In this months Forza 4 DLC release we see 10 new cars introduced. One car Aussie racing fans may be interested in is the..

2011 Holden HSV GTS

More power, better handling, and new technology are all hallmarks of Holden’s latest E Series—the 2011 HSV GTS. The Australian manufacturer has truly thrown out the stops for the GTS, with a 6.2 litre V8 capable of 436 horsepower and an engine note that has spawned praise from tons of automotive critics. So it’s definitely got the muscle for straight-line speed, but the GTS’s MRC suspension will automatically change the damping settings of the suspension several hundred times per second, resulting in a responsive ride that’s fantastic through the turns. It’s also a great-looking car, featuring a dramatic front end complete with a unique vase-shaped grille. When you think about it, the HSV GTS is a lot like your stereotypical Australian: it’s good-looking, sounds great, and is a lot of fun to hang around with.

Remember if you purchased a Season Pass, this car pack is free. Check out the trailer below.

For more information, head to ForzaMotorsport.net

Forza fans rejoice, there’s a new game on the way (early October), complete with brand new accessories. The Forza 4 steering wheel and pedals set was on display at the Tokyo Game Show (going on right now). It is quite an upgrade on the original Microsoft Xbox Steering Wheel and pedals, providing a much more towards a realistic racing wheel, to please the hardcore driving fans.

At the bottom of the photo the details card shows a price tag of $31,490 Yen, translated to Aussie dollars, that puts the whole set CSR wheel, shifter and pedals is around A$395.77.

If that’s not enough for you, then you may want to consider the CSR Elite, just make sure your getaway from the bank is in a fast car. Forza 4 is due out early October, expect the CSR accessories shortly after.

For more information, check out Fanatec.

In the lead up to an October launch of Forza 4, Jeremy Clarkson from Top Gear gives us comical run down of Halo 4’s Warthog. Apparently they get a number enquiries from fans as to why they haven’t yet reviewed the Warthog. Clarkson then launches into complex description of the animated vehicle that’d make even science nerd Adam Spencer blush. If you’ve got 2 minutes to spare its a good laugh.

More seriously, Forza 4 is highly anticipated with every previous Forza game raising the bar of driving simulation. This time round it’ll be interesting to see the Kinect integration which makes fans of the franchise both nervous and excited. Since Forza 3 we’ve had the release of GT5, which was visually stunning but was certainly lacking in areas. This time round, there will be no head-to-head battle between the racing sims, GT6 isn’t even being discussed at this point.

News regarding Forza 4 will come thick and fast over the next month in the lead up to its release, so expect a lot of coverage and a full review when the game ships.

Is it October yet ? Drifting the warthog around the Top Gear test track should be fun.

Mobile game developers Gameloft and Audi are teaming up to in a new promotion for the Audi RS 3. In a free app, now available in the App Store, you get a pretty decent driving demo and chance to win an actual real car – the Audi A3 Sportback. A little strange that an Audi RS 3 isn’t the prize, but lets move on.

The demo is actually a snapshot from the game Asphalt 6: Adrenaline and features 3 levels. Turns out the game is actually pretty fun to play.

To get into the comp, you’ll have to play between March 3^rd-16^{th and} join in competition to race three laps on the Bahamas track. The highest score can then be posted on Gameloft Live with a chance to win an Audi A3 Sportback 2.0 TFSI quattro. You’ll actually be competing with racers from all over the world, including United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Japan, Switzerland, Hong Kong, Russian Federation, Spain, Austria, Mexico, Belgium, Netherlands, China and South Korea.

Download the game now from the App Store

Interface
After a Hollywood style intro movie, the game fires into a pretty simple interface. GT Mode (Career), Arcade, Course Maker, GTTV and options. Entering the Career section (where you’ll spend most of your time) is an absolute train wreck of a UI. The interface is messy, cluttered and lacking an natural direction for the user. Now of course over time you learn where you need to go, but it’s anything but intuitive. Only after spending around 5 hours into the A-Spec races did I give the Licences section a try. Given they teach you the skills that you’ll need during races, this should be front and centre.

Also Polyphonic Digital, I’d like a few hours of my life back. I lost them going in and out of the race options to the Tuning Shop to spec my car for the race. Would it have killed you to put a link to this within the race selection area. You can enter the garage, which at least lets you choose from the cars you have. The problem arises when you check your competitors and see they have 100BHP (no option to change to kw) more than your car. To strap on a turbo so you can be competitive, you need to back out 3-4 levels, then enter the Tuning Shop, make the change, back out, then dive 3-4 levels deep to get back to where you were. To make matters worse, things seem to take forever to load, despite having installed the game to the hard drive.

Game Modes
Licences teach you about how to take corners, stop correctly, overtake and handle different conditions.
A-Spec races are ones you drive and is where you’ll spend most of your time.
B-Spec races lets you play crew chief and direct a hired driver to race.
Online play is mixed bag, sometimes you’ll get a competitive, fair race, but usually not.
Special events are challenges using different vehicles on different tracks. Progressing through the levels will unlock events.
Practice / Arcade is your opportunity to play and experiment.  

Cameras
Camera views include in front of car, in-car (premium cars only), bonnet and behind vehicle. There’s something strange in the way the behind vehicle camera is locked to the car. When turning the vehicle it feels like the left, right axis is incredibly twitchy. The camera should follow the car, but not be locked to the vehicle as this results in feeling like your car is still and the environment is rotating. While traditionally my camera of choice, I felt this view is near unusable. None of the cameras allow for rotating the camera, this means you’ll never see the side of your vehicle unless you watch a replay. Its surprising that GT5 developers spent so long developing the internal cockpits of these vehicles, yet you can’t look around it. You can look rearward and see the back seats / engine depending on your car.

If you can put up with the shadows issue, the in-car camera (where available) does provide for an immersive experience. Moving your couch closer to your HDTV will also help.

Graphics
There’s no doubt in comparison to GT4, this game looks stunning. Environments are very detailed, everything from trees, signage, buildings are all done really well. The stars of the game are undoubtedly the cars, where clearly the most attention has been paid to.

Shadows are a real problem in GT5, outside the car shadows on the road and vehicles are aliased badly, or jaggy. Going inside the car (premium cars only), really does feel like your in the drivers seat, only problem is the shadows that rush over the dashboard from the overhanging trees are heavily pixelated, ruining any immersion. The lighting system in general is pretty good, giving a natural feel coming out of tunnels or driving into the sunset give a realistic feel, but shadows are just broken.

Another promoted feature of the game is varied weather. In reality, most of the races you have are during the day in sunlight. Those rain effected races and special events have a nice touch (with premium cars), that the windscreen wipers actually work. Unfortunately the feeling of driving in the rain is ruined when you realise the rain on your windshield is little more than a heavily pixelated texture animation. It doesn’t build up or disperse different ways based on your speed or lateral GeForces.

The problem for GT5, is that GT4 is not the relevant comparison. A more adequate comparison is Forza 3 on the Xbox 360, especially when these A-list games are meant to be console sellers. While environments in GT5 are slightly improved on Forza, there’s one massive issue – damage. Something I’ve done in every driving game I’ve ever played, is had some fun creating spectacular crashes. Back in 2008 I seen an interview with the creator of GT – Kazunori Yamauchi. He said then that they wouldn’t ship the game with damage unless it could be done realistically. Well we’re 2 years on from that and the game shipped with lots of issues with damage.

Damage
Crashing your car in the first 15-16 levels you will see no damage at all. After that damage increases slightly until apparently being fully unlocked in level 40 (I’m currently level 20). If you don’t think damage matters, your wrong. Without damage, your able to smash into the AI cars when taking turns and coming out ahead with no consequences. I’ve also ridden the rail around a tight turn and been able to come out ahead. These is a very un-realistic and frankly broken part of the game which seriously detracts from the GT5 ‘Real Driving Simulator’ tag. The decision to hold damage till level 40 requires weeks of driving to achieve. Something that ultimately means a lot of GT5 racers will only ever see damage on YouTube videos.

Cars
One of GT5’s big selling points is the scale of the game, with more than 1000 cars its the biggest lineup we’ve seen in a racing game. Problem is.. it doesn’t feel that way. While pretty much every manufacturer is represented, the available cars for each feel really limited. What most of us racers do is search for our own car, or one closest to it, but chances are you won’t find it. Take Mitsubishi for example, there are only 5 cars – iMiev, Evo IV, Evo VI, Evo IX and Evo X. Subaru suffers the same fate, only 5 cars, despite both manufacturer having a long list of vehicles.

Cars are broken down into two categories – Standard and Premium. The 200 Premium cars are done in much higher detailed, have working windscreen wipers, interiors and undercarriages modelled. Only premium cars have deformable panels.

This week Polyphony Digital announced they are going to convert more cars from standard to premium via DLC. Another indicator things shipped before they were really done, despite years of delays.

The Good
This is without a doubt the best racing game available to PS3 owners. It has a great range of tracks, environments and premium cars look great. There’s plenty of different racing modes and road types – Tarmac, Dirt, Snow – Go Karts, Nascar, Road, Rally. If your froogle enough to save up 10Million, you can even get the Ferrari F1 car.

Not since Mario Kart have I had this much fun on a Go Kart. If your racing this mode, please try it using the first person camera. When you take a corner at blazing speeds and your kart just hooks up, its an awesome feeling. They have nailed the nervous sliding in the tyres, being brave is rewarded.

I think the in-car feeling of riding the bumps is the most realistic of any driving game I’ve played. The reality of flying along a road at 300km/h is that the surface would be bumpy, GT5 lets you feel this. There is a lot to love in this game despite its flaws.

The Bad
Music in the game is terrible. Worst yet, when changing the music genre in settings, it doesn’t hold. When you exit the game and re-enter the music setting returns to the default. When I’m driving I want to have motivating driving music pumping and when I exit to the menus I don’t want to feel like I’m at a sketchy 80’s piano bar.

I mentioned the UI, shadows, damage and texture issues above, they are all serious issues that detract significantly from the overall experience.

Replays – it is ridiculous that you cannot skip through a replay, either forward or backwards. This needs to be fixed, but is unlikely to be.

Course Maker doesn’t let you design courses as the name suggests, but rather select from a set of pre-made courses.

GT TV is a strange tack on part of the game. Its essentially a marketplace for GT to distribute videos, for a price, to racing fans. Personally I didn’t find anything engaging enough to purchase.

No Brakes !! – despite being able to increase the power of a vehicle by 100’s of BHP with modifications, there is no way in GT5 to upgrade your brakes. Its amazing bad that brake upgrades were omitted.

Video (in-game)

Overall
If your into driving games and you already have a PS3, its a no brainer, this is the game for you. If for some reason, in the 5 years after this generation of consoles arrived you still don’t have one, I think Forza 3 on the Xbox 360 is a better game overall. The minor increment on graphics in GT5 don’t make up for all of its flaws.

Interestingly Forza 4 is on its way in 2011, likely to lap GT5 when it ships. It’s all a symptom of the lengthy delays in development for the GT5 project. For those of us who bought GT5: Prologue (also known as extra finance for GT5), there really isn’t a lot that’s changed.

Grand Turismo 5 also supports 3D, like many of you I don’t have access to a 3D TV, so was unable to review that part of the game. Reports online suggest this is a good experience.

While the Top Gear track was something I was really looking forward to in this game, it really doesn’t feature very heavily. This would be improved by providing a list of lap times so you can compare yourself to The Stig.

The last thoughts are that this is a good, solid game, but seriously needs updates and fast. Some of the issues I’ve mentioned may be addressable via an update, but things like the shadow issue I suspect are fundamental to the lighting system and won’t change.

More @ http://eu.gran-turismo.com/au/products/gt5/

Last week the long awaited, much delayed Grand Turismo 5 was finally released to the public worldwide. I haven’t read about any early sales figures which makes me think they may be less than spectacular. Although I did purchase a copy, mainly for review purposes, but also to comparisons to Forza 3 on the Xbox 360, I feel maybe a lot of you got tired of waiting and don’t really care anymore.

Grand Turismo is a long running franchise that had a very loyal fan base, but after so many delays, its not surprising GT fanboys and girls are not exactly everywhere. Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure they are still out there, just not as many as there could have been had GT5 shipped when it was meant to.

GT5 should have gone head to head with the Forza 3, but instead most of the racing fans ended up pouring a ridiculous amount of hours into Forza. Obviously the two games are on different platforms and most people would settle in either camp, so if you are a PS3 owner, then GT5 is it. Problem is, if you were a racing game fan over the past couple of years, you’ve had the ability to walk into a shop and pickup and Xbox and Forza 3, heck it was even bundled together.

So many question to you all, did you buy GT5 ?

So many cars they can’t even fit them on one disc, the entire Forza Motorsport 3 car list has been released.

Over 400 cars and 50 manufacturers, these cars have been modelled to the very last detail both inside and out.

Check out the very lengthy list @ ForzaMotorsport

The guys over at Joystiq have a fantastic interview with Dan Greenawalt, game director of Forza 3. In the interview they discuss the all mighty Bugatti Veyron coming to Forza 3. This is just another reason I’m excited about the game. Being able to drive one of the fastest production cars in the world will be awsome.

To add to that, you can customise it with your own personal styling, making it your own show piece online.

Check out the video below, which shows the amazing lengths the developers go to, to accurately recreate these cars in the game.

Probably the most staggering piece of info from the video was that Forza 3 uses 10 times the amount of polygons that Forza 2 did. Maybe we haven’t yet hit the ceiling for current gen consoles.

More @ Joystiq

The newest racing game from Bizzare and Activision, features some crazy, arcade style racing.

20-car races across 14 locations and loads of power-ups all come together to make a game with one purpose. Fun!

Power-ups include (source: Wikipedia)

Shock – This sends out an electromagnetic pulse that can be use to disable cars in the blast radius or used to target a specific driver. This is recommended for use in large packs of cars for maximum benefit.

Barge – This emits a wave of energy out of either side of the user’s car to knock another car away. This power-up is best used on the apex of turns or at path junctions to veer the driver off course.

Shunt – A projectile-like weapon that shoots out the front of the car to give the player in front a lurch forwards. It’s best used at an angle or near a row of obstacles or in team races to give the team mate a nudge forwards.

Nitro – This item gives the player a short speed boost, as the name suggests. This weapon is usually a main staple in racing games thus far. It’s best used for boosting on clear stretches of road for maximum speed.

Mines – Another self explanatory weapon, the mines can be laid out behind the car for other opponents to run into. These must be placed carefully around the course so that it’s almost impossible for opponents not to hit them.

Repair – This power-up recovers almost all lost health for the car but is instead represented as a thin yellow haze as opposed to a simple colored box with a symbol and name on it. This is the only non-offensive power-up of the bunch.

On the serious simulation side we have racing games like Forza 3 and Grand Turismo 5 to look foward to, but if you just want to have some fun with mates, then Blur looks like a great option. This is the sort of game that will suit the younger and casual gaming crowd very well. It’s visually impacting and strives for enjoyment rather than reality.

Available: Q4 2009 on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC.

More @ Joystiq & the Official Blur website.

Racing fans rejoice, the countdown has now begun to the Forza 3 release date. Amazingly Australia and New Zealand will be the first to jump into the drivers seat on October 23rd 2009.

The United States have to wait until the 27th October 2009 for their turn.

The game is shaping up to be an absolute cracker for racing fans. Information and screen shots about Forza 3 is being progressively released at http://ForzaMotorsport.net. Personally October 23rd can come soon enough!

More @ Robot-Ninja and ForzaMotorsport. Watch the countdown thread.