The direct successor to the company's reemergence into to supercar market, the MP4-12C, is logically called the 650S. I don't suppose "MP5-13D" or whatever other fax machine catalog part number has quite the same ring to it. The "new" car shares 75% of its parts from the old, and is therefore still a 2 door, rear mid engined supercar with a 3.8 litre twin-turbocharged V8 sending power to the rear via a 7 speed DCT, with a "entry level" version of it called the 625, a convertible version, and a "LT" version of it, called the 675. Situated below it is the "entry-er level" McLaren, the 570S: a 2 door, rear mid engined supercar with a 3.8 litre twin-turbocharged V8 sending power to the rear via a 7 speed DCT, with a "entry-est level" version of it called the 540, a convertible version, and a "LT" version of it, called the 600. Above the 650 is the P1: a 2 door, rear mid engined supercar with a 3.8 litre twin-turbocharged V8 sending power to the rear via a 7 speed DCT, a track-only, non road legal version of it called the P1 GTR, a road legal version of the non road legal version of the road legal version of the car converted by an independent, aftermarket specialist, denoted with adding extra numbers to its name.
The specific car in question for this week however, is the 650S Gr.4 (the green car in the photo above), a fictional car in a fictional category based on a real category in a real driving simulator that seemingly has more arcade fans than sims. As an entry level racing category, Gr.4 cars are faster than the road legal versions of the cars, acting as a mid-ground between the road cars and the full fledged racing machines. As such, the non road legal, race prepped car produces only about 58% of the road car's power, while weighing more with the current BoP applied. The 650S Gr.4 borrows more than heavily from the 650S GT3, a real car in a real category slotted into a fictional category in this game, with pretty much a copy-and-paste interior from the GT3 car. But not the exterior, though; because while you only get one livery for the GT3 car and eighteen coats of paint with no livery to choose from on the road car, the Gr.4 car bridges that gap with six colours of one livery to choose from.
a-are you still with me...? Quick, where's my picture with the cute anime girl on it?!
So yeah, as you can probably tell, McLaren cars confuse the ever loving bebuddha out of me. Competition against the established Italian brands in the exotic supercar scene is much needed in my opinion, but I never really "got" what they're supposed to be about beyond competition existing simply for the sake of existing. They haven't the graceful appearances or the soulful songstress capabilities of a Ferrari, nor do they have the balls to the wall attitude, in-your-face attention grabbing presence of a Lamborghini. They've always struck me as a "we're just here to go around this track faster than anyone else" kind of manufacturer, which is roboticism I more readily associate with the Germans than the British. I guess the fragility of their cars gives them some flavour? Thankfully, I don't much have to try to figure out what's what this week, because the 650S we're putting on the track today is a racing car. So, is it the fastest thing in like, EVARGH?
Haha, of course not. It's Gr.4 post-2020. If you aren't in a loathsome FF in a Gr.4 race, you're obviously not in it to win it. However, when put in its RWD and MR company, the 650S is certainly... "rather brisk", I believe is the British way of terming it. While I didn't get to spend as much time with everyone during this week's meet, I did at least manage to sneak in my personal favourite, the Cayman GT4 Clubsport, and the formidable NSX Gr.4, a favourite in Gr.4 racing prior the BoP changes that made FFs overpowered. Even in the slipstream of the 650Ss (650S'? 650Ses...? AAAAHHH), I was barely able to do any more than simply keep up with the McLarens, which was a bit of a surprise in the Honda, given that it's also a fictional car built from the ground up to be a Gr.4 car, also arbitrarily blessed with seven gears like the McLaren, in contrast to the maladjusted Porsche with gears long enough to make the far fetched claim that it's the single best car in Gr.4 ever and anyone who disagrees needs to be shot on sight.
(Also, the NSX Gr.4 should've been this week's Car of the Week...)
To drive however, it's a little... blah. One might expect a rear mid engined racing car to possess the sharpest of turn ins and perhaps a bit of a cheeky rear end, but the 650S Gr.4 feels like it has the wheelbase of a 675LT with how... *ah-hem* overly stable it is. To illustrate, the 650S Gr.4 is one of the very, very few RWD cars in the game where I'm forced to set the brake bias towards the rear, just to get it to roughly imitate how a MR racing car should rotate into the apex of a turn. This problem I think is down to the downforce imbalance of the car, having too much in the rear relative to the front, because I think the understeer becomes more prominent at speed, such as at Kyotou. Even at lower speed corners however, the front end just feels numb and the tyres don't feel like they've much bite to them, in contrast to the aforementioned NSX and Cayman, lively and lovely at any speed. Also, the M838T engine, despite being heavily detuned from the road car, annoyingly retains its torque curve pixel for pixel instead of becoming flatter with an variable air/fuel restrictor, meaning that this turbo 3.8L V8 is all mid range shove and nothing else anywhere else. I personally find the best result shifting just before 8,000rpm, or about a whole thousand revs before its Honda-shaming 9,000rpm redline, which is just before halfway into the rev counter of the game's HUD. Yes, that means it bogs on standing starts as well.
Capable for sure, especially in the right hands. It's just no fun at all to drive, nor is it the fastest thing ever. The latter is usually easy to forgive in a car, but a McLaren? A racing car McLaren? That's like saying your perfume's only shortcoming is that it doesn't smell nice. At this point, what even is the point?
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