More Time and Drift trials have been added to Gran Turismo 5‘s Seasonal Event lists and fans of the game’s US road cars will be pleased. Each of the two events features a trial involving American non-race cars – limited by PP in the Time Trial and by tyres in the Drift Trial – along with two further open-to-all challenges. Here’s the numbers you’ll need to know:

The latest version of Gran Turismo 5, version 2.04, is now available. Weighing in at 79MB in size, the update focuses on fixing a wide range of software issues and bugs. Here’s the complete list of changes as announced by Polyphony Digital:

Sim-racing continues to grow as a hobby world-wide, and more companies than ever before are introducing high-quality racing seats at increasingly affordable price points. One of the latest products on the market is the rSeat RS EVO V3, and they’ve sent me a complementary unit to take a look at for myself.

Kazunori Yamauchi has just confirmed, via Twitter, the release date of Gran Turismo 5’s next update, presumably version 2.04.

The latest Seasonal Events have just gone live in Gran Turismo 5, and they’ll be putting your fastest B-Spec drivers to work! Here’s a closer look at the new races:

US automotive giant Ford is the latest car manufacturer to acknowledge the effect that video games have on brand recognition and vehicle sales, particularly in the 20-30 demographic.

Nissan Europe has today issued a press release detailing the campaigns their three GT Academy graduates will be driving in the 2012 season.

WRS Week 51 is Posted!

In an unusual twist following on from yesterday’s news that GT Academy is rumoured to be returning to Europe this March, German website Speedmaniacs reports that Germany is to get its own GT Academy for 2012 rather than being part of the European GT Academy. This rather unique situation is corroborated by an article posted on the German PlayStation Blog site.

The latest Time and Drift trials have just become available in Gran Turismo 5’s Seasonal Events, both of which feature the new Toyota 86 that was added to the game last month – for free – in update 2.02. Here’s a closer look at what’s new:

Kazunori Yamauchi has recently  revealed via Twitter that the inspiration for the location of the latest GT5 track “Route X” was the port of Hakata, near the new Polyphony Digital offices in Fukuoka.

Polyphony Digital’s custom “stealth” race cars in Gran Turismo 5 are some of the most difficult to acquire in the game. Available as pre-order and Signature Edition incentives, they’re simply not available to the majority of players.

GTPlanet’s Weekly Race Series (WRS) is the longest running online Time Trial competition dedicated to the Gran Turismo series. Having run continuously since its humble introduction in February of 2003, the WRS has been run for nearly 9 years and boasts 445 completed weekly time trials! For the first time in its long history, the WRS began hosting live, weekly online racing events shortly after the start of this year. Each week, participants from around the globe race against one another in live competitions organized by GTPlanet’s very own team of race administrators.

After a busy 2011 for Polyphony Digital, including a move and expansion to new offices in Fukuoka, the studio has recently started to advertise for new “Gran Turismo staff”. According to this translation of their home page, PD are after a number of GT-specific staff, including:

Disturbing laws are being proposed in the U.S. Congress which threaten the Internet we know and love, including GTPlanet and hundreds of thousands of online communities and social networks like it. Known as the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and the Protect IP Act (PIPA), these bills grant unprecedented control over the Internet to the entertainment industry and the U.S. government while attempting to thwart online piracy.

The two latest DLC packs for Gran Turismo 5 are now available in the North American PlayStation Store. Here’s a quick review of the new content that’s available:

The latest Gran Turismo 5 update, version 2.03, weighs in at 225MB and is currently going live around the world. 2.03’s new features were leaked, but have now been officially confirmed by Polyphony Digital: