Celebrating 20 Years of Gran Turismo

I was 25 when GT was first released. I'd already spent the previous 15 years or so playing driving games right back from Night Racer on Atari 2600, Race on Vic 20, Pole Position on BBC B, Test Drive 2 on the Amiga, etc etc.
Also had obviously pumped countless amounts of cash into the coin ops such as Outrun, Hard Drivin', Chase HQ, Sega Rally and all of the rest of them.
Driving games were what I played, and that was pretty much it.
Then the Playstation started to get talked about, and as someone else mentioned, a magazine feature showing this new forthcoming game, which blew me away! My brother and I were amazed at the prospect of being able to play coin op quality or better games at home.
It was a must have.
I spent ages trying to find a PS when first released, as they were sold out everywhere. But I eventually got one, and then the wait for GT to be released.
I had the date on my calendar, and that lunch time drove to the nearest shop and bought a copy, on the day of release.
Got home from work and stuck it on. It was a very late night!
I would find myself spending stupid amounts of time adjusting gear ratios, and fine tuning setups perfectly.
GT2 I never really got into for some reason, it didn't grab my attention as much as the original.
GT3 however was another story altogether! This was perfection!
Many an hour was spent racing with my brother having crazy battles at Mid Field Raceway, Deep Forest, Grand Valley etc over stupid amounts of laps, only to finish thousands of seconds apart. It was always very close racing, even though we had totally different styles.
GT4 I enjoyed, but didn't really get into due to having less free time.
After that I gave up on gaming due to spending more time in the music scenes I was in.
It was only after a chance mention from a mate saying he had got the beta of GTS that it grabbed my attention.
I applied for it but didnt get one, so didnt give it any more thought.
Then saw people talking about the downloadble one a week before release and thought I'd give it a look.
I'd been disapointed with Project Cars, so it was a last ditch hope of a decent racer again.
I loved it and am back in the fold! :D
 
I'll never forget the magazine preview - most likely Games Master - where they likened a screen shot of Trial Mountain to Cheddar Gorge. My sense of wonder with locations and my love of cars were united in one game.

GT2 is my favourite car roster. Unless they bring back such everyday 90s road cars in future, it always will be.
 
Here are books I kept too. Happy 20 th Gran Turismo
 

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Oh boy... 20 years!

Gran Turismo Games is one one of those things I can related to every period of my life. Like: when I first got a real job, I bought a PS2 and a copy of GT4. A very special girl came into my life during my days of GT2. And so on and on...

Happy Bday GT.

Merry Christmas everybody.
 
Superb article. 👍

The impact this series has had not just on us (heck, this community wouldn't be here without it), but globally since GT1 launched cannot be underestimated. It's not just a racing game franchise - it's had an influence on all our lives on so many different levels.

Sure, there have been highs and lows over the last 20 years, but the enduring legacy of the series is still as strong as it's ever been. And the countless moments created by it will, for me at least, live long in the memory.


Thank you Polyphony Digital.

Thank you Gran Turismo.
Here's to the next 20 years, wherever they take us. :cheers: :gtpflag:
 
Wow 20 years ago it all started.I already had a megadrive but desperately wanted a sega saturn,however if it wasnt for the fact the saturn was out of stock everywhere in my town i wouldnt have bought a playstation until much later.I had never heard of the sony ps but was determined to buy a console anyway so came home with it,a copy of wave racer and the rest for me is history as they say,for the record i had an xbox and still have a xbone s so luckily have the best of both worlds.
 
I got GT with my DualShock PSX for Christmas one year. I wanted Tekken 3 but my dad thought GT would be better for me, because he wanted to play it!

20ish years later and I own all but GT2 (couldn’t afford it as a kid) and love the series!

..though I do also enjoy Tekken :D
 
Nielsen
I'm actually surprised the series isn't older. It feels like ages since I grabbed a copy of the first entry. It also seems like ages since the jump to PS2. Oh well, I just grabbed GT Sport on discount today. Tough decision since I have no idea what to expect from a game that isn't GT7 or Prologue, but yesterday's nostalgic freebies and the holiday spirit got the better of me. :)
Click to expand...

In my opinion, you purchased a very good game. I have been driving Grand Turismo since the first release. I had up and down feelings with GT5 and GT6, but they gave me the best times I’ve ever had despite the problems they both had. I never thought a game could ever get me to met soooooo many people. I wish for the day they really get into making an Awesome Grand Turismo 7. For now, Grand Turismo Sport puts a giant grin on my face every time I sit down to drive it. The rating system is pretty good as it gives me a better driving experience the higher my rating gets. The racing to me is intense and very fun.
I’ll be honest, using the controller is fun, but I prefer my wheel. T300rs 👍

I have PCars 2 with the season pass and I’ve only played it once since GT Sport came out.
GT Sport is a freakin blast :D :cheers:
 
What a brilliantly written article.

For so many to get so much enjoyment, satisfaction, hours of mis-spent youth/middle age/twilight years.... and frustration... I confess to ramming that Merc CL 600 at the end of the Grand Valley Speedway straight - I'm not proud, but only way i could beat it in my scooby (with no talent)....

I was a Sega kid, only getting to trial GT when house sitting for people at 19(?) getting totally addicted to GT3, concepts, prologue, GT4 & GT5 online racing every Wednesday night (when single) with a group of continental buddies... to downloading GT6 and never playing it due to starting a family... (and ps3 yloding)

The Gran Turismo franchise has managed to attract my loyalty, and with GTS, I'm finally getting some time to race again with some buddies collected from GT5 online days... shame I'm still mediocre, and that being in the lead gives me heart palpitations, then my aging thumbs let me down time and again....

The GT franchise is something very special.... but, I SO miss the previous original and world tacks we've loved over the years... having the back catalogue of tracks would make this latest rendition such a well rounded sibling.
 
To me, GT4 is still the ultimate in what a GT game can be. It was my first GT game, and it has had the biggest impact on me. Without it, I would not be here. It also helped expand my knowledge of the automotive world more than any other medium, even my dad who has been around cars since he was 18. I might've only played this game for half of it's existence, but that equates to more than half of my life. I've had more years with GT than without, and I don't think many people can say that! Friends moved on from the series years ago, and there's nobody left playing GT Sport today. Many people know about Lancer Evolutions, Subaru WRX's, Holden Commodores, Nissan 240SX's, BMW M3's, Toyota Supras, and Honda Civics, but how many would know about the W12 Nardo? The NSX? The Daihatsu Midget? The Isuzu Bellet? I could quite literally list vehicles I came to know about through GT.

Here's to the next 20 years of the best gaming franchise in history.
 
Amazing article, Kyle!! Touching really :D. Badly, I got as well the server's issue, so I couldn't play it as I wanted it :(. Anyway, I was preparing in my mind a little writing about this "connection moment" we all are having these days... :D

"You know, some little things can come a big part of your life if you have a huge connection with them. It can be everything or anything, vital or viral, depends of how you look at them...

Videogames currently are a big part of our life, whether you touched an Amiga controller, an Atari controller, an SNES, a SEGA, a dualshock 1-4 or a Xbox Controlller, et cetera... I'm pretty sure some of us in our autobiography or will will mention it's favorite videogame of their childhood, or their whole life even. That videogame you shared with your little brothers, big ones, bffs, frenemies, et cetera... One of those games it's now accomplishing a well-deserved 20th anniversary of life. Gran Turismo.

Being 21 years old (just 1 year-23 days older than the game). I didn't manage as many to enjoy the beggining of everything as a baby, specially since my brothers had an SNES, which made another racing classic (SNES' Top Gear) my very 1st introduction to racing games, and gaming in general, we only had 3 games (the former, Super mario bros and a soccer game only memory I have of it it's Snickers' Side ads and the "Corner kick" warning). Normal since they were studying hard back then. Then, another one came out of nowhere, being my 1st touch with the Dualshock, NFS III HP came as a surprise in a market at 4 years old with misunderstandable fun with a sky-blue car with rounded tailights (C5 Corvette). Still, that was just a 1-hour rented discovery, it wasn't until 2002, being 5 when my life was suddendly going to be marked. When my aunt took me to a much closer videoplay to rent for me another hour, I saw a red disc with some chrome in it, the ps2 intro (unknown for me back then) and then, a big red screen with a huge white logo that said "Gran Turismo 3" appeared in front of me. That's where I said to myself "oh boy" and hitted the arcade button, after a some races, starting everything with the Evo VI rally car, the Focus Rally car and the calsonic GTR in Smokey mountain and midfield, respectevly, I had a unknown feeling of happiness I've never had in my life... After that, my life followed it's regular but drastricly changed course with "I want to be a race car driver" as a goal.

That's what, I'm pretty sure, most of the over 10 million buyers arround the world had when, back in December 23th, 1997 and summer 1998 had after just that 1 race... all thanks to a little known by the time company called Polyphony digital, and even a lesser-known Kazunori Yamauchi.

Apart of bringing a new racing game to many, it bring as well what I like to call a "discovery feeling". Think about it, did you knew Nissan, apart of Sentras and Primeras, had something called Skyline GTR on their lineup??... I mean, you could knew the Z32 Fairlady Z, but not the Skyline. More even, did you knew there was even MORE powerful, and funnier factory versions of cars you thought they were just boring?. Galant VR-4?? Lancer Evo IV?? Legacy 2.0 GT-B Touring Wagon?? The latters became some of my childhood dream cars. Especially the Evo IV, and that takes me to the next part of this writing.

Here at latinamerica (Peru including), Gran Turismo arrived a little time later after the northamerican release, and became a culture that, not only changed the way of seeing racing... sorry, games in general, it also made car culture a standard culture and not just something exotic only people with money could do. All that thanks to another feeling Gran Turismo always had... sorry, HAS. More than a "discovery feeling", it was more of a "personal feeling" most people could experience just starting to play the game, a feeling Yamauchi-San wanted to have while playing with an R32 Skyline GTR, which also owned back then. The feeling you have when you can say "I'm playing with my OWN car!!", that quote many people had back then while playing with a Honda Accord Sedan or Wagon, a Subaru Legacy or Impreza, a Nissan Primera, a 4th Gen Chevy Camaro, hell, even a Mazda Demio!!. And you could modify them even as you want! Basically, you could make your own dream car with your current car as a base!. Let me tell you a little story, I discovered the original GT back in 2003 at 6 years old near my grandma's house, and one neighbor, family's friend as well had a beautiful blue tuned Lancer Evo IV parked in front of my house, and everytime I see one in GT, I remember that car I wished the owner was still owning these days to getting it off his hands! Imagine that, as a 6 years old kid, dreaming of something different to others! That's the magic GT always had, apart of the "discovery feeling" those unknown cars and versions had, the "personal feeling" the normal-seeing cars had if you owned one at least IRL, and the "dream feeling" most of the cars had either in a special situation, or just plain stock. Even the professional designers wanted to make their own feelings while having full freedom of how doing it, a.k.a, the Vision GT programme, which is not even halfway done and it's bringing so much curiosities to the table, I mean, Hyundai in LeMans?? As a peruvian, I WANT to see that, even if we have to wait until 2025 probably.

Those feelings were perfectly resumed in a quote on a GTPlanet article about GT's 20th aniversary...

...the central feeling of ownership was cemented in GT. These weren’t just a collection of polygons you were selecting for a race; these were yours.
Click to expand...

Also, apart of the on-context feelings mention above, there was as well off-context feelings GT bring like "curiosity feelings", "what else we didn't know, and how to report them to the world so everybody could have knowledge of it??" That was the feeling many felt while playing with Skylines or Imprezas WRX STIs... Getting out of context wasn't the neccesary feeling the game wanted to make, but it was something unevitable considering the exoticness the game overall always brings to the playstation, and we always want to go over the line, again, unevitable... Not only that, it made many explore new worlds they wouldn't expected to be funny, I wouldn't be a graphic designer for example if it wasn't for the amazing graphics, videos, and overall creativity GT always has on every trailer video, UI work, or even car designs GT made me want to learn more (the Ford GT LM Race Car Spec III or the Toyota Team T-copia are good examples of the latter)!

In GT, there will be always so much going on beyond the green light, specially in these E-sports days Gran turismo decided to be part of with GT sport thanks to the FIA, an unsual-yet-amazing partner that, known always for changing drastically all kinds of motorsport, didn't changed the original essence of Gran Turismo, an essence that Polyphony digital amazingly knew how to keep it even with what's called "the biggest change in franchise's history", something not even Coca-Cola could do back in the 80s trying to change the original formula! The best example of this is the latest 1.10 update GT had, bringing not only a benchmark mode to the series like the GT league, also bringing back benchmark cars like the R32-R34 Skyline GTRs, cars that made the game what it is now, and also bring so much nostalgia PD knew it was going to bring, so what thing they decide to do, bring even MORE nostalgia by adding GT2's arcade mode BGM... You could feel as an old kid while playing as a modern kid nowadays.

I know this is a very long writing, but trust me, this is not even halfway what many GT fans want to say about the experience they started to have after that very first green light... With this, only there's one more last thing to say...

Happy 20th Birthday Gran Turismo!!! Thanks for the drive of our lives, let the drive go even further and...

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