The Eiger Nordwand Time Trial
Today we return to Gran Turismo 7’s Time Trials in VR, for another competition of the DualSense vs the Fanatec GT DD Pro racing sim system. GT7, as I’ve discussed earlier, has an interesting mix of tracks – some are gorgeous recreations of actual famous tracks, true-to-life down to the complex physics involved in racing them, but others are very much fictional. As this Reddit thread digs into, complete with image comparisons (though, given its age, it’s covering Gran Turismo Sport rather than GT7), today’s choice of the Eiger Nordwand track is one of the fictional tracks, though is set in a very real location – the Eiger mountain in the Swiss Alps, as Gran Turismo’s creators imagine a track fitted around the train lines of Kleine Scheidegg Railway Station. I appreciate these kinds of half-fictional/half-real approaches to track design, as lets GT7 offer a more globetrotting feel, and gives players the chance to see more recreations of real-life scenery than a “real-life tracks only” approach would allow for. As you can see in the image above, this is another one with a huge number of relentless turns and bends, not about to let you get comfortable. Even the straights just make the turns right after that much more difficult to handle, as I learned over a great many laps and will need to continue to learn. That set of repeated turns you can see on the bottom right of the track diagram was particularly difficult, with the Fanatec wheel especially seeing a lot of spin-outs.
DualSense – First 5 Laps
The state of affairs from last time continues here, as the DualSense is efficient and easy to use from the beginning. My best times across the different sections are all over the place here – on the one hand, my best time came last, showing some progress, on the other, I actually nailed Section 2 right out of the gate and failed to match it for the next 4 laps, and my other best section times were all on different laps. But this is the sort of thing you expect from a track that’s new to me. What I’m finding is that the motion steering tends to be far more forgiving when winding my way around these corners, and I’m not entirely clear why.
Fanatec Gran Turismo Direct Drive Pro – First 5 Laps
With the Fanatec GT DD Pro, things also continue similarly from the last time, as I have difficulty even matching the results of the DualSense, let alone surpassing them. Firstly, the biggest issue that I can register is that the wheel is broadly less forgiving when it comes to the turns and bends. Lap 3 was a particular write-off here, as I experienced constant, severe spin-outs that can cost me time very harshly. I thought things might change somewhat now that I’ve re-jiggered my setup and placed the wheel further back, making for more comfortable driving. But as you can see from the results, I still end up with multiple terrible lap times due to experiencing more frequent spin-outs than I do on the DualSense. As I’ve stated before, I’m not sure whether this is actually a “problem” as such – real-life motorsport is a challenging activity that requires great physical skill and a tactile understanding of your vehicle, so if the DualSense motion steering is just making things easier in an unrealistic fashion, I don’t know if I would consider it a plus. Of course, this is likely to still be a matter of experience as well – my motion steering time still far outweighs my Fanatec wheel time, and as long as I continue these tests, that’ll stay relatively constant. Beyond that, I do still feel quite intimidated by the whole thing – the force-feedback of the wheel, the forcible-steering in response to spin-outs and the seat I’m sitting in cause a constant subconscious fear of breaking something, and while I’ve seen that the seat is absolutely hardy enough to withstand more than what I can throw at it, it’s another aspect of using a racing sim wheel that I’m goin gto have to get used to over a longer period.
DualSense – Next 5 Laps
My greater understanding of the track and the seemingly easier process of driving with the motion steering means the DualSense drastically improved here. My average and best times improved by multiple seconds, though I did end the whole thing with a bit of a whimper, riveting to a rather poor time right after achieving a personal best on Lap 4. My best individual section times were also largely relegated to earlier points – there’s a lot of room for improvement here.
Fanatec Gran Turismo Direct Drive Pro – Next 7 Laps
In recognition of the extra difficulty I’ve had with the wheel – as my friend put it, I’m better at driving as long as I’m not crashing – I decided to do 7 laps instead of 5 for this last run, and I think that was the right choice as the results were quite interesting. I was a bit more experimental with my driving here and the results were rather poor, as I ended up with some pretty rough times early on. But things did get better as I progressed, with my best section times localised in the back half and my best lap time with the wheel only coming in Lap 7 – and it’s pretty competitive! The DualSense remains the undisputed champ in theoretical best time (all my best section times added together, seen below the actual results), but I can see a pattern here of slow but reasonable improvement when the racing sim setup. I feel like I’m getting better with it overall, but with a long way to go. I try to keep in mind all those other professionals getting unbelievable times on their own wheels – if they can do it, then I clearly need to fix my own mistakes.
Conclusions
This was an overall good test, showing a pretty straightforward continuation from the last one – the DualSense is easy to use and results in a smoother driving experience, while the Fanatec is more realistic and intimidating, hurting my score as the slightest imprecision causes brutal spin-outs on Eiger Nordwand’s many nasty twists and turns. Following this test I decided to spend more time on the wheel and with one of GT7’s required Menu Book races, set in the real-life Autodromo de Interlagos in Brazil. It reinforced my analysis of the wheel – I found that as long as I could keep my car straight and on-target, my driving and speed was excellent to the point that I was eventually able to surpass the first-place car in Lap 2 of 5, but the occasional difficulty with turns reared its ugly head time and again. Spin-outs don’t happen every time – far from it – but when you have a lengthy, turn-filled track and have to cover 5 laps, they don’t need to. I ended up taking ages to complete the race for the first time, and even then, the penalties for failing to cover certain turns properly meant I still haven’t conquered that race. But I improved over that night, and I’ll continue to improve on other nights.
