Did I ever say all VGTs weren't grand tourers? No. I simply said PD were allowing manufacturers to leave that original request if they wanted to.
So what is your argument then?
You question or let’s say delegitimize the whole VGT-Program because of a few cars that don’t fit to these standards that neither does the automotive industry for decades, the world of Motorsports nor the game franchise itself do.
The handful of cars, and correct me if I’m wrong here, that don’t fit to your strict rules are the Chapparel, SRT (both because of technology’s that ain’t based on currently available technology’s and one-seaters), and cars which just have 1 seat/ 1 door or whatsoever, like the Hyundai, Mazda, Alpine, McLaren, Peugeot L500, Lamborghini, Porsche Spyder, and that’s it already.
Porsche Spyder: in the tradition of open top race cars like the 550 Spyder.
Lamborghini: nothing uncommon and a more extreme approach like the Egoista.
Peugeot: Yeah one-seater too
McLaren: the same, also nothing special coming from a brand that has also two 3-seaters under its belt (which also would be disqualified under your strict interpretation of a GT).
Alpine: Race Car and the same as the Porsche Spyder.
Hyundai & Mazda: both interpretations of future Gr.1 kind of race cars.
Not that close to a traditional GT for sure, but they are GTs in the sense of all other GTs in Motorsport (GT1, GT3, GT4, GTX,..).
Chaparral & SRT: Concept cars that ain’t based on currently available technology’s/ or ain’t feasible in real life. But that is also in the tradition of concept cars, these ones also come up from time to time in the real world, but very rarely as these two too.
You could see the VGT-program as kind of an extension of the concept car culture into the virtual world (and back into the real world sometimes).
Most concept cars are more conservative and oriented on feasibility, but concept cars can have all kinds of purposes, so it happens that there’s also manufacturers who try to test the borders what a sports car can be (like the McLaren for example) or go even further and try to give a glimpse of how this or that could eventually look like in the far future (like the Chapparel or SRT).
So we have actually no difference to what was practiced for decades now in the automotive industry. There were also these kind of cars like the Lancia Stratos Zero, Citroën Karin or the even extreme and mostly impossible ones like the Ford Nucleon, Cadillac Thorium, GM Firebirds, BMW Next 100 etc..
There’s the term „Vision“ in front of it for a reason. If every car just sticks to the existing frame of what this or that car should be like, than what would be the reason to create concept cars at all?
So we have an approach to concept cars in the tradition of how concept cars and prototypes been done for decades, and we have a term (and description) that get‘s used in a very free way, also like it’s been done with production cars, iconic cars, for decades (and Gran Turismo is a Game that is based on the real world car culture).
And on top of that the VGT program is, in my eyes, absolutely in the spirit of Gran Turismo itself. It is something that hasn’t been done before, it is another step to make car culture accessible to more people (another aspect of it), it’s about trying out new things and it’s ultimately what Kaz wants to do, what he’s interested in and that is the no. 1 reason why GT as a franchise even exists. Yes it is also a way of marketing for the manufacturers, but that’s what Gran Turismo always has been.
And as i often read the Arguments: but the fans don’t want it, it isn’t popular, GT Concept hasn’t sold well..
There‘s still a lot who like VGTs, it doesn’t have to be the most popular thing to have a legimitation to exist and I think we can be happy when sales numbers or popularity ain’t the most important criteria after which everything else has to follow (even if VGT sure has also commercial reasons), with this criteria Gran Turismo as á Game wouldn’t even have come to life in the first place.
So what about your claims:
1. „everyone is just pushing off their existing drawings..“
2.“nobody’s sticking to the original concept anymore.“
1: it’s still not more than a claim of yours based on two examples of pre-existing concepts, other claims got even debunked (I think it was Famine). It is a very cynical claim, because you don’t know anything about the intentions/ motivations behind all of this, it’s just a negative interpretation that you claim to be fact the way I see it. But please correct me if I’m wrong.
Btw, recycling concepts or parts of it, has always been a part of concept cars. Designers or Design Studios proposed concepts to different manufacturers for example, re-used styling features and so on. Which you can also see happening with VGTs as features also move over to real world cars like the backlights of the Aston Martin, the grill of the Mercedes-Benz etc..
That there’s designers/ manufacturers who give in ideas/ concepts that existed before PD reached out to them i wouldnt deny, there sure are some (what doesn’t have to be a bad thing because otherwise they wouldn’t have seen the light of das probably), but saying that „everyone“ is doing that is nothing more than an exaggeration, and as I see it one that comes out of a misunderstanding of the VGT Program and a (rightfully) disappointment with the latest GT games. But you are aiming at the wrong things here, the problems lie in other departments and I highly doubt that GT7 would have significantly more content if VGT wouldn’t exist.
2: I think my view on this is clear by now, there‘s for the most part a misunderstanding on it, something I also misunderstood at first, but nailing PD on this when the whole automotive industry and the Motorsport world (which GT is just taking and bringing over into the virtual world, so they can’t just change the terms) ain’t caring for that much long before
GT or the VGT Program came to existence, seems unfair to me and I suspect the same reason behind this as for point 1. And you can’t just give cars like a 5-Door Hatchback Golf, a GT40 or something like a BMW GT, which is more a family car than a sports one, a pass but PD has to be 100% precise with that definition.