Anyone here have comments on Johnny Herbert Grand Prix?
Ace
Well... The demo seems an awful lot like F1RS, with perhaps a tad bit better
graphics.
I haven't seen the full game available yet, but PCGamer's website has the
demo, and it's also included with this months magazine on CD...
I wrote this to this ng before - apologies for repeating it.
Paul
I've just been looking at Johnny Herbert Grand Prix and here is a short
itsy-bitsy review.
I started with Suzuka which is a circuit I know well from MGPRS2. I
thought I'd do a 10 lap race at Suzuka which is similar to the things
I've been doing quite a lot with MGP.
I went for the professional level with no assists but no damage either
and spent the first practice lap thinking I'd lose it at every corner
but I always managed to keep it on the circuit. The way I drove that lap
I'd have been given a good hiding in MGPRS2 but I had to check to
confirm I didn't have steering assist. The circuit seems to have all the
corners in the right place and the graphical feel of the place is okay.
After 19 practice laps I'd recorded a 1:35.989 (and I'm only a moderate
driver) - this would have put me way out on pole at Suzuka this year.
The cornering speeds on the string of left-rights after the start-finish
straight seem much too high and I scarcely needed to brake for the first
corner - in fact I soon learnt that braking was for wimps and only
required in the most severe corners.
The car I was mucking about with looked a bit like a Sauber (surprise,
surprise) and the handling was much more on the arcade side than the sim
side. I'm not really sure how to evaluate the physics but it definitely
doesn't feel as it ought to. The***pit view had no instruments! What?
Yes no instruments and no mirrors (well there are mirrors but you can't
see anything in them). The feel of speed is there alright and you can
lock brakes and lose the back end - if you're an idiot or set the car up
to deliberately test this.
I cut short the practice after my 1:35 and in qualifying I realised that
this was nothing special - Driver 10 from team 3 turned in a 1:30.725
for pole. This speaks volumes for the reality - what do they do in Ace
(top) level?
And so to the race. At the lights, I dived down the middle to gain about
8 places. Gradually those drivers behind me clawed their way back by
fair means or foul. The AI in this game is stupid. They can overtake
anywhere on the circuit irrespective of whether there is any line for
them to take. One of them overtook me by riding over the gravel trap at
130R - do me a favour! At one stage the driver ahead of me was +30
seconds and the one behind (presumeably the race leader) was -1:30 - add
those together and you get 1:60 so allowing for say 20 seconds between
the leader, all the other drivers and the guy in front of me and they
should be lapping in 1:80 seconds - but they are doing low 1:30s - now
this stinks of emulation not simulation. Collisions are also very badly
modelled - the sounds are poor and the results of a smash even worse.
After the race I took off some wing mucked with the gear ratios - there
aren't many settings. I tried to put on soft tyres but I wouldn't let
me. Then I went back on the track and put together a 1:33.481 after only
4 laps. Well if I worked on this game I might be able to get good but
with GPL, MGPRS2 and a host of promising titles on the way I don't feel
the urge.
The graphics are alright - in resolution they about match MGPRS2 but in
content they fall far short. MGP has such an incredible car 'feel' -
only bettered by GPL - that it's hard to get worked up by the real time
shiny light sourcing on this number. It does go up to 1024x768 on my
Voodoo2 but that's par for the course these days.
The sound is pretty poor - my engine was quieter than the crowd! Hang on
I'm in the seat of a 750 BHP car, I've got a helmet on, earpieces for
the radio, no sound insulated***pit and I can hear the sound of the
crowd way over my engine - get away! The other cars are loud as well and
it seems than whatever relative speed they overtake you at they sound
like our relative speeds at 150mph apart. The brakes don't make the
coughing noise that modern racing brakes do and you can't hear the wind
at all. The tyres, though, sound okay.
Just as MGP it has no FIA licence, which doesn't matter with MGP but on
a number like this, I can't imagine enough people putting in the work to
do the graphics.
But it's the driving model, physics and AI that let this game down. It
doesn't pretend to be an arcade title nor does it have all the fun
features an arcade game would have so we have to look at it as a
simulation and conclude that it is a pretty ordinary one, but people who
find MGPRS2 a bit too difficult and aren't bothered by the lack of
realism may be tempted by this. The feel of speed is great and overall
it's a much better experience than F1'97 - though you can give me MGP
any day of the week.
Paul
> Anyone here have comments on Johnny Herbert Grand Prix?
> Ace
