Those who keep using the term \'racer\' need to play some other racing games beyond GT and Ridge Racer.
I\'ve posted about this in the past when someone asked if I could point out a better \'racer\', so I\'ll just cut and paste those thoughts here;
The most \'realistic\' RACER ever? Don\'t make me laugh, what other racing games have you played - why don\'t you try Grand Prix Legends, Grand Prix 3 and Jarret & Labonte Stock Car Racing for starters.
What could they add? \'wtf more could they have done\' Hmm...
i)Car Damage - for the most \'realistic\' racer ever don\'t you find it funny you can slam into a wall at 150 mph and nothing happens to your car. Don\'t start that bull**** about licenses J&L had cars from Nissan, Toyota, Chrysler, BMW, Audi, and Ford and DID have car damage. Of course Polyphony probably couldn\'t get ALL the manufacturers to agree to have their cars damaged, but why couldn\'t we have non-visible damage? Oh, but that would mean they\'d have to spend less time on the graphics.
ii)Rotational Collision Physics - if you tail end a car in GT3 it simply goes faster (ala Mario Kart), just watch a Nascar race to see what really happens. If you tried to bank off other cars when turning (like you can in GT3) in GPL both cars would go spinning out.
iii)Improve the AI - they don\'t even acknowledge your presence, they simply drive around their pre-defined paths - compare this to the games I just mentioned where opposing cars attack and defend the racing line. How the f uck can you call it the ultimate \'racer\' when you\'re driving against idiots who don\'t even know you\'re there.
iv)A larger field - only 5 other cars to race against? What is this, GT Mario Kart? J&L has a field of 11 other cars, while the GP games feature full 20+ fields...but of course if they added more cars to race against the graphics wouldn\'t be pretty.
Play some REAL racing games (ie not Ridge Racer and Sega GT) before you call GT3 the ultimate racing game, I don\'t even consider it a racing game - it\'s a driving game, a damn good one at that, but the actual racing model is atrocious. For all my complaints about the game I still like it, I got to about 60% before I finally got bored of simply racing against the track.
$hit go out and rent Nascar Heat 2002 - that game is much more of a real racing game than GT3 - it has proper collision physics and a decent racing model (the drafting model is spectacular).
Of course none of those games I mentioned have such nice graphics, and that\'s the bottom line, in the \'greatest racer ever\' you can\'t even adjust the sfx/music levels, it doesn\'t save the lap times for all the courses (this was in GT2), you can\'t customise your cars (this was in GT2) and you have LESS cars than GT2.
Those who call GT3 the best racer ever are either a)graphics whores or b)have never played real racing games or c)GManJoe.
J&L is the best pure racing console game money can buy, it has licenced cars, more tracks than GT3, an excellent damage model, incredible AI, and a 12 car field and all this on the 32 bit PSX - of course it didn\'t sell because the graphics whores at Gamespot, Videogames.com, IGN, and Gaming-Age didn\'t like the visuals so it didn\'t get the press it deserved. I can say the same thing for EA Sports\' Fifa series as compared to Konami\'s ISS Pro series.
In the end graphics sell, they sold GT3. We look at screenshots of games and if they look poor we write off the game. If EA Sports produced Madden 2003 with the same gameplay, less features, but better graphics they would be crucified...unless their graphics were as special as those in GT3 - then it\'s okay, we can put on the blinders, not see the faults in the game, call it the best ever, and throw progress, constructive criticism and inovation down the toilet.
Maybe for GT4 they will give even less cars, less tracks, same gameplay, but if they improve the graphics even further I\'m sure it will be widely hailed as the greatest racing game ever.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If GT3 had RRV\'s graphics it would have been slaughtered by the gaming press and the average gamer; \'it\'s the same as GT2\', \'hey, how come there are less cars\', \'the AI is still dumb\' etc. But all that was ignored because of the jaw-dropping visuals, so can you blame Sony? I can\'t.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gran Turismo 3 is the DOA3 of
driving games, massive graphical upgrade, minor gameplay upgrade = best game ever....
Those who think GT3 is a great racing game need to play some solid PC racing titles - Grand Prix Legends wipes the floor with Gran Turismo 3 in terms of the racing model. I still don\'t know how you can consider a game that has only a SIX car field, no damage (and therefore no repurcussions for driving like a maniac) and Mario Kart AI is the BEST \'racer\' of all time.
And for those who think GT3 models it\'s cars totally realistically might want to read this too;
http://www.digitalsports.com/ps2/gt3/review.htmlSeven,
Of course, most car manufacturers would call GT the best \'racer\' ever - it\'s the top selling game and their cars being in there give them the best exposure. Many companies had to actually GO TO Polyphony to get their cars in the game. It has nothing to do with the actual gameplay itself.