GT7 W86: Mazda RX-Vision '15

Ever since the 3rd generation, "FD3S" RX-7 ended production in 2002, rumours, fan renders, and outright clickbait articles purporting a grand return of a Mazda rotary sports car have swarmed the niche fan community incessantly. While the four door, four seat, and criminally underrated RX-8 did succeed the RX-7 in name and driving feel, it never had the laser focus, bleeding edge performance, stunning svelte looks, or cultural significance that the FD was so beloved for, leaving some to believe that the legendary 7 had no true successor. In 2015, Mazda took a look at that that storm of speculation and discourse and thought, "Y'know what? Ima have a piece of that action, show 'em how it's done for poops and giggles", and revealed at the Tokyo Motor Show, a "Rotary Sports Concept" known as the RX-Vision.

Of course, in the 13 years since the FD bowed out of the Japanese market, cars, and the world at large, had changed almost beyond recognition. Cars had arguably gotten so fast to a point that high tech computer wizardry had become a requirement to not only keep them on the road, but to get the most out of them on the track. Thus, pure, lightweight, simple, and affordable sports cars à la the RX-7 have been edged out of the market by technological juggernauts, with many companies even beginning to experiment with hybridisation to prepare for an eventual transition into a carbon neutral future, resulting in an influx of bloated, heavy, and isolating computers on wheels. The RX-Vision then, shocked TAS2015 attendees upon its unveiling both with its beauty and what said beauty seemed to promise; it was low, it was wide, it was svelte, and it hadn't a single screen in the spartan cockpit, seemingly promising the return of a pure sports car just like the FD RX-7 used to be. One could even argue that the RX-Vision looked less like its own thing and more like an FD RX-7 pulled out of a time machine and adapted for the climate of 2015: the goggles–shaped rear light cluster sheathing four round brake lights is the most obvious shared design element, but even the RX-Vision's headlights, while required by modern laws to be static, have running lights in the shape of panel gaps suggestive of the sorely missed pop–up headlights of the RX-7. Heck, the analogue gauges in the RX-Vision would almost look nicked straight from a Zenki FD in the early nineties if the tach didn't read up to an eyebrow–raising 10,000rpm! It really did seem like Mazda were dead serious about bringing something in the spirit of the FD RX-7 into the modern era; something that would be focused on just the driving thrills while actively purging from it any frills, and such a notion was proper cause for celebration both for rotary sports car fans and driving enthusiasts in general.

Photos: Mazda

However, despite all the direct callbacks to my childhood hero and dream sports car, the RX-Vision has always looked a little... off, to me. The part that sticks out to me the most—quite literally—is the stupidly long bonnet of the RX-Vision. One of the main selling points of a Wankel Rotary engine is that they're very compact for their power output, so why the heck does the bonnet of the RX-Vision look long enough to swallow a V12 longitudinally? What's under there, what's that space used for? Designer Maeda Ikuo has proudly stated in GT Café that this long hood, short deck style was an intentional design decision, giving the car great proportions and putting more load on the rear tyres, but I respectfully disagree with him. If load on the rear was really so important, I'd really rather they just made a rear mid–engined car instead, fully acknowledging that Mazda seems oddly adverse to producing RMR cars for some reason. One of the things that made the RX-7 so beloved was that it was a very "pure" and "honest" sports car—there was nothing on it that didn't serve a purpose, and the cars had a very simplistic, yet organic beauty to them because of that. The RX-Vision by contrast, was not only a hollow styling exercise, but one that looked like a fat, disproportionate person wearing a designer dress to me. Yes, the dress itself is achingly beautiful, but the thing underneath contorting, stretching, and giving it shape, I just can't for the life of me find attractive in the slightest, and the whole package just seems a waste.

Now, this is a personal pet peeve of mine, but I really wish the RX-Vision had a third brake light in the middle, even if it'd mostly be blocked by the rear spoiler in its lowered position (and I highly doubt this is legal anywhere). The spoiler bisecting and obscuring the rear lights may at first appear to be just a styling item, but in a blink–and–you'll–miss–it moment during the car's reveal, a video package did show the spoiler raising up and out of the way of the lights, and designer Maeda Ikuo has stated in an interview that the spoiler deploys automatically. It's a bit of a shame that the spoiler is completely static in GT7 in its lowered and obstructive position. I've genuinely never understood why spoilers and wings nowadays need to pop up and down. It's just unnecessary mass and complication. I'll deal with the drag penalty at legal speeds and save on the mass, thank you very much. Rear wings are cool, I want to see them, and anyone who thinks they're uncool are pots calling kettles black. Also, remember how I praised the RX-Vision earlier for not having a single screen in the cockpit? Yeah, that might be a bit of a problem, considering the fact that the thin stalks protruding from the doors hold nothing but cameras. They might want to look into that before putting the car into production, and while they're at it, maybe they can also add in door handles and a fuel inlet.

In 2022, seven years after the RX-Vision was initially revealed, Toyota unveiled a good looking, long hood, short deck FR GT3 racer called the GR GT3 Concept, and the folks at Japanese Nostalgic Car quickly connected the dots, similar roof and door cut lines, and proportions to the RX-Vision GT3 Concept that was added to Gran Turismo Sport in 2020. Now, I don't even want to fantasise about knowing what goes on behind closed doors of car design at a corporate level, but this lines up a bit too well with my gut feeling of "The RX-Vision is very unlike the Mazda I know", making me believe that the RX-Vision was never born specifically to be a Mazda to begin with, but rather as a shared platform. I know the auto industry is in a bad place right now, and the clock is ticking on the internal combustion engine, but as a Mazda fan, I don't know if I want a rotary sports car that has to compromise and share platforms with something it was never meant to be. To be clear, I'm not against platform sharing at all; I just think that the rotary sports car is too ingrained into Mazda's identity to share with and be compromised for some other make, even if Toyota and Mazda (along with Subaru) seem to be buddy–buddy in real life.

I don't give praise to Polyphony Digital often, but they've done an absolutely fantastic job in capturing the essence of the RX-Vision in GT7. Designer Maeda Ikuo has stated both in interviews and in the GT Café that he designed the surfaces in such a way that light dynamically dances across the car as the viewer moves around it to make the car appear more as though a living creature and not just a machine, and while a good approximation of this can be experienced without ray tracing, this dynamic light dance absolutely comes alive in GT7 with ray tracing enabled. It genuinely tickles my inner child taking the RX-Visions to Scapes with spectacular lighting, such as the Tokyo National Art Center, and just... moving the car around, much like a child would a toy car in his hands.

While the wheels and plastic trim pieces look black most of the time, at certain angles, they give of a slight candy apple reddish tint, and even that has been captured and replicated faithfully in GT7. It's not very noticable with the original body colour of Soul Red because they pair so well with said paint, but that reddish tint starts to really stick out and look awkward when the car is repainted in anything other than red, or when one messes around with colours and temperatures in photo mode to get the car looking a certain way.

On the technical side of things, Mazda are cautiously tight–lipped about any specs of the RX-Vision, refusing to spare us fans even morsels of information. We only know that the SkyActiv-R engine is the "main power unit", and that it's an FR. Despite Mazda's deliberate wording that leaves open the possibility of hybridisation, the RX-Vision's only power source in GT7 is its screamer of a Rotary Engine, interpreted by Polyphony Digital to be a naturally aspirated 4–Rotor that revs to 9,500rpm, producing a peak of 517HP (386kW) at 8,800rpm and 489.2N⋅m (360.8lbf⋅ft) at 7,500rpm. If you think PD were super generous with those power figures, wait till you see how little the RX-Vision weighs according to them: a mere 1,290kg (2,844lbs); 60 kilos (132lbs) lighter than the RX-8 Spirit R and just 20 kilos (44lbs) heavier than the RX-7 Spirit R Type A. These figures put the RX-Vision's performance somewhere around those of the C6 Corvette ZR1, Ferrari 458, and the NC1 NSX; all of which familiar names and flagships the FD RX-7 could go toe–to–toe with in the early nineties.

While the SkyActiv-R engine's power curves and noise do make it extremely similar to the R26B 4–Rotor of the 787B, a very pleasant surprise greeted me when I got into the car from the garage: it made actual 787B noises! This is a big deal to me because I've complained about PD not having a real 787B to scan and record back when I reviewed the 787B in GT Sport, resulting in the digital 787B—and anything else derivative and accepting of its 4–rotor—sounding decidedly unlike the real 787B, including the RX-Vision GT3 Concept. In other words, the "base" RX-Vision sounds more like a racecar than even literal racecars on startup! Despite this, the sound of the base RX-Vision has been notably muffled from its GT3 counterpart during actual gameplay, itself already slightly muffled from the sound of the faux 787B. Some have expressed that the piercing wail of the 787B's 4–Rotor is grating to listen to, and even I have to concur with that sentiment. The RX-Vision's sound, having gone through so much muffling, is perfectly fine to listen to even for long periods of time, all while still sounding highly distinct. It has struck the perfect balance in my opinion, especially if one can suspend their disbelief and not question how something with this much character and volume can ever hope to make production in today's car climate.

The benefits of not having to exist in the cruel and spiteful world are readily apparent from the right bucket seat of the RX-Vision, as the A–pillars are impossibly thin by stringent modern standards, allowing for an incredible view out front. The RX-Vision also doesn't have to print 0–100km/h times nor pass noise and emissions regulations, so the car can be geared naturally for its power curves and mass. Driving it is such a breath of fresh air and a stark reminder of just how ludicrously compromised modern cars are. 2nd and 3rd gear in the RX-V's sequential gearbox are very close to each other to keep the rev happy Rotary unabashedly screaming unhindered by noise regs, and the car will continue to pull all the way in 6th gear, topping out at redline around 320km/h (199mph) in clean air without even a hint of wanting to function as an overdrive highway cruising gear. Just like the 787B, the RX-Vision has ample mid–range punch normally uncharacteristic of NA Rotary Engines, and when mated to such close gear ratios, the RX-Vision is never left without an answer for any complex of corners. I do however concur with Obelisk and RX8 in saying that the RX-Vision has a bit too short of a final drive ratio for the speeds it feels otherwise capable of. It's not a big deal most of the time, but it does feel like squandered potential in the highly specific scenario of a top speed slipstream battle against other cars, or even copies of itself.

Of course, with performance numbers far surpassing that of the FD RX-7, the suspension setup of the RX-Vision has accordingly been tightened up to be less playful and more immediate. The RX-Vision shows no perceptible pitch and roll on its default Sports Hard tyres from the inside and out, and it's almost racecar immediate in its response to driver inputs. Its stiff suspension, incredibly lightweight body, and meagre downforce values combine to result in a car that reacts to every minute crease and crevice of the road surface, transmitting them all to its driver with such clarity that it even comes across visually in bumper cam, making the RX-V feel extremely raw and constantly on the edge, easily upset by an imperfect public road, beating up its driver visually in lieu of physically through the digital divide. It really does remind me of tuner cars from the 90s with how on edge and unrefined it feels in its pursuit of performance, no doubt worsened by the very modern 20–inch steamroller wheels. That stiff suspension setup can also be problematic even on an obsessively smoothed over racetrack: with a staggered 245–285 tyre setup and a rear weight bias from the long hood, short deck body style, the RX-Vision can struggle to put weight over the front tyres to get the long nose to bite into an apex, which is a problem only highlighted more by the fact that whoever is in charge of setting up fictional cars at PD just loves giving them stupidly tight differential setups, meaning that the laden, grippier rear end of the RX-Vision is always trying to keep the featherweight front end from turning and biting into a corner. On trail braking, there's a very prominent moment wherein the car awkwardly stops wanting to turn, the steering wheel judders, and the front tyres scrub with no leadup nor warning whatsoever, and it's a similar story on corner exits as well, where the rear end will suddenly break loose without warning on power, despite the malleable and predictable nature of the NA engine. What this translates to in practice is a very unpredictable and counter–intuitive car to drive; I find myself braking early for corners just to avoid having enough brake input to lock up the LSD when it comes time to pitch the car into the turn, and on corner exits, I'm always tiptoeing on the accelerator pedal, waiting, anticipating the stupid diff to bust the rear end loose. I keep TCS on at 1/5 when driving the RX-Vision not only because I appreciate the safety net, but also because the TCS light coming on out of a corner as I roll on the accelerator pedal is the only warning I'd get for the RX-Vision wanting to re–enact the last downhill run of Takahashi Keisuke versus God Foot.

Despite the "Vision" in its name, the RX-Vision is, in fact, not a Vision Gran Turismo car, meaning the car can be upgraded and adjusted. One might think then, that the car's rather glaring faults can be fixed, but I'm sad to report that, aside from the gearing, none of the RX-V's prominent faults can be tuned out. While a "fully" customisable suspension kit can be bought for the RX-Vision, the springs can't go soft enough to give clear, stable Vision on Sports Hard tyres, with minimum natural frequencies of 2.30/2.50Hz F/R. For some context, a C6 ZR1's stock values are 1.8/2.0Hz F/R, and that's hardly a soft car to begin with. There are no aero parts for the RX-Vision at all in GT Auto, meaning that the car is just stuck with its default downforce values for life. While the car does produce meaningful downforce as–is according to its spec sheets, it doesn't feel enough to counteract the lift the body naturally generates, as the car feels vague, floaty, and even snappy at high speeds, making some high speed corners and kinks either extremely precarious to take at speed, or just flat out impossible to negotiate without slowing to an extent where that becomes dangerous in itself. It's impossible to brake on the high line for the aggressively banked T1 of High Speed Ring Reverse without introducing the rear quarter panel to some armco, and it WILL snap loose without fail, controller or wheel alike, on the final left kink on Deep Forest's home straight. I'm merely speculating when I say this, but I really think the long hood, short deck body style is to blame for all this lift, as the air along the roofline of the car has to dip sharply to meet the boot lid of the car, creating a region of low pressure where the rear window is. It's why so many Le Mans racer have "long tail" versions, right? To feed higher pressure, less turbulent air to their rear wings for high–speed stability? Maybe this wouldn't be such an issue if we could put a towering rear wing on the RX-Vision to match its roofline à la the GT3 Concept, but despite the racecar already being in GT Sport prior to the release of GT7, none of that trickled down to the base car at all for some unfathomable reason.

For a million credits, I would certainly hope for more customisation options and a much better drive. The C6 ZR1 and any of the AMG GTs are just better cars in every regard, and good luck trying to convince your average petrolhead to not buy a Ferrari 458 and instead shell out more than thrice the Credits for a Mazda. Heck, I'd rather spend more on swapping in a racing 4–Rotor to an RX-7 or RX-8, and end up with cars that boast much more customisability visually and mechanically, to say nothing of the unreal fuel efficiency that racing engines have in this game.

The RX-Vision struck me as odd when I first laid eyes on it, and PD's interpretation of it only solidified those doubts into pure disdain. I'm just glad that Mazda has seemingly moved on from the pure styling exercises and made something much more balanced looking and no less beautiful in the Iconic SP.

Trying to Fix the RX-Vision

I genuinely think PD has given the RX-V too much speed and too little handling. It's obvious to say this in hindsight, but I think if a Mazda Rotary sports car was in production today, its most natural rivals would be the A90 Supra and the RZ34 Fairlady, both of which hover around the 550PP range—some 70PP below where the RX-V currently sits.

I did try my hand at assuaging the RX-V's awful tendencies, and while it is a bit of cheat to lower speed to get the car to handle better, I think I did pretty well, albeit also making the car a little soulless in the process. I think 400HP and 1,380kg (3,042lbs) are more realistic figures for a production car today; both power and mass are below those of the aforementioned Supra and Fairlady, and cruising at Japan's speed limit of 100km/h has the engine doing almost 3,000rpm in 6th gear. Flat out, it's good for around 270km/h (168mph) in clean air. And, of course, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to give the car the manual gearbox it deserved.

I don't know why I did this. I guess I just really wanted to say that I tried everything I could to make the RX-V work. I don't tune often, but I'd like for anyone still reading to give my setup a try and share with me their thoughts on the setup.

Wheels are 19–Inch items (one inch down from the default), at default offset and width.

GT7 W85: Alpine A220 Race Car '68

As of late, I've been feeling extremely discouraged from writing. A big part of it is due to how often GT7 physics and PP seems to change so often without warning, meaning that none of my testing and writing have much of a shelf life to them. As someone who writes as a hobby, I'd like my creative works to remain and stay relevant for as long as possible, but I guess PD don't see things the same way as I do.

シャパラル 2D レースカー '67 by MAX-MACH-5
#chaparral #2d #chaparral2d

The Alpine A220 Race Car '68 however, is a standout car in GT7's roster, simply for its evergreen relevance in a game constantly undergoing panic hot fixes and changes, and it achieves that thriving longevity despite not being a categorised racecar in the rather e–sports centric title. Early in the game's life, it was a hot favourite for grinding the WTC600 Tokyo money making race, because it was an extremely lightweight and fuel efficient car that was decently powerful, meaning that not only was it capable of nearly 300km/h in clean air, but it could also slot in very easily under 600PP with minimal modifications. The reason why that previous sentence is written in past tense isn't because the A220 doesn't serve that role anymore; it's because it got better at it. After all the tomfoolery with physics and PP updates, the A220 is one of the excruciatingly few cars that have their PP dropped instead of raised, going from some 601.75PP to 578.79PP. It's performance relative to the other cars in GT7 didn't change; the way it was rated against other cars in GT7 changed, meaning that, given the same 600PP cap, the A220 can actually be upgraded instead of having to be nerfed!

Money–making antics against the brain dead AI is one thing, but how is the A220 to drive? After all, said Tokyo race is at a half–wet city track with high average speeds and almost no runoff, and antique race cars have a bit of an image for being utterly unhinged and unsafe at any speed. The A220 displays a bewitching blend of responsive agility and stability, even by modern standards. It simply doesn't feel like a 56–year old car at all in that regard, but that's almost just a feint, a false sense of security to lull a modern driver into trusting it, because the rest of the car is proper horror. Its peaky engine and low drag means that it can hit some frankly harrowing speeds considering the age of this car and how little downforce it generates. Lift at speed does become a bit of an issue; despite the settings sheet showing that this car makes some minuscule downforce, the steering wheel does lighten up slightly at speed, and drivers will not only have to brake deceptively early from high speeds, but also pitch the car into high speed kinks earlier and earlier the faster the car goes. The race–tuned NA engine, like most in its era, is rather peaky, with a disconcerting torque spike near the top end, though this thankfully does happen very near the rev limit, so the car is most likely straightened out completely by the time that torque spike happens, meaning it's a quirk that's mostly unnoticable until the car is driven in the wet. And, while the dash is mostly lit, the tachometer of all things isn't, so if you're a PSVR2 user or simply drive in cockpit view without HUD for immersion, you'll really have to get well accustomed to the sound of a peaky 3L V8 picking up revs quicker and quicker as it nears its 8,300rpm limit.

All of that however, pales in comparison to the biggest (un)sticking point of the A220: the tyres. They are Comfort Soft by default in GT7, and for the speeds the Alpine can hit and feels otherwise capable of, the stingy grip on offer lets down the entire experience massively. I also find it incredibly difficult to get a read on bias ply tyres in GT games, making the driving experience a bit of a crapshoot. As a racecar from the 60s, the A220 of course doesn't come with ABS, and it very much wants to be treated as such in trail braking zones, and appreciates the game's retrofit ABS being on Weak rather than Default. The last point of caution is to just be smooth when driving the A220; chassis rigidity is always going to be an issue the older the cars are, and as such the A220 doesn't like sudden, snappy movements. It's a fast car, but it definitely demands a very skilled driver to keep it going fast.

Despite having its PP rating massively lowered in relation to other cars, the A220 is still rather hopeless in a sprint scenario against cars close to its current PP rating. In our Saturday lobby "featuring" the A220, cars like the F40, XJ220, Taycan, and much more effortlessly destroyed the A220, despite all the aforementioned cars downgrading their rubber to match compounds with the Alpine. For that reason, it's only real niche is in endurance races with high fuel usage. It's less a sprinter and more a marathon runner that can run a marathon at a pace almost matching the sprint pace of much younger athletes, and that I think is massively impressive.

The Alpine A220's constant relevance in new environments is a testament that, if something is made well, it will stand the test of time and be appreciated even by people younger than it, sometimes just as a window to see into the past, and sometimes, just as it is for what it is. It's a heartening reminder that it's worth putting in heart and effort into something that just might be be remembered for years to come.

A little something:

The A220's mirror case is chrome, so it actually acts as a mirror from the front of the car, too. Interesting to see what lurks behind the Scapes scenes, and shocking that PD actually thought that far "ahead" and have shot photos behind the visible Scapes scenes, too!

GT7 W82: Honda RAYBRIG NSX Concept-GT '16

Ever since Super GT's regulations for its top class of racecars, GT500, unified with those of DTM's in 2014, I've come to really dislike the category. What was once an international clash of methodologies and ideologies has now been reduced to just the "Big Three" manufacturers of Japan battling it out in a hollow condom measuring contest; underneath the barely recognisable silhouettes of Toyota, Nissan, and Honda's flagship cars were the same 2L turbo 4–cylinders nestled in the same FR chassis, with the only difference between them being the rubber that shoe the cars and the meat in the middle commandeering them, and I just find that incredibly difficult to get emotionally invested into. As a petrolhead, I find more personality in the race queens posing beside these GT500 machines than the cars themselves, and that's just sad.

Image: Sakura Hayashi Official Blog

One of the last holdouts of individuality in GT500 was, of course, Honda's NSX, easily the most rebellious GT500 entrant of the typically polite Japanese. Despite singing the same turbocharged 2L Inline–4 tune, the NSX Concept-GT has its heart in a very different place: aft the cockpit, immediately violating the rule in GT500 which stipulates that only FR cars may compete. As if having a Super Formula engine slung midships wasn't enough of a middle finger on its own, the NSX-P lined up on the top ten slots of the grid alongside its FR competitors as early as 2014, when the production NC1 NSX only debuted in showrooms mid 2016, meaning that the NSX-P had to be specially exempted from the rule that stipulates that cars in Super GT must be based (however loosely) on a models the general public can buy, hence why its known as the "NSX-P" instead of "NC1" like the road car. And just to stick it to the man, NSX-Ps also ran hybrid assistance; the only GT500 model to ever do so, though Team Kunimitsu, the team fielding the #100 Raybrig car we have in the game, opted to ditch the hybrid system for the 2016 season due to reliability concerns, meaning we GT7 players don't get to reap its benefits. For its blatant disregard for etiquette and rules, race officials slapped all NSX-Ps in the 2016 round of Super GT with a 29kg (64lbs) mass handicap, resulting in the rebellious Ronin weighing in at 1,049kg (2,313lbs) in comparison to the Lexus' and Nissans' 1,020kg (2,249lbs).

Of course, that mass deficit is more malleable here in GT7, where the game's Balance of Performance can arbitrarily add or subtract power and mass from a car from time to time. Now residing in Gr.2, the NSX-P weighs in at 1,175kg (2,590lbs) as of v1.52. A substantial increase over the car's original mass for sure, but at the same time, it's not the only one that has put on mass; it now only weighs 25kg (55lbs) more than the Lexus RC F and Nissan GT-R across all three BoP settings, meaning that its mass deficit over its FR compatriots got closed by a minuscule amount. The kicker however, is that, while the NSX-P normally has the least power of the three, under v1.52 BoP, it now has the most power among the three 2016 GT500 racecars: 545PS in comparison to the RC F's 542PS and GT-R's 540PS (401kW, 399kW, 397kW). If Super GT officials in 2016 have balanced all three cars to be roughly equal in pace, imagine what shrinking the mass deficit and completely reversing its power hierarchy does to the balance of the three. Hint: there is no balance.

推しの子　星野アイ　RC F GT500 by kankan0208
#oshinoko #anime #hoshinoai

Full disclosure: Even by my subpar standards, I'm not very good with high–downforce cars. However, despite my shortcomings, the NSX-P is just so easy to drive to my hands, and nothing else in the category even comes close. Yes, the engine revs to an astonishing 9,500rpm, and yes, it does make over 300PS per litre, but contrary to common sense, the HR-414E engine has healthy, usable torque from as middling as 5k, from which the power curves gradually build, reaching a crescendo at 9k, where the in–game HUD flashes the rev bar for a shift. Intuitively, that's where the NSX-P wants to be shifted, but trust me when I say that it's not an engine picky about shift points, and its Anti–Lag System, set to Weak by default, keeps the engine on its toes when off–throttle. It's just such a malleable, intuitive, and cooperative engine in spite of its bloodcurdling figures! As one of the only four cars in Gr.2 that I consider modern, the NSX-P displays startling immediacy in response to its driver's inputs, easily making the rest of Gr.2 feel like utter laggards and hazards to drive. But while it's one of the only four modern cars in Gr.2, it is the ONLY rear mid–engined car among the four, meaning that the NSX-P makes even its elite group of modern peers—who themselves already make other cars in Gr.2 feel slow and unwieldy—feel like sloppy pigs in the corners! In short, not only is the NSX-P the fastest Gr.2 car under current BoP, it's also the easiest to drive!

But of course, as with any GT500 car from the past decade, the NSX-P only truly comes alive when air starts rushing past its aggressive bodywork, at which point, the sheer, immense downforce that these cars are capable of so thoroughly dominates the experience that hardly anything else about the car registers. The grip that this thing produces at speed, alongside the drag said downforce generates, means that the NSX-P can get so stupidly close to the corner before needing to brake for it—even from top gear—that I don't much use brake markers alongside the track to judge when I need to stomp on the left pedal, instead rather just eyeballing the apex. It's mind boggling, even thinking back at it now! Not that the NSX-P really wants to slow down, because it incentivises and rewards slightly odd, wider entry lines into high speed turns that allow the car to bring more speed into the corner entry, and from there, the driver will just have to trust that the car will bite into a sharper line seeking the apex. This I think is where the NSX-P truly differentiates itself from and outshines its FR competition, because none of them can carve out a line as sharp as the NSX-P can, with their heavy engines up front. Downforce may make overtaking unnecessarily difficult, but because the midship NSX-P likes taking wider lines into high–speed turns, it's good both at attacking and defending around the outside of a turn, and it's SUCH a thrill when someone lines up on my inside, and I place that blind faith in the NSX-P to just send it round the outside, my nose still ahead and therefore retaining the right to the corner, and it's just... ooh! *Chef's kiss.* The speeds the midship NSX-P can carry through corners is so obscene that, with BoP off, a pair of NSX-Ps spanked a 787B silly around Tokyo East in our Wednesday lobby, even going as far as to harass a record setting AWD EV time attack machine in the ID. R. While sussing out the limits of the Racing Medium tyres in conjunction with the downforce is a matter of blind trust, dumb courage, and trial and error like any other high–downforce racer, once it does click, that adrenaline rush is one of the most addicting feelings I've felt. It's a bit like listening to a commentary video at 2x speed; if you can catch and process everything at 2x speed, suddenly losing that efficiency by going to 1x speed just feels so painfully slow—uncanny, even. That is to say, the NSX-P makes the entirety of Gr.2 feel inefficient, uncanny, and a downright chore. It can even mix it up with cars a category above on the right tracks! That is a scary thought, and I think we should just stop restricting categories in our lobbies when we feature racecars, and dabble more in turning off BoP entirely, too, just to see if more cars like the NSX-P are out there.

Honda Audio-Technica by wowbagger_84
#honda #audio #technica

Of course, like any other car, the NSX-P is not without its flaws. But because it is simply untouchable in Gr.2, the criticisms against the NSX-P are less of me saying, "the car is bad", but moreso, "this is just what Gr.2 is like", especially when its modern competitors in Gr.2 share the same foibles. As with all high–downforce cars with suspension stiff enough to withstand the crushing forces, the NSX-P can be a little sketchy in low speed corners where the aero is of no help and the suspension permits pitifully little weight transfer, and even with a hefty detune from BoP, the safety net of TC1 is something I inadvertently find my back pressed against from time to time, with full acknowledgement that the real GT500 cars never came with TCS or even ABS. That said, the rear end of the NSX-P lets go so linearly, with such tactile warning through my T300 wheel, that it almost feels malleable enough to play with. Because of said stiffness in the springs, raised rumble strips are to be taken with extreme caution, if not avoided entirely.

The speeds that high–downforce affords may be addictive, but the same high speed turns that make these aero–reliant cars so stupidly fun to yeet through also place a humongous strain on the tyres, so much so that, even on plain ol' 1x wear during our Saturday lobby, the default Racing Medium tyres hit their peak on LAP 2 of Yamagiwa, after which the tyres just fall off. I suspect that the cause of this rapid wear is due to the tyres getting too hot and melting themselves as though the road were lava. World Tour Driver Tidgney has excellent videos about tyre temperatures, how they affect racecars, and how to better manage them, and in these high–downforce cars, tyre temps are no less an essential part of driving (and preserving!) the cars as the engine oil, so much so that a player who uses 3rd party apps to monitor tyre temps in real time ought to glean pertinent information and gain a huge advantage, and I really dislike that GT7 doesn't display the tyre temps for that reason. Whatever the causes may be, tyre degradation makes the same blind faith the car demands of its driver ever more precarious, because there's nothing gradual or communicative about taking corners at those speeds; you just have to yank it hard into a corner, and you'll find out just how worn the tyres are only until after you carry too much speed into a turn, expecting the car to stick, and it just doesn't. At that point, there's really not much the driver can do but pray.

Look, the NA NSXes were my childhood heroes, and the 2008 Epson NSX GT500 still ranks among my top 10 favourite cars of the game, to look at and especially to listen to. I think it's one of the last "authentic" and "genuine" GT500 cars ever made. In those areas, the 2016 NSX-P can never hold a candle to the old NSXes, and the NC1 "nsx" will never be a real NSX to me. But while modern GT500 cars may not have much of a personality, their raw speeds are at such a high level that I genuinely think personality would just be plain dangerous; these cars have to be perfect and immediate at the speeds they ask of their drivers, and offer no surprises. That said, over the course of the week, I think I've miraculously found some personality in the category that seemingly forbids it: the NSX-P's personality is that it's simply heads and shoulders better than anything else in its category, be it GT500 or Gr.2, and it just goes to show just how much of a shame that it's the rebel, not the norm. If Toyota and Nissan haven't the balls to make a proper mid–engine sports car, why should Honda have to bend over backwards and pay the price? Why should Honda run an FR "Civic" in GT500, when paying customers can't even buy a Civic that drives its rear wheels, even partially? The NSX-P and NC1 NSX, simply by virtue of it being rear mid–engined, may just prove to be the peak of GT500 cars for a very, very long time.

GT7 W81: Porsche Carrera GT '04

Gran Turismo 7's large and varied fanbase often bicker and debate on what the game should be, but one thing that is NEVER disputed even among this often divided fanbase is that the Invite system sucks and needs to go die in a fire, and whoever decided to implement it in the game should be kicked into a volcano. Okay, maybe that's exaggerating things (just a tiny bit), but you hopefully get the idea.

Assuming you find yourself in a position with both a Porsche Invite and the 2.3 million Credits on hand to make the purchase, should you really buy a Carrera GT? After all, the real car has been involved in some high profile incidents, with a reputation for being a deadly drive that may well even overshadow that of the once–notorious 911. In GT7 v1.52, it's one hell of a tricky customer to handle, just as its real world reputation would suggest. The most immediate thing one has to watch out for is power oversteer, as the car lets go VERY quickly at its limit—almost instantaneously——after a very progressive buildup to said limit. That is to say, this is a car that will earn the trust of its driver, solely to stab them in the back with it with nearly zero warning. Even under braking, the driver will very much have to be on their toes, as the ABS intervenes so minimally under braking that it feels almost placebo, even on the strongest setting of Default. Stomping on the brakes fully sends the tyres into a screeching hysteria, robbing the car almost entirely of its ability to turn. Having the steering wheel even minutely off–centre extends braking distances to disastrous levels, and hitting a puddle with the brake pedal depressed is just an instant death sentence without trial. It's a car that very much has to be driven, feared, and respected as though it doesn't have ABS, and like any high–powered car without aids, the Carrera GT rightly demands of its driver to be very present and in the moment to feel every nuance of the drive, perhaps at a level that simply isn't possible to translate across the digital divide. But yet at the same time, it also fiendishly feeds a quick forming addiction when the driver exhibits bravery that should really only be possible in a video game. I can just about keep the CGT roughly pointed in the direction I want to go; I haven't spun it in the 12 or so races we ran during the week, but I can only keep it straight by under–driving the car. I know gunning for a hundredth of a second out of a corner could cost me 10 seconds if I spin it, and I don't like my odds with the CGT. In other words, driving the CGT feels like a gamble, and those who have an understanding—and dare I say, "trusting"—relationship with the car seem to have better odds with it.

That said, as one of the very last analogue supercars, the CGT may well and truly be the ultimate drivers' car. I would wax poetry and claim that the CGT's looks have aged like fine wine, but that would be implying that its looks have aged at all. I genuinely love the way it somehow blends self–assuredness in its design, while having the supercar requisite "HEY LOOK AT ME!" effect in a parking lot. It's just one of those cars that get prettier and prettier the more I look at it. And of course, it has a screamer of a Naturally Aspirated 5.7L V10 that revs to 8,600rpm, and it might just be in the conversation for the top 10 engine noises in the game, racecars included. Its suspension is so rock–solid that it genuinely feels like putting grooved road tyres onto some sort of a Le Mans racecar. That obviously isn't a good idea, but it feels to me like Porsche engineers have just made the bare minimum of begrudging sacrifices to overlap the two very different worlds, and the shared area in the Venn Diagram has been tailor–made to just perfectly fit one Carrera GT with absurdly little tolerance. It has near racecar levels of immediacy and response, so much so that sometimes I catch myself subconsciously falling into racecar instincts to drive it, like trying to carry more speed into a corner for more downforce and grip, completely forgetting that I'm on Sports tyres that can't handle those loads. It's THAT close to a racecar feel, and I genuinely think it could pull off wearing racing slicks with no mods whatsoever.

The invitation system in GT7 is indisputably idiotic, but if there's ever a car that justifies itself for being locked behind an Invite, the Carrera GT is it. A casual player will have no use nor want for it, and given how disastrous it can be to drive, I think the chance to even encounter it should be gate kept. A dedicated player will have to endure a long, consistent grind to perhaps one day find themselves face–to–face with it, hopefully polishing their skills along the way. The Carrera GT feels like a secret, post–game final boss that's absurdly tough to handle, requiring of its challenger every nuance and skill of the long and arduous journey there to meet it, well above the skill ceiling of what can be reasonably expected of your average Joe. But therein also lies its appeal: a car with its reputation and handling characteristics inherently challenges the most dedicated and perfectionistic of players to own it and OWN it, and if they do succeed, they'll be rewarded with a stupefyingly quick car with styling that looks frozen in time, and can belt out an opera like no other. The secret final boss is its own reward, and the only reward higher than that has to be found outside the confines of code and common sense; perhaps maybe an animalistic bragging right of being able to say, "I made the deadly Carrera GT yield to and serve me. (Therefore, I am more fearsome than the Carrera GT.)"

SPOILER

I have an FD3S painted in Fayence Yellow, and it took until this week for me to realise it's a colour that originally came with the Carrera GT. I guess that ought to jack up the value of my FD...?

GT7 W78: NISMO 400R '95

Many may point to the 2004 Honda Legend V6 for being the car that shattered the gentlemen's agreement between woefully polite Japanese car manufacturers to not advertise more than 280PS (206kW), bringing the infamous "276HP era" of Japan to a close by flaunting 300PS on its spec sheets. However, eight years prior, a complete car was sold by Nissan's motorsports arm, Nismo, that not only packed a rebellious 400PS (294kW), but was also completely untouchable by the authorities for illegal modifications. It had a warranty, met emissions regulations, had even had a naughty speedo that would dare suggest the possibility of speeds above 180km/h (112mph) to its driver! I suspect the reason why not many remember this shocker of a car is the fact that only 44 of those very special R33s were sold, each costing ¥12 million when new—roughly three times that of a regular R33 GT-R. And its name? It's not the Skyline, or even a GT-R; it's quite simply known as the Nismo 400R.

400R Prototype Style by captbradford (Edited)
#prototype #nismo #400r

But its name hadn't always been quite so blissfully simplistic; Gran Turismo 2 players may recall a very oddly named variant of the Nismo unicorn, the "Nismo 400R Preceiding Model", won from the 2nd 4WD Special Event in Seattle Circuit. Presumably a prototype of the 400R, the Preceiding Model had the exact same power and peaks of the production 400R, weighs exactly the same, comes with almost identical paint options, and to my hands, drove exactly the same, albeit with one arguably minor difference: the production 400R (and even a regular R33 GT-R for that matter) could rev to 8,400rpm, but the Preceiding Model was limited to just 8,000rpm. One might think that this would make the Preceiding Model immediately mechanically inferior, but both 400Rs make their 399PS at 6,500rpm, after which the powerband harshly falls off (Nismo claims 400PS @6,800rpm). That is to say, both 400Rs give their best acceleration when short shifted, and having a lower rev limit forces the game to shift the Preceiding Model earlier if driven in automatic, meaning that the Preceiding Model not only loses no speed to the production model when shifted manually, but is actually faster when both are driven with the game's automatic shifting!

While the higher revving 400R '96 would eventually grace every mainline Gran Turismo game up to GT6, the Preceiding Model would seemingly be left to languish in GT2 as a forgotten footnote. However, when the Nismo 400R returned to the series in GT7's Update 1.40, those in the know were in for a bit of a shock. The 400R in GT7 now makes the full 400PS, albeit still at a lower than advertised 6,500rpm. Its rev limit was a "mere" 8,000rpm, and it was listed as a MY1995 car when 400Rs were sold only from 1996–1998. To the best of my very limited researching capabilities, I've only managed to find one 400R that's classified as a MY1995 car: what seems to be a prototype. It would seem as if the 400R we got in GT7 is the Preceiding Model, just without its weird suffix!

Of course, given the wealth of aftermarket tuners that could extract much more power from the 2.6L Inline 6 engines of the Skyline GT-Rs with relative ease, it's no secret that the RB26DETT engine left Nissan assembly plants comically under–stressed. While said engines in racecars had no problem dominating multiple race series, the road cars, capped to 280PS and 180km/h by the gentlemen's agreement, always had trouble keeping pace with much more powerful foreign sports cars like the Porsche 911 and Ferrari F40, and even domestic competition from Honda and Mazda were staking serious claims to Godzilla's crown. The 400R then, feels like a passion project from Nissan, almost as if they were slamming their fists on the table and proclaiming, "screw the "agreement"; THIS is what we can truly do with the R33, tuners take note!" Of course, to properly bring the fight to foreign makes, the 400R couldn't make do with just more power; it also needed to tighten up on the R33's handling to harness the eponymous 400PS. To that end, almost every aspect of an R33 GT-R was reworked to create the 400R: the suspension was stiffened and lowered by 30mm (1.18in) to 105mm (4.13in), the body was widened by 50mm (1.97in) to fit thicker 275mm tyres, its aero was further tweaked, the clutch was twin–plate, and the driveshaft was carbon. Hell, even its engine oil is bespoke! QoL features weren't overlooked either, as front bucket seats and H.I.D headlamps play a part in the transformation of a R33 GT-R into a 400R. The full list of changes is too ridiculously long to list in writing, but the change that most attracts my attention is that the RB26DETT engine has been bored and stroked up to 2,771cc, and no longer called the RB26; instead, it's called the RB-X GT2. Displacing 2.8L, this RB-X GT2 engine bears a cheeky resemblance to the engines used in the R33 GT1 racecars at Le Mans, and that is just so incredibly cool to me!

Being rare and expensive is nice and all, but how does it drive in Gran Turismo 7? Can it really take the fight to foreign sports cars now that the shackles of Japanese etiquette are off of Godzilla?

As the ultimate factory road–going R33, the 400R retains much of the same personality and traits of the 1997 R33 V • spec already in the game, just turned up to higher speeds. What little fans of the middle child R33 might love the 400R for its commitment to the bit, but anyone unconvinced by the V • spec might be left wanting. Like all road–going R33s, the 400R left the assembly plant without a sixth forward cog, meaning that its 400PS is stretched out long and wide across five awkwardly spaced gears, with some upshifts needing to be made earlier and later than others to give the car its best acceleration. The lowered rev limit of 8,000rpm may sound inconsequential for a car that wants to be short shifted, but on a few occasions across different tracks, I've found myself wishing for a higher rev limit so that I can hang onto a lower gear when fast approaching a braking zone, instead of having to do a short–lived upshift. Being able to rev just 400rpm higher would've saved the 400R so much valuable time around Tsukuba and Eiger, to list just two examples. The R33 GT-R has always been known to be quite the porker by contemporary standards, and instead of improving on that, the ultimate R33 furthers that theme of a heavyweight boxer by being 10 kilos (22lbs) heavier than the V • spec, weighing in at 1,550kg (3,417lbs), with an uncomfortable 58% of it resting over the front axles. While the stiffened suspension does give the 400R good initial turn–in response, it hates long, sweeping corners, and drivers will always have to watch for understeer when powering out of a turn. But all that understeer is not at all to say that the 400R is a stable car to drive; just like the V • spec, the 400R will unstick its rear end on both corner entries and exits if the driver isn't smooth and considered with their inputs, and there's still a slight bit too much roll in the rear end for my liking. Slides will very much have to be caught with the steering wheel before the ATTESA AWD system can kick in; this is still a machine from 1995, after all. And, unfortunately, like most road–going GT-Rs in the game, the 400R also suffers from what I'm calling the "1.49 bounce", where certain cars bounce in an exaggerated fashion when going over bumps following the v1.49 physics update, and that behaviour very much still persists in the current (at the time of writing) v1.52. Drivers will have to get the departure angle from raised rumble strips dead right, or the car is most likely going to hop off the paved track or even into a wall.

Angel Beats Yuri Nakamura BCNR33 by Fast_R_61
#itasha #anime #angelbeats

All those complaints having been levied, there's simply no denying how wickedly fast the 400R is even by modern standards; it must've felt completely otherworldly back in 1996. Excluding the unrealistically light Italian "supercars" of GT7, the only contemporary peer I can find in the game that would bring the fight to the 400R is the 2002 SR II Viper GTS, and only if the track has long enough straights. The 400R not only kept harassing a younger track toy in the 996 GT3, but would also keep pace with modern cars like the LC500, while matching the JDM sports cars on sale today like the 2023 RZ34 Fairlady and 2020 A90 Supra blow for blow, as though modern machinery were its natural competition instead of anything antiquated from the 90s! And many of the aforementioned cars aren't exactly easy to drive, either! Not that anyone would consider buying a 1.8 million credit LCD exclusive car for practicality, but the 400R rolls out of Big Bill Hell's car dealer at 542.50PP (v1.52), meaning that it's an easy plug–'n–play, auto–win car for any 550PP event that allows it, like the Japanese 550 Cup or even the Kyoto 1h Endurance. Just watch for the front tyre life if you do bring it to an event with tyre wear!

Me personally, I don't enjoy the way the 400R drives. It understeers. It oversteers. It's picky on the straights, and needs to be babied over bumps. It also sounds god–awful from the outside! Like most GT-Rs in the game, it's endlessly needy and taxing without ever feeling rewarding to push; getting things right just feels like avoiding disappointment, and getting things wrong is endlessly frustrating. To satiate a tuner fix, I'd heartily recommend the Amuse 380RS Super Leggera, which is readily available in Brand Central for one eighteenth the price of the 400R, and drives like a sublime wet dream. For smashing 550PP events, I'd rather take a (still super expensive) 2002 NSX-R, tweak its suspension and diff a little, and give it a slight power bump. Or, heck, the 2020 A90 Supra at 549.57PP would do that job just fine, too. And it's precisely because the 400R is so cool, yet so hard to recommend, that I truly wish PD made the 400R a prize car for the Master Licence Tests that were added alongside the car in Update 1.40; after all, the production 400R was a possible prize car (alongside the TRD3000GT) for achieving all golds in GT1's National A licence. It just seemed like such an obvious, open goal, but somehow nobody at PD thought to take the shot. The 400R is cool to look at and eye–opening on the track, but 1.8 million credits for what is, in my eyes, a trophy car, is just... ouch.

Ikamusume Porsche911(996) by Fast_R_61 (Edited)
#anime #itasha #ikamusume

That all being said, I'm happy for the Nismo 400R to be part of GT7, not only because it's an incredibly rare unicorn IRL, but it also opens up the possibility and likelihood that the Z-tune might one day join it. Now THAT is a GT-R I might be interested in :)

SPOILER

Did you know that the 400R has a direct successor? It's called... the Skyline 400R.

(Bad language in the English CC)

Bet you didn't know they made another 400R!

Vic has also made mention of the one–of–one Champion Blue 400R: a GT-R LM Limited converted to 400R specifications. But the 400R also came in another colour that's very special to GT-R fans: Midnight Purple. One of which, No. 37 (wink) of 44, has an owner that sure as hell isn't shy about running the car hard!

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