How Gran Turismo is Made: A Behind-The-Scenes Tour of Polyphony Digital

[GT Sport]

The moment you realize Jordan is the very first of the first GT fans to see the upcoming GT even in its making process.
Dude, this makes me insanely happy and.. Jealous

 

[Sven Jurgens]

So awesome, literally brought a tear to my eye.

Thanks for all the amazing pictures and great write up!

 

[sirjim73]

I can only think of one word for this... Fascinating.

Fabulous article - thanks @Jordan


PS I think the colour for the Jaguar Vision GT was called "cashmere" in the bottom left of the aircraft hangar photo?

 

[VBR]

It's nice to have a look behind the scenes. However, it just leaves me feeling sad & empty...being reminded of the huge gulf that PD creates between themselves & us players...

 

[elston87]

The enigmatic and mysterious laboratories of Polyphony Digital always have something exciting brewing behind-the-scenes. Glad to see that the legacy of the franchise is still resonating inside the studio; all of those classic steering wheel controllers lined up like an arcade makes me wanna break out my PS2 and Driving Force Pro again! Daiki Kasho is also lively as ever; hopefully he's brewing up some new and fresh musical concoctions for the next title!

Thanks @Jordan for giving us this inside peek at one of the most prestigious places on the planet that I'd love to visit one day! I've got a ton of unanswered questions for the team!

 

[NissanSkylineN1]

Am I the only one who thinks that the desk space of the regular employees are a little too small?

 

[FoRiZon]

Am I the only one who thinks that the desk space of the regular employees are a little too small?

Not really. Seems rather standard for a work table.

Maybe the fact that most of employees has 2 or more monitors that give such illusions.

Source - me have been working.

 

[Granadier]

Nice to know. Looks like they have it also in the office test table with T-GT and some pretty old logitech gear. Fanatec is now a viable option for T-GT.👍

A Podium was mounted next to the CSL Elite as well. Wonder how much that flexes and shakes the desk...

---

Excellent article @Jordan. It was obvious how much passion you have for the franchise, and how much of an opportunity this was for you. Congrats, and thank you for sharing your experience with us.

 

[Vspectra]

Congrats Jordan! Love these articles.

Guess they made sure to hide or not allow photos of PS5 dev kits, 'cause all I see are a bunch of PS4 and PS4 Pro dev kits.

Also, Polyphony seems like a great work environment, so not surprised many on the dev team have stayed with the company since GT1 with Kaz treating the whole place like one big family. Parties every friday sounds like a blast and good for preventing burn outs typical in game development.

 

[Calmlity]

I felt a good atmosphere of the office.

 

[TurboTacho]

That's really splendid and wonderful design of the office. I'm envious of the huge variety of little things that make up the legacy of the series till today. Definitely worth the hard work put together.

If only my office had something like this...

 

[Satomiblood]

Kaz looks like a happy little kid standing in front of those shelves of model kits and car parts. Love the article.

 

[Nosalis]

Would have love to work there at least for a bit, even-though I heard the working conditions are far from ideal

 

[juanffy18]

Great article, nice story about how is difficult now to create cars and tracks this days, a lot of work!

 

[Corsa]

Good good!
Do Kunos next book a flight to their office at Vallelunga, which is right at the track next to the pits.

 

[jaytmtb]

What a great article and thank you to Kazunori Yamauchi and everyone at Polyphony Digital for giving us
the best car game in the history of car games 👍

 

[Lux Klonoa]

Jordan, the way you wrote the Daiki Kasho bit of the article kind of makes it seem like he's now the lead audio guy at PD... Is he? Or is Masao Kimura still the lead?

Regardless, I envy you, Mikail, and everyone else for getting the chance to meet him in person. You guys are lucky. =D

Oh yeah, did you get a chance to interview him, or no?

 

[ThruxtonGT]

Seems like a cool place to work.

 

[Jordan]

Thanks for all the kind words, guys. I wanted to communicate what it was like for a fan to actually be inside the secret, hallowed halls of PDI and I hope that came through. 👍

"With the next Gran Turismo game still a closely guarded secret, this is a particularly sensitive time for Polyphony Digital."
Not only the next Gran Turismo, but the next console too! I guess Poly has double checked everything before the tour^^
Poly as a studio seems ready for its next game and seeing Daiki Kasho reminds me some of the most epic songs in GT3

Indeed. There were a lot of very nervous people in that room!

Please tell me @Jordan if Daiki Kasho will release a new song (for anything, not just Gran Turismo).

Also funny that Lenny Ibizarre is there as well. Mayne thats why his song still plays even in transmission mode

I don't know the details and we didn't get to talk to Daiki very much, but he has definitely been doing a lot of work for PDI. He has everything he needs in PDI's dedicated recording studio, and you could tell a lot has been going on in there. I doubt they will be adding a lot of new music to GT Sport at this point, so I think we can figure out what he's working on now...

Hands up who looked at the monitors to see if there was anything we didn't know about... Be honest!

Me, the entire tour.

Kazunori's got an epic t-shirt, does anyone know where you can buy those?

It's one of the limited shirts sold during the NYC World Tour event this year. I bought a few extra and will be doing a giveaway soon, so keep an eye on the blog.

This read was amzing, I would of love a video too,

Thanks! This actually was going to be a video, but I got halfway through it before I realized I didn't have enough footage I could actually share. I might put together a short cut for our social media and I'll post it in here. I also recorded Daiki's solo performance, which was really cool.

ps: did u see a ps5 dev kit in your walk around ???

Kaz said that the cars in Gran Turismo 5 had 500,000 polygons. I’m confused why this article says the cars in GTS only have 70,000 polys.

I thought this was odd as well, but I wasn't confident enough in my memory of the 500k polygon count to ask a follow-up question at the time. Perhaps the lowest-LOD model they have to build is 70k? I'm not quite sure, but the 70k number came directly from the notes of the woman who modeled the Jaguar VGT, so she knows what she's talking about.

Jordan, the way you wrote the Daiki Kasho bit of the article kind of makes it seem like he's now the lead audio guy at PD... Is he? Or is Masao Kimura still the lead?

Regardless, I envy you, Mikail, and everyone else for getting the chance to meet him in person. You guys are lucky. =D

Oh yeah, did you get a chance to interview him, or no?

I know you're a fan and I thought about you when we actually got to meet Daiki. We didn't get the chance for an interview; he was at the after-party, but this was the only other time I saw him around the studio.

To answer your question, I really don't know. It has never been clear to me exactly how the audio department is structured at PDI, especially in regards to the boundaries between music and in-game sound effects. I think Daiki plays more of a creative/performative role when they are producing the games, instead of a full-time audio lead, but again, I'm not really sure how that works.

 

[SleezyBigSlim]

GT Sport assets are developed in 8k, amazing.

 

[Lux Klonoa]

I know you're a fan and I thought about you when we actually got to meet Daiki. We didn't get the chance for an interview; he was at the after-party, but this was the only other time I saw him around the studio.

To answer your question, I really don't know. It has never been clear to me exactly how the audio department is structured at PDI, especially in regards to the boundaries between music and in-game sound effects. I think Daiki plays more of a creative/performative role when they are producing the games, instead of a full-time audio lead, but again, I'm not really sure how that works.

Aww, hm, that sucks. Heh, glad you thought of me when you met him, though. =P

I see, btw. 'Cause the opening credits of Sport also lists him as sound designer alongside Kimura, so it seems like he's now a full-time employee at PD rather than an external collaborator for them. That's also why I asked.

Looking forward to your video of him, then!

 

[HellzFire]

I unfortunately missed the tour inside the studio itself, but for a good cause, team Jaguar went into the imperial area of Tokyo to do some instagram stuff.

The outside area of studio looks superp, I'm very grateful to have had the chance of visiting it. Incredible place. Wish I can come back there some day!

 

[sanrensho]

Congratulations, Jordan.
Living the dream!

 

[zeptrans]

This is THE place to visit, these photos are very expensive to my eyes

Good, thanks, the high pleasure I feel when looking and reading this article.

PS: next time, pls to tell at Kaz, if he wants, I'm open to join his crew lol ... between CAD designers, we understand eachother... no?

 

[Shinu]

Base models could very well be 70K and then Tessellation engine does its job to add extra smoothness (and polys)

 

[Tom]

Great work with this, @Jordan. You captured the studio, the atmosphere and everything in-between perfectly!

 

[Marius789]

Wow the tour must’ve been one hell of an experience. A true GT dream come true.

I am so jealous!

 

[GTnForza4ever]

Guy looks like an ape. I mean, he designs Gran Turismo like an ape would.

 

[badAZbuddha]

Guy looks like an ape. I mean, he designs Gran Turismo like an ape would.

 

[SestoScudo]

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