Nissan Relaunches The GT Academy
Nissan and Sony team up to give more gamers a chance to go racing
The launch of the second Nissan and PlayStation GT Academy has just been announced, giving gamers from across Europe (and Australia and New Zealand too) an opportunity to turn their virtual dreams into reality.
The eventual winner gets a full season's racing in the European GT4 Cup at the wheel of an RJN Motorsport-prepared Nissan 370Z. There's only one stipulation - anyone who holds, or has held, a national or international race licence is not elegible to enter.
From 17 December budding online racers will be able to compete on a time-trial course via PlayStation Network that previews next year's Gran Turismo 5 - one of the most eagerly awaited racing games ever.
The fastest 20 from each participating country will then compete on another exclusive Gran Turismo 5 in order to decide who moves on to the next phase, a five-day 'bootcamp-style' driver training programme.
The two best contestants from the driver training programme will then go on to a programme of UK-based races to help qualify them for an international race licence, although only one can go on to the full European race programme.
"The whole GT Academy concept is very close to my heart," says Kazunori Yamauchi, creator of the Gran Turismo series. "Our target with the Gran Turismo series has always been to come as close as possible to a real driving experience. To witness the level of driving achieved by GT players after a relatively short space of time at the GT Academy was very satisfying for me and I look forward to seeing the 2010 finalists in action."
Now if your question was Since when has playing Mario been like driving quickly in real life you'd have a good point.
Plus this is simply a marketing exercise.
I only bought a PS3 to play this simulator, as crap as the PS3 is as its broke and had to download the game!!!
Keeps me entertained when there is peace in quite (Wife and Daughter have ski daddled out somewhere)
Right I'm off to get that Ferrari F40!!!
The weak point in this case: Gran Turismo is no (and never was) a racing simulator - it's an arcade racer. If you are in simulators, try rFactor, Live for Speed or GTR2. Playing such a game for the first time may be a rather frustrating experience, especially if you are used to Grand-Turismo-like stuff.
Fun are all three though - real, arcade, simulator
on a ps3
It's like a PistonHeads 21st century Willy Wonka, with just one golden ticket for the one who can prove himself (herself?) worthy...
Jammiedodger26, you obviously don't play GT do you? I found virtual laps of the Nurburgring quite useful for when I went out there, I could even drive my exact car with simulation tyres and found it to be very accurate in terms of grip and handling. It helps to have a proper force feedback steering wheel, you can't go back to a controller afterwards. In fact, the only difference is in reality you have to queue for f
king ages just to go back around and the track is populated by middle aged nobs in 911s who need more virtual track time so they don't get in your way in the corners.But that shouldn't detract from the fact that driving games/simulators have really advanced in recent years.
Whilst GT4 was certainly eclipsed by some PC racers in terms of how a car moves around, GT5 Prologue does not suffer in comparison. (Just my opinion so feel free to disagree, get upset, or vent!)
As it stands the physics engine is well beyond other games that you can buy for PC or console. Paired with a 'wheel & pedal toddler kit' it is untouchable. And YES, I have played most of them..... And YES i am a bit biased
I have not tried playing the game wearing pants as I am sure that by stripping away all excess weight I can improve my lap times.
I would second the opinion that once you move from a controller to a wheel you will struggle to go back.
Good luck to all those who compete.
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