Polyphony shares more details on Gran Turismo 7's big new career mode
Cafes, customisation and classifieds - plus a look at the new weather system.
Shortly after we received confirmation of a March 4th release date for Gran Turismo 7, more details were shared on the returning career mode and customisation options for the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5 driving experience.
Following its absence in the online-focussed - and quite brilliant - Gran Turismo Sport, the career mode returns in full-blooded fashion for the first numbered entry in the series since 2013.
There's a compact World Map that hosts the many distractions of the career mode, including a licence centre where the series' infamous licence tests make their return, a tuning shop where players can pick up new parts to mod their cars - including licensed parts such as brake pads from Brembo - and a user car section where players can pick up pre-loved classics. It looks like all the fun of an evening spent browsing Pistonheads but in video game form!
It's part of a re-emphasis on car collecting within the game, with an all-new GT Cafe tasking players with picking up certain cars with their own connection. It's a mode that's also said to require an internet connection - so it'll be interesting to see how the car collection sits with a wider connected audience.
Elsewhere there's the return of the livery editor - something put to great use in Gran Turismo Sport - and of course the return of iconic Gran Turismo tracks such as Trial Mountain and High Speed Ring.
One final detail in the recent blog post gives us a look at Gran Turismo 7's weather system - a feature that was present in Gran Turismo 6, which boasted dynamic weather and day/night transitions.
Will Gran Turismo 7 offer something similar? "The time/weather change simulation brought to life in GT7 is unique to Polyphony Digital, who researched the complexities of nature and tailored it into a video game," reads the blog post. "Referencing a massive amount of meteorological observation data, we have recreated spatial / time of day conditions for particle size distribution and concentration distribution of aerosol particles in the atmosphere on a global environmental scale, in a procedure that is unique to the Gran Turismo series."
Given the reluctance to explicitly mention dynamic weather or time transitions in the blog post I'm guessing they won't feature in Gran Turismo 7, but we at least know that the weather that is being implemented is looking mighty pretty going from these screenshots.
Finally, we got to see a slim selection of some of the new cars coming for Gran Turismo 7, with Porsche's 917 modern concept taking centre stage while the real deal 917 that proved so effective at Le Mans in the 70s also making an appearance. There's some other Le Mans royalty present too in the shape of the Mercedes CLK GTR that so spectacularly flung itself into the woods on multiple occasions in 1999.
In other words, there's a fair amount to get excited about ahead of the March 4th release for Gran Turismo 7. Well, I'm excited anyway.