It looks like we are finally getting some Gran Turismo 5 love on Thursday, December 17th 2009.  On that day PD will release Gran Turismo 5 Time Trial Challenge on PSN. This download will include two versions of the Nissan 370Z , a single track and will center gameplay around real life prizes to be won for the world's fastest racers. The game will only be available on PSN until January 25, 2010 so act fast! No word on pricing but I get the impression it is free. 
 
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it's a demo, so it's free. this time trial thing seems pretty cool, though ^_^ 

Nice, I wonder how much they have improved on the graphics since Prologue, and if it will be evident in this demo.

A trip to the Indy 500! Count me in!

Hey cool. Thanks for the heads up.

just got the email: 

The demo is up.  The Nissan 370Z comes in tuned (black) and normal (red) spec. Internet options include online rankings and replay video downloads for the top rankers. The top rankers will be given physical prizes of some form.  
 
The demo will cut off on February 25 

i played the demo for just like 2 minutes (have company over).  But is it just me or do the graphics seem toned down from Prologue?  Obviously the track wasn't like the ones in Prologue tho.

I already downloaded the japanese demo, but was wondering if a US release of the demo is happening.

 My impressions:  

• I think the cars look incredible, but the included track doesn't look as amazing as it should.     
• As people have probably guessed, there is no car model damage. 
• There are no driving assists.
• The menu and interfaces haven't really changed at all from Prologue.
• The driving physics do feel great.
• Elevator Jazz Music.
• How is the download so small?! <300MB? 

" @flickr: I know its kinda weird. We saw in like E3 or some game show earlier this year that there was going to be damage in the game and we did see the graphics better from prologue even. I think the point from PD here is to have a contest really, as the only thing that seems better is the physics (which is the only thing that matters when trying to determine the best driver). Something is better than nothing I guess, but there is just so much potential for people to use this as flamebait.  "

" Look I don't want to start some forum war here but I played the time trial demo yesterday and I don't see where the beautiful graphics are.  It looks good, but nowhere near the level of polish that Forza Motorsport 3 has. Maybe it's the demo, I'm sure that GT5: Prologue had better graphics than this. If it is the case then this demo will do a disservice to Sony even though GT5 will sell itself.   "

So this is kind  of stripped from GT Prologue?

" It looks good, but nowhere near the level of polish that Forza Motorsport 3 has."  

" @handlas:  Definitely toned down. I knew I wasn't the only one to think this - it seems blurry in 1080p, almost like the game uses quincunx anti-aliasing rather than the 2xMSAA they had before. I changed back to 720p and it looked much better. Shadow resolution is also pretty poor and they seem to have removed the cool grass which they added in Prologue (on the whole i'd actually agree that Prologue does look better). To be honest the game is starting to show it's age - maybe I have just grown too used to playing Dirt 2 at 1080p 60fps on PC, or maybe it's the product of a bloated development time, but either way I don't think it's as impressive as it used to be. "

" @Slippy said:

" @handlas:  Definitely toned down. I knew I wasn't the only one to think this - it seems blurry in 1080p, almost like the game uses quincunx anti-aliasing rather than the 2xMSAA they had before. I changed back to 720p and it looked much better. Shadow resolution is also pretty poor and they seem to have removed the cool grass which they added in Prologue (on the whole i'd actually agree that Prologue does look better). To be honest the game is starting to show it's age - maybe I have just grown too used to playing Dirt 2 at 1080p 60fps on PC, or maybe it's the product of a bloated development time, but either way I don't think it's as impressive as it used to be. "

Some guy was posting that they stripped down the game to make the file size small for the demo.  Not sure I believe that but the file size was very small.  The demo looked pretty bland in comparison to Prologue.  "

This isn't a true demo, just a marketing thing. Also it is not surprising that it doesn't look all that great as it is a bare bones demo stripped down to its basic parts. Its only 200mb...  Thats like 60 .bmp files... 

"  My impressions:  

• I think the cars look incredible, but the included track doesn't look as amazing as it should.     
• As people have probably guessed, there is no car model damage. 
• There are no driving assists.
• The menu and interfaces haven't really changed at all from Prologue.
• The driving physics do feel great.
• Elevator Jazz Music.
• How is the download so small?! <300MB? 

 

They shouldn't have released this to the public............

" They shouldn't have released this to the public............ "