“Match Made In Heaven”: Hands-On With GT Sport & PS4 Pro
November 4th, 2016 by Matej
With all the new information coming straight from the
PS4 Pro Event in Big Ben’s hometown, we’re getting our first real view of GT Sport post-delay announcement. As we learned yesterday, the game
will support 4K resolution and HDR via PS4 Pro. Now, some more light has been shone on the exact nature of these specifications.
According to Stefan over at
TheSixthAxis.com, the game doesn’t actually run at a true 4K (2160p) resolution on the Pro, but instead at 1800p with checkerboarding. Kazunori notes the human eye has trouble differentiating between the two while in motion, which is the reason why Polyphony opted for the latter option and the improved stability it would bring.
The preview also briefly touches on the physics of the game. As Stefan tells it, the handling’s overriding characteristic is one of neutrality, through both the McLaren 650S (on tarmac) and Mitsubishi Evo X (on dirt) he drove. He does talk about the high-end Thrustmaster T300 used at the event, and expresses a desire for more feedback through the rim.
Rallying on the hardest difficulty proves difficult; racing through Tokyo, less so. “When I failed to control it around [the] Expressway,” says Stefan, “it was just a barrier or another car there to greet me and help me on my way.” Perhaps vehicular damage — with real consequences — is one of the yet-to-be revealed features Kazunori teased with the original delay announcement.
The “VR Tour Mode” would feature a similarly diverse pairing, with Audi’s R18 racer and the ND-gen Miata on offer (
watch a short clip of the Mazda here). The virtual reality implementation garners positive remarks, comparing favourably to Driveclub VR. That game makes do with the vanilla PS4 —
though it is set for a Pro-enabling patch — and the question of how much of a difference the consoles make is brought up:
“There’s a feeling that, while PSVR is a very good system, the power of the standard PS4 holds it back and the PS4 Pro should unlock something extra, something a little bit more special. Without the two base consoles side by side, it’s impossible to know how true that is for GT Sport’s VR – something felt lost in translation, but Kaz skirted round a question about if PSVR support would be a Pro exclusive feature.”
While Stefan stresses in the article comments that a translation mix-up really is the likely culprit, we’d be remiss if we didn’t point out one of the supposed tenets of Sony’s two-system approach is no exclusive gameplay features for Pro-enabled titles.
Hopefully, now that we’ve seen GT Sport running with VR on the uber-PS4, we’ll see it running on a regular system in the near future. All eyes on the
PlayStation Experience, then…
UPDATE: TheSixthAxis clarified some details for us on Twitter. The wheel used at the event was the Thrustmaster T300. The cars used in the 4K demonstration were the McLaren 650S and the Mitsubishi Evolution X, while the VR demo used the Audi R18 and the ND-gen Miata.
GT Sport Audio is ‘Big Improvement’ says Eurogamer Editor, Yamauchi Comments on Efficiency
November 4th, 2016 by Dustin Moore
Last month, the GTPlanet community was quick to take note of what sounded like
an improvement in Gran Turismo Sport’s vehicle audio design. Sure enough, amidst all the latest conversation about
image resolution, HDR, and
PSVR capability, a report from Sony’s PS4 Pro event in London seemingly confirms Polyphony Digital’s progress in the audio department.
“Unlike the digital drone of past Gran Turismo games it at last feels like you’re inside a complex, noisily mechanical piece of engineering,”
Eurogamer’s Martin Robinson recounts. “Elsewhere, a replay featuring a bevy of prototype cars displayed a diversity of engine notes, from the turbo diesel whine of an R18 to the throatier V8 of the Toyota TS030.”
This is all rather promising for those who have longed for better sound effects in the Gran Turismo franchise. However, Robinson shares his findings with the caveat that these improvements are not on par with other racing titles, but still better than previous GT offerings.
It was in 2014, following the release of Gran Turismo 6, that
Polyphony Digital publicly announced its effort to beef up its sound team. By 2015,
the Sony studio had recruited Forza Motorsport Audio Lead Mike Caviezel to step in as its Senior Audio Lead. Recent observations regarding the improved sound presentation in Gran Turismo Sport demos may indicate that the impacts of Caviezel’s contributions are just now becoming unmuted.
Robinson goes on to share that Kazunori Yamauchi, the creator of Gran Turismo, appeared especially proud of headway, as it relates to sound. At a point during a presentation, Yamauchi turned up the audio before admitting that there is “still more work to be done.”
This was not be the only curious comment Yamauchi provided at the event which, as a whole, spotlighted the future of PlayStation gaming.
“In terms of the release cycle for Gran Turismo, we’re on track as usual,” Yamauchi remarked to Robinson’s question asking what takes the team so long. Unfortunately, this case of being “on track as usual” is contradicted by
a missed release date that once had Gran Turismo Sport scheduled to arrive this month.
On the other hand, fans waiting in anticipation for the release of Gran Turismo Sport may find solace in hearing from those other than Sony’s spokespeople that improvements are being made. Still, the platform afforded in London did not result in a newly announced launch date, even after
a strange exchange at a South African gaming convention one month ago.
For the very latest in Gran Turismo Sport news, keep up-to-date here at GTPlanet and at our official
Facebook and
Twitter pages. Also, join the discussion in
our Gran Turismo Sport forum.
