Gran Turismo 5 Prologue preview

Four years and countless man-hours in the making, Sony's flagship racing series arrives on PlayStation 3 this week, albeit in the form of GT5 Prologue. As with GT4's Prologue outing, the overblown demo/taster pack features only a limited number of cars and tracks to experiment with via a stripped-down series of racing events, for a less-than-brutal price-point, a strategy that seems to have proved effective, with a reported million units of the game pre-ordered for the forthcoming European release.

Words by Colin Whiteside , playing on a Sony PlayStation 3.

The excitement surrounding the release is somewhat understandable, as the first Gran Turismo to feature online play it has a great amount of potential. It's hampered massively by including neither in-game Friends List management (something Sony's own Everybody's Golf had back in July), voice comms nor the option to set up races with buddies. Keen racers will have to put up with any old lunatic using their new wheels like a bumper-car until friends-only events are added over the summer, though at least gamers won't have to put up with any smack-talking teenage car modders gnawing their ears off in the interim.Elsewhere GT5 Prologue is business as usual, cars can be bought, tweaked and raced for the credits to buy more cars with, to enter yet more races, on and on, ad infinitum. Handling mechanics have changed subtly here and there, there's a new, preposterously expensive Logitech steering wheel available for it, and some of the cars- particularly the supremely special 2007 season Ferrari F1 models, have realistically-modelled dashboard views, replete with working instruments. Sadly the opposing driver AI has only marginally improved, car damage remains absent, and no, you still can't draw a five-foot-long penis down the side of your car to inform other racers of what you think of them. Whether a series with such a static core can survive against modern competition with more complete online modes, realistic vehicle damage and those frilly next-gen bits and bobs will remain to be seen.