GT's creator Kazunori Yamauchi talks to us about bringing the classic racing franchise to the PSP

Gran Turismo Portable was supposed to come out as a PSP launch title, wasn't it? It ended up taking a pretty long time. Was Sony angry at you guys for taking so long?


Well, actually, back then, it was Sony who told us they really wanted us to make a Gran Turismo for PSP. We told them we'd do it if we just had the time. We were busy with Gran Turismo 4, and Tourist Trophy. Then there was the Gran Turismo HD Concept, then Gran Turismo 5 Prologue. So we had four things that we were working on. We couldn't really devote too much time to a Gran Turismo on PSP. It's not that the game was cancelled, or that development was stopped, just that it was always a back-burner project. That we had, in fact, promised to make the game was a notion that was constantly nagging me. So now we saw a really good opportunity to really focus on the game and get it out there.



By "really good opportunity", do you mean the way portable games in general are experiencing spectacular popularity? Capcom's got Monster Hunter, which is pretty much the most popular thing ever on the PSP right now.


Well, yes. That's basically it. To be most precise, though, I'd have to say that ‘gaming’, as a ‘lifestyle’ is experiencing a gradual, radical change. When the first Gran Turismo was released, in 1997, the general impression of gamers was that if you were a gamer, you'd just play games for hours when you got home from work or school or whatever. Nowadays, you've got so many other things competing for your time. You've got your email, your social networking websites. Gamers have a lot more responsibilities these days. The old play style of games was like, you'd get some snacks and some drinks, you'd set them on the table, and you'd sit yourself down in front of the TV for a long session. Now, we see a lot of games that exist to fill in the little empty spaces. Fifteen minutes on the bus here, ten minutes on the train there. I thought of how nice it would be to give people a Gran Turismo that they could experience in these little pockets of time.


Once a player starts playing a Gran Turismo game, they're going to be playing it for several months. They have a lot of things they want to collect and do in the game. So if it's portable, they'll be able to make progress toward those goals every time they turn the game on.



So you're saying that games back in the day were forms of entertainment to be experienced holistically, and now, you have an opportunity to make both a game that a player can appreciate as an extended exercise in entertainment as something for just passing the time?
Exactly.



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