Kazunori Yamauchi

I just got in from the Gran Turismo 5 launch party here in Madrid – packed with media representatives from around the world, it was a fitting way to celebrate the end of GT5’s long and dramatic development. Here’s what I learned:

I’m very excited to announce that I will be personally attending the Gran Turismo 5 Launch Party in Madrid, Spain, this Wednesday, November 24th! Sony has been keeping very close wraps on what’s in store for the event, but it’s definitely going to be very big, and very special… It’s more than just a party, and should be a real treat for all automotive enthusiasts and the general public – be sure and stop by if you’re in the area.

The 8th annual GT Awards were held in Las Vegas last night, and Kazunori Yamauchi gave top honors to Mark Stielow for his custom 1969 Chevrolet Camaro. Check out the complete press release and the first pictures from the event below. Expect a lot more media, video, and interviews to start popping up from SEMA in the next few days.

While speaking with Jalopnik today at SEMA, Kazunori Yamauchi stopped short of providing a new release date, but was able to confirm the game discs are being stamped (produced) right now:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zvxMEOO4a_E

The Paris Games Week is about to kick off on October 27th, and according to these renderings, plenty of space has been set aside in “PlayStation City” for Gran Turismo 5. Seven-time WRC champion and GT fan Sebastien Loeb will be on-hand at the event, competing head-to-head with the public in the game. (He’d better start practicing, though – at his last event, he fell to a GTPlanet user!)

Car Magazine has just posted a new interview with Kazunori Yamauchi, as part of their big feature on the Red Bull X1 Prototype. It’s a good read (keep in mind it was conducted before the delay), but the most interesting revelation actually comes from a small new screenshot included in the article, taken from inside the X1’s cockpit at the Monaco F1 circuit.

The no-holds-barred prototype developed by Polyphony Digital and Red Bull has been revealed in the latest issue of Car magazine in the UK! As you may recall, the X1 is the answer to Kazunori Yamauchi’s question: “If you built the fastest racing car on land, one that throws aside all rules and regulations, what would that car look like, how would it perform, and how would it feel to drive?”

Let’s hope it inspires him to bring a similarly robust track editor to the Gran Turismo series! Thanks to Randy for the early tip.

The first batch of Kazunori Yamauchi interviews are finally getting published from last week’s Tokyo Game Show 2010! Here’s a translated transcript of GameBlog’s video interview above, kindly provided by our own RoadRunner99:

When Joey Logano went up against Kazunori Yamauchi in GT5 at the private GameStop manager convention, everyone in attendance won a free copy of the game. While Sony (obviously) wasn’t able to just hand it over yet, they did provide attendees with empty Blu-Ray cases sporting special-edition box art for Logano and Yamauchi to sign. This has, interestingly, provided us with the first look at the back of the game’s case, which showcases 2005 Gran Turismo Award winner Stephen Papadakis’ Honda S2000.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9k270m7ezQw

InsideSimRacing has just published their Gran Turismo 5 Special, dedicating almost the entire 38-minute episode to video reports from Gamescom 2010 by our cooperative team of Andreas (from InsideSimRacing), Famine, and Venari. They discuss everything that we learned from the show, and go into more detail about the private breakout session, the Yamauchi interview, and how the latest GT5 demo compares to previous games from the series. It’s divided into three different segments, so be sure to watch through the full episode to make sure you catch everything. The guys at ISR have even more GT5 material from the show coming, so stay tuned.

Kazunori Yamauchi has given us a heads-up regarding what to expect from GT5 in terms of hard drive installation size via Twitter (human translation thanks to our own SHIRAKAWA Akira):

For the third consecutive year, Kazunori Yamauchi has been invited to the prestigious Pebble Beach Concourse d’Elegance to present the Gran Turismo Trophy – an award “to support those who make efforts to preserve irreplaceable, precious automotive culture for future generations to come”. This year, it goes to the one and only 1952 Abarth 1500 Biposto Coupe in existence – an unusual, quirky, and significant car. From the official announcement:

Hello all, from drizzly Cologne!

GT fans, get ready! The start of GamesCom 2010 is now only hours away, and I’m very excited to announce GTPlanet’s big plans for the show. We’re teaming up with InsideSimRacing.tv to bring you unprecedented, in-depth coverage of all the new Gran Turismo 5 information about to be released. Here’s a preview of everything that’s about to go down over the next few days:

Remember the contest held to title the Daiki Kasho song used in Gran Turismo 5’s E3 2010 trailer? The winner was finally announced last week after Kazunori Yamauchi made his selection from 5,444 entries: “5OUL ON D!SPLAY”.

Before Kazunori Yamauchi created the first Gran Turismo, he began his career with a title known as Motor Toon Grand Prix. Produced by “Polys Entertainment” (later to become Polyphony Digital), it’s a cartoon racing game featuring 8 karts and 10 tracks. Sony has just announced the game’s availability for download as a “PSOne Classic” on PSN for $5.99. So, if you want to see how it all really got started, grab the 251 MB download and give it a go.