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It has become even harder to purchase new cars in Gran Turismo 7 following the latest patch as it has reduced the payout of various races, despite ongoing complaints about the game's microtransactions. The version 1.07 patch has cut back on the amount of in-game currency rewarded and has made changes to the races that are being used by players to farm credits (via VGC).
When the game launched earlier this month, it was reported that its cars are costing eight times as much as they did on Gran Turismo Sport, in terms of their real-money equivalents, as the games make use of microtransactions.
While many racing games have microtransactions, some of GT7's better vehicles call for several hours of gameplay in order to earn enough credits to acquire them. Some of the more exclusive cars are also displayed and later pulled out of shops in what's considered to be a tactic that plays on players' fear of missing out thereby encouraging them to spend real money on buying in-game credits so that they can buy the cars before they disappear.
To make matters worse, in previous GT games players were able to sell their cars to earn additional credits but in the latest entry this is no longer the case. Meanwhile, the coveted Legend Cars, which are the most expensive ones offered in the game, can typically be earned after extensive play. Entering races over and over is the only way to accrue enough credits to afford them without having to pay real money.
Some racetracks went some way into easing this, as they offered a decent reward of credits, but the new patch seems to have targeted this as the number of credits acquired from those specific races has been reduced.
GT7 players have the option of paying real money to buy the game's high-end rides. The PlayStation Store has four credit packs available at the moment, priced as such:
- 100,000 credits – $2.49 / £1.99
- 250,000 credits – $4.99 / £3.99
- 750,000 credits – $9.99 / £7.99
- 2,000,000 credits – $19.99 / £15.99
Gran Turismo Sport allowed players to buy individual cars as microtransactions, with vehicles ranging from $0.99 to $4.99 each. But in GT7, this can be far more costly. For example, the Porsche 919 Hybrid can only be acquired in exchange for 3,000,000 credits, which would require a player to spend around $40. That's a stark difference from the $2.99 it cost in Gran Turismo Sport to get the same car.
To spell this out: purchasing two of these cars would mean a player would have to shell out more than what the game actually costs. Of course, a fair number of GT7 players aren't best pleased, and it is no wonder that they've shared tips on how best to earn more credits.
Meanwhile, the developers have announced the server maintenance period will be longer than planned due to an issue found in the new 1.07 update.