Difficulty:

Hard

Time Spent:

20 to 40 Hours

The Bottom Line:

"Best in series"

This is one of the greatest PSP games I've ever played. Of course, I've only played Gran Turismo, NFS Carbon OTC, and the PSPgo exclusive demos for Rock Band Unplugged and Patapon 2, but a great game nonetheless. First off, let's get to the graphics. IN THE BEGINNING...Gran Turismo had great graphics on the PS1, then carried them on to the PS2, then the PS3, and after an agonizing 5 years, the PSP. For better graphics, you might as well try
and look for the GTPSP cars on your local highway or car dealership. I watched a replay of my Corvette ZR-1 on the Valencia circuit and it could've fooled a GT newbie for a Speed Channel rerun. To the gameplay, this ain't exactly Mario Kart. All cars handle differently on different surfaces and you need to liberally brake before entering a sharp turn. The cars all look great(all 800 of 'em) and you can waltz right into your local car dealer and see a few of them. The tracks all look real as well, and for the real life ones like Nurburgring and Laguna Seca, you can actually see the tiniest of details. For instance, if you come out of the 1st hairpin turn on the New York circuit, you can see an Air Force registration stand that really exists in that exact location. One of my only complaints about this game was the bad music. For years, Sony and Polyphony
Digital have placed some of the greatest licensed songs on their games (Lose Control by Ash for GT1, My Favourite Game by The Cardigans for GT2, Kickstart My Heart by Motley Crue for GT3, and Panama by Van Halen for GT4) until now, where the satisfactory rock and techno samples keep the game exciting. There is a feature that allows players to import their own MP3 music from their Memory Stick, but for some strange reason doesn't work on my PSPgo. It's a real shame that I was anxiously waiting to listen to Lovefool by The Cardigans while tearing up Special Stage R11 in an Enzo Ferrari. Another disappointment was that there are no nighttime stages in this game. Well, I eventually got over these and just enjoyed the game. Now you should stop reading this and enjoy the game, too.