Tips for changing from automatic to manual

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stpatty

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stpatty
I've played racing and driving games for the best part of twenty years. My first Gran Turismo was 3, when it came out. No other series of driving games has captured my attention the way they have, even when I've been mostly underwhelmed by them (see: GT5). In all of that time I've used automatic transmission. I think I've tried manual twice. I remember trying it on Trial Mountain in GT5. I think I was driving something fast. I could well be making this memory up, but I think I tried it during the license test in GT3 where Jimmy Broadbent spent most of an afternoon, taking a Camaro up the hill at Seattle. On both occasions, I didn't last very long. I've tried it more recently, and I didn't last very long either. I've tried it with Project Cars too, I'd often go through a corner and wonder why I wasn't accelerating and was making a lot of noise before I realised I'd forgotten about gears entirely.

I don't drive in real life, so I've never had any reason to learn how to be focused enough to drive with gears in mind. I think it's a mental thing for me actually, because one of my few recurring dreams involves attempting to drive a car somewhere and being a complete disaster zone. My problem with it in games is I forget. I'm so focused on trying to steer, accelerate and race the other cars that I'd be overwhelmed trying to add another input, especially when it's frequent.

With that said, I've had enough. Over the course of the year and a half I've been playing this game I assumed I'd make the switch if I ever got a wheel, but I can't see that happening in the future. I thought about making this thread a while ago when a few races showed how much of a disadvantage I was at, but it's been an ongoing thing for weeks. I can't fuel save, which is a pain because I drive for Nissan in the Manufacturer Series and because PD set appalling fuel consumption rates in both Daily and FIA races. I can't control certain cars properly because the car will be in the wrong gear at the wrong time. I feel as if I'm wasting my time sticking with something which is demonstrably worse, both in terms of immersion and potential. I have it bad enough with tyre wear when using a DS4, so if I can make a positive change, I think I should.

I'm not, I suppose, bad at the game as-is. My ratings are currently tanked, but my DR was as high as 34.9K just recently. When I don't piss about in daily races I can regularly be an A driver when focusing on FIA races, and can consistently get 1000+ point results. I also have the Platinum trophy from Gran Turismo 5, which has nothing to do with this topic but I feel I should mention anyway. There's pace in there.

So, my questions are as follows:

- Have you made this change, and how did you find it?
- What buttons should I use? Currently I use the right stick for throttle and R2 for brake. I get the feeling this should change. What buttons should I map rear view and change view to?
- How much attention do you have to pay to the game as you play for this to work consistently?
- How long does it take to learn what gear you should be in for what corner on certain tracks?
- … will this make me better at this game, or driving games in general? Will it make me enjoy them more?

Thanks for any suggestions anyone has.
 
It is worth doing. Stick at it in time trial mode... just do it over and over and over again, DON'T look at your rev counter, learn to do it by engine note at first. I use X and square personally. Best way is just to keep doing it. Don't worry about getting it right to begin with, you just need to get into the habit of doing it without thinking, then you can fine tune it.
 
I switched to manual when I bought a wheel. It took a while but it was worth it. Basically it's just a matter of plugging away at it until it no longer requires thought. By the time I used a DS4 again it just felt natural to use manual. Now I naturally try to shift even if it's set to automatic. I use the same button layout as those above.
 
I recommend you listen to your car's engine sound to keep track of when you need to shift, in performance driving you'd usually want to shift when the car is at its loudest (which is at redline). Downshifting is trickier so try downshifting one at a time when you see the revs go lower than half (this depends on the car too).

Keep in mind that not all cars are at their most optimal at redline but that's up to you to experiment and figure out on your own when you keep practicing and eventually learn manual shifting as second nature. Cars like the V-Tec hondas, turbocharged cars and 911 GT3s are at their best when they're at high revs, but other cars like huayras, GT-Rs and turbo BMWs usually feel less powerful at higher RPMs.
 
I'd recommend making the change, in the long run it's well worth it. If I was using the pad I would use the triggers as throttle/brake. And square/circle for gears (others use triangle/X). Overtime it becomes second nature and u will be able to get that bit more out of the cars. Good luck!
 
In GT4 I remember you could hold down the upshift button and it’d allow you to redline rev limit every gear for optimum speed, not sure if you can do the same in GTS.

Manual upshifting is easy for me just listen to the engine when it starts to get to the end of the gear for the change, my biggest problem is downshifting and not getting stuck over reving the engine in the wrong gear.
For cornering I aim to keep my speed at a minimum of 60mph.
 
Since making the switch is quite taxing at first I would recommend trying a slow car I am talking N200 class here and tsukuba. You need time to react at first and will require a lot of focus and practice.

Not letting the car hit the rev limiter should be your first objective. Forget about lap times, going off track, etc. You are going to be slower at first.

A few things to take into account about manual.

Lower gears help slow the car down.
Lower gears help some cars turn tighter angles.
Switching gears can cause stability issues while cornering and accelerating at the same time. It can cause slides or spins in worst case scenarios. If you are using the chase came you might want to switch to hood cam or another one so you can visually see when the car suddenly turns or the weight transfers because of a gear change.

Some cars take longer to shift than others. I'm talking N cars here. If it is very slow you might want to change gears before starting to accelerate as you might lose more time shifting than accelerating a bit slower on a higher gear.

You can tell if the car is starting to spin just by the engine noise. You might want to shortshift in those cases.

Then comes driver preference, while the aliens may be doing something you might not be able to do it. A personal example. Going around a hairpin in a Gr2 car in 1st gear might waste more fuel but getting out in 2nd gear has surprised me moree than once because it is harder for me to tell when I am applying too much throttle because the engine sound is lower.

Hope that helps!
 
stpatty
I've played racing and driving games for the best part of twenty years. My first Gran Turismo was 3, when it came out. No other series of driving games has captured my attention the way they have, even when I've been mostly underwhelmed by them (see: GT5). In all of that time I've used automatic transmission. I think I've tried manual twice. I remember trying it on Trial Mountain in GT5. I think I was driving something fast. I could well be making this memory up, but I think I tried it during the license test in GT3 where Jimmy Broadbent spent most of an afternoon, taking a Camaro up the hill at Seattle. On both occasions, I didn't last very long. I've tried it more recently, and I didn't last very long either. I've tried it with Project Cars too, I'd often go through a corner and wonder why I wasn't accelerating and was making a lot of noise before I realised I'd forgotten about gears entirely.

I don't drive in real life, so I've never had any reason to learn how to be focused enough to drive with gears in mind. I think it's a mental thing for me actually, because one of my few recurring dreams involves attempting to drive a car somewhere and being a complete disaster zone. My problem with it in games is I forget. I'm so focused on trying to steer, accelerate and race the other cars that I'd be overwhelmed trying to add another input, especially when it's frequent.

With that said, I've had enough. Over the course of the year and a half I've been playing this game I assumed I'd make the switch if I ever got a wheel, but I can't see that happening in the future. I thought about making this thread a while ago when a few races showed how much of a disadvantage I was at, but it's been an ongoing thing for weeks. I can't fuel save, which is a pain because I drive for Nissan in the Manufacturer Series and because PD set appalling fuel consumption rates in both Daily and FIA races. I can't control certain cars properly because the car will be in the wrong gear at the wrong time. I feel as if I'm wasting my time sticking with something which is demonstrably worse, both in terms of immersion and potential. I have it bad enough with tyre wear when using a DS4, so if I can make a positive change, I think I should.

I'm not, I suppose, bad at the game as-is. My ratings are currently tanked, but my DR was as high as 34.9K just recently. When I don't piss about in daily races I can regularly be an A driver when focusing on FIA races, and can consistently get 1000+ point results. I also have the Platinum trophy from Gran Turismo 5, which has nothing to do with this topic but I feel I should mention anyway. There's pace in there.

So, my questions are as follows:

- Have you made this change, and how did you find it?
- What buttons should I use? Currently I use the right stick for throttle and R2 for brake. I get the feeling this should change. What buttons should I map rear view and change view to?
- How much attention do you have to pay to the game as you play for this to work consistently?
- How long does it take to learn what gear you should be in for what corner on certain tracks?
- … will this make me better at this game, or driving games in general? Will it make me enjoy them more?
Thanks for any suggestions anyone has.
Click to expand...


Hi, you should keep playing manual until you feel comfortable, at which point you will never want to go back to automatic, as you will know by then what an invaluable tool it is at helping to control the car.
Its pretty amazing that you got up to A rank using AT, I mean the game does a good job but in some spots it will not be optimal and certainly mistakes are more costly.
If you're using a controller the best way to do it is to use L2/R2 for brake/accel obviously, and the right stick to shift. You want to set right stick up to downshift, and right stick down to upshift, it's easier to do quick successive downshifts by pushing it than pulling it.
Have fun!
 
It’s definitely worth learning, if for nothing else, having the ability to short shift in races where fuel saving is the strategy. I always played AT from GT1 to GT6, only once I started playing sport mode in GTS did I finally switch to MT, it took a week or two to get fully comfortable and to stop forgetting to downshift. But I have always driven MT IRL too, so it may take a little longer for someone who doesn’t drive at all IRL.

I agree with the poster above though, start with slower cars, or define cars to be slower when using them. It definitely helps at first, and stick with it, the more you do it the better you will get at it. Good luck, hopefully you’re able to make the switch. :)
 
All you need is practice, it will come naturally one day. Why? Well some cars need to be shift sooner as possible to red line, with some you can hold till no more at limits, some cars would benefit from early shifts.
I did enjoyed the change - more control in every possible situation, you'll sure find them out while experimenting. Personally use R2 for throttle and R1 for gear down, L2 for brakes and L1 for gear up. Since usually I don't need a higher gear when using gas and vice versa.
The top benefit of manual transmission for me is that you now can use first gear, because strangely in Gran Turismo automatic mode completely ignore first gear, even if set up made to have long one.

As for from what to start with, I'm opposite recommend something forgiving and benefiting from late shifts like group 2 cars. You can burn gears there long enough and this also will smooth learning and give you a little show of difference between AT and MT modes affecting acceleration.
 
Listening for the engine noise is mainly how I up shift. Turn the BGM off so you can hear the sweet song of our people much better. Down shifting for braking and taking corners is where you have to feel for where you're making power to be able to carry on, a lot of the time this is still done by ear with me. That is just trial and error with different cars and tracks to know how low you should go in the gears on a given corner. Sometimes the "ideal gear" the game displays on the screen upon approaching a corner is one gear too low. I've found you now are grabbing that low gear for such a short time before you have to up shift because the car is screaming at the top of the rev range with nothing left to give and you lose time. Its a fine balance because also too high of a gear in the corner and you'll just slog through

Its going to take some time to get a feel for shifting. I found it hard for me to even explain because it seems natural to me since I've been driving IRL for close to 30 years and playing GT since the original
... Also manual with the DS4 is sometimes a pain in the ass. I almost always use automatic on controller and leave the manual duties for my G29
 
For me it was partially about finding a comfortable control layout. After that it was just practice. I only made the jump in Gran Turismo 6 having been gaming since 1995.

I use circle for up shift and square for down shift.
 
After using AT for 20 years I finally switched to MT about 5 months ago. Although overall I'm slower, I can still win in lobbies. There are certain times it really pays off, like downshifting to save a turn when I've braked way too late. Plus, it's a whole lot more fun. After trying a bunch of combos, I decided on the right stick. I think R1 L1 might shift faster, but I have a hard time braking accurately with L2 and have mapped R1 for brake as well as L2. I know that sounds confusing, but it works for me.
 
I'm guessing this won't be a solution you'll want, due to the cost, but you can use an Xbox Elite controller with the PS4 via a CronusMAX Plus, and then you have paddle shifters. I used that with Forza, and it's miles better than messing about with the top buttons, really intuitive.
 
If memory serves me correctly weren't you able to use the DS4 as sort of a wheel? Like making wheel movements with it?
 
Qyn
If memory serves me correctly weren't you able to use the DS4 as sort of a wheel? Like making wheel movements with it?
Click to expand...
yes though more like a bike. It is very usable but the down side is its not as good as the stick for lazy people.
 
It’s definitely worth the change in the long run. It’s a valuable too to add to your driving tool kit. Manual transmission allows you to do many things:
- downshifting during braking to use the compression braking of the engine. Allows you to brake later and deeper into corners. This compression braking has a different feel to it, and in RWD and AWD cars, it allows the rear wheels to do more braking without losing traction and locking up.
- quick downshifts during mid corner to help fight understeer. When you’re in the middle of a longer radius corner, when you’re feathering the pedals and kind of coasting, being in a lower gear will help tighten the radius of your turn.
- short shifting (ie shifting before the redline) on corner exit in cars with poor rear traction is a good way to fight corner exit oversteer.
- several cars make peak power well before redline, and actually lose power as the revs reach the redline. In these cases, short shifting can help keep the rpm in the optimum range
- short shifting for fuel saving is a legit way of saving fuel if you need to. It’s not as effective/efficient as lift-and-coast, but combining the two techniques is how you get maximum fuel saving.
- properly timed shifts can help with weight transfer, corner entry understeer, a more aggressive turn in, corner exit oversteer, and corner exit understeer. Even adjusting your line mid corner when racing wheel to wheel.

I use a DS4 for all my gaming. For any driving game, I use
R2 - Gas
L2 - Brake
Circle - Upshift
Square - Downshift
X - Hand Brake
Triangle - Look Back
L1 - DRS/Push2Pass/Nitros/KERS/go faster button
R1 - Change View

The rest doesn’t really matter, but I usually put Headlights on R3, and either Wipers or Nothing on L3, depending on the game.

Which buttons you use for Upshift and Downshift doesn’t really matter too much, as long as it’s comfortable for you. I use the layout I do for specific reasons related to drifting in GT (allows me to Gas, Foot Brake, Hand Brake, and Downshift all at the same time. I use the heal of my thumb on X, and tap Square with the tip. Like I said though, that’s specific to drifting, not at all necessary for racing or regular driving).


As far as actually learning to use MT. First, turn off the background music. Like other people said, you want to get used to using your ears to listen to the engine note. It’s not to say that there aren’t also visual queues to tell you when to shift, but listening to the audio is always your “backup” queue - or maybe better, your “analog” queue. As for the visual queues, the rev counter starts to flash like a strobe light when you’re at redline - you don’t want to be staring at the rev counter at the bottom of the screen, but you should be able to follow it with your peripheral vision. Additionally, if you drive in cockpit view, many cars have shift lights on the dash or wheel telling you when to shift (and these cockpit shift lights don’t always match up perfectly with the rev counter on the HUD, not sure when tbh).

The last on screen aid you have for driving MT is the gear indicator...someone’s going to get mad at me for mentioning this thing lol. If you look at the gear indicator on the HUD, you’ll see a big white number that tells you what gear you’re in. As you approach a corner (usually quite a ways out from the corner), you’ll see a red square with a black number appear to the right side of the big white number. The red and black number is the game telling you the minimum gear you should be in for the upcoming corner. When the red square starts to flash, that’s the game telling you to start braking for the corner.

**Disclaimer: this red and black gear indicator is controversial, because, for the most part, it’s wrong (just like the driving line). I’m not promoting it’s use as a driving aid to find speed, or learn a new circuit. For the most part, ignore the blinking, stick to finding your own brake markers (signs, curbs, trees, etc). If, however, you are struggling to figure out what gear you should be in for a given corner, you can use this indicator as a rough guide. Like I said before, a lot of the time, it’s wrong in the sense that it will tell you to go one gear lower than you need to (meaning the game thinks you should be taking the corner slower than you really need to). It also depends on the specific car and tune you’re driving. Again though, if you need a rough guide, it’s somewhere to start.

Like others have mentioned, I’d recommend picking something kind of average, N200 or N300, and then your circuit of choice...something on the smaller side, something where you can get into a nice rhythm. For simplicity’s sake, I’d recommend a car that has a 5 speed transmission. 4 speeds are weird, and 6/7/8 speeds are unnecessary for learning. A combo I think would be good for learning is the BMW M3 Sport Evolution ‘89 with stock power and stock transmission, at Tsukuba. If you want to tune the suspension and diff, that’s up to you. Hopefully you know the track well enough by now lol, and for driving a manual, it’s really straight forward. With the M3, you’ll only use gears 2, 3, and 4 for the entire track. The three hairpins are taken in 2nd, and you’ll hit 4th on the two straights, everything else is 3rd gear. Use this combo to learn a few things, like paying attention to the engine note for when to Upshift, and getting used to Downshifting while you are braking. Drive down a straight and hold a gear, let the RPM climb pass redline to the rev limiter, so you can hear what it sounds like. T1 will be the only place you’ll have to Downshift from 4th to 2nd, every other braking point will be single downshifts. For learning, I would recommend on focusing on doing all your downshifting while you are braking. Once you get good with the MT, there are more “advanced techniques” that involve doing your final downshifts while you are trail braking and turning into the corner...but that’s something to work towards. Keep it simple to start. The goal is to just get into a comfortable rhythm where you’re up and down the gearbox without even really thinking about it. Once you feel you’re getting the hang of it, you can find a nice rhythm, try turning off the HUD, and turn some laps using only the engine noise to tell you when to shift.

Once you get the hang of Tsukuba in the M3, I’d recommend trying something slightly faster at the Redbull Ring, maybe something N300 or N400 with 6 gears (a 5 speed is still fine here if you prefer). A racecar of some sort could also be a decent choice to use, any of the Gr4 or Gr3 cars would work well, whatever you’re comfortable with. The racecars will have close ratio transmissions, which means more shifting....but that is what you’re hear for lol. RBR is a good track to learn MT, as you have 3 long straights followed by heavy braking zones where you go all the way up the gear box, then back down. The middle and final portion of the track with the sweeping corners is a good place to learn and practice how timing your downshifts can help with rotating the car through the corner.


As far as mistakes to avoid, the obvious one is forgetting to Upshift and hitting the rev limiter. It happens, but you’ll soon by upshifting like a pro without thinking about it (there’s really nothing to think about lol). Downshifting is where smaller but more frequent mistakes will occur, the two major ones being either downshifting too low, which means you’ll be going too slow through the apex; or not downshifting enough, which means you’ll be slow through corner exit. The only way to eliminate these kinds of mistakes is practice, and finding that rhythm...eventually you’ll do it without even thinking about it.

A couple notes about “rapid fire downshifting”. When going from high speed to low speed for a tight corner, you’ll often be dropping 3, 4, 5 or more gears at a time (depending on the car and transmission settings). In Gran Turismo, for the most part, you can downshift through these gears almost as fast as you can tap the button. This will actually help slow the car down, which means you can brake later and deeper into most corners. It is possible to downshift too fast, and the indication of doing so will be that the drive wheels will lock up. For example, the M3 at Tsukuba, if you shift down into 1st gear at the hairpins, you’ll feel the rear end lock up and lose traction (unless you’re going really slow). Locking the drive wheels is the only danger in GT though. In real life, and other games, there’s more things to watch out for. You mentioned pCARS - in that game, you have to be a lot more careful with your downshifts, a) the game simulates shift-locking much more, b) over revving the engine by downshifting too aggressively causes engine wear and increases engine temp (even if wear is turned off), both of which decrease power. In real life, you have all that, plus physically braking things. But since this is GT, we don’t have to worry about any of that lol.
 
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I drove automatic for 30 years in all of the driving/racing games I’ve ever played and didn’t switch to manual until last December. GT Sport is where I made the change. And I haven’t looked back since. Manual truly is the way to play.

My advice is to start with a low powered car. Something that shifts slowly like a Honda S800. Test it on short tracks like Tsukuba or Suzuka East. Work your way up the class ladder and try incorporating longer, more complicated tracks as you get better.

It’s not hard at all. It just takes some practice.
 
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The BoP forced me into switching to manual. Adjusting the transmission made auto a lot more usable in older games but in GTS, I needed cars with suitable gearing for the track I was on and that narrowed my car options. If I wanted to keep a wide car choice, auto had to go. Besides, the engine braking is too useful to not to make the most of and dropping an extra gear for a second to lock the rears for rotation comes in handy.

Manual is a no brainer as it has no downsides...unless you're in the 8 geared LM55. Shifting down that many gears is a nightmare.:crazy:

Pick your favourite car (preferably 6 or 7 gears) and track (with enough turns to practise your gearing) and do a custom race for an hour. You'll be shifting without thinking about it by the end and wondering why you didn't do it sooner.
 
It all about training your muscle memories until it becomes second nature....

Just choose the button layout that feels the most natural, logical and ergonomic to you....

There are many ways to do it....
Choose one and stick to it.... And practice many hours to no end...

I personally have an old school set up.
When I am not on the wheel setup, and playing with the controller instead, this is my button layout:

Steering with the left joystick of course (with the PS3, I used to still use the Dpad)
Accelerate = X
Brake = Square

Look back = down button (with the PS3, it used to be that I could assign it to the R2 button)

Shift up = R1 similar to the real life paddles
Shift down = L1

Handbrake = O
Emergency flashing light = Triangle

Tried and true for over 20 years. .
And I gold challenges with no problem this layout..


Edit: for the life of me, I cannot use gas and brake trigger style with R2/L2 together with gear shifting using R1/L1...
Too much work to rewire my brain...


bil coz
guys the right stick is the best option. When I read those who use L1/R1 I get a headache just thinking about it.
The stick is absolutely perfect. Some race cars use the same thing!
Click to expand...

Edit 2:
I have been driving exclusively in Manual with L1/R1 in Chase view on controller for over 20 years.... I feel totally fine.


If you want something totally brain hurtful, try this:
You may also consider using the right stick for Gas / Brake mapping as follow:
Up and Right = Gas
Down and left = Brake...

In doing so, you can heel toe with your right thumb...;)
It's actually real fun ....
 
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Lots of fantastic advice in here, thanks everyone.

I already knew a lot of the things mentioned so far, things like looking at the torque/power curves to see when the best time to shift is. I know the Gr.3 Supra is faster when you shift earlier, and the recent fuel saving episode of Tidgney's Driving School on youtube went into more depth about the power curves. That's one of the main reasons I want to change, because I know I'm at a disadvantage, especially when I need to save fuel.

Last night's FIA races were actually the first time in 950+ races I turned the music off and played with earphones in. I was surprised at how much more involved I felt in the driving and how much more responsive I could be to what the cars were doing, both the X-Bow and the Gr.3 GT-R. Changing from cockpit cam to bumper cam helped with that too I think, but the engine was definitely more prominent so I think it should be easy enough to rely on that in addition to the rev bar onscreen.

I'll give it a go in the next few weeks and be sure to let you all know how it goes. Thanks again.
 
Another option I went for was a wee gadget called FPS Dominator which has paddles. £34 on Amazon just now. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B01L8QHXJA/?tag=gtplanetuk-20
Has mods built into it for FPS games but I've never used them, only bought it for the paddles & they work a treat.

Here's mine.

DS4_Paddle.jpg
 
GTS has forced me to learn Manual after 25 years of using Automatic too. I set up a second account to practice it with. It is hard changing the habit after so long. There's still the odd time where if i'm not concentrating properly i'll forget i'm in a manual and the car will hit the rev limiter!

The hardest part for me is still changing down from high gears. I still have to look down to check which gear i'm in as i approach the corner and to make sure i've down shifted enough times to get the gear i want. There's times i lose count and shift too many or not enough.

I'm about half a second to a second slower than my automatic times depending on the track. Even though i'm slower, it actually more fun. Oh and it stops that annoying problem you get with Automatics where you want it to drop another gear on a long corner and the only way to make it do that is to press the brake harder losing even more time!
 
stpatty
I've played racing and driving games for the best part of twenty years. My first Gran Turismo was 3, when it came out. No other series of driving games has captured my attention the way they have, even when I've been mostly underwhelmed by them (see: GT5). In all of that time I've used automatic transmission. I think I've tried manual twice. I remember trying it on Trial Mountain in GT5. I think I was driving something fast. I could well be making this memory up, but I think I tried it during the license test in GT3 where Jimmy Broadbent spent most of an afternoon, taking a Camaro up the hill at Seattle. On both occasions, I didn't last very long. I've tried it more recently, and I didn't last very long either. I've tried it with Project Cars too, I'd often go through a corner and wonder why I wasn't accelerating and was making a lot of noise before I realised I'd forgotten about gears entirely.

I don't drive in real life, so I've never had any reason to learn how to be focused enough to drive with gears in mind. I think it's a mental thing for me actually, because one of my few recurring dreams involves attempting to drive a car somewhere and being a complete disaster zone. My problem with it in games is I forget. I'm so focused on trying to steer, accelerate and race the other cars that I'd be overwhelmed trying to add another input, especially when it's frequent.

With that said, I've had enough. Over the course of the year and a half I've been playing this game I assumed I'd make the switch if I ever got a wheel, but I can't see that happening in the future. I thought about making this thread a while ago when a few races showed how much of a disadvantage I was at, but it's been an ongoing thing for weeks. I can't fuel save, which is a pain because I drive for Nissan in the Manufacturer Series and because PD set appalling fuel consumption rates in both Daily and FIA races. I can't control certain cars properly because the car will be in the wrong gear at the wrong time. I feel as if I'm wasting my time sticking with something which is demonstrably worse, both in terms of immersion and potential. I have it bad enough with tyre wear when using a DS4, so if I can make a positive change, I think I should.

I'm not, I suppose, bad at the game as-is. My ratings are currently tanked, but my DR was as high as 34.9K just recently. When I don't piss about in daily races I can regularly be an A driver when focusing on FIA races, and can consistently get 1000+ point results. I also have the Platinum trophy from Gran Turismo 5, which has nothing to do with this topic but I feel I should mention anyway. There's pace in there.

So, my questions are as follows:

- Have you made this change, and how did you find it?
- What buttons should I use? Currently I use the right stick for throttle and R2 for brake. I get the feeling this should change. What buttons should I map rear view and change view to?
- How much attention do you have to pay to the game as you play for this to work consistently?
- How long does it take to learn what gear you should be in for what corner on certain tracks?
- … will this make me better at this game, or driving games in general? Will it make me enjoy them more?

Thanks for any suggestions anyone has.
Click to expand...

Start with slower cars. I made the switch a couple of weeks ago. Use the daily in Suzuka, gr4 is great for learning.
I use x for shifting up and square for down. How long it'll take to learn which gear to use in each turn depends on many things. How fast do you learn, do you watch top time replays? These help give you an idea. You can adapt your style after you build a basic framework on how the lap flows.
I'll tell you, it is totally worth the work. You'll be able to do things, specially on slower corners, that you just can't do with AT.
 

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