Gran Turismo

Gran Turismo

It’s been five years since Sony’s flagship ‘real driving simulator’ was announced for their handheld. Over that period of time racing games have moved on considerably. The Forza series has maintained the realism of Gran Turismo but also introduced the much needed damage that the series so incongruously lacks, while games such as Race Driver: GRID offer an inviting halfway house between dour simulator and Outrun-style arcade racing. Nonetheless, with over 800 painstakingly modeled cars and 35 varied tracks, challenge modes and a suite of multiplayer options, Gran Turismo PSP still manages to be relevant and impressive, despite its long-overdue appearance.

Even so, the lack of a structured Career Mode seems like something of an oversight on first touch. As a result, much of your time is spent setting up single one-off events to compete in. All of the game’s tracks are available from the start, but you’ve only one car to begin with. As such, you’ll need to get stuck in winning races and completing challenges in order to earn the cash to fill your improbably large garage. Challenges are similar to the License tests from previous Gran Turismos and act as a sort of tutorial, tasking you with taking a corner with the optimum racing line or navigating a series of S-bends. As ever, the emphasis is on realism and so the principles you learn and perfect here are relevant to any driver. Most challenges are easily cleared at bronze level but the Gold medals and big money payouts are reserved for the particularly skilled or practiced.

Once you have some money for cars you’ll be able to visit a dealership and get spending. Only four car dealerships are open at any time, and none of them have more than ten vehicles in stock simultaneously. Instead, the dealerships appear randomly as you play, a silly and frustrating system as you’ll often be waiting for a manufacturer to turn up when you’re after a particular motor. On the other hand, limiting access to all of the game’s cars does make for a Pokémon-style Got To Catch ‘Em All meta-game, especially as it’s possible to share your garage with friends.

As with all of Polyphony Digital’s games, the presentation is slick and uncomplicated. Car tuning has been reduced to just eight variables (power, weight, suspension and so on) and so even this area, the real hobbyist guts of the game, is relatively intuitive. The game looks about as good as a PSP title ever has although, again, it falls a little short of the promotional videos Sony’s drip-fed us over the past few years. It may feel like a stripped back version of the main series, lacking a number of the deeper features its elder brothers display, but it’s still an incredible feat of programming and obsession to motoring detail, and will mostly satisfy anyone who shares that passion.

4 out of 5