Gran Turismo 5 Prologue

10 Review to this product

• 

  JoshJosh
  April 21st, 2008 on 6:12 pm

  Rating

  Gran Turismo 5 Prologue is really thin on content for anyone who just came off Gran Turismo 4 or even Gran Turismo 3 A-Spec. So, if hundreds of cars, thousands of aftermarket parts, and dozens of tracks is mandatory then don’t consider GT5 Prologue.

  However, what’s actually on the disc is almost perfect. The driving is excellent and the force feedback with a wheel is tremendous. The technology is great, with gorgeous lighting and the best looking cars I have seen in a game. The challenges are easily beatable depending on your skill, but I have tons of fun just trying to do hot lap and rise up in the rankings.

  The only place I can really ding the game is in online play. There is no way to make a private lobby, and early races are plagued with people who play like its Burnout. But it’s in there, and you can earn money for better cars quickly. A better online system would give the game a lot more replayability.

  So, basically, the physics, look and feel, and feature set are all greatly improved over past games. It doesn’t have much content but the core driving experience is as usual superb.
• 

  The Matrix Fan
  April 24th, 2008 on 5:36 pm

  Rating

  Wow. Trying to give Gran Turismo 5: Prologue a complete review is like trying to count the grains of sand on the beach in Ashikita, but I’ll do my best.

  Whether you are a new player of Gran Turismo or a long-time fan like myself, the only place to truly start is choosing the Gran Turismo TV option and watch the video “Beyond The Apex”. I watched this video at least 4 times before I even started playing the game.

  We get to meet Kazunori Yamauchi, Gran Turismo’s creator. This man loved cars by age 8, and his love has developed into a lifelong dream of providing video gamers the perfect balance between car beauty, and car functionality.

  But this is no easy task – for example, his development team took great pains to take 20-30,000 pictures of just ONE racetrack over a 2 month timeframe! Why? To make us feel like we’re racing on the real thing.

  Every curve in the road, every tire mark on the track, every dip of the car frame with acceleration and shifting is designed to give us all the sensations we would feel driving a car in the real world.

  The game gets glowing reviews from Tanner Foust, a professional drifter and Rally car driver. It’s one thing for a person like me who’s never been on a racetrack, it’s quite another when a professional driver says this is the type of game that encourages people to go out and buy a rear wheel drive car and try it for real!

  Okay, so let’s get on to the gameplay.

  The online PS3 players can use the functions of News, Online Racing, and Online Rankings. The only thing sweeter than hosting a race with players from across the globe and winning a three lap race by a hair’s breath, is seeing YOUR name at the top of the online rankings.

  There are 71 cars to choose from, more than enough to whet our appetites until the full version of Gran Turismo 5 is released. This game gives us a lot of creative freedom: we can alter the AI difficulty, the active steering, the driving physics, braking, traction control, tires, and much more.

  The graphics are, for lack of a better word, flawless. During the intro movie, a car is shown driving on a road with sunlight reflecting off the rear panels – the light is shown as patchwork through leaves on a passing tree. That level of detail is also in the gameplay itself.

  There are 4 different viewpoints for driving the car: a player with the top-of-the-line racing wheel can choose three camera angles inside the car, while other players can choose the exterior camera to get a better overall view of the car’s physics. As far as the controller options, we can choose the button setup ourselves. I was very impressed to see the controller schematic for not just one, but FIVE driving wheel simulators to choose from.

  On the racetrack, we have a blue line to direct us on the best path to victory, which we can either follow or alter at our own risk. The path also shows us the optimal brake times, which is a fantastic feature for the novice and expert alike. We have rules to follow – The days of cutting across patches of sand to get ahead of our opponents are gone. There are penalties for hitting other cars, ramming cars off the track, using shortcuts and any boundary collisions.

  So what are the shortcomings?

  Well, the online portion does have limits. If the host player of a race has a slower internet connection, the race can end prematurely or the picture quality/gameplay is sacrified. Some players are extremely courteous, other players may resort to cheap schoolyard tactics which can ruin the overall racing experience.

  The AI can be a little cruel on the racing circuit. We can’t hit other cars, but if we’re in the line of another car that drifts into us, we get penalized.

  The emphasis on drifting is more prevalent in this iteration of Gran Turismo, and the art of drifting is not easy to master. The more casual player might find this aspect of racing very frustrating.

  Younger gamers might get frustrated with the realism of the game’s physics….this isn’t Twisted Metal, after all. But hey, if Kazunori Yamauchi could love cars at age 8, then I guess anything is possible.

  But the biggest shortcoming? This is only a prologue….the finished product will most likely not be released before 2009.

  Anyone with a passionate love of cars probably has this game in their library already. The casual player can definitely give this game a rent, much as I did. Be prepared, though: Once you appreciate the fine art of drifting and racing with the precision of a heart surgeon, you won’t be returning this rental on time. You’ll be saving your pennies for a Dualshock Wireless Controller or a Gran Turismo Racing Wheel.

  Gran Turismo has truly earned the title of “The Real Driving Simulator”.
• 

  Wehrli
  May 14th, 2008 on 1:27 pm

  Rating

  Gran Tourismo 5 Prologue is the first racing game I purchased for my PS 3. The graphics and colors are extremely realistic. Using the controller for steering, braking, and accelerating takes some getting use to. The wheel might be easier. All the tracks have an arcade version were you can do time trials to build skills before actually racing. The cars you race in events never crash so you have to run a near perfect race to beat them. You have a wide selection of cars to choose from. You start out with enough to buy a low powered car to race with other lower powered cars. As you win races you win cash to purchase faster and more exotic race cars. Overall, you experience what it is like to drive at high rates of speed on several famous race courses. It is well worth purchasing before the full version comes out
• 

  D. Hong
  May 25th, 2008 on 2:37 pm

  Rating

  For those who do not have the time to earn all the cars and tracks, visit gamefaqs. com and download the game save file. There you will find the save file which has all the cars, plus the F1 2007, and tracks. Great way to drive all the cars instantly and tracks if you just don’t have the time to devote.
• 

  elixxxer
  June 12th, 2008 on 1:19 am

  Rating

  Please ignore the reviews touting this as an incomplete game. They were clearly expecting something other than what the title promised, a Prologue. If you are a serious Gran Turismo or car enthusiast like myself and own a PS3, you are doing yourself a great disservice by not purchasing this game. The graphics are astounding, there is a healthy choice of cars (70+) and online play works very well. In fall, crash damage and enhanced online gameplay will be added via online update, so Polyphony is not leaving this game alone until the full release of Gran Turismo 5.

  While the game still feels like GT of old, the new in-cockpit view adds genuine realism and excitement to the gameplay. Also ignore others here as they assert that the driving dynamics are the same as all previous GT games: this is blatantly fallacious. In “professional” physics mode, handling characteristics are far more realistic than ever before. You can genuinely feel body roll, push (understeer), mid-corner rotation and squats and dives from acceleration/deceleration. Each car feels immensely different and astonishingly organic.

  Again, if you are have been a fan of the GT series, do not wait until the full game arrives and pick this one up immediately. If you never liked GT, big surprise, you won’t like this iteration either. Also, all of your progress (bought/won cars, money, etc.) will be carried over to the full game as well. Anyone expecting more than a “prologue” had their expectations set too high. Yes, the full game will obviously be more comprehensive, but with promised online updates and by far the best driving dynamics ever created for a racing game, Gran Turismo Prologue is easily worth $40.
• 

  Neechi Mosha
  September 28th, 2008 on 1:14 am

  Rating

  For a demo this game is truly amazing. I enjoy it and feel that I’ve played it more than any other game I own — all of which are full games. It is definitely worth the money -buy it now.
• 

  JLC
  November 2nd, 2008 on 1:19 pm

  Rating

  Gran Turismo 5 Prologue just keeps getting better! Great Sound and Picture, 3 levels and the first one isn’t borning, lots of tracts
  
  and cars to choose from, fast loading and I recommend this game, can’t
  
  beat it for the money!
• 

  Jonathan Ownby
  November 3rd, 2008 on 9:02 pm

  Rating

  The Gran Turismo series is the best video game racing series there is, and this is the best Gran Turismo yet. In many ways, that is.
  
  The game is a prologue (as noted in the title) to the full version of Gran Turismo 5, and sometimes it feels like it. For instance, there are not nearly as many cars or courses as in any of the other GT games. If you are migrating from another racing game series, this is not likely to be a problem for you, as it likely still contains more cars and about the same number of tracks as what you have been playing. If you are a GT enthusiast, though, you may be somewhat disappointed by the limitations. There are only four classes of races, each of them containing 10 major races, so there are forty races overall in the general class racing events. There are, as always, make specific races accessed by going to the dealership for your car, and a decent arcade mode and two player setup, so there ends up being a reasonable amount to do in the game. But if you are looking for something you can play for months before nearing 100% completion, this is not it. Unless you are a terrible game driver, in which case it may take you months to master it.
  
  The difficult races are actually difficult, and there are performance point restrictions that keep you from bringing a vastly superior car to a race and dominating it. Some of this was altered with the downloadable update that made this “spec III”, but it is still mostly the same breakdown at the higher levels of racing. You must work your way from the back of a 16 car pack to win a race consisting of cars of similar performance to your own. This can be a bit tricky.
  
  So, the game is obviously abridged, but the graphics are nearly perfect, and the physics are spot on. It feels like driving a car in real life. I am a long time fan of the series, and if you are too, this one is absolutely worth owning.
• 

  L. Gu
  December 6th, 2008 on 3:47 am

  Rating

  Gran Turismo 5 Prologue is a great racing game. Now, with that in mind, please do pay attention to the word “prologue”, as some of the biggest gripes with this game have to do with this simple addition to the title and its relevance.

  Gran-Turismo 5 Prologue is NOT the full GT5, but the experience this so called demo offers is only surpassed by a few other full racing games. From the start, the game offers 6 tracks and over 70 cars. While the amount of tracks is not exactly mind-blowing, the amount of cars matches those of complete racing games.

  The game is an improvement in every aspect from is predecessors. First and foremost is the graphics of GT5P. This series is well known for its graphical prowess this game is no exception. Prologue looks astonishing, in HD or not.

  The main menu of this game takes a different approach than previous games of the series. The player is introduced to an interactive menu that includes all the game modes, as well as your currently in-use car resting in a background with a multitude of information available on screen. From there, players can choose to enter single player, 2-player, events, or a few other options.

  Gran Turismo is not an arcade racer, and it never was. Please don’t get this game thinking you can take a 40mph turn at 100mph. As this game strives for realism, it inevitably takes out the `fun’ in a driving game for some people. Still, hardcore racing fans and GT-fans will not be disappointed by the driving dynamics and physics this game has to offer.

  A new feature to GT5P is the online racing mode. In here, you can choose a track of certain degree of difficulty and the game will pair you with a number of other players. While this is a cool feature, its implementation could use a little more work. Depending on your connection speed, do expect a certain amount of lag, and while my recent experiences haven’t been so bad, it’s still worth mentioning.

  The game isn’t without some faults. There are some complaints of the AI that’s in the game, and while I personally don’t really mind it, just know that they typically follow their predetermined racing lines religiously and the online lag may be frustrating at times.

  Overall, Gran Turismo 5 Prologue is a great game in itself and provides an more-than-adequate preview of what’s coming ahead. If you just can’t wait for the full game to come out, (rumors suggest Christmas `09), then definitely pick this one up to hold you out until then.
  
• 

  B. Walls
  December 20th, 2008 on 7:35 pm

  Rating

  This is one of the best and most relastic driving game I have seen. Everyone that comes to our house (adults) love it. It is best experiece with a wheel such as the Logitech Driving Force GT. Highly recomemend!