's, when the track is wet.
 
ka-mai
Final thought... there are probably 75% Japanese cars in the game but check out how many races in offline mode allow you to use them?
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This, to me, is one of the biggest problems with A-Spec. There is a disappointing lack of races to *compete* in. It's extremely difficult to find a series to enter that will give a nice challenge in the majority of the cars in the game.

My point is, that a large portion of the cars in the game are street cars that are between 350-450 PP. These cars are also very fun to race, but there's really no races to enter that level of car and get a good race. There's so few "open" racing series for these cars. It's either you must use X Y Z brand of car, or model year between A and B, or other restrictions. There's a lot of racing series for high-end fast cars, which is great, but what if I want a nice competitive race to drive an Evo, 180sx, s2000, Mustang GT, etc?

They need to make it like GT4 where you can create a race and select the "difficulty". However, even at 10 difficulty in GT4 the races were somewhat easy. These races also need to provide a decent credit/exp reward (comparable to the A-Spec series).
 
Even an option under the start button saying "back to main page" to bring you back home would take them less than 5 minutes to code.....and saves us hours and hours of pressing the [X] and [O] buttons
 
ka-mai
Final thought... there are probably 75% Japanese cars in the game but check out how many races in offline mode allow you to use them?
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So I'm guessing you haven't heard of Arcade mode. You can use any car you want on as many tracks as you want (even on tracks you design yourself!)
Any comments anyone, other ideas to SIMPLY transform this game?
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Yes, adjust the attitudes towards A-Spec and completion. You don't need to get Level 40 and all 1000+ cars in their respective paint jobs to have fun. Just find cars you like, tune them the way you like, and race them the way you like. In arcade mode against AI, or Time Trials against yourself. Some people are so closed-minded to the full features of this game. There is plenty of GT5 to be enjoyed outside of leveling up, getting trophies, and earning credits. A-Spec and GTLife are not end-all-be-all.
 
Get rid of the Amuse S2000 GT1 Turbo. That thing has been an AI's favourite toy for too long. Or at least give it less downforce and grip.

On a less personal note, there could be many more RM's. Some of the ones I thought of were:
TT RM
R8 RM
Skyline R34 RM
Esprit RM
Silvia S13 RM
Mustang RM
370Z RM
GT-R RM
Evo X RM (how this wasn't in before the start is beyond me)
Golf V RM
 
Villain
So I'm guessing you haven't heard of Arcade mode. You can use any car you want on as many tracks as you want (even on tracks you design yourself!)


Yes, adjust the attitudes towards A-Spec and completion. You don't need to get Level 40 and all 1000+ cars in their respective paint jobs to have fun. Just find cars you like, tune them the way you like, and race them the way you like. In arcade mode against AI, or Time Trials against yourself. Some people are so closed-minded to the full features of this game. There is plenty of GT5 to be enjoyed outside of leveling up, getting trophies, and earning credits. A-Spec and GTLife are not end-all-be-all.
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So you're saying that although the entire basis for the offline "game" is A-spec and B-spec, levelling up and trophies, we should just forget the shortcomings in that portion of the game and use the other portions of the game where you get no rewards, no trophies and most importantly perhaps, no money to buy and upgrade cars. We should go to the "Arcade" portion of the "greatest driving simulation ever made?"....that's your solution?..lol.
 
1. Make pitting harder and more realistic. Allow the driver (A Spec) to actually make the pit stop, while enforcing pit road speeds. Allowing you to enter the pits at 380 mph is crazy. They already have time penalties (rally modes)--use them. And for goodness sake make the refueling time realistic.

2. Move level required to do 24hr Nurburgring to level 39. There is no need for spec-specific XP at reaching level 40, it's a waste! Unless future patches add higher levels, that is.

3. More variety of cars from around the world. Do we really need 478 different Mitsubishi Lancers and Mazda Roadsters?

4. Fix the cockpit view shaking when cornering. If you don't have epilepsy now, drive a few laps at Indy in your Vette in cockpit view and you'll be on meds soon.

Honestly it's a great sim overall and I'm already itching for GT6!
 
FeedMeRice
This, to me, is one of the biggest problems with A-Spec. There is a disappointing lack of races to *compete* in. It's extremely difficult to find a series to enter that will give a nice challenge in the majority of the cars in the game.

My point is, that a large portion of the cars in the game are street cars that are between 350-450 PP. These cars are also very fun to race, but there's really no races to enter that level of car and get a good race. There's so few "open" racing series for these cars. It's either you must use X Y Z brand of car, or model year between A and B, or other restrictions. There's a lot of racing series for high-end fast cars, which is great, but what if I want a nice competitive race to drive an Evo, 180sx, s2000, Mustang GT, etc?

They need to make it like GT4 where you can create a race and select the "difficulty". However, even at 10 difficulty in GT4 the races were somewhat easy. These races also need to provide a decent credit/exp reward (comparable to the A-Spec series).
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Race in Arcade Mode. I never realized it, but when you race in Arcade Mode, the other cars you're racing are really close in terms of PP. I completely agree about the A-Spec races. But A-Spec races offer so little money, just race for fun in Arcade, and when Seasonal Events are working again, use that.


Villain
So I'm guessing you haven't heard of Arcade mode. You can use any car you want on as many tracks as you want (even on tracks you design yourself!)


Yes, adjust the attitudes towards A-Spec and completion. You don't need to get Level 40 and all 1000+ cars in their respective paint jobs to have fun. Just find cars you like, tune them the way you like, and race them the way you like. In arcade mode against AI, or Time Trials against yourself. Some people are so closed-minded to the full features of this game. There is plenty of GT5 to be enjoyed outside of leveling up, getting trophies, and earning credits. A-Spec and GTLife are not end-all-be-all.
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You're right, Villain. Do people not realize what this game is meant for? Do they know the reason why Kaz even wanted to make this game? Isn't it obvious? Are we the only guys with brains better than the, "Where's my reward for doing nothing?," mentality? Do I need to make it any clearer how dumb Johnnypenso is? Does he think Kaz's focus was on trophies? Obviously, that's not the essence of "The Real Driving Simulator".

Doesn't mean that I don't agree that there are so many faults in GT5. All we can do is hope PD knows what needs quick fixing and do it for an update in the NEAR future.

GT for LIFE!
 
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i do the seasonal TTs mostly and thats it in GT5...well until the outage. you only aquire new skill no xp or credits for those. doesnt quite seem right.

im at level 29, i do think i will get 30 maybe 31 before i stop playing GT5. while the amount of laps ive run and my driving skills will be way way way up there, 30 wont reflect that at all.

not really important but it is another flaw so that a good driver can be ranked low and someone who never drove much could rubberband grind to 40. making the experience level of a person totally meaningless.

id like to see a system that reflects a guys skill and actual time behind the wheel a little better. not sure how they might calculate that but lap times versus power to weight or something could have some meaning...something like that anyways.
 
This comment will surely get me lots of abuse. But I can't wait for Forza 4.
I've always been a GT guy, but after playing Forza 3 from it's release and until GT5 came out, my feelings seems to favour Forza.
Most of all because they don't use half a decade to produce a half finished game. It's not without it's faults, but it's nowhere near as incomplete as GT5 was and still is. Not to mention the livery editor which is where I spent most of my time on Forza 3.
Kaz and Polyphony are getting beat at their own game, and I fear it will cost them dearly.
I'm still gonna be playing GT5 until Forza 4 comes out, but after that I fear I won't even remember GT5.
 
You're not wrong to look forward to FM4. You're horrible for favoring FM3 though. The overall feeling of it is blah.

Watching FM4 gameplay looks just as cartoony as the previous game. Maybe a fresher look, still cartoony. And I'm afraid the physics won't be improved too much judging from the gameplay that's been out. A car turning in FM4 has the look arcade racers have, which is Completely distinguishable from sim racers like GT5.
 
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