Reviews// Gran Turismo 6

In most driving games, it's usually the other vehicles that bring the challenge to the table, but the AI cars in GT games are not so aggressive or even interactive. They sometimes give me a nudge and throw me off the road, but only if I'm directly in their way, seemingly by accident.

They all follow the same racing line as each other - breaking, turning and accelerating in phase like synchronised drivers trying to score a 10. They hardly stray from the path to overtake anybody either. A few times I've found myself in 2nd place with the winner half a lap ahead of me and the rest queueing behind me. Realism can be apparent in many forms but for this game the AI has a long way to go.

It seems the only reason for other cars is so that we can more easily gauge how well we're doing in a race. As if the car in first place is just the gold trophy time we have to beat and the second car is the silver trophy time, etc. Although of course these times will vary from race to race.

I find it easy to use the other cars to my advantage too. Since the way they drive is so 'vanilla' and safe, I can always rely on them to brake early enough so that if I'm right behind one I can just use them as a safety net to slow you down for a corner. Techniques like this are so easy and effective. You don't even get punished for them, which leads me to believe that this wasn't even thought of during the making of the game.

Apparently there are around 1,200 cars for you to win, buy, or otherwise obtain. This might seem a bit over-the-top as out of these I will probably only ever choose to buy around 10-20 that I actually want. The rest I'll have either won or just bought for a specific event.

I'm glad I don't have to go wading through the giant mosaic of car dealerships every single time though. If I need to find a new car that fits certain requirements, there's a handy section of recommended cars that serves up a decent choice based on whichever license section or type of event you choose.

I suppose the reason for including so many cars is for variety more than anything else. At first you can only afford cheap, every-day cars that you'll see being driven around every day, not built for high speeds and quick cornering. This is what I like about the Gran Turismo series - you start at the bottom and drive a variety of different classes of cars on your journey to the top.

In previous games you'd gradually work your way up to high-end supercars after a very long time spent driving slow cars in which you have to brake very early just to get around corners. However, GT6 seems like a much shorter game. I seem to accumulate money much quicker so that I'm able to buy much better cars earlier on. Tuning costs a fortune though, as if to balance this out.

I tried the online multiplayer and went through the motions of creating a lobby. It takes a bit of setting up as you can fine-tune every aspect of the rules for your event. Thankfully though, you can save your event settings. I do have a little niggle about this though.

After I saved my settings I tried to open the event and I and was stopped because I hadn't added a comment. Why would it let me save settings that I couldn't start a game with? I have lots of little niggles like this, but that's all they are - just little annoyances that are in no way game-breaking.

It feels like more of a complete version of GT5 than a full sequel, especially with it not coming to PS4 at this stage. They should've called it “[i]Gran Turismo 5: Encore[/“i]. I still feel that it's a great game but the timing with the PS4 and lack of graphical advancement will reflect badly on it.

Pros
+ Simplified and more accessible.
+ A few interesting new features like Lunar Exploration.
+ Still a solid Gran Turismo experience, but simplified.

Cons
- Graphics haven't improved much since GT5
- Still too much waiting around where there shouldn't be.
- More like an expansion of GT5 than a full sequel.

SPOnG Score: 3.5/5