An unfortunate set of circumstances required me to unplug for a few days, and I want to get everyone caught up with the latest batch of news over the past week or so. Frankly, there hasn’t been much going on in the world of Gran Turismo, but all of that is about to change with GamesCom 2010 coming up next week! Several GTPlanet members will be in attendance throughout the event, and we’re going to have more exclusive coverage than ever before – watch for more major announcements on that over the next few days. For now, here’s a quick summary of what you did (or…didn’t) miss:

Remember the contest held to title the Daiki Kasho song used in Gran Turismo 5’s E3 2010 trailer? The winner was finally announced last week after Kazunori Yamauchi made his selection from 5,444 entries: “5OUL ON D!SPLAY”.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92mDRnjgwmc

Remember when we first got the hint that there would be “two collector’s editions” of Gran Turismo 5? It turns out that was correct, as the Signature Edition was just announced today for everyone except residents of the United States. Here’s what you get for €179.99 (pre-order here at Amazon.fr):

The PlayStation BETA event I told you about was finally held this past weekend. GTPlanet reader Adam Lang was first on the scene, and has been kind enough to provide us with lots of videos and screenshots from the GT5 demo on display. Most notably, you’ll see a much-abused Enzo Ferrari show heavy damage to its front bumper, along with an Audi R8 and the MOTUL R35 Skyline JGTC car. He’s also provided a lot of (literal) screenshots of the demo, so you can get a higher-resolution look at gameplay.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rB1UyZAV1Vo

Great news for our man Lucas Ordoñez (winner of the first GT Academy)! Lucas and his team, RJN Motorsports, have qualified their Nissan 370Z have first in its class for the Spa 24 Hours race this weekend. I’m not aware of any online live video streams of the race (if you find one, please share it in the comments below), but Lucas has promised me that he’ll be constantly updating his Twitter feed and his Facebook page directly from the paddock throughout the event. Good luck, Lucas!

Scans of the French PlayStation Official Magazine’s feature on GT5 reveal the magazine is weighing in on two of the game’s most exciting unannounced features. Most confidently, they’ve listed karting as a major category in the game and even included a small note on the track editor. Of course, the text is in French, but you can see all the scans for yourself right here.

Programmers from the U.S. Department of Energy, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the Society of Automotive Engineers have found an interesting way to build “green racing” features on top of Gran Turismo 5: Prologue. Apparently, the system works by sitting between the steering wheel and the PlayStation 3, watching and recording controller inputs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=746uWpjd85w&feature=player_embedded

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPg7dXCIqeU

As of July 24th, we’re now less than 100 days away from the launch of Gran Turismo 5 and sales already off to a great start, with pre-orders alone  holding the game steady in the top charts of the web’s largest retailer, Amazon.com. GT5’s already broken into the top 50 best-selling games on the site, and it’s dancing around the PlayStation 3’s top 10 list (these lists are updated hourly, making it difficult to pin anything down to a specific rank). It’s even more impressive when you consider this is only the Collector’s Edition we’re talking about here, which commands a $40.00 premium over the regular game.

Before Kazunori Yamauchi created the first Gran Turismo, he began his career with a title known as Motor Toon Grand Prix. Produced by “Polys Entertainment” (later to become Polyphony Digital), it’s a cartoon racing game featuring 8 karts and 10 tracks. Sony has just announced the game’s availability for download as a “PSOne Classic” on PSN for $5.99. So, if you want to see how it all really got started, grab the 251 MB download and give it a go.

Mercedes-Benz continues to take full-advantage of its newfound affiliation with the Gran Turismo series with cross-promotions and online games, and this may be the best yet! Visitors to the Mercedes-Benz World in Weybridge, Surrey, UK get a chance to drive the SLS on GT5’s Nurburgring Nordschleife, recording an official time. The three fastest drivers (along with two more contestants randomly selected from the top 100 times) get to drive a real SLS AMG on Mercedes-Benz World’s test track.

One of the new features in Gran Turismo 5 I’ve personally been looking forward to is head-tracking. Unless you’ve got the luxury of playing racing games on three screens, the ability to look into and through the turns – just as you should do in real life – provides a considerably more immersive experience. GT5’s head-tracking was first shown in limited action at E3 2010, but it was reportedly difficult to use because of surrounding conditions the PlayStation Eye had to deal with. According to a recent article from the Official PlayStation Magazine, however, the functionality isn’t perfect. Quoting the magazine from this article at CVG.com:

Sony UK has announced a special event known as “PlayStation BETA”, to be held for a select group of gamers on July 30th-August 1st in Birmingham. It’s basically a chance for members of the public to try out the company’s biggest upcoming titles, and you guessed it: Gran Turismo 5 is on the list. Here’s the press release:

Sony’s showing off GT5 and several other big upcoming titles at a private media event on Tuesday night, and one of the editors of the company’s official PlayStation Blog has opened the floor for questions. From his post:

Sad news: remember the Polyphony Digital-designed supercar, the Citroën GT? After it was first revealed in an update to GT5 Prologue, it was widely publicized and praised in the media as the physical prototype made its way around the world at various car shows and events. It even floated around Venice, and this video I uploaded to YouTube (also embedded below) of the car driving around the streets of London has received more than 1.5 million views.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibi9cLBlFy8

A few more interesting quotes have emerged from the GT5 article in the latest “PlayStation: The Official Magazine (UK)”. According to Kazunori Yamauchi, Polyphony Digital has essentially future-proofed the game’s 200+ “Premium Cars”: