Polyphony Digital, the developer of the upcoming Gran Turismo 7 has revealed that the game will require a constant internet connection, even for those who are playing the GT Cafe single-player campaign. In fact, you’ll need an internet connection to play any part of the game other than arcade mode. Needless to say, the fans aren’t amused, though the developers do claim there is an important reason for the connection. The game is set to launch on March 4.
The always-on detail was first revealed, sort of, in a PlayStation Blog post describing the features of the game. Almost every part of the game had an asterisk next to it, and at the end of the post, a note said: “*These features require internet connection.” Naturally, fans noticed this in the post’s comment section, asking if so many parts of the game really needed to be always online. While it was expected of the competitive modes — and the previous game GT Sport was excused from being always-online because was primarily competitive-focused — the fact that even the campaign mode was online caused more than a few raised eyebrows.
Eurogamer interviewed Polyphony Digital CEO Kazunori Yamauchi, who clarified why the game would require that connection: “The requirement for the online connection isn’t specific to the Cafe per se – it’s just to prevent cheating overall from people trying to modify the save data, so that’s the reason for the online connection… The only part of the game that doesn’t require an online connection is the arcade mode, because that has no effect on the save data, so that’s possible. But anything that has to do with the save data requires a connection. For example things like the livery data as well – that’s something that is downloaded from the online server.”
It remains to be seen if this causes a problem for the game on launch, and if Polyphony and Sony will walk back the always-online requirement.