Whilst players have had the Gran Turismo Sport beta in their hands since March, Polyphony Digital has been coy on details surrounding the single player experience. However, a recent interview in a magazine discussing Gamescom may have revealed new training features.
The article kicks off by discussing GT Sport’s Sportsmanship rating system. Used to judge how safe a racer is on the track, SR will be factored alongside driver performance to give drivers a chance to earn an FIA-certified license. It’s from here however that things get interesting.
The first mention of new information focuses on a section of events called “Track Experience”. The magazine claims players will be able to drive individual sections on each of the game’s 19 circuits. If true, players could break down larger tracks like the Nürburgring, learning them piece by piece. Gran Turismo on PSP had a similar feature for the Green Hell.
As this is a translation, take the above with a grain of salt. The excerpt could be referring to license tests as seen in previous entries of the Gran Turismo franchise. In these tests, it was common for Polyphony to give players time trials on certain sectors of a specific tracks. If we now have free reign of taking on which parts of a circuit we want to, it would be a series first.
This isn’t the only new piece of information revealed by the article. The focus shifts to the single-player component of GT Sport and what the driving challenges might offer. According to the piece, slalom and drift events will join more traditional races, our first acknowledgment of these event types.
The GT series has included Slalom challenges since GT2, but the mention of drifting is particularly interesting. Drifting in Gran Turismo titles has often felt like a bit of an afterthought. Perhaps this will change with GT Sport — players have already spotted it within the beta’s settings screen.
That’s it as far as potential new information goes. Yamauchi talks about the title’s support for the PlayStation VR headset and how impressed he is with the peripheral. The writer reiterates Sport mode’s use of live commentary and streaming during high profile events too. It’s positive to see Yamauchi’s initial vision is still carrying the development of GT Sport.
The biggest challenge will be introducing new players into the sim racing fold and the addition of a “learn-by-sector” mode would certainly help tackle that obstacle. Naturally, we welcome more variety in the the solo experience via drift and slalom events. Whilst we must remain skeptical due to this being translated information, we’ll be sure to report more as it comes in.
Thanks to queleuleu for finding the magazine article!
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