Kazunori Talks to Red Bull About GT Sport Scapes, The X2010 & More

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Since the reveal of Gran Turismo Sport, Kazunori Yamuchi has once again been pushed into the spotlight of the broader gaming media – a new iteration of Gran Turismo brings in a level of hype unmatched by many series in the genre and gaming medium as a whole. One such outlet who are covering the recent unveiling of Gran Turismo Sport is Red Bull’s gaming section, who conducted an interview with Kazunori himself. Whilst a lot of the article reiterates points we already knew and reported on, there are some interesting statements from the head of Polyphony Digital.

Kazunori goes into more detail about ‘Scapes’, GT Sport’s new Photomode feature that will allow players to take an unlimited number of cars to many locations across the planet. The interview confirms that 1,000 environments have been photographed for use and images will be able to be recreated for viewing at a 4k resolution. Describing the mode as ‘Photoshop but smarter’ in the article, Yamauchi clarifies:

“Every picture contains spatial and light information, so whenever you move a car around in the environment, all shadows are adjusted in real-time. And what’s probably my favourite, you can actually let the car drive. Like you can let it pass the Royal Palace of Tokyo or the Guggenheim Museum in New York and it looks like a real shot.”

The most interesting comment from this quote is how the car movement is described as letting the car ‘drive’. So far in footage we’ve seen cars being placed in where they need to be for a photo but this suggests that we can actually get some sort of drivable area the car can ‘auto-drive’ in as we snap pictures – which would certainly change the level of quality photographers will be able to capture in these new environments.

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Red Bull make a note-worthy comment when talking about the 4K resolution ‘Scapes’ can produce: they point out that Sony asked them not to mention any questions relating to the much-rumoured PS4 Neo. This can be interpreted in a positive or negative light, but the fact Sony felt the need to allude to it at all could point out that a new hardware announcement (and any subsequent GT Sport enhancements) may be on the horizon.

Unlike the majority of the PS3’s lifespan, where Kazunori often alluded to pushing the system to the limit, he again has insisted that GT Sport is currently at “50 to 60 percent of what we want to achieve on PS4.” highlighting that there is definite room for improvement in the eyes of PD when it comes to GT Sport and GT7 in the future.

Kazunori’s ambition for cars is often explored in interviews like these and he uses an anecdote about GT’s first foray into car development and design – The Red Bull X2010 – to talk about how it came to be:

“I sat down with some friends and we joked around that idea of a street car, that could compete with one from Formula One”

Modestly put, the friends he is talking about here are none other than Adrian Newey and Sebastian Vettel – two very important personnel in the world of open wheel racing. “At the end of the day – we’re just a bunch of car nerds” Kazunori remarks, showing the boyish enthusiasm that led to the creation of the now-iconic futuristic racer.

The idea of a fan-based engine was engineered by Adrian rather than Kazunori who was more keen to the idea of having enclosed wheels and an F1-like rear wing. However between the three, the task of designing, building and driving the vehicle gave GT a truly unique car that could have been the first step toward the Vision GT project that arrived in GT6.

The infamously fast X2010 - Image taken from the Red Bull website.
The infamously fast X2010 – Image taken from the Red Bull website.

Although the interview doesn’t give too much new information, Kazunori’s elaboration on the much quoted “50% completion” statement and small detailing of the ‘Scapes’ mode gives a bit more direction to what we can expect when GT Sport launches this November.

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Comments (46)

  1. robert81

    No dynamic weather no dynamic time that’s a massive kick in the teeth how can they run fia races and such with static conditions

  2. BrunetPaquet

    I’m looking forward to the online open lobbies, I saw online in a screenshot of the “My Page” screen, so, yeah. Really eager to getting info regarding that portion of the game ∩ω∩ (Kitty Face)

  3. Skids4kids

    I believe ‘Scapes’ to be a huge – unexpected, and yet somewhat obvious – step in the right direction. It fits in perfectly with Kaz’s dream of the ultimate virtual driving experience and perhaps it’s completion will free up assets and inspire the PD team to polish up other areas requiring attention. I’m pretty eager to try it out for myself.

  4. ionstriker

    “a new iteration of Gran Turismo brings in a level of hype unmatched by many series in the genre and gaming medium as a whole” LMFAO do you actually believe that hahaha. No one cares about photo mode. Give us great cars great tracks and good sounds. Don’t get too hyped people. It’s just a remastered gt6 .

    1. MeanElf

      No one – really? You must have missed the GT5 and 6 photo mode forums, because they are pretty full and still active.

      As for people’s apparent fear that this game will be only about photo mode – don’t forget that Kazunori-san is foremost a car nut and enjoys driving them – I think his main focus will be on that part of the game – the Scapes part of it all is just the icing for those who like to extend their experience with the cars.

    2. Oyashiro-sama

      Actually, it’s worse. You only have 15% of the cars, half tracks, no dynamic weather, probably smaller solo/offline events (guys, give us your money if you want psn!) and god knows what more, I mean, what less. You will have the new livery editor, but I don’t find pasting sticker to be any fun :S

    3. Brendan Rorrison

      I do believe that, yes. Please point me in the direction of another racing game series with a fansite as huge and active as GTPlanet. Thoughts and feelings aside, GT Sport is still a big deal in the industry due to it being a first party exclusive for the most popular console in the world at the moment.

    4. ionstriker

      @meanelf I know all about the photomode scene that was happening. I even took part in it. Its certainly unique. But they shouldn’t just keep showing it off like it’s the best part of the game. Tell me someone who would buy gt just for the photomode. They need to show us how this game compares to the competition. That’s what we need. We don’t need so much emphasis on photomode

    5. WyldAnimal

      LMFAO do you actually believe that hahaha. No one cares about photo mode. Give us great cars great tracks and good sounds. Don’t get too hyped people. It’s just a remastered gt6 .

      Actualy there is a huge Following of Users who Just use PhotoMode.
      Car Lovers who aren’t good at driving, or has limited ability to Drive.
      Can Still Enjoy the cars in Photo mode.

      I myself love Photomode…
      Especially if we’ve had a really great close race…
      Replay and Photo Mode to make Stills of all the exciting moments.

    6. MeanElf

      Ionstriker – I can name ten people here without breaking into a sweat who would buy GTS for the photo mode and Scapes alone – what’s more, they’d enjoy the driving too.

      Have patience, we all know PD and how communication to the outside is still a new thing for them. Like I said, I can’t believe that the team would bring a game out that was focused on photo mode and the eSports aspects.

      Like I also said on another news thread – it’ll be interesting to see who thinks what once the game is out.

    7. Johnnypenso

      I don’t think we’ve seen anything of consequence yet outside of photomode and e-sports have we? What else are you expecting?

    1. Viperman240

      He could be referring to the loading screens, as its pretty much a “scape” (screenshot) of the track its loading with the car moving around the course, or it could be both who knows.

    2. Griffith500

      The loading screens effectively (potentially; I mean, I agree, but it’s not certain yet) being a “video scape” is one thing, but remember that the video is several frames of data. They won’t be doing the same for the Scapes proper without several shots from different angles of the area. You can reconstruct a 3D scene from a single photograph, but it will naturally be missing any “shadow” area behind occluding objects.

      http://petapixel.com/2013/07/24/researchers-reconstruct-highly-accurate-3d-scenes-using-high-res-photos/

      I bet PD do something similar for real word tracks.

      The movement is likely essentially faked, by providing the virtual camera with the same data that would come from a race replay, in respect of relative movement of camera, background and subject (anyone who’s worked on 3D computer graphics understands the notion of coordinate transformations, and how from continuum mechanics they are technically arbitrary – often, as far as the renderer is concerned, the world moves around a static camera; “camera coordinates” vs. “world-coordinates”).

      In order to avoid the problem of shadows, they would have to blur the scene in a similar way to what is used for asynchronous time warp in VR rendering… The physics are not modelled, not even in the loading screen. The car appears to have an issue with its front suspension geometry (or its weight distribution?) in the video linked to, that is also present before the “blur”. Perhaps the car can be subjected to virtual forces (lat, long, gravity) separate from any movement, that’d be great as well.

      Anyway, it’s a cool feature, and I’ve been wondering why they hadn’t added it for a while now!

  5. s3nNa

    Dont mean to be another person to complain about sounds but if only kaz put as much effort and passion into making the sounds authentic as much as he is going on about this photo mode. E3 couldnt come any sooner , its gonna make or break i think. PD is always so behind and delayed. Hire more people and get what needs to be done and give its fans what their crying for not give the fans what you want us to like and enjoy just because you do. Rant over i guess.. been holding that in for a while lol

    1. Tenacious D

      Sounds have been improving since GT5 Spec 2.

      GT5 delay from official release date: 3 days
      GT6 delay from official release date: 0 days

      Ability for Kazunori and PD to get a fair shake on the intranets: rare

    2. TomBrady

      @Tenacious D Exactly bro. You are spot on with that. Also, Update 1.13 on GT6 drastically improved cockpit audio. GT’s sounded much better ever since.

      People can obsess over the sound but really, it isn’t that important, and it’s not that bad in GT6. They’ll keep improving it but it’s never going to take precedent over physics or gameplay AKA things that actually matter to a racing game

    3. SimTourist

      You’re so wrong, sir, the sounds are absolutely important, I can’t even play GT6 with sound on because I can’t take it for longer than 5 minutes, it just makes me nauseous. And stop trying to spin it, good sounds don’t take away from physics or gameplay at all, if a small team like Kunos with 12 people working on it can make great physics and sounds and graphics, then a big team like Polyphony with 100 times the budget can absolutely make it. You need to stop making excuses for PD because it doesn’t make any sense.

    4. Tenacious D

      Mr Sim, you had better never get anywhere near RaceRoom, or every other racing game will suck to you. ;D

      Man, am I glad that I’m not a hardliner like you guys, because I can actually enjoy things that aren’t perfect. And by golly, nothing is. Believe it or not, there are also these things known as degrees of quality. You can choose to draw this really deep jagged line at Gran Turismo and insist that “This sucks, but everything else is pretty okay.” I guess actually you’re just hurting yourselves. I guess you lot are just going to sulk while the rest of us enjoy GT Sport.

    5. Imari

      That’s right Ten, everyone else is actually stabbing themselves in the gut because they don’t like the same things that you do.

      Or maybe, other people have different tastes. Maybe sounds really are important enough that it’s a dealbreaker for them. Maybe Gran Turismo really does fall below the level where they say “You know what, I don’t want to pay money for that”.

      Or maybe you’d just like to keep making sweeping generalisations and belittling people.

    6. oneloops

      @SimTourist If you hear GT6 sounds from last cars added you will see the evolution and the great improvement since GT6 release.

      Lexus Vision GT, Subaru Vision GT, Senna’s Lotus F1 98T, Redbull Junior… All of theese cars have amazing sounds, great sound details from differents revs, at revving limit, and for example when you push the throttle and you release it…

      We can expect a step forward from there, PD is doing thing well and they know that we have great expectation and requirements about the final game sounds.

    7. SimTourist

      TenaciousD, and you’re not wrong, after I’ve heard Raceroom, my standards have gone up considerably, even Forza 6 sounds like crap to me now, just all around lacking in sounds, and GT isn’t even on the map right now.
      Oneloops, you say that, and later cars might be better than some Suzuki Cappucino by a slight margin, but they still sound like absolute crap to me, digitized to hell and back, it doesn’t resemble a car, period.

    8. Tenacious D

      Imari, I suppose “I haven’t heard all the sounds in GT Sport – or I don’t want to – and they suck, therefore the game will suck” isn’t a sweeping generalization.

      I really shouldn’t pay attention to those to which sounds are the most important factor of a racing game or close to it. And it’s pretty obvious that I don’t care what you guys think, when sounds have been improving through the series since GT1 and everyone carries on like they haven’t. Misrepresenting the situation in order to get attention doesn’t go far with me.

    9. Johnnypenso

      “Sweeping generalizations”…lol..oh the irony. Sounds improving =/= good sounds or up to industry standards. How many times does that lack of equivalency have to be pointed out to you? And who are these people carrying on like they haven’t improved since GT1?

    10. Thedetailer

      Here’s a thought, If people want a 100% real experience and don’t understand that evolution takes time, you could settle for the time being in I don’t know, A REAL CAR. I am more than just a casual when it comes to driving games but you guys are being unrealistic. Enjoy every title for what it has to offer and track and autocross a real car. If I can do it anyone can.

    11. Johnnypenso

      Unrealistic to expect promises made for going on a half a decade to be fulfilled? Or unrealistic to expect the leading sim driving/racing game in the world to have a sound package that is able to compete with the best of sims, something accomplished consistently with games that have only a tiny portion of the budget GT has?

    12. Tenacious D

      Johnny, I have no problem with “Make everything even better.” But “This or that sucks” and pretending nothing is good in Gran Turismo isn’t going to serve their cause any. It isn’t going to get Kaz’s attention and it sure wouldn’t mine. And it doesn’t help matters when people give passes to other racing games which in some ways are no more perfect.

      Can we please have reason and a desire to discuss rather than throw lava all the time? Just a darn thought, there.

  6. MeanElf

    Nice article Brend – I for one am glad for the info as that sounds pretty sophisticated for just one part of a game.

  7. usielx313

    In the CGI world we call it High Dynamic Range Image (HDR) wich have a very lot of lighting information and can be placed as a sphere around the enviroment.

    Its sad the news we get from this game is more about photo mode.

    And they keep saying the game is 50% of what they want to archieve….yeahh…dont trust that guys…this is not naughty dog or rockstars, this is PD and they have lost all the good reputation they use to have.

    1. TomBrady

      He means they’ve only optimized the game about 50%. Meaning they’re only using half of the PS4’s power so far.

      And it’s laughable that you talk about Rockstar as if they’re some type of technical powerhouse. Not even close. They are no where near PD’s, Naughty Dogs, or Guerrilla Games league. Hell they’re not even in DICE’s league.

      PD has always been one of the best in the business when it comes to technical chops. GT5 and GT6 had some of the highest native resolutions on PS3 games despite also being 60 fps. GT4 had a 1080i mode.

      PD is no joke, and the only reputation they’ve lost is amongst haters like you.

    2. SimTourist

      What the what? Rockstar are absolutely a technical powerhouse, GTA 5 is doing so many things and looks better than 90% of the games with a much smaller scope, hell GTA 5 is still probably the most technically advanced open world game on X1/PS4 despite being a remaster.

    3. usielx313

      Ahhahaha! Gerrilla games better than rockstars ahahhahahaha ok….hope you buy gt sport so you can enjoy your super game

    4. Imari

      @TomBrady Whatever Rockstar may be, they make great games. Which surely is the whole point of the exercise.

    5. freedom1104

      TomBrady, seriously do you really had no idea what its like to have a 60fps experience, gt6 dont even come close to constant 60fps even on 720fps mode, let alone 1080p. Okay its a last gen console and i get that but there a few games can hit constant 60fps on ps2, eg like you said GT4 and Genki Racing project games had no problem hitting 60fps constantly.

      PD was the best in business, now it isnt, if they want to get their throne back they better work out something rather than constantly showing off a phototaking mode in a RACING GAME/ SIMULATOR whatever you called it. i bought a brand new ps3 at the end of it lifespan to play gt6 only , if i dont had my friend to play with , i would sell gt6 and ps3 rightaway the next day.

  8. MrWaflz55

    If GT Sport is half of what he wants on the PS4, then it’s time to double the expectations for GT7 to make it an even better game.

    1. TomBrady

      No, he means the demo they showed is only using 50% of the PS4 potential power. It’s simple english, you shouldn’t have such a hard time understanding what he means but you’re not alone.

      They’re months and months away from the final date. They still have a lot of optimization to do. That’s what he means, not that we’ll have to wait for GT7 to get the 100%

  9. Nato_777

    I’m not sure Kaz actually meant the car could drive through the scape but rather was referencing the ability to add motion blur to make it look like the car was moving in the photo.

    1. Johnnypenso

      This was my favourite part:
      “Renault RS.01 by a whisker (the two MX-5 variants ran it close). It’s a car that I love using in Project CARS and its re-created well in GTS. It handles very similarly in both titles, and from me that’s a big nod to the improvements PD has made to the physics engine for GTS.”

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