Grand Prix 4

Alex · July 4, 2002, 14:01

Well, have anybody played it? I have already ordered my copy (I was never disappointed by a Geoff Crammond's game), but I wanted to know what other people think about it.

alva · July 4, 2002, 14:04

diddn't know it was released allready?
The previews i read about pretty good, but they revamped the interface apparantly, wich seems to be for the worse.
but better graphics, better AI,....

Alex · July 5, 2002, 09:48

Hmm... wasn't it released yet? Funny, because I will be receiving the game in the next hours, I guess...

Unless they have done with GP4 what they did with GP3, which was released first in Brazil.

PCRefugee · July 6, 2002, 13:29

I've got it and I'm not very amused. It seems to have some kind of disc protection which refuses to let the game run after the first few times. I've been to the official website but it's only half-built so there's no forum yet to try and find out if anybody has similar problems or if it's just me. I've tried it on 2 different machines (P3 with Voodoo5 and Amd1.3GHz with GForce 4) and after a few goes it won't run on either.

Alex · July 6, 2002, 15:33

Well, I can say that I'm not satisfied.

I eagerly installed the game and started it, no problems at all. But when I tried to run a few laps on a circuit, I found out that my system barely could handle it, stuttering and giving me horrible frame rates (sometimes it looked more like a slide show).

That is not a game failure, of course... My system is a bit old and does not have the power to run it (I have a Duron 850 MHz, w/ 256 MB RAM and a jurassic Viper v770 32 MB videocard, plus WinXP Home).

On the other hand, some people complained that GP4 uses a lot of CPU power to render the graphics, instead of the videocard power. Which could be pointed out as a failure.

Oh, well. I've uninstalled and shelved it for now. Maybe I'll do a major computer upgrade in six months, maybe not. I could try to sell it, but it is a bit frustrating to realize that selling it won't pay for my disappointment.
Back to GP3, then.

To PCRefugee: you can try this site, it has a lot of info about the game and active forums -- you might even get some help there.
URL: http://www.simracingworld.com/html/gp4/

Good Luck.

Asher · July 6, 2002, 18:05

GP4 works great on my system, but then again it's a brand new top of the line gaming rig...

Alex · July 6, 2002, 22:47

Oh, Asher... I despise you so much.

Now tell me more about your "baby"...

Asher · July 6, 2002, 23:29

If you insist.

Athlon XP 2100+, 512MB DDR333, GeForce 4 Ti4600...

Alex · July 7, 2002, 00:08

Quote:

Originally posted by Asher
If you insist.

Athlon XP 2100+, 512MB DDR333, GeForce 4 Ti4600...

AAAH! My life is ruined... but I asked for it, didn't I?

Do you think that these specs below would be enough to run GP4 w/ approx. 20 FPS and most of the graphic fluff on?:

(insert processor here) 1.2 GHz, 512 MB, GeForce 2?

Just curious.

Asher · July 7, 2002, 03:05

Probably not, even on this system the "in game tester" thing estimates 32 fps with full settings + 1280x1024 in GP4.

I think the game's graphics code is a tad bit...inefficient.

PCRefugee · July 7, 2002, 06:07

Thanks for the info Alexnm. I'll check it out.

Alex · July 8, 2002, 15:57

Quote:

Originally posted by Asher
Probably not, even on this system the "in game tester" thing estimates 32 fps with full settings + 1280x1024 in GP4.

I think the game's graphics code is a tad bit...inefficient.

Yes... inefficient...

Reading other forums, I see that a lot of people are experiencing a hard time trying to make GP4 work decently on their systems. And we are talking about people with good systems, like yours.

And lots of bugs and incompatibilities. It seems that they never tested the game on WinXP w/ DX 8 or newer.

Hmm... Infogrames is the publisher... I see a pattern here...

I just did not expect such sloppiness from Crammond.

Asher · July 8, 2002, 19:06

I run GP4 on Windows XP with DirectX 8.1, and it hasn't given me any real compatibility problems.

Alex · July 9, 2002, 09:52

Quote:

Originally posted by Asher
I run GP4 on Windows XP with DirectX 8.1, and it hasn't given me any real compatibility problems.

Sorry, that is what happens when one forgets to divide the text into paragraphs.

What I meant was that GP4 delivers a poor performance on WinXP, unless, of course, you have a powerful system. Production of GP4 started while GP3 was being finished, and that could be the main reason for the game's poor performance and lack of optimization under WinXP or DirectX newer versions.

I really don't want to upgrade my computer just because of a game. I already did it because of Civ3.