14 DAY TRIAL // Sony has finally managed to put a release date next to Gran Turismo 5, the racing simulator that has been under development for close to four full years. Unfortunately, the March 2010 date that was announced at a Sony Computer Entertainment of Japan press event at the Tokyo Game Show was only for the Japanese market and the representatives refused to issue any comments related to North America or to Europe.
Luckily, there are some clear signs that Gran Turismo 5 might actually arrive on the same date worldwide. The boss of Polyphony Digital, Kazunori Yamauchi, told MTV Multiplayer a while ago that, “Its release is not too far away – it will be after the PSP GT release – and, most likely, it will be a simultaneous worldwide release.” Since that statement was made, things might have changed, but Sony needs to make sure that the situation of GT 5 Prologue, which launched in the United States a full four months after it did in Japan, does not repeat itself.
Other statements from Yamauchi hinted that the video game was pretty much done at that point, as the team was only working on making sure that all bugs were squashed and that the car-damage model was working well. With a Gran Turismo video game for the PlayStation Portable released recently, Sony and Polyphony Digital probably thought that pushing the full Gran Turismo to next year might make sense from a commercial point of view.
It might also be that the racing market is pretty crowded at the moment. Need for Speed: Shift from Electronic Arts has just been released and seems to be pretty successful and well reviewed. Forza 3 Motorsport from Microsoft is also set to arrive before Christmas. Blur, a more arcade-racing title that focuses on power-ups, has also just been pushed to 2010, while the market is also waiting for Split/Second from Disney.