GT7 W32

I don't get American cars, at all.

I've no idea why they have pickup trucks bigger than minibuses when light lorries and vans can carry the same loads, if not more. I don't get why they use piss for fuel. Their turn signals are dumb, sometimes they come with front license plates, sometimes they don't. Cars released in 2023 are marked as 2024 model years. Their gallon is different from the gallon of the rest of the world, but their mile is still the same as everyone else's. Go figure.

But the one that baffles me the most is the muscle car. Pony cars, too. Apparently, there's a distinction between those two terms, which is only a very recent realisation for me. Either way, I genuinely can't tell the difference between a Mustang, Camaro, and Challenger when they're all FR 2 door bricks packing F–off NA V8 engines with gearing aimed at the quarter mile. What's this weird obsession, almost unwritten rule that it must be FR and NA V8? If you wanted the best quarter mile times, why wouldn't you make the car rear–midship with AWD?

And why would they put a Corvette engine into a Camaro and give it the Corvette's Magneride when, they, you know... have a Corvette? A Corvette is was a 2 door FR sports car with better aerodynamics. Why not just drag race the Corvette at the quarter mile instead of the Camaro? What purpose do the pony and muscle cars serve that the sports car doesn't already do better?

And so you can imagine my confusion when the 2018 Dodge Challenger SRT Demon was added to Gran Turismo 7 in the most recent 1.40 update, a car whose explicit goal is to run quarter miles in the 9 seconds range. My brothers in Buddha, you had a Viper. You could've dropped the Hellcat or Demon engine into that. You could've put all that time, money, and engineering into your flagship pride and joy Viper instead of an almost literal brick. Why didn't you?

As some of us have already reported, there is actually no way in hell a Demon can do the zero–yon in 9 seconds in the game. In fact, when I raced my peers' Demons in my Camaro ZL1 and Viper GTS, they all comfortably out launched the supposed dragster. Not only that, the Demon barely pulled away from my ZL1 on gimped Sports Hard tyres on Conrod Straight, and a 6–speed stick shift Viper pretty much hung with the Demon... around Daytona. What is the point of putting 840HP into something with the aerodynamic profile of a brick wrapped in sandpaper? What is the point of having 840HP if the vast majority of it is buried up top near redline, and can put none of it down out of a corner? What is the point of having 840HP if cars with 640HP can keep up with it? Plus, you know, neither the ZL1 nor the GTS required me to use TCS to keep them on the paved stuff. The Demon is liable to kill its driver even with TCS enabled. That's how awful it drives.

Maybe pony cars and muscle cars are supposed to be cheaper than their flagship sports cars and appeal to the everyman. But then again, the Demon costs a whopping 200,000 Credits in the game, which is almost 1.5x the price of a goddamn Viper, and well over twice that of the ZL1. And then you consider the fact that both those comparison cars hover around 600PP on Sports Hard tyres while the Demon sits at 620PP, yet still can't convincingly outperform either, and it's just... haaaaargh I don't get it.

And how the HELL does one manage to make a 2 door coupé nearly 2 tonnes in mass?! It's not even a luxurious GT car!

The part that baffles me the most is that, in 2018, people are still making petrol powered dragsters. If you're making a one–trick–pony, at least make sure that it, you know, is the best at the one trick it does. Not only does the Demon not do its one trick best, it can't do any trick semi–decently. If the whole defining trait of Dodge performance cars is that they have comical power and go fast in a straight line, they're going to have a serious identity crisis in the age of the EV takeover.

What a dumb fuck car this is. Complete waste of my fucking time and money.