How is GT5 compared with SHIFT 1 & 2?

[x2400]

I play both S1 & 2.Oneday I play GT5 at my friend's house and felt kind of weired. I don'tknow whether it's from his G27 wheel that I am not familiar (I use joystick with S1&2) or it's due to GT5 physic. So i would like to ask other people who play both games with the same control devide how both games differ.

thank you,

[Beaverz]

I've played both with Logitech driving force GT and GT5 is better to drive. The cars response better to the input I gave them and force feedback is miles better, at least it's how I like a racing game to handle.
The problem is AI is somewhat boring to race with.

BTW I don't know about how both compare to the real life because I've never driven a real Pagani Zonda R before.

[Scalage]

Input from GT5 is direct and thus better and more realistic.
That's all you need to know really

[Kaerar]

lol, it's not better or more realistic, in fact I'd say it's one of the worst iterations of the GT series for that. GT4 was better, 3 worse, 2 better etc...

To me GT5 feels like driving a boat compared to real life in comparative cars. Shift 2 is much closer as long as you don't get input lag. Something pCARS has fixed

UCP makes the handling feel a lot better.

I must admit though I'm really disappointed with Forza 4, 3 wasn't great, but 4 was terrible for handling.

[smoglessbutton4]

Hence my console sim racing concentrates on GT4

[GTAce]

This is complete nonesense and every serious sim racer should agree. GT5 is miles ahead of GT4 in terms of realism, unless you use completely unrealistic settings (you can turn the game in to a complete arcade racer with driving aids, tires and car tuning).

The (AI) racing aspect of GT5 is pretty bad though, I agree, but with proper organized online events, you can avoid that issue.

[Age Rohbein]

Agree with the latter. GT5 is *much* better in the physics department than GT4, which was still arcade in that it had built-in rear-end stabilization fudges to make driving easier for the masses.
At least in normal 'street' sports cars with lower-grip tyres and all aids off - and I own one of them, since I drive a Miata MX5, which is in the game - it's miles better than its predecessor. The AI is a bit better, too - bit less boneheaded than before.

[Kaerar]

Realism wise it might be better, but the whole balance in GT5 is off. None of the cars I've driven in GT5 compare to their real life counter-parts much at all. Some will be closer than others, but including tuning aspects of both Shift 2 and GT5, Shift 2 can be modified to feel very close to the real thing (with UCP I might add) whereas GT5 doesn't really get that close. I sunk way too many hours into GT5 and it was still like driving a boat (less so that 3 though).

[fisheracing]

Originally Posted by x2400

How is GT5 compared with SHIFT 1 & 2?

Seriously now m8. Have you really not got any more important issues to be pondering over besides this. Obviously you are the one doing the actual physical comparison, so therefore you are in the best position to answer your own question.

[brrupsz]

how is gt5 compared with shift 1 & 2?

good.

[FreelancerMar]

As someone that does still play Forza(Espically now that I can use my DFGT to play it thanks to the XCM-F1 converter box for my X360) It is MHO that Shift and Forza do seem to have somewhat similar Physics and Response times. However When it comes to response times Shift wins hands down and is the better of the two franchises. I will need more time to cross compare them since I do not have Shift for the Xbox. I do have Forza 1, 2, and 3(yes I do still play Forza 1 and the graphics upscaling is very nice). As for physics, well that's kind of difficult to say which is better since I do not have a car that's in both games to compare it with.

I know that the OP asked about GT5, but I cannot comment about that because I do not have a PS3.

I do hope however that this post has been at least somewhat useful.

[Kaerar]

This highlights how much personal opinion is involved with the feel of a game. Personally I find Forza all over the place compared to Shift 2, but then I use a pad not a wheel. With wheel it could be totally different.

[FreelancerMar]

@Kaerar

I know what you mean about being all over the place. Back when I picked Forza 1 up I was playing on a 1st gen Xbox and it was really easy to royally screw up, spinout, end up off the track etc..... I also was not used to using a gamepad for Racing titles. I had adapted myself to using a flight stick which I was using to play NFS titles with. The Thrustmaster Topgun Afterburner to be exact. It is the ancestor to the current "Flight Stick T-Hotas".

Anyhow I had finally got the hang of using the game pad for Forza(For that game those thumsticks are sensitive) Which allowed me to finally start enjoying the game. The game is NOT easy by any stretch of the word.

I didn't get my DFGT until the summer following Shift1's release. At which time I revisited the Majority of NFS titles in my collection. I finally understood why some of these online folks seemed to be Impossabily fast.

oops I went off topic.

Sufice it to say, once you get used to something it isn't always easy to get used to something else. at least not quickly.

[Kaerar]

I know what ya mean, a wheel gives much more progressiveness and accuracy with turning. However I still find them hard to use, primarily because I don't like the lack of feedback!! Even my Dad's crappy Ford Falcon has more (useful) feedback than any game steering wheel.

I guess being a racer in real life holds me back here as I don't game the game, I race a car in a virtual world. Hence I don't learn the broken aspects of sim racing either.

Thing is I never had a problem with keyboard steering until GT Legends/Shift 1's change from the older NFS and other games. I had developed a method to steer smoothly with a keyboard which was destroyed by the new style and I couldn't adapt my keyboard style to it. Moved on to a Xbox Pad then to a Razer Onza.

Anyway back to topic, Forza 3 and 4 I've had a go on for fairly large amounts of time on my mates Xbox. The cars just feel very off in that game. Even Stock Shift 2 feels better to me. GT5 still feels like a boat simulator compared to real life and I can never feel the confidence in the car to fling it into corners as I would do IRL or in Shift 2. Some cars in Shift 2 inspire confidence, something I found lacking with most cars in GT5 and none inspired it in Forza.

[Age Rohbein]

Had none of the problems with flinging cars into corners mate... but then I did stay well away from the whole 'tuning' approach most people take to driving GT5, slapping grippier rubber on, upping the engine etc. and generally making the thing ridiculously arcade compared to the real life street cars.
If anything I 'detune' the cars and that does make them feel more real, but I only drive normal street cars and I have my doubts about Polyphonys realism level in any GT5 cars which the makers wouldn't have driven themselves (e.g., Formula 1, Le Mans winners etc.) My personal feeling is that it's at least as good as most racing sims, but only for a limited number of cars and with detuned grip/no driving aids.

[Cham3leon]

How can you even compare Shift with something like GT? I haven't played the last two Gran Turismos but even from afar you can see that they are far more realistic and enjoyable than Shift2, let alone Shift 1.

It's obvious that Shift was made to somewhat compete with GT, but EA being what they are, intended on closing it to the mainstream audience in an unusual and awkward way, and suddenly, you get a "simulation" where cars are undriveable on straights and go ridiculously sideways in turns.

The first time I tried to drive a Gumpert Apollo in Shift 2 with stock tyres and everything, I had a feeling I was driving a Renault 4 with tyres made of soap.

I literally can't even watch vanilla Shift2. With PTMu, it was nice and fun, still probably worse than GT, but at least driveable.

[Kaerar]

Dude go race a car. Any decent car on a circuit (preferably one that's available in both games) and then try them ingame. One thing you'll immediately find is that (assuming you've applied UCP 1.09 or higher) Shift 2 has a much closer feel to real life than GT (even in stock trim). The grip level is the first thing you notice, GT especially with it's "realistic tyres" is closer to driving on ice/oil than asphalt or any of the other surfaces in the game. Shift 2 OTOH gives that feel of grip while cornering whether it be road tyres or slicks. If anything I'd say the grip is a little too good with slicks, but with the stock, lvl1 and lvl2 it's not too far off. With even slicks in GT it just doesn't seem to have that same feel which inspires confidence in the car that you get from the feedback IRL.

As Iain Bell stated far too many "sims" miss the mark of real life racing by a mile. Racing Drivers who test complain of a lack of grip and floaty feel to most sims and while the stock and patched versions of S2 are a little lacking, the UCP really fixed 98% of those issues. GT5 is limited by it's engine and choice of platform...

[Cham3leon]

I already drove a car. Many, many times. And I'm quite sure it didn't wobble on a straight line.

The physics behind the game are probably decent, but no good when the car doesn't feel like a car. As far as UCP is concerned, I never tried it out, and I don't know how it handles floaty physics, but I have played vanilla, and it was awful.

[McClusky]

Originally Posted by Cham3leon

I already drove a car. Many, many times. And I'm quite sure it didn't wobble on a straight line.

You need the UPC installed and of course tweak the car(s) setup and it will be much better.

[Kaerar]

Originally Posted by Cham3leon

I already drove a car. Many, many times. And I'm quite sure it didn't wobble on a straight line.

The physics behind the game are probably decent, but no good when the car doesn't feel like a car. As far as UCP is concerned, I never tried it out, and I don't know how it handles floaty physics, but I have played vanilla, and it was awful.

The floaty physics were a byproduct of a few misplaced physics settings like fuel tanks being 10m behind the car or whatever. The UCP fixes those mistakes and corrects most of the typo's/errors in the cars stats setups. So in other words floaty physics are gone for most cars (one or two still suffer) and it's really awesome to drive the cars. That B Class Invitational in the Corvette and the A Class Invitational in the McLaren MP4-12C are now both awesome fun instead of exercises in controlled aggression

Oh and driving vs racing are entirely different things

[bogdantw]

I'm not going to debate whether it's more realistic than GT5 or not. I'm not a console player and I had only a limited (but overall positive) exposure to it.
From my point of view it's not even an issue worth discussing.
The PS3 version of S2U is probably the worse version of the game (platform wise) and you have zero modding ability.
And comparing PC version to GT5 is not exactly apples to apples anymore and doesn't appeal to the same category of users either.


Shift2 - PC version
I liked this game from the very beginning and after applying mods to it (UCP, tire mods in particular) I started to love it and still do very much.
But personal feelings aside I'll try to be a bit (brutally) honest about it.

In terms of handling and force feedback effects it is still a far cry from actual realism or simulation standards, even with UCP and lots of advanced tuning on the cars.
Only way to approach realism in Shift2 is with one of the tire mods - NTM or PTMu.
These 2 bring the physics of the game to a new dimension and closer to the big boys (Project CARS, rFactor, iRacing, SimBin stuff, etc). Without them realism and Shift2 do not mix very well.

As Iain Bell stated far too many "sims" miss the mark of real life racing by a mile. Racing Drivers who test complain of a lack of grip and floaty feel to most sims and while the stock and patched versions of S2 are a little lacking, the UCP really fixed 98% of those issues.

I'm sorry to say but that exactly the feeling you get coming back to Shift2 from Project CARS for example (which is Ian's brain child)
Floating sensations and disconnection from what the cars and tires are actually doing are very prominent.
Lots of aids inside the game, even after turning them OFF.
Brakes , to give you an example, still have a lot of ABS-like behavior.
Tire lock-up occurs very late (if at all) and it's more on the subtle side of things when it does. Threshold braking is not really possible because of that, a technique many racing drivers (and sim-racers) depend on a lot.
Some form of traction control also seems to linger a lot in the physics.
You get no trailing throttle oversteer or trail braking oversteer, making cornering way too easy and arcade style.
And the list can go on and on ...

As I said tire mods will improve physics and alleviate some of the above mentioned aspects. But they're not miracle workers.
Still, the game has a huge fun factor and many qualities to it.
I love it and will continue to do, just not particularly for its realism.

[Kazumi]

GT5 and Shift are different. Prefer one or another. My personal favorite on consoles is Enthusia though, but being a PS2 exclusive it looks quite outdated. Some car handle nice though and the tuning does what it suppose to do (neither GT nor Shift does, sometimes the opposite, sometimes make things worse when it shouldn't...) at least on a few cars . On PC there are many choices, but for some reasons it's harder to find a package that compares to GT5 and even Shift with its content, and mods always can have varying quality or varying physics based on what the modders think is right.

Also GT5 has some great tracks (Nordschleife, Le Mans), S2U track list is also quite good, especially european GP tracks. I think both games would benefit from more unique tracks, even GTs track generator can be fun every now and then . And maybe also trying to get a full racing series right, and not just the cars.

Originally Posted by bogdantw

I'm not going to debate whether it's more realistic than GT5 or not. I'm not a console player and I had only a limited (but overall positive) exposure to it.
From my point of view it's not even an issue worth discussing.
The PS3 version of S2U is probably the worse version of the game (platform wise) and you have zero modding ability.
And comparing PC version to GT5 is not exactly apples to apples anymore and doesn't appeal to the same category of users either.

But then you don't know what GT5 you don't like GT dislike about it?

What's obvious the car performance is a bit more accurate, you can take many of the 1000 cars and the lap times, corner speeds aren't that far off. Shift can be off by a margin especially when you expect cars from factory. That of course can leave a negative impression.

Yes, unfortutanely almost everything feels unpolished, starting from the menus, track lighting, handling, control set-up... to some nasty bugs. While you get used to the menus the other things can't be improved on consoles, while on the other hand GT still get updates and even new tracks (Motegi soon)

Originally Posted by bogdantw

Shift2 - PC version
I liked this game from the very beginning and after applying mods to it (UCP, tire mods in particular) I started to love it and still do very much.
But personal feelings aside I'll try to be a bit (brutally) honest about it.

In terms of handling and force feedback effects it is still a far cry from actual realism or simulation standards, even with UCP and lots of advanced tuning on the cars.

There are multiple reasons, keep in mind you get similar problems relative to "normal" driving with an autocross set-up with stiffer rear suspension and wider front tires. The front will feel more numb and straight line driving a bit worse. It's - obviously - good for autocross if done right

It's not like this isn't a natural phenomena in physics. However, of course it depends when, where and how it happens, which probably even is most important for driving.