MotoGP stars Rossi and Lorenzo take battle to Gran Turismo 5
The 2011 MotoGP season may have ended, but two top motorcycle racers are continuing their racing rivalry via Gran Turismo 5 during the break.
Valentino Rossi endured a tough first season riding for Ducati, failing to record a single victory for the first time in his 15-year career, so was possibly trying to boost his morale when he issued a Gran Turismo 5 challenge via Twitter. “I’m issuing a challenge: Gran Turismo 5. Nurburgrïng. Driving the Zonda R. A lap time of 6.14.211. Can anyone beat that?”, and clarifying the rules with “Simulation mode, not driver aids except traction control at level 5. With the steering wheel.”
Given than he has almost 250,000 followers he was probably expecting a challenge, but possibly not from Yamaha MotoGP star Jorge Lorenzo, whose title challenge had ended after he was forced to miss the Phillip Island round of the championship due to injury. After asking “That was a warm-up lap, right”, Lorenzo followed it with photographic evidence of a 5:58.2 lap, which he has since dropped to 5:48.7. Rossi took the response in good humour, responding “5:58.2 Jorge? Nice lap. I have to practice!”
Valentino Rossi has famously raced in various rallies, including the Rally GB, and tested Formula 1 cars with times comparable to many of the permanent F1 drivers at the time. But Capcom are probably wondering why they chose to battle via Gran Turismo 5 rather than MotoGP 10/11!
Incidentally, if you wanted to take up the challenge and don’t have a wheel, don’t forget we reviewed the awesome Thrustmaster T500 RS, which is the officially licensed GT5 wheel and pedal set. And with Christmas almost here, it’s not too late to drop a few hints to anyone who might buy it for you! Or to potentially pick up a bargain on ebay at the moment.
Join the ORDC Club on Forza Motorsport 4
One of the best things about Forza Motorsport 4 is the resurrection of the formal Clubs element. Not only does it bring racers together more easily, but it’s great to have messaging options and the ability to share cars etc.
Obviously we’ve got a club running – ORDC – and we’d love to have you as a part of it.
ORDC Club in Forza Motorsport 4
In addition to all the benefits of joining any Forza Motorsport 4 club (the achievement, the chance to access additional cars), we’ll also be offering some additional incentives with some competitions/prizes for club members, and when we work on project cars with the world’s top Forza tuners, you’ll be able to access them via the ORDC wherever possible.
We’ll also be using it as a way to build teams to tackle some of the best unofficial Forza race series around, so whether you just fancy hanging out with some reasonable racers who make an effort not to pile into everyone at the first corner, or want to take your racing a little more seriously, you should find a home at the ORDC.
Want to join? Just leave your gamertag in the comments and we’ll add you at the earliest opportunity.
The Ultimate Forza Motorsport 3-screen set-up
Need for Speed: The Run announced
Well, that was quick – no sooner had we posted the trailer, than a press release arrived officially announcing Need for Speed: The Run which is due for release on November 18, 2011, for the Xbox 360, Playstation 3, PC, Wii and 3DS.
It’s being developed by Black Box, and will put you into a cross-country race from San Francisco to New York with underground racing involving you avoiding the police, beating your rivals and taking on urban traffic, icy mountain passes and narrow canyons. It’ll be powered by DICE’s Frostbite 2 engine.
“This is the year that Need for Speed goes to the next level,” said Jason DeLong, Executive Producer at EA. “We think that Need for Speed The Run is going to surprise people with its intense, thrilling story and big action feel. But the game would be nothing without hot cars and crazy-fast chases. So that is what we’re delivering — explosive racing that will have players flirting with disaster at 200-miles an hour.”
It’ll continue to use the Need for Speed Autlog system to track how you and your friends are performing in the game and pump out that information to all your social networks as you race from the Golden Gate Bridge to the Empire State Building.
Are there enough Cannonball Run fans to justify Need for Speed: The Run? Will you want it sat alongside Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit and Shift 2: Unleashed on your shelf? And will this be a successful return to the roots of the Need for Speed series? We’ll be watching this one closely!
Gran Turismo Surpasses 60 Million Sales
Gran Turismo 5 finally arrived with a worldwide release last month after a long wait, and the most recent delays led ‘games analysts’ to predict sales could suffer – particularly after the release of Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit just before GT5.
But no racing fan will be surprised to know GT5 is selling faster than a Sebastien Vettel qualifying lap, and that’s been highlighted by the fact the series has now passed 60 million units, with Gran Turismo 5 contributing 5.5 million sales in the first 12 days of release. That 60 million figure comes after 13 years, 5 full games, 4 prologues, and the prospect that work on Gran Turismo 6 is already underway.
Gran Turismo 5 is also topping charts around the world – including Japan and Australia. In the UK it held the top spot for a couple of weeks, but Call of Duty: Black Ops has just recovered (For Call of Duty and similar games, check out the new FPSPrestige website – from the people that bring your OnlineRaceDriver!).
Don’t forget Forza is part of the World Cyber Games 2010
Qualifying is almost complete for the World Cyber Games 2010, taking place at the Los Angeles Convention Center from September 30 – October 3, 2010, with Forza Motorsport 3 one of the official games of the tournament.
In fact, three racing games will play a part, with Trackmania for the PC, and Asphalt 5 for mobile gamers.
As one of the UK writers for ORD, I’ll be cheering on Daveyskills who will be representing us in Forza 3, and Shaw in Trackmania.
Buy Forza Motorsport 3 from:
Buy Trackmania from:
Looking forward to the best F1 game ever made
September 24th 2010. Get that date in your diaries – for it’s the release date of what looks set to be the greatest Formula One game of all time. Five developer videos have been released to whet our appetites, and after watching them I’m bloody hungry. Each will wet your pants for different reasons: the first is a general introduction, the second explains the handling physics, the third regards the superb-looking weather effects, the fourth looks at the how all the tracks and cars have been designed and finally number five (the best one) gives a sneak peek into how the game itself will work. This is where the game begins to potentially stand apart from other racing games.
Codemasters have dabbled previously in storyline-based racing games – remember Ryan McKane, the boy-racer out to avenge his fathers’ death? No, of course you don’t, because you bought TOCA Race Driver
The cars don’t require extensive setting up either – which is one of my biggest bug bears about racing games. I don’t want to spend hours adjusting my gear ratios, torque settings, brake bias and the ‘in’ and ‘out’ of my toe. I don’t even care what a toe is, let alone know whether it should be sticking ‘in’ or ‘out’ or up another driver’s arse. The cars in F1 2010 will have been generally set up by your team, just like in real life, and it will be down to the driver to tweak these settings, and not have to understand the minutiae of aerodynamics and gearbox technology in order to do so.
Then there’s the racing itself – obviously the game has all the licenses etc, but the attention to detail is impressive. Tyres will grain, a proper racing line will emerge and tracks will ‘marble’ – meaning do-or-die overtaking manouveres are likely to end in ‘die’ unless perfectly judged. The weather effects look truly superb, and when you’re racing on slick tyres when the rain begins to fall strategy becomes all important – do you pit and cost yourself time? Do you stay out and risk an accident? These are the real-life judgment calls that F1 drivers have to make and they are the calls that the player will make in the game, which is exactly how it should be.
In-game voice talent comes from BBC Radio Five Live commentator David Croft, with his co-commentator Anthony Davidson – the former BAR, Minardi and Super Aguri F1 driver acting as a special advisor to Codemasters whilst creating the game. Codies have said they won’t be including an in-game commentator in the style of the previous F1 series where first Murray Walker and then James Allen lent their vocal talents (and hopefully there won’t be such an irritating engineer barking at you whenever you do anything vaguely interesting. Yes, I know I’ve crashed thanks. I personally think having no commentary is a brilliant decision as there is nothing more unrealistic when pretending you are an F1 driver than hearing a TV commentator talking over the sound of your engine during the race. After all, the game should be about representing the sport and not the TV coverage.
So what’s Crofty doing in the game if he isn’t commentating? Good question. I’m glad I asked it. The answer is he will be the voice in the post-race press conferences, asking questions relating to your performance if you make it to the podium. The answers you give will affect the media and the public’s perception of you and presumably have a knock-on effect on how quickly you can progress your fledgling career. The fifth developer diary video gives us a pant-wetting sniff of how the game is structured and what we might be looking to expect.
Above all what makes this game the most exciting prospect for F1 fans since Grand Prix 4 is that the team behind the game really know what they are doing. There won’t be a demo – the team are focusing 100% on the game until release, and they won’t be messing around creating any downloadable content, for as soon as the game is released the development team will turn their attentions to F1 2011. There was no F1 2009 because they didn’t want to rush out a sub-standard product. The game’s senior producer Paul Geal worked on Geoff Crammond’s ‘Grand Prix’ series, and the fact that GP3 and GP4 are still modded and updated by a strong fan community tells you that they are still the best F1 racers available. But not for long. F1 2010 looks set to be a massive step forward not just for F1 games but also for the entire genre and I cannot wait. Go on – I dare you not to order it
ModNation Racers launch video trailer
It’s only a video game, right?
A fascinating phenomenon associated with modern gaming has manifested itself in recent years. The advent of on-line multiplayer games (and their social networking structure) has for the first time in human history, and for all practical purposes, blurred the once distinctive age barriers between generations.
With the creation of the internet and its associated applications like on-line gaming, the primary way people are relating to each other is through faceless audio voices. The ever increasing sophistication of gaming in general has helped to lure not just kids, but also adults of all ages, gender, and nationalities to partake in the special effects experience that is the fun world of modern gaming.
Brothers playing videosgames by Sean_Dreilinger on Flickr (CC Licence)
In the case of simulation games and the steeper learning curve to master them, kids below the age of 18 are easily the minority. It may surprise you to learn that according to, “Biz Report” a demographic tracking company, the average age of todays gamer is 35. People over the age of 50 comprise 26% of all gamers.
However the demographics break down, the fact is everyone is mentally pictured by everyone else, at about the same vague age when interacting with other on-line gamers. Doesn’t matter if you are 21 like Forza oval aces, “WStewart1206”, or 71 years young like, “EZT TomCat7,” the nature of the technology and the majority average age of user’s, means that everyone is treated as though they are about 35 years old. Easy to do when you can’t see who you are talking to. The sound of ones voice is just not enough to tell the difference between a 21 year old and a 31 year old for example.
Question is, is this a good thing? Is it good to treat someone under the age of say 16, with the same respect as someone twice his age? Is their a problem with granting equal adult consideration and social status to a youngster who has not yet moved into that more mature arena? Is society being more harmed than enhanced by this, “social evolution” that creates a virtual community of one adult age group, whether you are an actual adult or not? In the future will this lead to a further desensitizing of the differences between a legal adult, and a minor? Does such a blurry condition where the traditional hierarchies of a structured society break down, naturally cause that society to eventually fail?
These questions may sound a bit too rhetorical and alarmist for the topic of gaming, but the fact that they can be asked at all tells you at the very least that things are more socially different now than at any other time in the past, and we should take note of it. Considering that 60% or more of all American households have video game equipment, and that social networking itself is on an exponential rise world wide, cultural change may be occurring so fast that we can track it almost month to month. In the past it took an entire length of a generation for cultural changes to take place and grip a society, now it may only take a couple of years.
In simulation racing as with real racing there has always been a blurring of the lines of age (and gender), because on the race track, you are just another competitor, and age or gender is never considered, (unless you are the ageless NASCAR star Mark Martin of course). Games or sports that are not entirely dependant on youth as a main advantage, as in automotive racing, have seen a wide mix of ages competing head to head.
The difference in simulation racing is greater casual social interactivity above and beyond the game at hand. You won’t see real racers pal around and have a beer together after a race, when one is 17, and the other is 35, married, with two kids and a mortgage. This does in its own way happen in on-line gaming however. Not that you can have a literal beer together, but more of a virtual drink together, and time for talk about other things outside of simulation racing. The down time between races or events provides the time for this kind of social interaction on an equal level, because remember, the perception is all participants think the person they are listening to is about 30 something years old, even if they are not.
Maybe the more interesting question becomes which generation will people be more persuaded by when all generations are for the first time in human history given equal status via the anonymity of on-line gaming? In the absence of age identification which culture will influence all the others the most? Will the younger trendy under 20 something generation become the dominant group to advise and lead everyone else? Or will the older more creative baby boomers dominate the scene as they are apt to do?
My guess is that the two will leach off of each other establishing a blended middle ground never seen before. Because of this new kind of socializing the authoritarians will lose some authority, and those light on esteem will gain more esteem.
In the end it looks like gaming will be the domain of the more mature open minded generation, be they young or old. How this affects society in general is hard to predict. There are some parallels you can point to in the case of the internet itself, which suggests that the more information made available the more free thinking societies become, and the greater chance for improved mutual understanding lives to see another day.
The flip side paints a gloomier picture, one of societal break down, the idea that certain natural barriers of age and gender are essential for a healthy community and should not be crossed, and that dismantling these support structures brings about the decline and chaos of a society where leadership is lost and moral direction is abandoned. But hey, don’t worry too much; it’s only a video game, right?
Full throttle,
AAR GTDon
Tips and tuition: The Forza Files 2
Although it’s true that the fastest laps in Forza3 are executed by the fastest hot lappers of the 1.5 million drivers in the Forza community, it is widely recognized that this is but one facet or skill set of the simulation racing genre. Racing head to head, or door handle to door handle, is yet another side that produces its own legion of experts. One can be good at both, but few can be great at both.
It is accepted rightly or wrongly in the Forza community that the two are very different skill sets, and require two differing mindsets to master. My opinion is less discriminating. I believe one is the indispensible training aid of the other.
Everyone does at least some hot lapping which amounts to the real racing equivalent of practice sessions and testing. In F1, for a real-world example, special types of drivers are often used solely for testing. The test driver’s job is to in effect hot lap the car so the engineers can prepare it for the actual racer to practice in, and then bring the car up to a race competitive level. Test drivers are often specialized high quality drivers in their own right, but for whatever reason may have never truly succeeded at the highest level in competitive racing.
In Forza we see a similar type of division between hot lappers and racers. Elite racers will often foray into the arena of hot lapping, and indeed have often come from the competitive ranks of hot lappers. This kind of cross over is common, but, much less so the other way. There are dedicated elite hot lappers that refuse to race based on a long list of reasons that their counterparts say are merely excuses. Reasons such as, “I don’t like to race,” “I hate lag and collisions,” “I’m only interested in running a perfect lap and I can’t do that with other cars on the track,” and perhaps most damning, “I don’t like the pressure of racing.” It is for these reasons and others like them that some of the very best Forza hot lappers in the world make no attempt to enter competitive racing events.
Obviously there is some human psychology to all this. If you are exceptionally good at one pursuit, there is little reason for you to pursue another similarly related endeavor that you are not exceptional at. Human ego being what it is prefers to be the “king of the hill,” over the “also-ran,” every day of the week.
Nevertheless, racers need the tutelage that comes from hot lapping, and can not do without it. To be an extremely good FM3 racer means that you will by necessity need to run laps that are nearly on a par with a top 10 hot lapper. The fundamental skill to run supremely fast laps is most easily gotten by hot lapping. Just as in real life racing, “there is no substitute for track time.” The more seat time you have the faster you will be.
Because of this near dichotomy of the two camps, the question often arises how to determine who is really #1 in the entire Forza world? Is it the more gamer oriented hot lap driver who sees the simulation race track as nothing more than a “map” with a single artificial racing line? Or is it the Michael Schumacher simulation wannabe racing addict, who can expertly pirouette his way through traffic using a variety of lines for the win? The question may never be directly answered. Sort of like comparing dissimilar apex predators, depends on what ecosystem you place them in. A marine predator on land is no mach for a land based carnivore.
There is no unifying method to bring the two together on a level playing field is the overriding problem. Making things even more difficult (on the hot lap side) are the recent revelations of transmission glitches that somehow allow a given car to be over-built for the class. This isn’t the first time “Turn10” has had this sort of thing pop up, but with all the advances of FM3 it was an unexpected shock. Worse still is the fact that “Turn10” has known of the glitch for some months now and refuses to address it. This has sent angry waves of clamor all throughout the Forza community lately. The leader boards are being undermined as a result, and as has been the case in the past with the franchise, no one knows for sure who is legit and who isn’t. Even those veterans that are well known for their speed are being questioned. It’s a sad state of affairs because with each passing day the leader boards become more skewed, and rife with pretenders, and ne’er-do-wells.
On the racing side things are not that much better, there is no unifying international sim-racing championship to produce an ultimate #1 competitor in Forza Motorsports. The premier Xbox360 league known as the, “IFCA” (International Forza Club Association), boasts some of the fastest drivers in the world, but lays no claim to hosting any overall definitive championship among their many popular series events. I mention the IFCA because they are the closest to actually having a Forza world champion, with their end of the year, “IFCA Championship” finale. This is when the top points earning drivers from out of all the IFCA series for the entire year meet to compete head to head.
Still, this is but one league (albeit the largest), there are other Forza leagues that have their own cadre of super star drivers too. There is Race Shop World Series , SIMRACING HD , Virtual Motorsports Racing League , International Sim Racing Association , The Online Racing Association , Forza Motorsport Challenge , and Sim Racers to name a few.
The smartest thing all of these well known racing leagues could do to promote their sport, is come together as a unifying force and agree to produce a single, “Forza World Champion.” It has been suggested that each league might select a representative champion candidate to battle the other league champions. Until then the only other rough estimation for who might be #1 is found in the IFCA World Rankings List . The list is a compilation of data points including hot lap, time trial, and series performances for the top 200 Forza2 drivers in the world. In general it gave the Forza community a vaguely accurate idea of who was probably #1 overall. A new and up to date list is said to be in the works for FM3.
So where does it leave us for now? In a place of relative uncertainty one could argue, but there is hope. Though the hot lap leader boards are being compromised daily, series racing has been revitalized! Due in part to another debacle involving the new match making form of multi-player mode for Forza3, many have left the once endlessly popular public lobby scene in search of greater racing fulfillment in the form of league racing. As proof, memberships have skyrocketed, and leagues like the IFCA have had to place a limit on sign-ups for some of their series for the first time ever in their nearly 5 year history.
Though the bloom may be off of the venerable “hot lapper” these days, sim-racers may be entering a new renaissance period that has only just begun. Cruel irony is that Forza3 as a simulation racing game has at the same time both initiated the ground swell towards sim-racing, while not offering more racing features, but less. It suggests that the up-tick in popularity amongst league racing is as a direct result, a kind of protest vote against the many fundamental changes away from simulation racing.
See you at the track,
AAR GTDon
This week’s track tip comes from the #1 lap record holder in D-Class for Sunset Peninsula Full Reverse:
“Turn 1 is critical, down shift to 5th early, and then into 4th early, and clip the inside rumble strip with the left front tire. Make an early turn-in towards turn 2, and go over the right side rumble strip with your right side tires. If done right you will run out of 5th gear before turn 3 arrives. Let it bounce off the rev limiter once or twice, then down shift to 4th as you enter turn 3, followed by a quick down shift to 3rd. Stay on a wide arc, 3rd gear will bring you through turns 4 and 5, go way to the inside and heavily over the rumble strips into turn 5 to avoid the wall. Shift up to 4th, and then 5th gear early, as you start to turn-in early for turn 6. As you exit turn 8, shift down to 4th gear, and then immediately drop to 3rd, and line your car way out to the left side before entering the hard slow right hand turn 9. Shift up to 4th and 5th staying to the inside around fast turns 10 and 11. Stay to the outside before entering turn 12, and then steer towards the inside in 3rd gear as you aim for the inside curb, then let the car drift wide to the outside before reapplying throttle for the long exit of turns 13-14, and onto the finish. Or, you can just race my ghost.” –AAR GTDon
