Every other week, it seems, stories hit the wires and Web suggesting that Bugatti is finally ready to reveal the production model that will replace it now out-of-production Veyron. And, one after the other, those rumors get shot down.
But, yet again, there was plenty of excitement and anticipation when the supercar maker announced plans for a news conference at this year’s Frankfurt Motor Show. And, once again, it turned out that Bugatti itself was playing games.
Quite literally, in fact. The Frankfurt show serving as the backdrop for the debut of the latest entry into the wildly popular Gran Turismo videogame for the popular Sony PlayStation. That said, Bugatti chief Wolfgang Durheimer did suggest that the full-size version of the Vision Gran Turismo “gives a clear indication of the future design direction of our brand.”
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It took nearly a decade for Bugatti to complete the production of all 450 of the Veyron variants it planned. It’s now expected to come up with something even faster and more high-tech. And the Bugatti Vision Gran Turismo certainly qualified in the latter category.
It was created in collaboration with Polyphony Digital, which has so far sold over 70 million copies of the racing game since it was launched in 1997. Kazunori Yamauchi, the creator of the game and CEO of the software company, called the project “fulfilling and enjoyable,” and suggested the digital Bugatti will “further convey the beauty of cars to a new generation.”
The design of the digital Bugatti was meant to pay homage to the brand’s historic race cars of the 1920s and ‘30s,such as the Type 57 Tank that won Le Mans in 1957. But there is nothing retro about Bugatti’s Vision. It would look futuristic on a track or street today, which gives further credence to the possibility it offers a hint of the next Bugatti production model.
(Live from Frankfurt, Click Here for TheDetroitBureau.com’s complete show coverage.)
Confirming the videogame car “showcases Bugatti’s new design language,” Durheimer promised that, “We’re (going to be) building the world’s fastest, most exclusive, most luxurious and most powerful production super sports car.”
That is, of course, whenever the next Bugatti finally does go into production.
Sadly, Bugatti doesn’t offer any specifics about what’s under the virtual hood of the Vision Gran Turismo, though one would suspect it’s an update version of the quad-turbo W-12 borrowed from the old Veyron. That would likely put it in excess of 1,200 horsepower.
And what might that get you on the Le Mans circuit? The supercar maker claims its simulations show the car should be able to top 250 mph on four separate sections of the long French track — which would mean something capable of topping the lap times of the best of today’s LMP1 models.
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