Gran Turismo 3: A-spec

aka: GT3, Gran Turismo 2000, Gran Turismo 3: The Real Driving Simulator - A-spec
Moby ID: 3910

Description official descriptions

This is the third game in the Gran Turismo series of racing games.

The game is now an even more realistic driving experience with lighting now having an effect on the game, such as buildings blocking the sunlight. There are smoke effects caused by skidding and even heat rising from the road.

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Credits (PlayStation 2 version)

541 People (379 developers, 162 thanks) · View all

Reviews

Critics

Average score: 92% (based on 47 ratings)

Players

Average score: 3.8 out of 5 (based on 106 ratings with 10 reviews)

An excellent product.

The Good
Everything. There is a wide variety of cars, from compact to sports, including some '80s cars. There are lots of tracks, and all of them appear to have been worked on extensively, with detailed buildings, environmental effects and sun glare. In Rally races, they've even included believable dirt tracks, which when played in two player mode, can really distort the view of a trailing car.

The Simulation, or Career mode, is outstanding. You can only buy a few cars with your measley starting credits (cash), and you use that car to win races to earn money to buy upgrades to improve your car. It has been really thought out and was implemented nicely.

The Arcade mode, which lets you play two-player battles, free run, and other races is also done nicely. Not only is it there for people who don't want to start a career, but some areas of this mode MUST be completed to get a 100% completion rating for the entire game.

The iLink battle is astounding. If you have the hardware to set this up, you are guaranteed one of the most exciting nights of your life. You can hook six PlayStation2's to each other, each connected to a separate television and race each other, all at once, just like you would find in a video arcade.

The Bad
I can't really find anything bad to say about GT3:AS, but one thing I was disappointed at was the fact that they didn't include any '80s muscle cars, especially from Dodge, which were readily available in GT2. Other than that, the game is, well, perfect.

The Bottom Line
Any fan of racing games should pick this up no doubt. If you loved the previous GT games, you will adore this incarnation. People who aren't into racing would probably get bored of this game really fast, so I'd recommend it as a rental to non-race fans.

PlayStation 2 · by JPaterson (9502) · 2001

This racer acts like a drug, for better or worse

The Good
It's not hard to explain what gets people hooked on this game. First and foremost, I would say the graphics are quite amazing, even eleven years after GT3's initial release they still look great.

And then there's the sense of achievement once you got your first car all prepped up and once you have won your first championship and got away with a new bonus car plus a decent amount of credits. It is then that you really want to try out more cars and can't racing the same few tracks over and over.

The Rally mode does not yet include the penalty system that pestered GT4. This is a relief because the rallies are rather difficult to master even without penalties.

The simplicity of the menu layouts and the speed of switching between screens are also much more of a relief as compared to the tedious and frequent loading screens of GT4. There's not so much aggravating loading involved in this title.

The Bad
Back in 2001, this instalment may have been the epitome of racing sims on the PS2. At the same time, the GT franchise had always been hyped beyond recognition. There are plenty of flaws and frustrating experiences that come along with prolonged play.

I don't mind so much the smaller range of cars available as opposed to GT2 or GT4, no, it's actually the lack of track variety that makes the simulation boring after a short while. And increasing the number of laps for each difficulty level doesn't help make it more interesting.

A problem that has still not been addressed even by GT4 is the resale value of the cars. No matter how much you invest in any further tuning parts, you'll never get the huge amounts of money spent back. I guess I can live with this, but it's nonetheless annoying.

I also noticed that the computer cars are not only dumb and strictly routine by the way the drive, but they are also unfair towards the player. There are some events that are nearly impossible to win, and I'm not talking about the endurance races. For example, take the MR challenge at amateur level: I got me a nice Honda NSX Type R car, all nicely done up to maximum level and optimally tuned too, and still I can't seem to beat the Elise cars here. It's also that much more horsepower doesn't help when speeding up on straights in order to get a little advantage over the competition, because once you reach the next corner, they're all quite close behind you again, and the AI cars seem to be routinely placed on certain spots on the track where you will get to see them every time regardless of your advantage that you think you should have. That's really a pain in the butt, and luckily, this issue has been addressed in the next instalment.

It may be me, but in the steering, I don't like the oversensitivity of the steering axis, and there's no option to adjust the sensitivity of the controller. I'm not intending to buy a steering wheel. In comparison, the steering sensitivity in Enthusia has been done much more realistic, like driving a real car, and I know because I do drive for real.

The Bottom Line
There's plenty of hours of fun in this game. But once you've seen all of the tracks and you've sensed the computer AI's unfairness just to make things even more challenging, the only thing in the game that may keep you motivated to keep on playing is the percentage of completion on the status screen. You may want to see more cars also, but the tedious gameplay will most likely prevent you from clinging on to the experience.

PlayStation 2 · by CoffeeCrack (20) · 2012

Great Game For Its time

The Good
This game has got lots of gameplay time, about 60 hours. The cars and tracks available are very high detailed. Also has different types of tracks, goes from technical, with lots of turns, to high speed tracks. Each car has a different handling. The endurance races are not too strenuous.

The Bad
In this game there were only about 180 cars, way less than previous titles. Some professional events and races are just too long.

The Bottom Line
This game marks a huge leap in graphics and that's due to the change from PS to PS2. It allows you to have a very nice time, alone or with your friends. It justifies being one of the best selling PS2 games ever. It's a classic and if you can you should get it.

PlayStation 2 · by Pedro Cunha (233) · 2012

[ View all 10 player reviews ]

Trivia

1001 Video Games

Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec appears in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die by General Editor Tony Mott.

Development

Although Gran Turismo 3 A-Spec is more advanced in the graphics department than Gran Turismo 2, GT2 featured around 500 cars and 27 tracks. GT3 has 19 tracks and around 150 cars. This was due to time constraints; the extra detail that developers went to when developing vehicles and tracks for GT3 made the scope of GT2 an unrealistic goal.

Sales

According to developer Polyphony Digital, Gran Turismo 3 A-Spec sold 14,890,000 copies worldwide since its original release, making it the best selling title in the franchise at the moment of writing.

Awards

  • 4Players
    • 2001– Best Simulation of the Year
  • GameSpy
    • 2001 – PS2 Racing Game of the Year
  • Retro Gamer
    • September 2004 (Issue #8) – #94 Best Game Of All Time (Readers' Vote)

Analytics

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Related Sites +

  • GT Planet
    Covering the World of Gran Turismo
  • GT3Times.com
    A site for submitting your race/lap/licence/time trial best times and see how you compare to the rest of the world. No driving up against walls or off-track allowed.
  • Gran Turismo 3
    Sony's official portal for Gran Turismo 3.
  • Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec
    Official website
  • IGCD Internet Game Cars Database
    Game page on IGCD, a database that tries to archive vehicles found in video games.
  • Racing-Line
    A lap times database. No wall-riding or off-course times are allowed, but there IS a specific hybrid section
  • The House Of GT
    Online racing centre. Also the source of mk's GT3/GT Concept garage editor.

Identifiers +

  • MobyGames ID: 3910
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Contributors to this Entry

Game added by Brolin Empey.

Additional contributors: Macintrash, Matthew Bailey, Tibes80, Famine3h, Zaibatsu, CalaisianMindthief, Patrick Bregger, Titan10, Pedro Cunha, Victor Vance, FatherJack.

Game added July 14, 2001. Last modified February 5, 2024.