Is Toyota Becoming Distant from Gaming?
When you think of cars which have been made popular by racing games featuring licensed vehicles over the past 20 years, your mind will turn to Japanese performance cars, including a number of models from Toyota including the Celica, MR2, Supra and so on. Toyota even have a car currently on sale which is prevalent in modern racing games, the GT86. Having such widespread exposure in video games should be a great thing, right? After all, if kids grow up driving Toyotas on video games, they are more likely to buy a vehicle with a Toyota badge. Well judging by the presence of Toyota (of lack thereof) in recent video games, Toyota seems to think otherwise.
Let's bring up some examples, starting with the Codemasters titles, GRID and DiRT. The first instalments of both titles featured a number of Toyotas, but fast forward beyond GRID 2 and DiRT 3 and the Japanese manufacturer is no where to be found. For the majority of other AAA racing games, things were going well with Toyota but the only production model featured in this year's upcoming racing simulators (GT Sport and Project CARS 2) is the GT86 in various forms. The biggest kerfuffle surrounding Toyota was outed last week, with Turn 10 announcing Forza Motorsport 7 will not feature any Toyota road cars.
So what could be the reason behind Toyota throwing video game developers the cold shoulder when it comes to vehicle licensing? Knowing how confidential licensing terms tend to be, no official reason has been stated. One rumour has it that Toyota does not wish to see its road cars modified in video games, which would the lack of road cars in FM7 understandable, but at the same time a very odd decision considering Toyota have produced cars which are extremely popular in the tuner scene. Another likely reason is that Toyota is hiking up the cost of licensing their cars, probably due to the desirability of certain models.
It's not all doom and gloom for video game fans seeking to experience driving a Toyota virtually.... If you are a mobile gamer. The One-Year Anniversary update for Assoluto Racing brings a generous selection of road going Toyotas and cars from the motorsport division are still represented well. But most racing gamers have driven a Toyota Supra in a virtual world, and we can't help but notice a missing void if we can't continue doing so in future games.
Let's bring up some examples, starting with the Codemasters titles, GRID and DiRT. The first instalments of both titles featured a number of Toyotas, but fast forward beyond GRID 2 and DiRT 3 and the Japanese manufacturer is no where to be found. For the majority of other AAA racing games, things were going well with Toyota but the only production model featured in this year's upcoming racing simulators (GT Sport and Project CARS 2) is the GT86 in various forms. The biggest kerfuffle surrounding Toyota was outed last week, with Turn 10 announcing Forza Motorsport 7 will not feature any Toyota road cars.
So what could be the reason behind Toyota throwing video game developers the cold shoulder when it comes to vehicle licensing? Knowing how confidential licensing terms tend to be, no official reason has been stated. One rumour has it that Toyota does not wish to see its road cars modified in video games, which would the lack of road cars in FM7 understandable, but at the same time a very odd decision considering Toyota have produced cars which are extremely popular in the tuner scene. Another likely reason is that Toyota is hiking up the cost of licensing their cars, probably due to the desirability of certain models.
It's not all doom and gloom for video game fans seeking to experience driving a Toyota virtually.... If you are a mobile gamer. The One-Year Anniversary update for Assoluto Racing brings a generous selection of road going Toyotas and cars from the motorsport division are still represented well. But most racing gamers have driven a Toyota Supra in a virtual world, and we can't help but notice a missing void if we can't continue doing so in future games.
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