Shared from www.theguardian.com.
At first glance, Gran Turismo 7 offers much the same experience as the original game did back in 1997: an idiosyncratically clean aesthetic, a focus on authentic handling and impossibly shiny cars that put any carwash to shame. There have been some tweaks under the hood, as you would expect, and one major alteration that will probably divide fans, but this 25-year-old motor is very much still running.
One thing that hasn’t changed is Sony-owned developer Polyphony Digital’s synergistic mastery of PlayStation hardware. Gran Turismo has always been trotted out to demonstrate the true graphical potential of Sony’s consoles, and Gran Turismo 7 slips into its traditional role of technical showcase with ease on PlayStation 5. While it remains compatible with the PlayStation 4, on the newer machine this is a jaw-slackeningly beautiful game. Each vehicle is fettled in obsessive detail, down to the exact arrangement of reflective elements in an individual car’s headlights.
The game also provides the best workout for the haptic trickery of the PS5’s DualSense controller yet. In a racing simulator, understanding the forces to which the car is subjected at any given moment is crucial, and GT7 turns this handheld collection of vibration motors and resistive triggers into a remarkably effective communication tool.
The much anticipated car-collecting campaign mode returns after its absence in Gran Turismo Sport, and it’ll grab most of the headlines. But in a move that is likely to frustrate longstanding fans, it’s surprisingly different this time round. Instead of the other titles’ more freeform vehicle-purchasing exploration, your route through the early part of the game is tightly controlled and punctuated with educational mini-lectures on significant or enduring aspects of car culture. Series creator Kazunori Yamauchi evidently sees preservation of this culture as a solemn responsibility in a changing automotive landscape, something that’s clearly reflected in the charming yet slightly stuffy delivery of these history lessons.
Less forgivably, earning money can be painfully slow, the occasional gift roulettes are comically miserly, and the most desirable cars are phenomenally expensive and often only fleetingly available as the in-game markets shift. The result is enormous longevity for those with the patience, but even then there’s the nagging sense that the entire economy is built to coerce players into spending real money to secure their favourites.
Fortunately, the time you spend out on the track, whether alone or in the cleverly regulated multiplayer mode, is a pleasure. The handling model, the core of any racing sim, remains hugely engaging. The most profound additions to the driving experience are two features that are neither completely new nor particularly glamorous, but they are executed superlatively: the changing time of day and weather conditions, which are nothing less than a full-blown atmospheric simulation. Spotting your braking at the end of the Le Mans 24 Hour circuit’s infamous Mulsanne straight becomes an entirely different challenge as the sun gradually dips below the horizon, and even from a solely aesthetic perspective, it’s difficult not to feel utterly transported as you sweep towards Yokohama docks through the early morning mist, rays of the rising sun bouncing off the asphalt.
Rather than the old binary of wet and dry races, certain circuits can evolve as the session progresses. If it’s damp but not actively raining, a visible drying line may appear as cars displace the standing water, but races just as often begin wet and get even wetter, offering up less grip as the asphalt becomes completely saturated. Arriving at an event with no idea of the conditions you will encounter, but being able to accurately read the road in front of you, extends the novelty of the already generous number of cars and circuits available. That said, neither of the two British circuits, Brands Hatch and Goodwood, support wet weather at all, which does beg the question: has Yamauchi ever visited the UK?
It’s reassuring that despite ever-greater technical refinement, Gran Turismo’s unique, eccentric character remains intact. It’s present in the grab-bag mission mode, which handily demonstrates that a race between 17 brake horsepower Fiat 500s can be just as gripping as one between cars with 50 times that. It manifests most obviously in the utterly bemusing music rally mode, which has you hitting checkpoints to the strains of 80s pop relic Hooked on Classics. Keeping this distinctive spirit alive in the era of 4K and 60 frames a second, Gran Turismo 7 feels both fresh and comfortingly familiar.
Images and Article from www.theguardian.com