SimHQ.com - Motorsports Zone

While GTR has raced into Germany's stores November 5th, the rest of the world has to wait until the first quarter of 2005.

SimHQ has managed to secure a preview copy of the game — yes the title says FIA GT Racing Game — and we will follow up with a proper review once we get our hands on the review copy.

Please bear in mind that the preview copy is valid for only 10 days, so the following are the very first impressions and should not be taken as "set in stone".

As this is a pre-view copy the final product may differ, but there is no doubt about it; if you select simulation mode in the first screen, a simulation you will get!

I'm one of the people who were intensely disappointed by the official demo which was released without the all-important simulation physics. To be honest, the demo left me wondering if GTR was moving away from the sim racers and if SimBin was putting their efforts into pleasing the more casual racers, those chaps that reportedly pick up a racing game and then run off to forums complaining about the difficulty being too high.

Rest assured that the simulation physics in the preview version are much more interesting and satisfying than the crippled pro-sim physics in the official demo. Simply removing the driving-aids in the demo is not enough, in terms of describing the real simulation physics.

And in that sense, the official demo is not representative of the final product (or rather the preview version of the final product).

If you've been following the reports about GTR you'll know that tracks have been modeled with the aid of GPS data, numerous photographs were taken at each and every race event in the FIA GT Racing schedule by the SimBin crew, and that real telemetry data has been used to help model each bump in the road as accurately as possible.

SimBin has also had access to detailed, real data concerning the cars. All this to ensure as high a degree of accuracy and authenticity.

GTR, as a consequence is the official FIA GT Racing game featuring the real teams, real drivers, real tracks and real cars... at least for the year 2003.

As the icing on the cake, NaturalPoint's TrackIR is supported and Live Track technology is used to ensure that the track surface changes as the race progresses. Just as in real life, a groove will appear and the grip in the groove will be better than off it. Furthermore, the weather changes dynamically.

For the first time in a simulation I was able to actually find the "look to apex" feature a nice addition rather than a distracting gimmick.

Let's take a look at some of the cars, very accurately modeled and painted to reflect their real life counterparts in the 2003 FIA GT Championship. All screenshots were taken using 1024x768x32 resolution, no anti-aliasing.

All driving aids were off, when testing the cars. Even ABS and Traction control was set to none. And make sure to set the auto-clutch to off. If you leave it on, it will work as a hidden driving aid in terms of ensuring perfect and smooth engagements and disengagements of the clutch.

The Lotus Elise (which starts off this preview) is a car you should absolutely strap on your back as soon as possible since it is easy to predict where it will go and you can throw it round the corners. It's not the fastest car in the selection but it is very charming and I want a real one in my garage — now!

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