Gran Turismo 7hasn’t been without controversy since its release earlier this month. Developer Polyphony Digital promoted the game as a love letter to car culture duringSony’s State of Play event in February. However, it’s still a money-making venture, and the game’s received a good amount of flack for its aggressive monetization.
OneGran Turismo 7player decided to take a stand against the game’s micropayment system. They managed to rake in hundreds of dollars worth of in-game currency without playing the game or spending a cent by writing a simple script.
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The script appears to originate from a user on the PSNProfiles Forum known as Septomor. Using the PS5’s Remote Play function, players run the script on their PCs while streamingGran Turismo 7from their console. It allows players to grind for Credits by running the same race repeatedly while players are away. The script reportedly lets players earn an impressive 15 million Credits every day. That would typically cost the player about 120 dollars fromGran Turismo 7’smicrotransaction shop, but Septomor’s script lets players cash in by just running it in the background.
Septomor claims to have created the script for players who were turned off byGran Turismo 7’sintense grind following a recent update. Last week, the developers significantly reduced the number of Credits players get from completing races. This makes it much harder to unlock new cars in what many perceive as a blatant attempt to push players into spending more money on microtransactions. Polyphony Digital rolled out the controversial patch the same day thatGran Turismo 7suffered a 30-hour server outage, a big problem for a game that requires an internet connection, even for single-player races.
The combination of these factors led to understandable outrage from fans. Disgruntled customers promptly took their complaints to Metacritic,causingGran Turismo 7’suser rating to plummetto record-breaking lows. As of this writing, it’s sunk to an abysmal 1.8 out of 10, lower than any other first-party PlayStation game since Metacritic launched. While “review bombing” remains a controversial topic in gaming circles, it’s not surprising given the circumstances.
Microtransactions are likewise a hot-button issueamong gamers and developers. Those who defend the practice argue that it’s necessary to keep AAA games profitable in the modern industry. AAA games have only gotten bigger and more expensive to produce, while prices have remained stagnant for decades. However, many players get understandably angry when developers unexpectedly demand more money for a game they already own.
Gran Turismo 7is out now for PS4 and PS5.
