Gran Turismo 7: Will PlayStation’s Premiere Racing Game Make its Way to the PC?

by Mike Alexander / Editorials, Articles, Gran Turismo 7, Highlights / 01 Jan 2023

There is a subset of gamers who have a particular need.

A need…

For Speed.

No, I’m not talking about Need for Speed fans, but racing fans in general. Those of us who want nearly endless rosters of awesome cars to drive, in-depth customization options, and plenty of open tracks to take your ride out and show off on.

For many years, the kinds of racing games you could play were almost entirely locked down to what you gamed on. If you were on PlayStation, you had Gran Turismo. If you had an Xbox, you were probably playing Forza. If you were on PC… well, you had way more options by default. You could also get sick racing sim setups on PC, ones that were way more high-quality that the logitech steering wheels they had for consoles.

Things have changed in recent years though. Console racing games have become more sophisticated, the dedicated peripherals are now more inclusive of platforms outside of the PC, but, most importantly, the games themselves are available in more places. Ever since Xbox had its whole philosophy changed from, “please buy an Xbox”, to, “We don’t care where you play, as long as you’re playing an Xbox Game Studios game”, you can play the second best racing series literally anywhere.

Microsoft has made Forza available on Xbox consoles and PC for years on end now, and with Xbox Game Pass, the delineation is even blurrier. As long as you have game pass, your Xbox is an Xbox, but your PC is also an Xbox too.

This appears to be an ongoing success for the company, and other big players in the video game industry are taking notice. Most notably among those is Xbox’s direct rival…

PlayStation.

Sony has been making PlayStation games available on PC via Steam for a few years now after taking their cues from Microsoft, and the initiative seems to also be successful for them. Maybe PC players are just happy to be included on things they’ve been kept out of for so long, but either way they’re buying these games in droves.

Marvel’s Spider-Man, God of War, The Last of Us, and more have made their way to PC, and more are slated to make their PC debuts in the coming months and years. These iconic franchises that required you to own a PlayStation to enjoy before, can be played on the same system you were playing Forza on just a little while before.

And that brings me to my main question: wHeN’s gRaN TuRiSmo?!?!

There hasn’t been any kind of formal announcement, and with each passing week it seems less and less likely that PlayStation’s premiere racing game, and probably the top dog of the entire genre, will ever hit the PC.

On one hand, it kind of makes sense. Sony’s course of action for all of these years has been to make awesome games that can’t be played anywhere else, so keeping one thing, and arguably their best thing, locked down to their own hardware just sounds like good business.

But on the other hand, I kind of want to cycle between Forza and Gran Turismo on my PC at high framerates and a large-format, ultra-wide monitor. That’s something consoles just can’t provide with any kind of consistency.

So, will Gran Turismo ever come to PC? Only time will tell, but it doesn’t sound like that’s part of Sony’s plan going forward. But keep an eye out, it might just be the ace up their sleeve if they need some good press or a boost in visibility over their competitors. Gran Turismo on PC might be the only thing that could drown out the immense hype of Nintendo’s impending juggernaut: The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.

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Mike Alexander

Mike has been playing video games since he was able to hold a controller, having been fascinated by Sonic 2 on his mom’s Sega Genesis. That fascination and passion for the art form has grown exponentially nearly 30 years later, and he doesn’t see that fading away anytime soon.
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