Jordan Greer

During his time at Snetterton to watch the two GT Academy 2010 finalists compete for the top spot, Kazunori Yamauchi talked with quite a few journalists. His last interview to be published is with BBC’s TopGear. As you would expect, there aren’t any bombshells, but here’s the most notable quotes:

One of the more unpleasant surprises we’ve had waiting for Gran Turismo 5 was the unexpected postponement of the game’s March 2010 Japanese release. It was a quiet announcement, but set a somber tone at the beginning of the year for us eager fans. Since that time, we have not received any sort of information on exactly why that happened – until now. In an excellent interviewwith Dean Gibson of AutoExpress last weekend, Yamauchi-san clarified things a little bit:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGZfMhZQp5Q

Our friend mimaximax continues pumping out videos from his copy of the GT5 demo! His third update includes a batch of clips featuring the Lexus Weds Sport IS350 on the Nurburgring Nordschleife, and it’s looking as good as ever. Enjoy!

Thanks to the mysterious mimaximax, we’ve got five new videos that you definitely do not want to miss. Fortunately, he’s focused on cars we haven’t seen very much, including the Petronas TOM’s SC430, ARTA NSX, and the Yellow Hat Supra. You’ll even recognize Sebastian Loeb’s face in an in-car replay. But enough with the text – start watching these videos!

As the mysterious GT5 demo has been making waves over the past week, two more interior replay videos have surfaced. Similar to the Subaru Impreza WRC driver and co-driver animations that we saw earlier this month, both show the Toyota FT-86 Concept on Tokyo R246, but from slightly different angles. Thanks to all who sent these in!

First things first: two independent sources have privately confirmed to me that the GT5 Demo Collection is real, and the original whistle-blower lherre has backed up his announcement with more screenshots. This collection is also providing a closer look at things we only got to peek at during the shows where these demos were originally featured.

According to an Italian gaming site, a Sony representative at last week’s Game Developers Conference informed them the company was looking to release Gran Turismo 5 in October of this year. While GT5 received little attention at the show, Sony’s marketing vice president, Peter Dille, re-affirmed the game would release this year. Of course, October also fits nicely within the “fall” release window mentioned by European Sony executive James Armstrong last month.

Three high-res screen shots have just been released, which appear to complement the most recent new trailer for the game. I’m particularly impressed by the interior lighting of the car, with all of the SLS AMG’s buttons and knobs lit accordingly. Something else to look for: the “Tentative” street names on the road signs… Thanks to “deep_sky” for picking these up first!

GT5 received brief mention at Sony’s large press event at the Game Developers Conference 2010 today. While the focus of the show turned out to be Sony’s new motion controller, it was “confirmed” the company’s biggest racer will be released in 2010. Of course, for anyone who’s been paying attention, this isn’t exactly a surprise, but it should calm any lingering fears that remained after the game’s Japanese March date was postponed.