More on Gran Turismo HD Comments by Tom Bramwell

As justified it might be to make jokes about GTHD, it is not only two-player head-to-head.

@lambtron

I don't know about the "who has what track" issue. I agree, if it wasn't managed properley it could be a proper mess. Got no answer for that, but I hope Polyphony do :)

@Hog-lumps

I get what you are saying, and I agree a bit of a random element can turn up some nice surprises. I see that as a bonus, but I don't think it breaks the whole model that Polyphomny are aiming for. Plus, I would hope that sufficient descriptions and community chit chat would draw players to tracks they hadn't previously considered (for example, its word of mouth that made the most popular CounterStrike maps the success they were).


@alpha-0ne

Oh ffs. You win the pointy hat for your excellent regurgetation of the "this is how much it will cost if you buy everything" example.


Someone mentioned concern for those who won't use the online services. Well surely the classic pack simply isn't for them. As I see it (unless I missed something) the two packs could be viewed as online and offline variants (roughly speaking).

I mean you can hardly blame an online game for not catering for offline players. You may as well criticise GT for not catering for the snowboard fans among us for all the relevance it has.

@markypants

Same point really. A game cannot really be blamed for the lack of broadband amongst some gamers. If you have no decent internet access than buy a different game, simple as that. If you have a next gen console and you DON'T have broadband, well that is really something for the customer to sort surely (coverage allowing I realise) if they are to get the best out of their investment.

@Artemis_Matsas

"If for some reason i just have to format my PS3's hard drive, then what?"

Online purchasing won't work like that. When you buy something you have bought the right to download it as many times as you want, but it will only work on your specific system/account/whatever (don't know the exact details of how it will be secured).

Downloadable content has been around for ages. Just look at PC shareware or e-books. There will always be a way to cater for you losing your drive contents, so that shouldn't be a concern.

"Sony hopes to make GT HD available for a very low price - as little as the cost of the game disk and instruction manual"

Well, that makes it a good deal more sensible than my worst fears. 30 spangly GT5 cars of the quality of the Lotus Elise screenshot for the cost of a few buttons seems worthwhile having. Then just a few favourite cars and tracks should bring the whole thing in for under a tenner for me.

@disc

"Can you ask them why they aren't just making Gran Turismo HD Classic available for free as a download?"

I wouldn't be amazed to see that happening. Wipeout Pure on PSP is essentially using that model.

They want us to pay like, heaps of pounds for a full game. They must be joking.

Heres hoping Forza 2 doesn't go down the same path

dk_rare it isnt, you will have 300 cars (ALL WITH FULL VISIBLE DAMAGE), 50 tracks, 12 player onine play

there will be new cars and tarcks but in additionl to these

I really cant understand why anyone is trying to justify this... how can getting less for your money be better? How could anyone just want less choice than what they have had before... wow its agood job online is free.. ;-)

If the visible damage in the first Forza is anything to go by, I can live without that.

And it's obvious this is meant as an appatizer. If you want to wait for two or three years to play a Gran Turismo game, then that's your decision. If you want a taste of things to come, well, that's your own decision too. Funny though, that many of those who complaint wouldn't buy a full GT game either, because they're either a) anti-Sony and won't buy a PS3 anyway or b) anti-GT.

They don't force you to buy it, so why the hell complaint? So many ridiculous people here. If it's so difficult to not buy a game, then go see a psychologist.

Oh the irony, first you (as in plural) bash Sony for not giving you the option to have Blu-Ray as it brings the price up, because why should you pay for something you don't want. Then you bash Polyphony to give you the chance to buy EXACTLY what you want and not pay for something you don't want. So which is it?

@alpha-0ne

It simply depends on what is more important to you, the number of tracks you can drive on, or that you like all of the tracks? Some of your value is coming from the fact that you can choose exactly what tracks and cars you pay for and don't have to pay for any of the ones you don't want. For some players, it won't be the right deal, for others it will be.

Now I fully accept the price point they have chosen may be wrong, that is something that will be discovered with time, but the principle is sound enough. Its not a model that was created by Polyphony. Its pretty much the reverse of what is known as "buying in bulk" and as a sales model its been around longer than computers have.

I'm afraid I don't like the "pay-for-content" model at all. If I know every new thing is costing me, I'll probably end up only using a fraction of the cars I would have used if they were all included in the game to begin with. I'd rather pay more upfront if it means a richer game experience, even if the only reason the game experience would otherwise be poorer is because I'm a tight-fisted bastard.

It's like buying a game for a home system vs paying to play it at an arcade (although you'd have to assume the arcade machine was in your living room). With the combined cost of a portion of the home system and the game you could pay for more games than you'd probably want to play at an arcade, but knowing that each game doesn't cost you any more, you are free to mess around and try new things on the console version.

Apologies for the clunky comparison, which is no doubt showing my old age, but that's the way I see "pay-for-content" games. Give me a larger sunk cost anyday.

Who the hell cares about the number of cars? I'd say give us ONE car, just make sure it's fast and shiny and fun to drive.

Also, does this mean we don't have to work through the meaningless grind to get the fast cars this time? Maybe I'll have time to play GT this time, then... :)

A problem with the 'only buy what you want' model is surely that people don't neccessarily know what they want - If the game had 20 tracks then I'd try them all, and then just play the 5 I like. But if I have to buy each one individually, I may end up buying say 5 tracks at random, and not liking any of them.

I'm not a big GT fan, but I always thought a large part of the appeal was that you could dabble with a huge variety of cars...

What bout AI? Will tha be included this time?

I'm not a big GT fan, but I always thought a large part of the appeal was that you could dabble with a huge variety of cars...

That's your problem you're not a GT fan meaning you won't know which tracks you do or do not like which is why it's reccomended you play the previous iterations of GT first just so you don't go blindly buying stuff.

I can understand complaining about the Microtransactions infrastructure but at the end of the day it's just a demo.

a £300 demo if you're that dedicated to GT. o_O

What bout AI? Will tha be included this time?

10p per IQ point

Uh , hang on a second , what's the difference between GTHD and any other MMORPG distribution model ? It's not like they are reinventing the wheel here .

Because you don't have to pay real money for every weapon/item you want to use?

DamnMW: "This is outrageous, the game will cost £50 and if you want all the downloadable content you will be easily forking out £75, not good, I played the first 3 GTs and don't intend to play anymore. Car damage was something gamers were asking for more than 8 years so it was about time."


'Don't Fucking Buy It then!' - As My 360 owning friends keep telling me.

What do you pay for a PGR3 car?

@ruttyboy

guess what , you're already paying for that content because you're paying full price for the game .

Anybody remember a game called Motor City Online ? I wonder how long it'll take for that concept to return...

Erm, yes you're right skool, however I answered your question. The two distribution models are completely different 0_o

Btw, why do ppl regard GT as something great? It doesn't do things that other racers didn't already do.

And I just read it again, but am I correct in thinking that the online mode will have nothing? As in: You bought the game, now you will have to buy the tracks and cars to go online?

If so, can I say: Huh?! 0_o

@ruttyboy

hehe , yeah you did . Wasn't there some MMORPG games that were distributed freely and charged for x amount of content ?

''What do you pay for a PGR3 car?''
I'm not actually sure as I was perfectly happy with all the ones that came with the game originally :/

You get GT HD premium with it as well as in GT5 demo with the later to be released Damage and Ai.

But yeah that's practically the online aspect of it.

@ruttyboy

No they're not you have to pay for a subscription despite you shelling £30 on the game to play on it.

If we use the XBL justification pricing method on average the total cost for GT is £428 spread over the next 2 years for the actual GT5 game to be launched (if we're lucky) is £428/730 = 59p per day

Stop buying Pepsi everyday and you'll be fine.

Are the cars already going to be on the disc? I'm thinking this is not going to be the case...?

But if all the cars are not already on the disc how are people who haven't downloaded the same cars going to race?

Hey, you know what? The system for GT:HD will work out and be implemented to suit the gamers - if it doesn't work, it will change.

I certainly don't like the idea of GT5 being a download-only service, but if GT:HD gives PS3 owners a little taste of what's to come, what's the problem?

Have slipped into a parallel universe again?

MMORPG Model - Pay upfront for ALL usable content , then a monthly subscription fee to pay for use of the servers. Expansion packs requiring an additional upfront fee for extra content.

GT HD Model - Pay minimal cost upfront for game engine ONLY, then pay small specific fees for specific user selected content and no monthly fees for server use.

I personally hate micro-transactions and can see it really ruining gaming for me before long (3-4 years for it to be an embedded business model) --- :(

Perhaps if they lowered the inital cost of purchase, but they won't of course.

@Wonga. And that sir, is how you errode the second-hand market:

Disk = low cost (Say £20)
download content for the above = low too (but tied to an individual identity).

Individual 'trades in' the disk = Disk is 'worthless' (It's £20 NEW!).

So too is his personal downloads of content because he no longer has the game.

FERRARIs for Grand Turisimo!! Now I can see if my tricked out Evo really is faster then a F430

I feel this is a step (good or bad) that should be taken after an online infrastructure has been put in place and become established not before.

Don't run before you can walk.

well , GTHD is clearly a testbed . It they offer the disk at a very low price it might become very succesfull . I too won't be suprised if they offer the game as a free download .

It might have zillion cars and a trillion tweeks, but will it be any fun? Rather have RR7.

>"Seriously, my concerns would be around the track and model sharing - if you're playing opponents and have no models in common, that's a lot of data to shunt around at the start of the race. Wouldn't that make it slow to start up?"

Aren't we talking about the same omnipotent, omniscience PS3?

The real question is......


How would anyone review this?

>" If you want a taste of things to come, well, that's your own decision too. Funny though, that many of those who complaint wouldn't buy a full GT game either, because they're either a) anti-Sony and won't buy a PS3 anyway or b) anti-GT."

No matter what, this is diverting sources, sources that can be used to crate GT5.

The question is, which do you prefer? a £200 demo and GT5 3 years later? or no stupid demo and GT5 2 years later?

I certainly don't like the idea of GT5 being a download-only service, but if GT:HD gives PS3 owners a little taste of what's to come, what's the problem?

The problem is ppl like me not wanting stuff like this and eventually being forced to use it or stop gaming. A) When I buy a game, I expect it to be complete. Patches and expantions are oke imo, but they shouldn't be part of the core product. B) I'm not going to pay for games that arn't on a solid medium. I wan to see a dataholder and a nice box with a manual + extra's in return for my hard earned money.

This whole DLC has been a part of the xbx and the 360 for a while now and in all this time I could only be tempted to buy 3 things (because they gave really good value for money). However, I do get the feeling that we are being forced to use these systems more and more.

it all sounds truly horrible

Sounds quite ridiculous really. How will people know what cars and tracks are worth their money untill they've raced with/on them... of course in order to do that you have to pay out for everything. If the games not ready, then don't release it yet... if at all, as most people are probably more looking forward to GT5 anyway (if you're a fan of the GT games that is) and not this simple cash in.

As 'The Bodybuilder' already mentioned... its gonna be a right pain to review.

it's hardly surprising sony are doing this, their just jumping on the bandwagon which m$ introduced...

as soon as bill gates mentioned xbox live and micro transactions i knew that games would sooner or later be sold with features held back just so we mugs can pay extra to get them later...

PGR3 has had them for a while, sony is just trying 1 upmanship on m$, how long before you download a FPS for say £5 and then have to pay £2.50 for every enemy you want to shoot in the game, while similtaneously being bombarded by 'selected' in game advertising...

welcome to the 21st century friends, where big business will do, what Jack Thompson has failed to do, and kill of video games as an entertainment artform...

the chippy across from work charges 25p for each of those little things of red or brown sauce.

i think it's fucking rediculus that to get the amount of sauce from them i'd have to pay around the same as the chips i'd like to dunk in them.

plastic forks are also expensive!

i find that by charging people significant amounts of money for items they expect for free not to go down too well.

oh and fucking B&Q!! charging for plastic bags to put the £250 work of gear I buy from them doesn't go down too well either!

can't believe that they are including Ferraris! but that fact has been overshadowed by all this talk of buying tracks and cars. I only ever use a few select cars on a few select tracks but i cant see the justification of the asking price that sony want me to give to them. I mean for exampel, on PGR2 when playing the game on xbox live, it was a let down when i could not race against guys who had not purchased the downloadable content. the other thing that had me riled was that some of the cars that were available as dlc were cars i did not like too much. With regards to the game taking 6 months to model, i can only assume that it has to do with the intensity of the crash damage modelling. i can only hope that the damage will be realistic to the point where the car would not be driveable anymore. overall i would have to say that this custom purchasing idea creates more problems than it solves. I cant see the logic/benefit of someon buying all of the cars and tracks.

@Xerx3s

"What do you pay for a PGR3 car?"

If you don't want to: nothing. Fact is, you don't need to because the best cars come with it. Oh, and it has that oh so last-gen thing that comes with it too: tracks.

Yeah, so the cars are "just" 50-100 yen each. What they didn't tell you is that the KEYS to the cars are 500 yen per set, 'cause you have to get them digitally cut at Sony's Online Emporium For the Seriously Deluded (or "shop" for short).

Psi, you can be sarcastic all you want, but it doesn't hold. You buy a game. Then you can expect that it has all the features to play the game. Buying a racing game and then saying that you have to buy the tracks and cars to play it (under the flase flag of "but now you can customise!"). I don't have anything against DLC. I don't complain about prices (after all, you are the one that makes to the choice to buy it). However, critisism is in place when they do stunts like this.

100.

and why does every thread nowadays seem to be microsoft vs. sony... and ninty in between? could be a version of two and a half consoles.

"and why does every thread nowadays seem to be microsoft vs. sony..."

Someone dropped the insecurity bomb, and the fallout isn't about to clear up any time soon.

Xerx3s i can be sarcastic because i can't think of exactly how to express my hatred for this type of thing. what they are doing is taking online gaming into the relms of ringtone purchasing fuckhead mentality. how long till im seeing ocean finance fucking adverts in games because some marketing dickhead has had an idea!?!

oh and back onto my topic of dunking foodstuffs! working nightshift and we got pizzas from papa johns next to the aforementioned chippy.. they supply garlic butter to dunk your pizza into! the garlic butters free!! not an additional cost!

i think i've just knocked 10 years off my life dunking a 14" pizza into butter basically.. gillian mckeith would faint! :D ill send her one of my poo's

lex someone dropped the insecurity bomb back when the c64 and speccy were out. and its never gonna change. the main reason the ninty fans don't get caught up in as many squbbles is they've been through it with master system, megadrive etc etc etc...

the closest console eveyone comes to agreeing with was great was the dreamcast and it was a massive failure... gutted