Concerns over the Federation Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA) partnership with Gran Turismo have been voiced for a while, but it turns out that relationship is not over. The director of FIA Formula E and Innovative Sport Activities Department, Frederic Bertrand, has said the company will renew their partnership with Gran Turismo 7 when the game is more stable.
Gran Turismo will return to FIA competition
Concerns over the FIA relationship with Gran Turismo began when the majority of FIA branding was removed from Gran Turismo 7. Last month, the FIA announced they would be using Assetto Corsa Competizione for the 2024 FIA Motorsport Games in October rather than the latest Gran Turismo game. However, it seems like this was by mutual agreement. Bertrand told Motorsport.com the relationship has “not ended” and that they agreed with Polyphony Digital’s Kazunori Yamauchi to wait until Gran Turismo 7 had improved:
For Motorsport Games, the difficulty we had at that moment is that they were not necessarily ready to support the live event as we wanted, because of GT7 and everything. So we agreed with them that we will work with Assetto Corsa for this one. It’s also easier for us, because it’s more open to many countries. But we still work with Gran Turismo on plenty of other projects. So no, it’s not an end. It’s just an acceptance of a non-exclusive approach, and we feel that esports needs to be more open. That’s what we agreed with Kazunori-san. It’s agreed, and it’s done in a perfect Japanese nice way!
The FIA plans to reassess the suitability of Gran Turismo 7 next weekend and if the game is ready, they will renew the partnership during the first three months of 2024. For now, Gran Turismo 7 continues to receive updates with another teased for this week. Details of this are yet to be revealed fully.
In other news, the release date for Tactics Ogre: Reborn has seemingly been leaked through the PlayStation Store. Elsewhere, reports had spread that Roller Champions was being canceled but Ubisoft has now denied this is the case.
