I finally got to sit down and try out my copy of GT5 with my Fanatec PWTS yesterday. Here are my impressions.
Before we start, however, please understand that I really did want GT5 to be better than FM3. Just as I want FM4 to be better than GT5. I own both consoles and don't have any special affinity for either of them. Unlike, I'd guess, some of the holy crusaders in this thread. And with that, prepare for some GT5 trash-talking!
My first impression was that the presentation was laughably atrocious. From the bizarre opening movie, the Pilotwings-like elevator music (and I'm a jazz lover!), and the cumbersome menus, I began to get worried. Oh, ok, it's time to pick my race outfit. Well, I'd much rather just race, but
okay. Now I have to pick a background color? And a picture? Set my home message? Well, this is irritating. I couldn't help but contrast this to FM3 in which I already would have been guided through the intro with a well-produced voiceover and put into an R8 for a teaser. I felt as if I had gone back in time to 1998.
But I'm a reasonable guy. I realize that the racing is where it all happens, so I'm willing to put up with the clunky presentation. So let's pick a car
don't laugh but the MX5 is one that I know pretty well so let's start there. I had heard that not all cockpits were modeled, but it was a little disappointing to see this realized with my very first ride. I thought that I could overlook this, but I guess I'm just too anal.
I take off in my first race and immediately start noticing some signs of trouble. I don't need to go into the visual problems that people seem so focused on, but needless to say that the game looks great until it doesn't. Then it gets ugly. I can usually overlook texture issues and mild tearing, etc
but framerate drops are hugely disappointing in a racing game. FM3 isn't perfect in visuals, but it seems to usually do okay in the framerate department with a few exceptions.
What I did appreciate at this point was the driving model, particularly with the weight transfer. I play with all assists off and it felt surprisingly good-maybe even better than FM3. However, and this is a big one for me, the lousy rumble, force feedback, and sounds make it extremely hard to get any feedback about the car other than visual feedback. What I mean is that there is little indicator of what's happening when I begin to oversteer, slide, or lose traction. It's an odd sensation when things begin to go wrong, almost as if the back end of the car just gracefully starts to float away with no sign of trouble. The whole driving model feels more organic compared to FM3, which could be a good thing if the haptic and aural feedback were better. I didn't get into tuning to see how this affects the modeling, but this is big for me.
One other issue with the feedback is how GT5 handles the clutch and 6-speed shifter. The clutch has a very, very, small biting point that makes it tricky to feather. More importantly, the clutch will not engage if the accelerator is down even a little bit. It actually throws you into neutral or reverse with no indication that it has interpreted this as a mis-shift. It's surprising that they got this so wrong when FM3 has a pretty good clutch/shifter system despite there being only one wheel that supports this. Bizarre.
I raced more throughout the evening and really did try to give GT5 a chance, but I'm afraid that the problems that I have with it are just too glaring. It's a shame because I think that there's a good game in there and some of the features blow FM3 away. I guess I'll look forward to FM4 at this point and hope that it combines the best of both games. Then again, the talk of Kinect has me a little worried about the future of that series.
I think I'll put GT5 on the shelf in the meantime.