When the 2015 Mazda Demio XD Touring was added to Gran Turismo Sport as part of update 1.47 in late October of 2019, I was most definitely the happiest person in the entire player base of Gran Turismo at the time, and probably by a long, long shot too.
You see, the Mazda Demio, known as the Mazda2 in export markets (and also now in Japan... go figure), holds a very, very special place in my heart, as it's the very first car I've ever driven on Japanese roads when I rented one to navigate Japan back in 2017, and is also the first Mazda this fanboy of the brand has ever driven anywhere. I had to rent a car as Daikoku Futou, my destination on an industrial reclaimed island, is not served by public transportation, and taxis never venture in there on their own. If the name "Daikoku Parking Area" sounds familiar to you, it may well be because it's the venue of a well–known RX-7 meet every 7th of July (7/7)... or it could just be that it's a Scapes location in this game, released at the end of that year!
I mean, yes, the Demio I rented from Times Car Rental was a 3rd gen model with a petrol engine, automatic gearbox, and (for some very puzzling reason,) AWD, which means that the Demio that's featured in the game, a 4th Gen diesel manual FF, literally cannot be any more different than the car I had driven while still sharing the same name. But pah, details. Who's ever given a rat's behind about those?
Even without my personal experiences and bias though, the Demio has always been an integral part of the Gran Turismo series. The first gen Demio in Chaste White is quite possibly the first car many players have driven in Gran Turismo 1's very first licence test, and has been with the series since through both their incarnations. In fact, in Gran Turismo 6, a 3rd gen Demio Sport had a CVT gearbox, which is an excruciating rarity in the series. Yes, sure, the CVT may have put many a player to sleep, but what better reason to put a tuba of an exhaust on to ensure that you and everyone else driving within striking distance of you stays awake?
Continuing that lineage of slightly off kilter quirks, the 4th gen Demio in Gran Turismo Sport is powered by a 1,496cc SKYACTIV-D engine, making it one of the only two diesel propelled road cars in the game alongside its stable mate Atenza. Anything faster than these, you'll have to go all the way to Peugeot and Audi's LMP1 offerings to find. According to Mazda, this engine, fitted on both the Demio and Atenza, has the world's lowest compression ratio of (road going?) diesel engines, at 14.0:1, fed by a trick two-stage turbocharger reminiscent of the system found in the FD RX-7 of lore. As the cherry on top of the block, said engine is mated to a proper 6 speed stick shift manual gearbox to further set itself apart from even its stable mate, making it quite the curious gem of a car to examine under the microscope this week.
...wait, isn't a high compression ratio better for any internal combustion engine? Why is Mazda boasting about having the lowest compression ratio diesel? Gah, I don't know. My pea brain is already melting from writing this week's review and staring at all the numbers and Japanese on the spec sheets.
I know it's a bit of a stretch, but I think the Demio is one of the quiet pillars of the series, an integral part of its soul, if you will. If you'll Ittai your Jin with your ba for a moment and take a slow gait with me down memory lane, the Gran Turismo games of old always had players starting out in a cheap box that barely moves, with which you're somehow supposed to win races, thereby scraping together some credits to either upgrade said box or buy something less boxy and more feisty. It's that struggle and progressive training of a player in these attainable, everyday boxes on wheels that set apart the Gran Turismo series from its rivals since its inception, and has come to define the genre it created, named "caRPG". If you're skilled (and mad!) enough, these boxes could even share a racetrack with sports, super, or even racecars! The fact that this e–sports focused title that takes itself way too seriously, Gran Turismo Sport, has included a Demio in it gives me hope that Gran Turismo 7 can rekindle some of that lost magic of past titles, and let me feel that sense of childlike wonder with attainable, oddball cars I never knew existed, and imbue me with encyclopedic knowledge about them.
Now that I (think I) am an adult, it's relatable and attainable cars like the Fit and Demio that excite me more than supercars and racecars, believe it or not. Yeah, the McLaren F1 is brilliant, and it'd be nice to sample a Koenigsegg to see what all the fuss is about, but I'm never going to even be able to close to one of those cars. In contrast, I've been able to rent a Fit Hybrid for my work and even write a long, drawn out review for it, which truly has been one of the greatest highlights of my life thus far. I would dearly love to be able to find a diesel Demio to rent for my work in the same fashion, but surprise surprise, the only Mazda2 that's unfortunate enough to get sucked into this hellhole that is Singapore is the petrol model and only with a slushbox, despite its in–game description stating that over 60% of initial orders for the car were specced with the turbodiesel engine. If there's anything the all inclusive country of mine hates, it's cars and people with a passion... and people with taste. And poor people. And biological males. And hom-
*cough*
Anyway, I'm still hoping that one day, I'll be able to bring you that real life review of a Demio diesel. In fact, I scare even myself with how disproportionately much I want to do it. I'm almost tempted to put myself in a financial vice of importing one myself to do that, the cost of which to do so in Singapore is enough get oneself a robustly optioned 718 Boxster anywhere else in the world. Why doesn't someone just shotgun me in the back of the head already?
Even when comparing the Fit Hybrid and Demio Diesel on paper for my boring real life applications, I really struggled immensely to see just what the latter offers that the former doesn't. A base Fit Hybrid offers more boot space, a better overall Euro NCAP safety rating, and much better fuel economy than even the 6MT, i-ELOOP equipped Demios, such as the one featured in this game. You'll need to order specific grades of the Demio to get a it with a stick with seven forks, pushing the prices up to Fit Hybrid or RS territory (and no, the 15MB doesn't count, cool as it may be). Now, there are almost endless ways you can spec the two cars, but as they are in the game, the Demio costs a whopping 2,700 Credits more than the Fit Hybrid at 19,500 Cr., and this gap in price is something I find largely holds true in the real world as well.
Of course, the Fit Hybrid has problems in the real world that aren't replicated in the game, as I'm sure does the Demio. I regrettably can't compare these two in the real world without bankrupting myself and seventeen generations down my family tree, but what I can tell you even without having an actual physical Demio is that it comes with ACTUAL, PHYSICAL KNOBS FOR CLIMATE CONTROL, along with a touchscreen that you're not "supposed" to actually touch—which on their own are more than enough to justify any price hike over the Fit, and together makes me want to marry the head engineer of Mazda sight unseen. Not only that, the Demio comes optional with Mazda's Active Driving Display—a pop up screen on top of the dash onto which the most vital tidbits of information when driving, namely nav instructions, the current road's speed limit, and the car's instantaneous speed, is projected, so that the driver's line of sight never needs to veer off the road ahead. The pop up display is such a godsend—one that I kept wishing I had in real life with my Fit when ducking under speed cameras (not that I ever go above the speed limit, of course).
I mean, think about it, what's the next cheapest non–Mazda car that has a HUD speedo? Baby, don't even look at me unless your car can give me that sexy pop–up action! Does your Bugatti and Ferrari have HUDs? No? Peasants, the lot of you! Don't even come close to me or you'll infect me with the stench of POOR!
With the Demio falling behind the Fit on paper, I was really hoping that it would make sense once the Ko really starts to Do... oh fine, once the soul really begins to move, for those of you unfortunate enough to be illiterate with the culturally rich language of Nihongo. Unfortunately, the Demio also falls short of the Fit Hybrid in the driving dynamics department, which is such a shocker for me personally. The Demio is so softly sprung that, even on the downgraded, cold Comfort Soft tyres we were running on race day (default are Sports Hard), you'll be shaving off body panels with your tyres under hard cornering loads on a perfectly smooth and level racetrack such as Maggiore.
The driving impressions I'm about to dump on you are therefore done on Comfort Medium tyres, which just feel like spiteful, economy, poor man rubbish mashed and melded into the shape of a tyre. Might well be appropriate, given that cars of the Demio's ilk often come with CM tyres by default in previous games, where they actually gave a damn about road cars. *sigh*
In contrast to the Fit, the softer Demio moves around and squirms a lot under stress. It definitely seems to me that the Demio has been set up to be more comfortable than racy. Despite being lower in height and weighing the exact same as the Fit Hybrid even when measured in pounds (2,381lbs, 1,080kg), the Demio just oddly feels like it has its centre of gravity set at SkyActiv heights up front, perhaps because the diesel engined Demios do suffer quite the mass penalty in comparison to its petrol counterparts. In any case, the Demio diesel feels heavier than it actually is, requiring drivers to brake markedly earlier to ease the unwilling car into a corner in comparison to the Fit, which feels more like a go–kart that allows you to brake stupidly late and flick it into a corner without much thought. The Demio on the other hand, feels much more mortal, mechanical, and old–school a drive, reminiscent of the cheap but cheerful Japanese crapboxes that people tend to romanticise. You have to have your finger on the pulse of the car and treat it right before it will reciprocate, and is such an involving and engaging drive because of it.
It may be soft, but it's still a Mazda, the company that continues to sell us the ND Roadster, a sports car noted by many to be soft as well. Similarly in the Demio, that softness does not necessarily mean sloppiness—there's thought and design that went into the suspension setup of the Demio, which becomes evident the moment you find out how to make it Zoom–Zoom. You'll need to trail brake into corners, be cognizant of where weight is at all times, and keep an eye on the tach. And speaking of, the tachometer is large and dead centre in the dash, with 4k rpm where the diesel engine makes its peak power top dead centre, lending this unassuming car such a spunky feel. There is definitely a "click", an eureka moment, if you get things right in the car, and nailing that perfect lap with it feels more laborious and more rewarding as a result. Whether that fits your definition of "good handling" or "fun to drive" is, of course, entirely up to you, but speaking for myself personally, I feel more awake driving the Demio than I do the Fit, simply because the latter simply gives me what I want instantly with no drama... and it really isn't any faster than the Demio after about 4 minutes of flat out racing when it runs out of battery juice.
If you're planning for your career in GT7 and are wondering if the Fit Hybrid and Demio diesel are any good, I'd say that the Fit is the much, much better choice in a racing game that doesn't simulate its horrid throttle response while magically giving you manual control over its cogs. It's tauter, much more immediate in the twisties, and will happily even wear Sports tyres. A 4 minute advantage over the Demio is still an advantage, after which they are more or less equal in pace. Unfortunately, the Demio diesel isn't good for much of anything aside from novelty when translated into the digital realm, and while I personally like both a lot, I can only recommend one.
Cars like the Demio are doomed to never really leave that much of an impression in a game that laser focuses on sanctioned, formal racing using built to spec racecars. It's no FD RX-7, it's no Taycan Turbo, nor is it a Viper GT3-R. It's never going to set anyone's pants on fire or melt their hearts—it's not even going to get any use in the game's utter sham of a campaign mode. You most likely won't be too moved by this car in its digital form, physically or emotionally.
But the thing is, I have been moved physically and emotionally by the car in an area where it excels—in real life, and therefore I'm very, very biased towards it. Half this "review" is me just going on a diatribe about my real life joys and sorrows. I love throwing cheap, light, little cars around, especially if they've a Mazda badge on them. The Demio may have a badge that says "2" on it in most markets, but it is the car of many firsts for many people. It was the first car I've ever driven in Japan, the first Mazda I've ever driven, and the first car that really made me know the joys of vehicle ownership. I remember checking into a hotel in the dead of night bringing only my PJs and a bag of toiletries with me to my room instead of my entire luggage, instead leaving that in the back seat of the Demio. I remember that time I brazenly left the Demio unlocked and running outside a convenience store, a conbini as they call it in Japan, because Japan was such a safe and courteous country. I walked in asking for directions to RE Amemiya, and in hindsight I really should've bought something as thanks. Looking at a Demio brings back to me the heavenly taste of Starbucks' Caffe Latte on a groggy, one handed morning drive. A coffee that I'm horribly lactose intolerant to, yet I need so, so much. A coffee that costs only a mere ¥216 per bottle at any conbini—a price that I've yet to be able to find even closely replicated back here in Singapore, IF they even import it. Seeing a Demio brings all those sweet, sweet memories flooding back to me, and I can't possibly critique or review it in a fair manner. I'm biased towards Mazdas normally, but this one especially so.
The Demio isn't a "2" in my eyes; it's number one.
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