Tearin' up Taro's backyard!

[Caustic Saint]

I know I'm waaayy late to the party on this one, but it's new to me, so why not share?

I picked up Project Gotham Racing 2 for Xbox when I was out shopping today and was amused to see Yokohama listed as one of the tracks. After getting to it and racing the track, I was impressed with the level of detail and the amount of 'Hama landmarks they put in the game.

Such as:



and



And as good as the Yokohama stuff in PGR2 is, Shinjuku looks even better in PRG3. Check out the trailer (just shown in Tokyo this week) for the latest iteration here. The trailer is a must-view, since still images can't really do it justice.

I think it's pretty safe to say I'll be getting an Xbox 360 at launch.

[Taro Toporific]

I... Project Gotham Racing 2 for Xbox when I was out shopping today and was amused to see Yokohama listed as one of the tracks. After getting to it and racing the track, I was impressed with the level of detail and the amount of 'Hama landmarks they put in the game.

DAMN! That looks just like the "bird's eye view" option on my a new GPS navagation system in new Nissan FUGA 350 sports (Infinity M35). Most of the major intersections and expressway ramps have a game-mode view of the approaches to tempt me to play Grand Theft Auto for real... especially telling voice-actived "Navi-chan" to stuff it when I miss an off ramp.

[dimwit]

Navi-chan looks pretty officous to me. I don't think I would want to mess with her. I can see a visa renewal gone down the drain if fuck up parking.

[Kuang_Grade]

Here's an image from the Tokyo PGR 3 trailer to show the level of detail that Caustic is talking about (and he's definately right about stills not doing it justice)....You can see EPSON billboard from Shinjuku in the background and I love 'The Last Samurai ' billboard on the left (and I don't think it is there as an ad...if it was an ad, I suspect it would be much easier to see). And while there was much debate in the gaming press about PGR 3 movies being real in-game graphics or merely pre-rendered....the developer swears they are in-game.
http://www.joystiq.com/entry/1234000177049223

On a similar note, game girl advanced recently had little bit about the realism on these driving games.
http://www.gamegirladvance.com/archives/2005/06/17/lets_go_tokyo_the_game.html

I was talking with Chris Buffa the other day about traveling. He mentioned that he went to Tokyo for the first time last year, but it felt familiar because he had played Project Gotham Racing. It wasn't perfect, but he could recognize Shinjuku and get a feel for how the city was laid out.

While not as detailed as PGR, Genki's Tokyo Xtreme series for the Dreamcast and PS2 are highly detailed recreations of driving around Tokyo's highway network (sans the traffic, just the occasional car and truck to give you something to zoom past).

[Caustic Saint]

Here's a cool page I found that some 'Hama PGR fan put together. It's a comparison of in-game locations and their real-world counterparts.

The level of detail in the PGR3 stuff is almost off the scale (I just noticed the "Last Samurai" billboard in the pic KG posted. ), and I can see why some people have been doubting the authenticity of some of the pics that have come out. I think Bizarre Creations went a long way towards silencing some of the doubters when they released shots of some of the actual wireframe models of trackside buildings.

They haven't announced all the locations for PGR3 yet, but Shinjuku, Asakusa and Yokohama are all in. No word yet on other Japan locations. (As far as I know, the only other city officially mentioned so far is New York.)

[omae mona]

especially telling voice-actived "Navi-chan" to stuff it when I miss an off ramp.

Hey, mine's called Navi-chan too! My talking back at Navi-chan is the way Mrs. Omae Mona has learned practically all of the dirty words she knows in English. Especially when Navi-chan suggested I drive through a solid wall at Narita Airport (I ignored her).

[Taro Toporific]

especially telling voice-actived "Navi-chan" to stuff it when I miss an off ramp.

Navi-chan looks pretty officous to me. I don't think I would want to mess with her. I can see a visa renewal gone down the drain if fuck up parking.

Hey, mine's called Navi-chan too! My talking back at Navi-chan is the way Mrs. Omae Mona has learned practically all of the dirty words she knows in English.

I have to confess that I ripped off the name Navi-chan from the name of Omae Mona's beta model. His Navi-chan is a brittle bitch and has hissy-fits if Omae Mona takes a short cut to my house.

My voice-activated Navi-chan is only a little bossy at times and she had to be trained to understand my fuckqued up Japanese. However, she learned to obey, sort-of (previous models of Nissan car-navigation had an engrish-mode but in the new version Nissan trashed the engrish and just offers more video-game pictures of local landmarks).