Japan will see a downloadable demo of Gran Turismo 5 Prologue on the PS3 on October 20th (which happens to be this editor’s birthday). No word on the rest of the world, but I’d expect it to hit the US and Europe a few weeks later, as that’s the standard we’ve seen previously.
Translated from the latest edition of Famitsu:
release Dec 13
demo version from Oct 20
mysterious disguised GT-R will be driveable in the demo version
first time Daytona has been in the GT games
watch car info programmes from around the world on GT.TV
use points you gain from offline events in the final product to buy fascinating cars
Sounds good to me. Hopefully we see the demo and final release close to the same time Japan does.
Rumors had been circulating over the intarwebs the past few weeks that Gran Turismo 5 Prologue would be a free download on the PlayStation Network. Unfortunately, those rumors aren’t true. IGN in the UK has confirmed with Sony that the title would be released simultaneously on both Blu-Ray and the PlayStation Network.
While Prologue is heading to PSN, it won’t be free like the previously released Gran Turismo demo and doesn’t include damage modelling - unlike the Blu-ray version. However, both versions do include more than 40 cars, as well as offering the chance to go head-to-head with fellow speed freaks in 16-player online races.
So be warned: there is a definite bonus to getting the Blu-Ray version for GT5 Prologue. If you really could care less about damage modelling, then grab the PSN download.
Rumors were flying around the intarweb yesterday about Gran Turismo 5 for the PS3 featuring well over 1000 cars in it’s arsenal. Today Sony shot those rumors down with some heavy artillery.
Three Speech, the semi-official Sony blog, contacted the company directly to find out what’s the deal.
“Despite news articles claiming that ‘SCEI/Polyphony Digital’ have made an official announcement with regards to GT5 featuring 1000 vehicles, we can confirm that this is pure speculation. It would appear that the list is a mixture of vehicles that were included in previous GT titles, coupled with somebody’s own fantasy garage.
Further details about GT5 will be announced in due course, but for the moment at least, we can confirm that the current car list/speculation, does not come from SCE.”
As further evidence, the website that posted the list has announced it’s fake and wasn’t sent to them by Sony or Polyphany Digital.
Oh well, I guess we have to go back to speculating what kind of cool cars will make the cut in the next PS3 racing simulation.
So with all the hype comes great scrutiny and we here at Loot Ninja are no different, we take Forza, flip up it’s hood and poke around until satisfied.
Presentation and Graphics: The game supports 720p graphics, which looked very crisp on a high definition display. The game runs at 60 fps, which is impressive, but unfortunately does suffer from some jaggies like the demo. (but this can be overlooked when you look at the beautiful backgrounds) The presentation of the game is terrific and the car editor functions are outstanding. You can fully customize any car in the game from aerodynamics to engine to pure paint job. I also like that your current car is displayed in the main menus as you choose races. Forza 2 does great as far as presentation goes. 4.5 of 5
Sound and Music: The music in Forza is decent, but I typically just mute the soundtrack, plug in my iPod and turn up the FX sounds. Nothing beats a nice engine rev in 5.1 surround sound with a little bit of Jay Z going in the background. You can actually here the fans cheer as you rev by them. 4 of 5
All three of these games look beautiful. There’s no denying that. But how do they stack up head to head? A user sent us this image to show the differences between these 3 games with cars they have in common.
Personally, I think GT HD has better car detail than both of the others. What do you think?
Sony and Polyphony Digital today released a new trailer for Gran Turismo HD for the PS3. The new video shows a new car, the Nissan Xanavi Nismo 2. This car is absolutely bad ass.
Hopefully this car shows up in the game for the PS3. And maybe a new track. I can only hope.
The new rally racing game in the Colin McRae series has some amazing car damage effects. This is all real time and normal mapped, so it takes on a pretty realistic effect of how damage would occur.
Our friends over at PS3Blog have an interesting article up today. One of their readers had a conversation over PM with a developer from Polyphany Digital (skebe). In the PM session, skebe admitted to not having car damage in Gran Turismo 5.
derrickgott007: People are already exploting the no damage to ruin the leaderboards….There are videos on Youtube on how to get 1.07min lap times by fence riding and going full speed into the turns to riccoceht off the fence….Please put in damage to stop these people.
skebe: Sorry for not being able to respond earlier… didn’t know until today that this forum had a PM feature
Although we’re not ready to implement damage until they can be shown in a truly authentic way (which is extremely hard work if you think about it), we are doing our best to avoid these kind of ‘cheating’ to take place.
derrickgott007: I understand what you are saying about the hard work…..But FORZA 2 has damage, and so does the TOCA series…If GT5 had damage it would be UNSTOPPABLE.
skebe: No I mean, really really really hard work… to the extent of creating another game, almost. From our standards, what other racing games are doing is ’simplified damage’. You know how **bleep** we are when making our games… we would want to simulate every single dent differently
I dont know about this point of view from skebe. I understand they would want it to be perfect, but not having damage takes away from the realism.
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So with all the hype comes great scrutiny and we here at Loot Ninja are no different, we take Forza, flip up it’s hood and poke around until satisfied.
