A quiet change to Gran Turismo 7, instituted in the recent 1.65/Spec III update, has made the game the dirtiest it has ever been — and we don’t mean in the Daily Races.

While major changes in GT7 are usually pretty well highlighted, it’s not that unusual for updates to introduce smaller things with less fanfare and occasionally without any mention at all. That’s why, each update, GTPlanet has an Undocumented Changes thread wherein our members list discoveries that do not appear in the patch notes. Ordinarily these might be minutiae like new “Real Car Paints”, but on occasion they may be more notable.

So it’s proven with a surprise addition in Spec III that sees cars getting utterly filthy, or at the very least a lot dirtier than before and a lot quicker too. This could be linked to the new 6-, 8-, and 24-hour endurance races added by the Power Pack DLC, adding to the immersion of these considerably longer events by enhancing dirt accumulation — but it is not limited to the Power Pack.

Image via SuperSportX

However, it was in one of these new events that the effect was first documented on the forums, with member SuperSportX showing the Mercedes CLK-LM in the eight-hour GT ONE Endurance event at Circuit Spa-Francorchamps getting really very grubby just shy of the six-hour mark.

Not only that, in a subsequent post, SuperSportX revealed that it applies to the opponent vehicles too, with other members following up to show dirtier than expected cars in other events, races, and even time trials across Spec III as a whole. While more profound in longer sessions, it’s visible over relatively short time periods too.

For a quick test, we checked it out with a grid of plain, white-painted Super Formula cars running over two hours of Special Stage Route X and, as you can see, all of the AI cars came out of it pretty splattered. Hopefully with discarded tire bits and kicked-up dust and dirt, and not simulated Gran Turismo insects.

Windscreen spattering in a ten-lap World Circuits race at Yas Marina, via Nebuc72.

A distinctly dusty Espace F1 in a custom Le Mans race, via suomi1

Detail on our Super Formula test car

Our Super Formula test car after two hours at SSRX

It seems that the accumulation of dirt can be enhanced by what and how you’re driving, and where. Our SF23s were in a pack, flicking bits into each other, but not braking, or even cornering particularly hard. The same two hours of close-quarters racing at a track with braking zones and actual corners should generate more grime.

If you want to make your car truly minging though, we’d head off-road. A few laps of Fishermans Ranch should see you right for a properly dirty vehicle.

Unfortunately, at the end of it all, it looks like the dirt goes away the second you leave the track, making your garage car pristine once again. That’s a bit of a pity as — like earlier titles in the series — GT7 still supports a Car Wash feature, even though it would appear relatively unnecessary.

Still, it’s a good bit of fun and adds a little extra immersion to the title, showing that Polyphony Digital is still working on enhancing GT7 even 3.5 years down the line. Feel free to drop pictures of your dirt-encrusted vehicles in the comments thread!

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