A special free Gran Turismo demo is set for launch later this year, as Sony gears up to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the PlayStation console.
The demo, going by the name of “My First Gran Turismo“, will appear towards the end of the year in an unspecified “holiday” window and be free for all PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 users.
Details are exceptionally scarce at this point in time, but there are a couple of hints of what to expect. The very short official blurb states that it will “include some of the favorite cars, tracks, and race events that evoke the nostalgia and excitement of the very first GT experience”.
Given the free nature of the demo, we’re expecting a rather small track and car list, and the hints about may point primarily towards those that appeared in the original game. Gran Turismo 7 has been leaning into nostalgic content already, so we’re pretty much thinking of Deep Forest, Grand Valley, High Speed Ring, or Trial Mountain. Unless others are added to GT7 in the meantime, of course.
As for vehicles, all ten of the original brands are still in the game — even if TVR’s current status is unclear, and its only representation is a car from GT3 — so there’s a good chance we’ll see a handful of those too. “Race Events” could mean virtually anything, but it sure would be nice, if unlikely, to see the Grand Valley 300 back.
Free, widely available Gran Turismo demos are a pretty rare occasion. There was Gran Turismo HD in 2010, a free demo of Gran Turismo 5 Prologue in 2008, the GT6 GT Academy demo in 2013, and the online open beta for Gran Turismo Sport across 2017. That marks My First Gran Turismo out as quite the special event.
It’s part of a wide range of celebrations over the next three months, beginning with a PS Plus free play weekend on September 21-22 and continuing right through to December — with December 1 being the actual 30th anniversary.
Other events to mark the occasion will include special PSN avatars, the release of game sound tracks from the God of War series and others, PlayStation Tournaments in a number of sports titles as well as Tekken 8 and Guilty Gear Strive, and the launch of a PlayStation-themed “collection” called Shapes of Play.
Arguably the celebrations will actually get underway this weekend with the launch of Astro Bot. This title, from Team Asobi, looks to be a massive love letter to the games and characters of PlayStation’s history, and there’s more than one reference in there to Polyphony Digital’s products…
We’ll bring you more on My First Gran Turismo, including its launch date, when we have it!
See more articles on PlayStation.
