Gran Turismo Series Exceeds 55 Million Units

Sony Computer Entertainment subsidiary Polyphony Digital said that as of December 2009, it had sold 55.45 million units across its entire Gran Turismo series, solidifying the series one of gaming's top-selling properties. The Gran Turismo series debuted on the original PlayStation in Japan in 1997, wowing gamers with its realistic car physics and graphics that were some of the best at the time. The game came to the U.S. and Europe in May, 1998, splitting the driving genre from its arcade roots in favor of a more simulation-focused angle on home gaming consoles. European GT sales claimed nearly half of total worldwide franchise sales with 25.31 million sold in the region. North America captured 19.8 million units sold, while the series' home country of Japan claimed 9.7 million units. Asia made up the rest, with 640,000 units sold. 2001's Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec, the series' debut on PS2, is to date the best-selling Gran Turismo game, with 14.89 million sold. 2005's GT4 follows with 10.98 million, while the original sold the next greatest number of units with 10.85 million. Tokyo-based Polyphony's most recent GT game was a long-awaited PSP version of the game, which finally launched in October 2009, alongside Sony's new download-only, UMD-free PSP Go handheld. Through December 2009, the game sold 1.8 million globally: 320,000 in Japan, 620,000 in North America, 820,000 in Europe, and 40,000 in Asia. The popularity of the GT series, which goes by the tagline, "The Real Driving Simulator," helped spawn other attempts at realistic driving simulations, the most successful being Redmond, WA-based Microsoft and Turn 10's Forza Motorsport series, which debuted on the original Xbox in 2005. That series' most recent entry, Forza Motorsport 3, released in October 2009 on Xbox 360, and sold 1 million units in its first month, according to Microsoft. Now GT fans are anticipating the famously long-awaited GT5 for PS3. SCE recently pushed the game's March Japanese release out to an unspecified date, citing "production-related matters," in a report. There are no firm GT5 release dates for Western territories.