GTR2: Why are Modern Sims Still Not as Good?

[Paul Jeffrey]

GTR2 is 11 years old, features a series that no longer exists and was developed for technology less advanced than a modern smart phone. Unbelievably it's still one of the best sims available today.

What I want to know is why? Why in the last 10 + years have some of the many awesome features found in this now long forgotten game not made their way into something more modern? Ok granted many different games feature some of the bits in GTR2, but no single title has taken what was already an incredible base and expanded upon it with the aid of much advanced technology we now have at our disposal.

Driving School? Check
Fully animated pit workers? Check
Animated flag marshals? Check
Day - night transition? Check
Weather cycle? Check
Full official series licence, over two separate seasons? Check
...and the list goes on and on...

Simply put GTR2 was massively overdeveloped, period. SimBin Studios quite literally took every single aspect of the then premier GT racing series in the world and recreated it all into a compelling racing experience that still stands out as a top simulation even by the standards of today, 11 years after the game hit our shelves.

I just find it all incredibility bizarre. In very few industries outside of sim racing will you see a decline in product quality and content as the years progress like we have to put up with today. When GTR2 first shipped in September 2006 the game was a complete package, not splattered with ridiculous bugs that prevented anyone having a good time, not bombarded by wave after wave of disparate DLC content with little or no relevance to the main experience and not hanging on by the merest thread for dear life as another iteration of something that's been released by someone else already. It really was a golden time for sim racing fans, and those who witnessed it all first hand really did think this would be the beginning of something big in sim racing.

Fast forward to 2017 and sadly the progress expected post GTR2 has quite simply not materialised. The game, the official simulation of the FIA GT World Championship, was probably the very last fully feature complete racing simulation we have seen in our niche genre. We've had loads of new games since then, some of which have even been released by the same people responsible for GTR and GTR2, but none have even come close to matching the level of features and polish afforded fans back in 2006. It's down right strange.

Take RaceRoom Racing Experience for example, developed as the next GT game from the people behind GTR and GTR2, when the title first hit public beta stage back in February 2013 what did we have? Basically a hotlapping simulation with limited content, no official series licence, no AI to race against and precisely zero multiplayer features. Added to the still missing animated flag marshals and a range of other GTR2 items that haven't made the move over with time, it's all rather a depressing scene in which to take in.

Ok I appreciate Sector3 have worked exceptionally hard at improving RaceRoom to get to a level where it is barely recognisable now to what it looked like on launch day, but still to even consider releasing a game that was basically stripped of everything that made GTR2 great is simply mind boggling.

And it's not just RaceRoom that are guilty of missing out some key features considered par for the course 11 years ago, everyone is doing it! You only have to look at one of the most popular sims on the market Assetto Corsa as a perfect example, they consider themselves to be perfectionists on a mission to produce the most true to life experience possible, and they even miss out the core basics like weather and day to night transition, never mind such "nice to have" features like a driving school, proper flag implementation and multiclass racing options. It's simply amazing to realise that these features quite simply only exist in a game that was designed and released over a decade ago. Unbelievable.

GTR2 still looks pretty good on top graphics settings, still feels very nice indeed with my trusty CSW V2 and still sounds like it belongs in the very top tier of audio experience. All that whilst replicating a seriously mega international championship in a exceptionally detailed simulation that really does pick out all the little features that makes driving on a virtual track feel like the real thing. With that said and the pretty compelling physics considering the age of the title added up with stuff that no other sim has all together in one package, this is why I still believe GTR2 is, without reservation, the very best simulation racing experience one can purchase during 2017.

I love the game, it's just a bit sad that no one has thought to try and make something similar in the following 132 months since it was released.

GTR was released by SimBin Studios exclusively for PC. The game is still available to purchase on Steam for £4.99.

Like GTR2? Well lucky you, we are seriously considering a brand new informal league! Check out the GTR2 sub forum for general GTR2 discussion or our new GTR2 RDGT Championship forum for more details of the new league season. To prepare for the league all we ask is you have Premium membership, a fresh GTR2 install and these two additional patches HERE and HERE. Get ready for a return of the legend....

Do you still enjoy GTR2? What did the sim do right in your opinion? Why do features present in GTR2 still not appear in moderns sims? Let us know in the comments section below!

 

[Rupe Wilson]

What other sites do is up to them and how they handle it.
At RD we have a set of rules that all must follow if you wish to race on our servers. plain and simple.

at RD it's not uncommon to find yourself uploaded to youtube without anyone ever asking if it's ok.

In all honesty i personally have never had i issue with this. But do understand what you mean.. i will check with other staff what the situation is about that.
In our own rules for online racing
http://www.racedepartment.com/threads/racing-club-regulations-2017.10978/
number 12 is the rule for Teamspeak. and "Team speak only, Voice chat only,

So we do try to do things correctly..

As i have said i will check up and get back to you..

Thanks for bring this to my attention.

 

[AndrewBo]

@Rupe Wilson
As far as it goes for the leagues, we have it stated in the Rules:

8. Disclaimer
By entering in a RaceDepartment league the team, team owner and any of its drivers accept the following terms:

A) RaceDepartment can and may expose the name of the teams and drivers, as well as their cars and liveries in live broadcasts, preview and review movies, screenshots, articles, news items and league-related posts publicly on the website, forums or social media.

Can be found here:
http://www.racedepartment.com/threads/racing-league-regulations-2017.11826/#post-530016

 

[Rodent]

Thanks for bring this to my attention.

It would be cool to have an official stance on it, just a "Ok if I stream/upload this guys?" would probably be best, for me the answer would be yes.

And I agree, it should be up to the site, I've agreed and comply with the rules here at RD so no real issue. I'm just voicing my opinion that I don't think it as a rule enforces anything beyond satisfying a peeve for those who don't like nicks, and I disagree with the notion that was voiced earlier that allowing nicks would somehow make a service or sim worse.

 

[Rodent]

Cool, though that leaves club racing, and again, I don't mind. But enforcing real names for casual racing and also having it be a free for all for broadcasting could make people uncomfortable, I know I've thought about it, but seeing as how small our community is I don't mind.

edit: Sorry for the double post, one reply for Rupe, one for Andrew. =)

Edit2: Found

1. It's strictly forbidden to record and broadcast teamspeak voice-chat via youtube, twitch and or other media unless you have permission from all the drivers in the session.

So I guess that answers that. Seems it's not enforced though, mind I have never complained myself so perhaps it's just considered silent agreement.

 

[AndrewBo]

I realy don't want to sound rude now....but please....can we , from now on, stay on Topic ?

 

[Tim Ling]

To be honest, as gamers/simers what we think we want is accuracy.
I remember back in the day (cue "Hovis" music

) that people complained the the guns in Counter Strike didn't react to recoil correctly. FFWD to CS:GO, and they're still complaining about the same thing, but for a different reason ...sound familiar?
Let's be honest here-how many of us know what driving a Viper GTS-R, a Ferrari 550 Maranello or even a Nissan 350Z in anger feels like? For a large majority this is a dream, and this is why we simrace.
We hear <insert commentator here> talk about how the wind affects downforce. We read about chassis flex, and wonder what it does to the feel of the steering.
And then we want it in our favourite sim.
Why? Because it makes it more real? Even F1 teams have trouble correctly replicating cars that they design on their own bespoke simulators, and they spend £millions.
Personally I'm glad I get to spend some of my spare time rocketing round racetracks from around the world, or even from someones imagination in my favourite cars.

 

[Joerg Baermann]

To be honest, as gamers/simers what we think we want is accuracy.

Immersion is important too, without the whole racing experience get's rather boring.
As for accuracy, we can only judge by the cars we have driven ourselves.
What annoys me is when game developers release follow ups where features are removed, Codemaster's F1 series is a very good example of that, not to mention those who promise features and then deliver either without or with bugs, it's like that it is widely accepted to release beta version of games these days and never fix the bugs.
Besides that, the few things that Paul mentioned are not the hardest and most time consuming things to add in a racing game.

 

[MatzeLoCal]

Just had an issue similar, and i found when my wheel was not input device 1 or 2 in game..
only 3 input devices can be used.. had to unplug a button box...
Now its input device 1 and never a issue..

Thanks for the reply. Problem is I only have two Input Devices: The CSW v1 and the Clubsport V3 Pedals.
But I will test around a bit with your info.
Thanks again

 

[Associat0r]

I also forgot to mention that the early ISI F1 sims had that useless driving school, many years before GTR2.
It's a good thing they removed that needless circus from F1-Challenge 99-02 to make place for proper content instead.

Anyway, it would be more appropriate to praise ISI instead of Simbin for all those features.

 

[Joerg Baermann]

I also forgot to mention that early ISI F1 sims had that useless driving school.
It's a good thing they removed that needless circus from F1-Challenge 99-02 to make place for proper content instead.

For someone completely new driving schools are a good addition though, although I like how F1 2016 does it since that makes a bit more sense.

 

[David Dominguez]

Lack of identity, that is what happened.

And where is the identity in AC and pCars?

 

[Associat0r]

And where is the identity in AC and pCars?

Speaking of identity.

 

[David Wright]

It will be interesting to see where we go in the future.

I would suggest there are indications GTR2 type features will return. Reiza indicated their next game will include dynamic weather, and perhaps we can assume it will retain its day night cycle. Simbin have said GTR3 will also include dynamic weather and day night cycle, and this will presumably appear in R3E in due course. pCARs already had day/night cycle and dynamic weather - pCARs2 will retain these and build upon them and add animated pitcrew too apparently. We don't have any information on AC2 so we can only speculate but it would surely be necessary to add significantly to the feature list to encourage people to move over from AC1.

While S397s improved rF2, pCARs2, Reiza17 and I strongly suspect AC2 will remain "general purpose" racing games, there are indications that more focused sims will return too. GTR3 and GTL2 are obvious examples. I am very curious about ISIs "not rF3" project too. If its not rF3 there is the possibility it will be a focused product.

 

[Bjarne Hansen]

Hope you are right David.
But the the big sales point right now is XXX amount of cars and XX amount of tracks with endless stream of DLC with random cars and tracks.
Those 12 pages here in 3-4 days suggest that maybe there is a market for a focused sim.

 

[tunaphis]

At least tarmac drivers have something to discuss,Over in rally land it's being slim pickin's since RBR until Dirt Rally came and went.Every year I wait hoping that a pure rally sim without the add on crap of buggies and such will arrive but no, it's gets worse.The average age of players on Dirt Rally is 40,the prime demographic for home based entertainment dollars but many are saying enough,no more preorder,wait and see or wait for a sale.I own a ps4 pro,xbone one s and a alienware laptop but only 3 games so these dev's better start understanding we've being gaming since they thought the easter bunny was real.

 

[tunaphis]

So many sim business experts here, if you see it so clear I have no idea why are you wasting your time here instead of creating your company and make the perfect sim if it's so easy.

smart ass.

 

[Radu Oros]

For sure that dynamic weather day night brake temps brake pressure rolling starts false starts etc. these will grow and make sim racing very popular. Chassis flex thermomechanical slipangles and more. /s

These things will only satisfy the guys already very dedicated to sim racing, and still the satisfaction fades away.. because buzzword features do what buzzword features do.
Do you think real professional drivers get excited over their brake pressure, the rolling starts, the chassis flex, their very real engine leaking oil, tyres shredding from wear, rain non-stop for hours. These are just problems for engineers and the team crew.

But basically people just want to transform sim racing in not a game of racing. Gameplay and realism is very important, but not more important than having people finding other people rapidly for racing, within similar skill. And these weekend leagues and club races don't cut it.
The most popular and most active games, which also tend to have some of the best gameplay, are very online multiplayer based. Community servers don't cut it either. You need people just connecting to search for a race, the system finds you opponents and the system selects the cars and track (maybe randomly or based on user activity), you enter the game, warm up a bit or do qualifying, and start racing. You need to commit for the entire race or you drop rank or get suspended for hours or days. And I'm not talking about copying the iracing system, is outdated and doesn't really generate that much activity.
Then you need good rules for dealing with players that grief or cut corners or bump into others.

But keep the AI, good AI. Sim racing games can be based on two parts, racing AI and racing people. If you make competitive matchmaking racing very good.. well there you have it. Good AI is good for people to practice their setups and stuff.

And no, you don't need to charge subscription money besides the game price for competitive matchmaking run by the game and not the community, that'd be ridiculous, since you don't see rocket league, csgo, dota2 charging extra money for people to connect and play competitive against others. You need to plan your company resources to account for it.

GTR2 in its exact state wouldn't survive in today's video game market against what's currently on offer in terms of (sim) racing games, but it did well in 2006 and following years.

 

[Manwith Noname]

To be fair, I do buy most of my games trough Steam even if I don't like how they run fixed prices

I know this is a little off topic but...care to elaborate?

As far as I am aware, developers are responsible for setting the price of their product. They're (developers) responsible for when a product is discounted and by how much. They're also responsible for when they eventually see fit to lower it's retail price. Steam / Valve isn't fixing prices beyond the percentage they take for overseeing the store page listing and the various community hub features (servers) that come as part of a package when selling a product there.

 

[scolman21]

Havent played gtr2 for years, but news of the legend returning is really interesting. amazing game back in the day !

 

[JoeNathanYouTube]

For sure that dynamic weather day night brake temps brake pressure rolling starts false starts etc. these will grow and make sim racing very popular. Chassis flex thermomechanical slipangles and more. /s
.

Yes, those handling/physics features you mentioned are extremely important to the genre of sim racing. Without them, it's not quite sim racing, and if it's not sim racing, then it's not really any different from Forza/GT and then we'd all have to question why we have such extraordinary rigs and gaming setups, putting up with missing features and incomplete games... Also, did you really just complain about tire wear and rain? What?

Nonetheless, it's important. And so is AI.

AI clearly isn't as important to iRacing, but it's still vital to the genre. As an American, sometimes I can't race at the same times as every one else, and maybe I want to experience a car that no one else is racing in a league. Having good AI is always nice, you can't go wrong with that.