GT Sport’s Spa Daily Race Hit By Deluge of Cheating [Update]

Update: Since we posted this article, Polyphony Digital has addressed the issue with additional barriers to prevent corner-cutting. The original article is preserved below.

It’s only natural for gamers to probe the limits of what’s allowed in a game. This is how we discover neat things like how to set rain conditions on every track in GT Sport. However, when it comes to things that affect other players, and give the unscrupulous a leg up, it’s just not cricket.

Those of us who play GT Sport’s Daily Races will have noticed that some players are unnaturally fast in Race C this week. These players are setting qualifying lap times that are beyond what seems possible, and are unable to replicate that form in the race itself except on the final lap. There’s a good reason for this: they’re cheating, and it’s getting pretty widespread.

The situation is pretty similar to when the Goodwood Motor Circuit first appeared in GT Sport, and it all hinges on that final chicane. In essence, players are exploiting how the game calculates penalties. You can see the trick in action below:

GT Sport divides circuits up into mini-sectors. Each time you pass a mini-sector, the game updates your gaps to the car in front or to your best lap time. If you leave the track’s limits, it checks your mini-sector times to see if you gained time and applies a penalty. However it only does this when you return to the circuit and pass through a mini-sector.

With the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps, as with Goodwood, the trick involves shortcutting the final chicane and then remaining off the track up until the finish line. By staying off the track, the game doesn’t detect and apply the penalty until the start of the next lap. This means that players can cut around three seconds from their qualifying lap or final race lap without penalty.

Polyphony Digital has previously acted quickly to remedy the situation at both Goodwood and the Time Trial at Willow Springs. However in both cases it required the addition of unsightly barriers. We wait to see if there will be a solution for Spa, and what form it will take.

Featured image courtesy of Stephan.

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