‘Gran Turismo’ review: Drifting into cliches and video game aesthetics

Gran Turismo is a moderately entertaining, very long Super Bowl spot quality commercial for PlayStation and Nissan. — Photos: Handout

In 2006, a Nissan marketing executive had a truly insane idea to create a competition and an "academy” to turn gamers into race car drivers. Darren Cox saw an untapped market of potential car-buyers in Gran Turismo enthusiasts - the popular PlayStation racing simulator that first came on the market in 1997.

And in the third year of the "GT Academy,” an actual star emerged in a 19-year-old British kid named Jann Mardenborough, who would go on to become a professional driver, just like he dreamed.