Brilliant but flawed, That first act is genuinely fantastic and one of the most engrossing gameplay experiences I've had in ages but unfortunately loses its mystery and dread after the first act. Turns into a repetitive slog, the meta narrative elements are predictable and don't feel deep or compelling enough to excuse how dull the reveals are. I can still recommend this despite the many things holding me back from truly wanting to call this a fantastic experience because its bold enough to want to try and go places that most games wouldn't do in fear of alienating its audience.

a good sequel to the fun and engaging DMC3.

keeps the immaculate atmosphere and sets in such a stunning background/world. the combat for Nero is a bit wacky, repetitve but can be satisfying at times, as for Dante the improvement was amazing, all the concepts from the previous games were improved and made very fun to use, despite his part being in a quite boring segment.

overall very fun and enjoyable game despite its flaws

Gran Turismo 7 is hands down one of the finest racing games i've ever played. It's a real love letter to how the automotive industry has evolved and the gran turismo series has certainly evolved with it, taking everything that was already great about the series and fine tuning the experience to near mastery.

The feel of driving in gran turismo 7 is just superb and on a ps5, it's taken a step further through the dynamic haptic feedback of the controller. I'm not a huge car nerd or anything, I don't properly understand half of the tuning parameters but I do very much appreciate the detail. Infact, detail is key to gt7, every car feels uniquely different to drive. The weight behind accelerating, braking and steering never feels the same, retro and more modern cars are very noticeably different in how they handle and tuning a car adds an extra layer of personalised performance.

What struck me right away was how the ps5 controller enhances the whole experience, the feedback sensations i'd get from the clunk of a gear change or driving over curbs or passing over the metal grates on the tokyo expressway circuit each were very satisfying. It uses the hardware available to craft a driving sensation that i've never felt before and I hope to see used more in future ps5 titles.
All this said, driving in gran turismo 7 is not going to be to everyone's taste. True to the series' nature and history, it is a realistic driving simulator, so don't go in expecting instant responsiveness in handling even at absurdly high speeds or arcadey, explosive presentation. The visuals off the track aren't the focus here, neither are big crashes or high octane street races, it's just not that kind of racing game.

But what gran turismo 7 IS, is a refined, distinguished driving experience just like its predecessors. There's something really comforting to me about how this game presents itself and requires focus and discipline from the player. Going too fast around a corner? Tough, you'll go off track and probably crash. Crashing into other cars on the track on purpose whilst you overtake? You'll be forfeiting a large amount of bonus credits and significantly slowing yourself down. I know because I was guilty of this when I first picked it up. I hadn't played a GT game since GT5 back in the day and playing games like burnout and kart racers made me play that way seemingly by default. But as I kept it up and got better at the game through its challenging license tests and lengthy races I began to notice the satisfaction of staying focused and watching my speed. So then eventually, I was able to cruise around tracks at immense speeds with total precision and it felt amazing, it just takes practice, just like when I learnt to drive for real!
I specifically remember struggling with it and then, with practice, perfectly executing the back to back S curves on suzuka circuit in my beloved (tuned up) aston martin v8 vantage. That gave me a big stupid smile.

Outside of racing, I fell in love with this game's overall presentation, music and feel. Gran Turismo got me into modern jazz and lounge music and allowed me to go on to discover some great artists that I listen to on the regular now like T-Square and Casiopea. So listening to some familiar and new tracks in the world map gave me a tingle of nostalgia. Complimenting this is gran turismo's always quality user interface and delicate, classy vibe. When you're not on the track gran turismo feels like coming home after a long day. Taking trips to gt auto, the tuning shop, scapes, the garage and the dealerships felt familiar yet new and deeply personal. Pick a car you really like, show it some love at gt auto and the tuning shop, personalise it (and your racer) to no end with the help of a massive online library of assets, take it for a ride or take a photograph. That brings me to 'scapes', GT7's new 'photo mode' - an already essential part of gran turismo taken even further yet again.

'Scapes' allows you to take any vehicles from your garage, frame them in over 2500 locations and then take a snapshot. The library of gorgeous photographs of real world locations around the globe is absolute magic, the way they allow you to superimpose any car(s) into one of these scenes and still make it look convincing blew me away. Not to mention that the sheer number of camera positioning options, trickery and effects make it easily one of the most nuanced and enjoyable in game photo experiences that i've ever used. Granted there are some limitations to how much freedom you are allowed in certain scenes and many of the effects were too dramatic for me to want to use them (some even downright unpleasant), but it matters little considering the massive library of things for you to play with. The panning options in particular make for some really cool action shots.

Now onto where I think this game feels held back. For starters, basically all career races are rolling starts. Inherently this isn't an issue but when you take into account that you always start the race in last place, races don't really feel like races so much as one big game of catch up. The distance between first and last place before the race even begins is often a good 30 second difference - meaning they could be almost half way around an average track before you've even passed the starting line. Therefore, instead of an exciting battle for a podium position and the tension of maintaining your position once you're there, the majority of your time is spent carefully overtaking and climbing your way to the front. This also means that you need your car to perform above average or you won't have a chance of getting to the front of the pack before the race ends, which for me at least, takes away an element of the freedom that picking the car you want to use allows.

Visually this game does look great and I know it isn't the focus but it would also be nice to have some more detail in the crowds and extra details on the side of the tracks to make the overall experience a bit more immersive. There's also some modes and styles of races that appeal to me very much on paper but weren't up to snuff for me in the actual game. Like music rally, extreme weather races and dirt/gravel rallying. Music rally in particular was hailed as a new 'focus' for the game and earns a place on the menu screen right next to the main world map. But the actual event itself is just underwhelming with no real incentive to keep playing and with generally pretty uninteresting music choices (would have loved to see some callbacks to classic GT tracks). It's something I tried out while the game was installing but had no interest to revisit. If they bring in some really good tunes i'll definitely give it another go though.
As for extreme weather races and classic dirt/gravel rally, I never felt that these were as strong in gran turismo as in other games like dirt, and gran turismo 7 is unfortunately not an exception. In gran turismo it feels almost too much like you're not in control - which I know is the game trying to be realistic but I find myself slipping and sliding all over the place so I really need to slow down and sometimes grind almost to a halt to keep the car steady which just isn't that fun for me. Then there's the jumps in rally races which feel frustratingly difficult to execute and land without going flying into the barriers and losing your position seemingly everytime; unless, of course, you really slow down the pace and steady yourself which again, is a shame to me because I really just want to get some air haha.

Then there's the fact that the game is always online, the use of micro-transactions (which weren't introduced to the series in this game to be fair) and a general lack of content at the moment, but that will likely change. Disappointingly there's a good few car manufacturers, like mercedes-benz, that I was looking forward to seeing a nice selection of cars from and then there's literally just one in brand central that isn't AMG. Don't get me wrong the number of cars is still huge, it's just not up there with its current competitors and didn't give me the same thrills as previous gran turismo games with its general level of variety. But again, this will most likely change as the game gets updates.

Overall a borderline masterclass driving sim and while i'm not actually a huge motor head, I found myself drawn in with its inclusive, accessible methodology to teach the player about automotive history and mechanics. For big car fanatics, this will be a real treat of a game i'm sure. The cafe was a great and different but totally welcomed new way to introduce players to gran turismo and go about the game's 'career' mode in a more natural way. It was also a very welcome way to acquire new cars quickly and move up the ranks/tiers in terms of performance and cost.
The nostalgia was major with this one and i'm sure that i'll be coming back to it when I want a fun yet challenging and rewarding driving experience!