- 297
- United Kingdom
Hey guys, thanks for having, yay my first post, etc, etc,.
Apologies if this belongs in an existing thread but I actually don't know whether it does or not... and no, I am not trolling, trying to prove a point or trying to be an edge-lord.
I've been playing the demo of GT Sport, and while I have enjoyed the gameplay, )it's obviously not the best physics, it still manages to feel very good to play and feels very 'right'), there is an underlying murk that comes with what I've experienced so far of this game which suggests to me that it may be time for Sony to cut their losses and pull the plug coming from several things that I've noticed.
These several things suggest to me that two particular outcomes need to come about to 'save' Gran Turismo if you will (which I'll get to in the end), but first let's get to those several things:
Even before you factor in the other things I've listed, the online/sport emphasis + lack of campaign alone is enough to completely scupper any chance this game ever had of being a big-seller, it will just be another WipEout Omega = an old yeller franchise in dire need of a refresh simply being abused as a nostalgia shovelware cash-cow by Sony. Also, I'm fully aware that Sony and Polyphony are claiming they've taken what they had before and torn it down to start again, but let's be honest, it's a copout to cover up their inability to do things consistently and on time. They had a deadline to make a full blown Gran Turismo, they didn't do it, and they're covering it up.
Also, lets be brutally honest, even if the published version of the game is the best Gran Turismo ever conceived, the gaming press will still shoot it down with mediocre scores, quite simply because after GT5 and GT6 they are now fascinated and fixated with the idea of the downfall of Gran Turismo. They've been wowed and amazed by other racers, there is absolutely nothing other than pretty graphics Gran Turismo can possibly offer to get itself 9/10 or 90% scores, based on what I've seen it's an 8/10 or 80% at best.
All of this points towards one man possibly being too close to his baby to be able to step back and assess what's right and what's wrong, a man who clearly has absolutely no clue in handling PR, a man who's vision is now so warped and inconsistent that it's beginning to show in this game which, in my mind set to be a sales flop and there's two outcomes which need to happen in order to ensure that Gran Turismo never get's to this sorry state ever again, it's time for Sony to do what's right and that is:
Either:
1) Reassign Kazunori Yamauchi to a different role or relegate him to a consultant position: If you look at all that's gone wrong since Gran Turismo 4, it all trails back to this man, it appears that while he is clearly very intelligent, he is completely incompetent as a project/product manager as he does not seem to be able to deliver a product on time and at 100%. Sony needs to replace him with either a single project manager or a team of project managers from the motorsport, sports, media and marketing industries. I think Kazunori Yamauchi is possibly too emotionally attached to Gran Turismo to run it properly.
Or:
2) Pull the plug on Polyphony and/or put Gran Turismo on a 10-year hiatus and reset: Sometimes you get so far down the road that you eventually hit the glass ceiling, Sony, don't do what 20th Century Fox did to The Simpsons: endlessly repeat the same thing in zombie-form in the hope that popularity booms again. You've made your money out of this franchise, pull out while it's still profitable, or learn from what Capcom did with Street Fighter = put it on a 10-year hiatus, scope out via external sources what was good and what was bad, scope out the rivals, and them come back in a huge way when people least expect it, hell, do a 7 year hiatus and come back with Gran Turismo 7.
Either way, I think something has to change massively because this franchise is just becoming another WipEout.
Apologies if this belongs in an existing thread but I actually don't know whether it does or not... and no, I am not trolling, trying to prove a point or trying to be an edge-lord.
I've been playing the demo of GT Sport, and while I have enjoyed the gameplay, )it's obviously not the best physics, it still manages to feel very good to play and feels very 'right'), there is an underlying murk that comes with what I've experienced so far of this game which suggests to me that it may be time for Sony to cut their losses and pull the plug coming from several things that I've noticed.
These several things suggest to me that two particular outcomes need to come about to 'save' Gran Turismo if you will (which I'll get to in the end), but first let's get to those several things:
- No career mode in any shape or form: sorry, but online, missions, tests and tutorials are NOT sufficient for career or campaign modes in a racing game, you're simply glorifying the extras. That is a massive shame because the AI is actually good once you turn off boost in options and start to venture into normal difficulty and beyond. They really could have done something with it instead of shoving quirky nonsense that, let's be very honest, only the hardcore fans will get into. They have taken away the heart and soul of their own game and it boggles my mind how they could have ever come to this idiotic decision.
- The especially stupid interpretation of rally: it can't seem to decide if it's a rally-cross or straight rally mode, and I don't think that Polyphony quite understand that you can't simply do an half-way house approach between the two. Also, can someone please point me towards real-life cases where a rally stage or rally-cross track that's 10 cars wide? You either have both separately or you have one, don't try mish-mashing the two together (the rally physics are still quite bad).
- 2D trees on a PS4... I mean, really? Considering the rest of the game looks so good, forward facing sprites for trees? Are they being lazy or what? Do they not realise that casuals will notice stuff like this? Even the joke of the games industry: Assassin's Creed has better 3D modelled trees and their game is arguably a lot more complex. What is the point in making the part of the game that exists within the track walls look so good when you're going to make everything immediately next to it looks so terrible?
- Pit-stops are cutscenes... I mean, seriously? You think we're not going to notice the cars un-spawning and re-spawning? The pit-stop times aren't even realistic either: you get to pit entry, the car magically warps to entering the box, nice pretty cut-scene all very well done (but where the hell are the other cars in the pits???) and you magically warp right to the end of the pitlane... other games managed to do this properly on PS3, there's very little excuse for this.
- The menus are an un-ergonomic mess: I come from a design background, and those menus are a joke. You have to stop and think to figure them out, the best menus are the ones which don't require that, GT Sport's menus are a bigger muddle than the early versions of Audi's MMI system. Why can't Polyphony ever keep it simple and stop focusing on constant razzle-dazzle? (Also, Forza and Project CARS are no saints either when it comes to UI)
- Group 1 is nonsense: sorry, but it is, you get nearly 2 year old LMP1 cars (because you're too lazy to get this year's cars unlike your rivals) and proceed to take a dump on them by having them as mid-pack cars against fantasy cars? I can really see the ACO and WEC being oh so happy about that, perhaps there's reason there's no Le Mans in this game; to save them the insult of seeing their top category being served up for dinner to fiction. What Polyphony have done with the LMP1 cars here is like Manchester United signing Lionel Messi and putting him in the hotdog stand.
- The car and track list: even if it's going to be bloated by DLC (which I sincerely doubt it will ever happen), as a game that's going up against Forza 7 and Project CARS 2 (or Shift 4 as I call it), to launch with that shallow a list is a complete joke and a disgrace given Gran Turismo's fame for wealthy car and track lists, even if Forza 7 is bloating via last-gen cars.
- And lastly, it's the whole emphasis of "online" masquerading as an eSport: I've worked in eSports, and trust me, GT Sport is not eSport worthy and nor is the current thought system at Polyphony capable of eSports. Online only saves I get, because to be honest everything is going towards cloud storage whether you like it or not. But, having all of the "campaign" and emphasis of the game on online or "Sport Mode" as their marketing team calls it is plain suicidal, people will not buy into it at all and everything on the internet in reaction echoes this sentiment. As I said before, the traditional GT Mode is the heart and soul of the Gran Turismo, and they've ripped that out. This is possibly the first Zombie-Gran Turismo.
Even before you factor in the other things I've listed, the online/sport emphasis + lack of campaign alone is enough to completely scupper any chance this game ever had of being a big-seller, it will just be another WipEout Omega = an old yeller franchise in dire need of a refresh simply being abused as a nostalgia shovelware cash-cow by Sony. Also, I'm fully aware that Sony and Polyphony are claiming they've taken what they had before and torn it down to start again, but let's be honest, it's a copout to cover up their inability to do things consistently and on time. They had a deadline to make a full blown Gran Turismo, they didn't do it, and they're covering it up.
Also, lets be brutally honest, even if the published version of the game is the best Gran Turismo ever conceived, the gaming press will still shoot it down with mediocre scores, quite simply because after GT5 and GT6 they are now fascinated and fixated with the idea of the downfall of Gran Turismo. They've been wowed and amazed by other racers, there is absolutely nothing other than pretty graphics Gran Turismo can possibly offer to get itself 9/10 or 90% scores, based on what I've seen it's an 8/10 or 80% at best.
All of this points towards one man possibly being too close to his baby to be able to step back and assess what's right and what's wrong, a man who clearly has absolutely no clue in handling PR, a man who's vision is now so warped and inconsistent that it's beginning to show in this game which, in my mind set to be a sales flop and there's two outcomes which need to happen in order to ensure that Gran Turismo never get's to this sorry state ever again, it's time for Sony to do what's right and that is:
Either:
1) Reassign Kazunori Yamauchi to a different role or relegate him to a consultant position: If you look at all that's gone wrong since Gran Turismo 4, it all trails back to this man, it appears that while he is clearly very intelligent, he is completely incompetent as a project/product manager as he does not seem to be able to deliver a product on time and at 100%. Sony needs to replace him with either a single project manager or a team of project managers from the motorsport, sports, media and marketing industries. I think Kazunori Yamauchi is possibly too emotionally attached to Gran Turismo to run it properly.
Or:
2) Pull the plug on Polyphony and/or put Gran Turismo on a 10-year hiatus and reset: Sometimes you get so far down the road that you eventually hit the glass ceiling, Sony, don't do what 20th Century Fox did to The Simpsons: endlessly repeat the same thing in zombie-form in the hope that popularity booms again. You've made your money out of this franchise, pull out while it's still profitable, or learn from what Capcom did with Street Fighter = put it on a 10-year hiatus, scope out via external sources what was good and what was bad, scope out the rivals, and them come back in a huge way when people least expect it, hell, do a 7 year hiatus and come back with Gran Turismo 7.
Either way, I think something has to change massively because this franchise is just becoming another WipEout.
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It kinda reminds me of Gran Turismo 4 Prologue..
