Reviews// Gran Turismo 5 Prologue

Event mode is more of a structured challenge. You start out with 3,500,000 credits, which is enough to buy one of the six cheapest cars from Prologue’s full range of 40 cars. The chequered flag waves and you get to enter any of Prologue’s eight C-class challenges, which include model-specific time trial challenges and races, and a mission race around the new Daytona Speedway track.

Finish in at least third place on these events and you’ll unlock eight B-class challenges. Do the same thing there and you’ll be racing A-class events. Credits won in events can be used to buy new cars for your garage.

There are no car upgrades or parts on offer, as Prologue only permits you to buy complete cars. It’s the little limitations such as this, as well as the absence of offline multiplayer and license tests that clearly mark GT5 Prologue as a stripped-down game. There’s still a decent challenge here, though.

Most of the C-class and B-class challenges are fairly easy for veterans, but I found it very difficult to get golds on A-class events. It pays to save up for a top-of-the-line motor, but that takes time and patience, as you’ll have to repeat races until you build up sufficient capital for that Ferrari or Dodge. It’s worth it, though, especially if you take the view that you’re always honing your driving skills for greater challenges.

There are other challenges in dealers’ showrooms, where you can enter manufacturer events. If you buy an Audi TT, for example, you can take it back to Audi for a special TT-only race event. Most of Prologue’s 22 dealers offer these one-off races, which in turn generate even more prize money.

Naturally the most important thing to consider before buying Gran Turismo 5 Prologue is how it responds and how its cars handle. I always thought the default settings in old GT games left the cars feeling a bit too heavy, as though you really had to drag them around corners. In Prologue that phenomenon has cleared to reveal a fresher and more immediate set of physics. You can really throw cars into bends and still feel like you’re in full control, until you overdo it. Forza 2 does this even better, but Prologue shows that GT5 is heading in the right direction.

Sony claims Prologue has “all-new and improved opponent AI for a nail-biting race experience”. Well I didn’t get to that stage, but there has been some improvement. You can see AI-controlled drivers if you look through the windows of cars in replays, and they do seem to be imbued with some kind of intelligence at last – I’ve been cut up a few times, even though I didn’t instigate or provoke the aggressive driving, and I’ve also seen some horrible pile-ups. The AI is a bit more unpredictable now, then, but I still don’t think it’s particularly clever.