Shuhei Yoshida siger at han reddede Gran Turismo og hjalp det med at blive et globalt fænomen

Efter 31 år annoncerede PlayStation-veteranen Shuhei Yoshida, at ville forlade Sony for noget tid siden. Den 15. januar havde han sin sidste arbejdsdag, og siden da har han optrådt i adskillige podcasts, hvor han har givet os sit syn på sin tid hos Sony og spilindustrien generelt.

For nylig optrådte han på PlayStation Inside, hvor han blev spurgt, om der var noget, han var særligt stolt af fra sin lange karriere, men ikke havde fortalt os om. Og det gjorde han, hvilket førte til en ret uventet historie om, hvordan han hjalp med at gøre Gran Turismo succesfuld.

Det originale spil blev, som du måske husker, markedsført som en "real driving simulator", og det var tilsyneladende meningen, at det skulle være netop det. Problemet er, at det var virkelig svært at spille, som Yoshida fortalte seriens skaber Kazunori Yamauchi:

"During development, Kazunori Yamauchi showed me a prototype of Gran Turismo, and I was among the first to play it. And to tell you the truth, he was really serious when he talked about simulation! It was extremely advanced, perhaps too much so. But at first Kazunori Yamauchi didn't take my feedback at face value, so he gathered around thirty consumers to test the game. And just as I expected, they all crashed without exception at the first turn, because the gameplay was so difficult."

Dette fik Yamauchi til at indrømme, at Yoshida havde ret. Gran Turismo blev mere spilbar og en hidtil uset succes, der lever videre den dag i dag:

"I was at the back of the room with Kazunori Yamauchi, at which point he turned to me and told me I was right, and that's when he rounded things off and toned down the pure simulation aspect a little to put out the Gran Turismo you know today on PS1. In a way, I like to think that I partly saved Gran Turismo's fate, and that I played a small part in its success."

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