Gran Turismo 3: A-spec
We have finally reviewed SCEA's long awaited bad boy of a racing game. Come take a look see at the most comprehensive review of GT3 on the net.
Published: August 2, 2001
There has never been a time in the past while playing a videogame that I never thought of what it would be like if it just had this, or a little more of that. Maybe the graphics were a little jagged (caused by no anti-aliasing, in other words lines with rough edges), or the backgrounds were plagued with what I have nicknamed the "big pixel syndrome," just look at any textures in the Tomb Raider series of games and you'll know what I'm talking about. It doesn't matter whether it is Final Fantasy, Metal Gear Solid or even, a game called Gran Turismo. There is always that one thing that makes a title less than it could've been.
For two years the fine people over at Polyphony Digital worked on making the best racing game ever created, for the newest, most technologically advanced and most powerful console currently on the market. Two words can sum up the end result. A masterpiece.
By now, there is no doubt that you've already read a review or have heard your friends praising Gran Turismo 3: A-spec (GT3) for its spectacular graphics and uncanny resemblance to reality. However, what those reviews cannot offer is what the peoples reaction to the title really is. So I am placed into somewhat of a difficult position. Do I just go on with my review as normal, or do I take advantage of the fact that the game has already been available for a little while, and use the data I've gained over that period of time to write the best and most comprehensive review of GT3 on the web? I think I'll go with number 2.
Because there are just about an infinite amount of places where I could start, I'll begin with talking about the graphics and just how incredible they really are. Imagine for a moment that it's just finished raining out side, and you look out a window to see the white, cratered circle that we call the moon all alone in the night sky, minus a star here and there of course. The street lamps are on, illuminating the road with circles of light, one after another. You decide to take a drive.
Now stop imagining. Actually go out and get GT3. Once that is done, pop it into the CD tray of your PlayStation 2. Go into the simulation mode and buy a 4-wheel drive car that you can afford (preferably the Japanese Daihatsu made Storia X4). Then proceed to go into the beginner league (found in the racing mode) and find a night course called Special Stage Route 11 in the 4WD Challenge. Enter the race. Let all of the other cars go ahead of you and wait for a few seconds before pressing down the accelerator (default button X). Then slowly increase your speed and look at the environment. Now you're like, "OH MY GOD! Chris has me under mind control!" But no, you're not imagining things, each street lamp is there with the light emitting from it where it should be, and when you pass under one, the light reflects off of your car just like in real life (press the R1 button to get a better view), if you look at the back view of your car you see water fly off the back of your tires from the puddles on the road, and you see that whatever vehicle you picked is an exact model of its real life counterpart!
By now you've probably lost control and have crashed into a wall because you can't differentiate from the game or reality. So please back up (default button triangle) and begin going forward again. You will come across a Ferris wheel that is lit up with magnificent fluorescent lights. You have my word that every time you do this course, this Ferris wheel will prove more of an opponent to overcome than the five other cars that you are competing against. For it is so beautiful and overwhelming, that you will have to put everything you've got into focusing your eyes on the road instead of it.
If I had to say one negative thing about the course environments, it's that the backgrounds in a sense are too detailed, and become very distracting to the eye while driving. The course that I mentioned above is one of the most awesome courses in the game, and with the exception of the test track (which has some trees, a tunnel, and not much else), the other 17 tracks (34 if you count the backward ones) have their share of detailed and colorful backgrounds as well.
When you work your way though the beginner mode, you will earn enough credits to begin upgrading your vehicle. Parts you can upgrade range from putting in a new spin wheel, to turbo charging the engine (if that upgrade is supported) or even installing a high-tech racing computer chip that can boost up your horsepower by a good margin for a relatively cheap price. For some tips on upgrading your ride and deciding which vehicle is the best value in the early stages of the game, take a peek at our GT3 tip section after your done reading this review.
As in past incarnations of the Gran Turismo series, some races are only accessible by using a specific vehicle (like Volkswagen's Beetle) or a vehicle that has a unique characteristic (like those with a Boxer type engine). Races that consist of a fair amount of courses give you the option of doing each separately, like you would any other, or going through a series mode. This takes you through each individual track, except there are a few catches involved. The first is that you cannot exit the series mode until you've completed all of the tracks (unless of course you want to lose all of your progress, but thankfully the game allows you to save), and the second isn't really a catch, but points are given for each race, so that if you say got first place, you would get 10 points, while if you got in sixth place, you'd only end up getting one. The difference between doing a series race and just doing them individually is of course the ones noted above, and also that if you get in first place in the point standings, you will receive some extra bonuses; A bundle of credits and a secret car.
Also returning from previous games in the series are license tests. Once you become familiar with the control scheme, these are a snap. It is only when you get up to the International licenses and S license that you will find yourself spending the most time and suffering from the most frustration, this might also apply to the rally license as well, but I found that quite easy. Some have labeled these tests impossible, but they're only impossible for those not willing to spend the time, or lack the skill necessary that it takes to complete them. After the first half of beginner races, there will be license requirements. So it's best to just get these out of the way first, so you don't have to deal with them later on, and can just progress though the game without having more obstacles to overcome than there needs to be.
Speaking of obstacles, there is one and only one main obstacle in getting the 100% mark on GT3: A-spec. Time. Simply put, if you have enough spare time, you will be able to progress through GT3 at a pretty steady pace. However if you do not have a lot of spare time on your hands, I recommend that you just rent the game to experience it, and avoid buying it. Everything in this game takes time to do, as with any other game ever made, but this one especially. Some races in the endurance category can take upwards of 2 hours to complete, even with the best cars, and require you to do upwards of 100 reaching as high as 200 laps a piece! The payoff for these races is obviously bigger than any other, in both the amount of credits and the quality of the bonus car, but if you don't have the time to complete them, then you might as well forget them altogether. This negative or "obstacle" is also apparent in the professional category of races, which require you to do 10 or more laps of each course (ranging from roughly 5-20+ minutes a piece), and when doing championships that contain 10 races, well… you do the math. This game is not for those working two part-time jobs while going to college to say the least.
But what good are absolutely unbelievable looking cars when you can't control them? This is luckily one of GT3's many strengths. You can go into the rather extensive option menu and configure the controls to the pressure sensitive buttons of your choosing, or, you can setup your Logitech made steering wheel that has been specially made for the game. The wheel itself plugs into one of the PS2's USB ports and provides the most realistic driving experience ever on a console. Instead of just providing force-feedback, which is just a simple vibration that varies at different levels, it goes one step further. The wheel actually provides resistance when you turn, so if you say try to do a sharp 90-degree turn while doing 150mph, you would have one hell of a time trying to pull it off. Although, if you want to get the fastest times possible, the regular DualShock2 controller is the best way to go bar none.
Also in the options menu there is a category that houses all of the music tracks featured in the game. The soundtrack of music featured in the game is as follows:
[table][tr][td][div]Artist[/div][/td][td][div]Song[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]8 Stops 7[/div][/td][td][div]Satisfied[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Apollo Four Forty[/div][/td][td][div]Stop the Rock (Mint Royale Mix)[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]BT[/div][/td][td][div]Mad Skillz-Mic Chekka[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]CiRRUS[/div][/td][td][div]Break In [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Cult[/div][/td][td][div]She Sells Sanctuary[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Dave Aude [/div][/td][td][div]Go Gran Turismo[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Elite Force [/div][/td][td][div]Call It Brisco (And Why Not?)[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Goldfinger[/div][/td][td][div]99 Red Balloons[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Grand Theft Auto[/div][/td][td][div]As Good As It Gets[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Grinspoon[/div][/td][td][div]Champion[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Jimi Hendrix[/div][/td][td][div]Stone Free [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Judas Priest [/div][/td][td][div]Turbo Lover [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Junkie XL [/div][/td][td][div]Def Beat [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Lenny Kravitz [/div][/td][td][div]Again[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Lenny Kravitz [/div][/td][td][div]
Are You Gonna Go My Way?
(Gran Turismo Remix)
[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Methods of Mayhem[/div][/td][td][div]Crash[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Mötley Crüe[/div][/td][td][div]Kickstart My Heart[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Papa Roach [/div][/td][td][div]Never Enough [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Powerman 5000 [/div][/td][td][div]Supernova Goes Pop[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Raekwon[/div][/td][td][div]Determination[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Snoop Dogg[/div][/td][td][div]Dogg's Turismo III[/div][/td][/tr][/table]
The menu gives you the option of deselecting the tracks that you do not care to hear while your driving, and then you can select shuffle to play them in a random order, or can just hear them in the order that they are displayed on screen.
Music is accompanied by quite possibly some of the best sound effects ever in a racing title. The staff of Polyphony Digital actually went out and (for six months) individually recorded the engine sounds for each of the vehicles in the game from their real-life counterparts. This provides for a true to life experience that just adds to the realism in the game.
Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) isn't really a big factor when winning races is concerned. Basically, if you have a good enough car, and don't make costly mistakes (i.e. crashing into walls head on) you should theoretically win each and every time. Although it is true that if you bump a car, and it catches up with you later on, it may bump you back. But as I said before, this doesn't really play a huge factor in the whole gist of things.
One of peoples many complaints about GT3: A-spec is the amount of cars in the game, or more specifically, the lack there of. This goes back to the beginning of the review where I was talking about how if one thing was better, or another feature was there, a game could have the opportunity to be "perfect." GT3 features a total of 181 cars, including the bonus ones not available from the normal car dealers. That is an impressive amount to say the least, and when you stop to consider the detail as well as the striking resemblance to each cars real-life counterpart, you might change your criticism a bit. There are many other complaints about the game, most of which will most likely be taken care of when Gran Turismo 4 is released. However, one thing is not debatable, and that is Gran Turismo 3: A-spec does give you "the drive of your life."
For two years the fine people over at Polyphony Digital worked on making the best racing game ever created, for the newest, most technologically advanced and most powerful console currently on the market. Two words can sum up the end result. A masterpiece.
By now, there is no doubt that you've already read a review or have heard your friends praising Gran Turismo 3: A-spec (GT3) for its spectacular graphics and uncanny resemblance to reality. However, what those reviews cannot offer is what the peoples reaction to the title really is. So I am placed into somewhat of a difficult position. Do I just go on with my review as normal, or do I take advantage of the fact that the game has already been available for a little while, and use the data I've gained over that period of time to write the best and most comprehensive review of GT3 on the web? I think I'll go with number 2.
Because there are just about an infinite amount of places where I could start, I'll begin with talking about the graphics and just how incredible they really are. Imagine for a moment that it's just finished raining out side, and you look out a window to see the white, cratered circle that we call the moon all alone in the night sky, minus a star here and there of course. The street lamps are on, illuminating the road with circles of light, one after another. You decide to take a drive.
Now stop imagining. Actually go out and get GT3. Once that is done, pop it into the CD tray of your PlayStation 2. Go into the simulation mode and buy a 4-wheel drive car that you can afford (preferably the Japanese Daihatsu made Storia X4). Then proceed to go into the beginner league (found in the racing mode) and find a night course called Special Stage Route 11 in the 4WD Challenge. Enter the race. Let all of the other cars go ahead of you and wait for a few seconds before pressing down the accelerator (default button X). Then slowly increase your speed and look at the environment. Now you're like, "OH MY GOD! Chris has me under mind control!" But no, you're not imagining things, each street lamp is there with the light emitting from it where it should be, and when you pass under one, the light reflects off of your car just like in real life (press the R1 button to get a better view), if you look at the back view of your car you see water fly off the back of your tires from the puddles on the road, and you see that whatever vehicle you picked is an exact model of its real life counterpart!
By now you've probably lost control and have crashed into a wall because you can't differentiate from the game or reality. So please back up (default button triangle) and begin going forward again. You will come across a Ferris wheel that is lit up with magnificent fluorescent lights. You have my word that every time you do this course, this Ferris wheel will prove more of an opponent to overcome than the five other cars that you are competing against. For it is so beautiful and overwhelming, that you will have to put everything you've got into focusing your eyes on the road instead of it.
If I had to say one negative thing about the course environments, it's that the backgrounds in a sense are too detailed, and become very distracting to the eye while driving. The course that I mentioned above is one of the most awesome courses in the game, and with the exception of the test track (which has some trees, a tunnel, and not much else), the other 17 tracks (34 if you count the backward ones) have their share of detailed and colorful backgrounds as well.
When you work your way though the beginner mode, you will earn enough credits to begin upgrading your vehicle. Parts you can upgrade range from putting in a new spin wheel, to turbo charging the engine (if that upgrade is supported) or even installing a high-tech racing computer chip that can boost up your horsepower by a good margin for a relatively cheap price. For some tips on upgrading your ride and deciding which vehicle is the best value in the early stages of the game, take a peek at our GT3 tip section after your done reading this review.
As in past incarnations of the Gran Turismo series, some races are only accessible by using a specific vehicle (like Volkswagen's Beetle) or a vehicle that has a unique characteristic (like those with a Boxer type engine). Races that consist of a fair amount of courses give you the option of doing each separately, like you would any other, or going through a series mode. This takes you through each individual track, except there are a few catches involved. The first is that you cannot exit the series mode until you've completed all of the tracks (unless of course you want to lose all of your progress, but thankfully the game allows you to save), and the second isn't really a catch, but points are given for each race, so that if you say got first place, you would get 10 points, while if you got in sixth place, you'd only end up getting one. The difference between doing a series race and just doing them individually is of course the ones noted above, and also that if you get in first place in the point standings, you will receive some extra bonuses; A bundle of credits and a secret car.
Also returning from previous games in the series are license tests. Once you become familiar with the control scheme, these are a snap. It is only when you get up to the International licenses and S license that you will find yourself spending the most time and suffering from the most frustration, this might also apply to the rally license as well, but I found that quite easy. Some have labeled these tests impossible, but they're only impossible for those not willing to spend the time, or lack the skill necessary that it takes to complete them. After the first half of beginner races, there will be license requirements. So it's best to just get these out of the way first, so you don't have to deal with them later on, and can just progress though the game without having more obstacles to overcome than there needs to be.
Speaking of obstacles, there is one and only one main obstacle in getting the 100% mark on GT3: A-spec. Time. Simply put, if you have enough spare time, you will be able to progress through GT3 at a pretty steady pace. However if you do not have a lot of spare time on your hands, I recommend that you just rent the game to experience it, and avoid buying it. Everything in this game takes time to do, as with any other game ever made, but this one especially. Some races in the endurance category can take upwards of 2 hours to complete, even with the best cars, and require you to do upwards of 100 reaching as high as 200 laps a piece! The payoff for these races is obviously bigger than any other, in both the amount of credits and the quality of the bonus car, but if you don't have the time to complete them, then you might as well forget them altogether. This negative or "obstacle" is also apparent in the professional category of races, which require you to do 10 or more laps of each course (ranging from roughly 5-20+ minutes a piece), and when doing championships that contain 10 races, well… you do the math. This game is not for those working two part-time jobs while going to college to say the least.
But what good are absolutely unbelievable looking cars when you can't control them? This is luckily one of GT3's many strengths. You can go into the rather extensive option menu and configure the controls to the pressure sensitive buttons of your choosing, or, you can setup your Logitech made steering wheel that has been specially made for the game. The wheel itself plugs into one of the PS2's USB ports and provides the most realistic driving experience ever on a console. Instead of just providing force-feedback, which is just a simple vibration that varies at different levels, it goes one step further. The wheel actually provides resistance when you turn, so if you say try to do a sharp 90-degree turn while doing 150mph, you would have one hell of a time trying to pull it off. Although, if you want to get the fastest times possible, the regular DualShock2 controller is the best way to go bar none.
Also in the options menu there is a category that houses all of the music tracks featured in the game. The soundtrack of music featured in the game is as follows:
[table][tr][td][div]Artist[/div][/td][td][div]Song[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]8 Stops 7[/div][/td][td][div]Satisfied[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Apollo Four Forty[/div][/td][td][div]Stop the Rock (Mint Royale Mix)[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]BT[/div][/td][td][div]Mad Skillz-Mic Chekka[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]CiRRUS[/div][/td][td][div]Break In [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Cult[/div][/td][td][div]She Sells Sanctuary[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Dave Aude [/div][/td][td][div]Go Gran Turismo[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Elite Force [/div][/td][td][div]Call It Brisco (And Why Not?)[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Goldfinger[/div][/td][td][div]99 Red Balloons[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Grand Theft Auto[/div][/td][td][div]As Good As It Gets[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Grinspoon[/div][/td][td][div]Champion[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Jimi Hendrix[/div][/td][td][div]Stone Free [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Judas Priest [/div][/td][td][div]Turbo Lover [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Junkie XL [/div][/td][td][div]Def Beat [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Lenny Kravitz [/div][/td][td][div]Again[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Lenny Kravitz [/div][/td][td][div]
Are You Gonna Go My Way?
(Gran Turismo Remix)
[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Methods of Mayhem[/div][/td][td][div]Crash[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Mötley Crüe[/div][/td][td][div]Kickstart My Heart[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Papa Roach [/div][/td][td][div]Never Enough [/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Powerman 5000 [/div][/td][td][div]Supernova Goes Pop[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Raekwon[/div][/td][td][div]Determination[/div][/td][/tr][tr][td][div]Snoop Dogg[/div][/td][td][div]Dogg's Turismo III[/div][/td][/tr][/table]
The menu gives you the option of deselecting the tracks that you do not care to hear while your driving, and then you can select shuffle to play them in a random order, or can just hear them in the order that they are displayed on screen.
Music is accompanied by quite possibly some of the best sound effects ever in a racing title. The staff of Polyphony Digital actually went out and (for six months) individually recorded the engine sounds for each of the vehicles in the game from their real-life counterparts. This provides for a true to life experience that just adds to the realism in the game.
Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) isn't really a big factor when winning races is concerned. Basically, if you have a good enough car, and don't make costly mistakes (i.e. crashing into walls head on) you should theoretically win each and every time. Although it is true that if you bump a car, and it catches up with you later on, it may bump you back. But as I said before, this doesn't really play a huge factor in the whole gist of things.
One of peoples many complaints about GT3: A-spec is the amount of cars in the game, or more specifically, the lack there of. This goes back to the beginning of the review where I was talking about how if one thing was better, or another feature was there, a game could have the opportunity to be "perfect." GT3 features a total of 181 cars, including the bonus ones not available from the normal car dealers. That is an impressive amount to say the least, and when you stop to consider the detail as well as the striking resemblance to each cars real-life counterpart, you might change your criticism a bit. There are many other complaints about the game, most of which will most likely be taken care of when Gran Turismo 4 is released. However, one thing is not debatable, and that is Gran Turismo 3: A-spec does give you "the drive of your life."
