Finally got my hands on a US copy today, and all I can is WOW! the new additional cars make this a while different experience.
Me and my buddy each pick up our own copy (with free T shirt) today after class, we headed straight to my house with some snacks planning to rush through the different classes of races. After the initial install I was prompted with an update, surprisingly it finished on first try (took me many many tries on my Japanese version, maybe it's connecting to servers in US instead of Japan this time) and even maxed out my 8MB/s DSL internet download speed. We started around 3:30pm, it is now 12:51am and we JUST turned it off. Yup, 8+ hours of GT. :lol:
Last time I've played with Prologue was almost exactly a month ago, I sold my Japanese copy locally when US car list was first released (keep it mind that at this time no one knew if Japanese version was going to get an update or not), so my last impressions are from pre-Spec II Japanese version.
Oh, before I forget. Logitech G25 owners: Spec II update sets steering mode to amature. Make sure you set it to simulation under Settings > Driving Force Pro settings.
My first car was the Focus, although I later realized that the Integra Type-R would have been a better choice (hint), I wanted to try out something different as I have already driven the Integra to death in the Japanese version. Right away it was clear that AI have been further improved since the Spec II update, it was already pretty decent to begin with (they do try to avoid contact), but now they actually move out of your way and even sometimes come to almost complete stop when other cars spins out and blocks the track. Engine sounds have also improved as well, I haven't done much comparisons yet because I am still trying out new cars, but it was really noticeable on the DC5 Type-R. There are also a few small tweaks, such as able to change car in race selection screen, new race events layout, etc. If you have never played the Japanese version you most likely wont notice.
One thing that's a bit disappointing as a hardcore GT player: the single player race difficulty seems to had been massively down-tuned for the US version. While taking turns, both me and my friend were able to finished all C, B and one race from completion in A class races in little less than 5 hours with only a handfull of race-required cars (with many repeated races to earn money for few cars we wanted). We have both already previously finished Japanese Prologue, but this was by far much easier.
What made it easy was lack of penalties. If I remember correctly, Japanese version has very strict penalty system that penalize you for bumping into other cars, running into walls, and cutting corners from the very beginning of the game (C class races), they require players to race properly and search for miller-second improvements in their lap time without any contacts. But in the US version, there's no penalties of any sort all the way from C to A class races. It's completely different here, you can use AI as walls and cut through S turns. This is not a problem to those of us we who play racing simulators like how simulators should be played, but this, in my opinion, takes away some of the simulation-ness away from an already fairly mainstreamed simulator. My guess is that they believe the original system would have been much to difficult to appeal to the general American market (gamers). Same had been done before, races in Gran Turismo 1 were sped up for the Americans.
If anyone playing the US version wondering why it's this easy, now you know.
There are still many things I have yet to mess with: S-races, on-the-fly adjustments, Quick Tune Menu and Drift Mode etc. But right now, I am just having too much fun testing out all the new cars.
Viper, if you are still considering, you NEED this game!
(oh and a G25 too )
* If anyone's wondering, yes, Beyond the Apex documentary is in GT-TV as soon as you start the game.
** For those of you in the US, here's a
10% off coupon at Circuit City usable (April 17-19) both in-store and online.