Gran Turismo 7 Spec III Update 1.65 & Power Pack DLC Now Available

Ten weeks after it was first announced, the bumper Gran Turismo 7 Spec III update is now available to players worldwide, bringing a host of new content and features to get to grips with.

If you didn’t check in ahead of time and missed out on the preload — only the second time a GT7 update has been available this way — you’re looking at an update of a hair under 9GB on PS4 and just over 15GB on PS5, somewhat reflecting the very different contents on the two consoles.

Of course we did hear quite a bit about the Spec III update and the Power Pack DLC in yesterday’s announcements alongside the preload, but there’s always finer details missing until the update goes live and the patch notes land.

Gran Turismo 7 Spec III: Power Pack DLC

Unless you’re on PS4, undoubtedly the biggest news — and apparently accounting for about 40% of the update’s size — is the PlayStation 5-exclusive Power Pack DLC. The first paid expansion for GT7, the Power Pack adds 50 races against the Gran Turismo Sophy AI agent’s latest evolution, dubbed “Sophy 3.0”.

This is a pretty significant chunk of events, equivalent to 17 new GT Cafe Menu Books, with some of the races being endurance events that — by the official announcement — last up to 24 hours of real time, so it’s going to be a while before the full breadth of the challenges become known. We’ll be bringing a separate article with all the information as we get it.

However, what we can say at present is that each race will allow you to pick from some pre-tuned cars, representing different difficulty levels and awarding different credit boosts corresponding to that. There’s six different paths to unlock, each running on a particular theme, and a total of six additional reward cars which are also pre-tuned machines based on existing GT7 vehicles.

You can access the Power Pack from a new icon in the lower-left of the World Map. This also allows you to buy the DLC if you haven’t already picked it up, via the PlayStation Store, although it does also appear on the PS4 World Map without the ability to purchase as what’s essentially an in-game ad for the DLC.

The Power Pack is priced at $29.99/€29.99/£24.99 and is available from today. Interestingly, there’s also a new microtransaction option, by way of a 5,000,000cr ticket. This is also priced at $29.99/€29.99/£24.99, a good deal lower than the values of lower-cost credits would scale to, and giving a little extra cost-benefit to the Power Pack which includes the same 5,000,000cr boost.

Gran Turismo 7 Spec III: Two New Circuits (and a Surprise)

We’ve known for the entire ten weeks that we’re getting two new circuits in the game, in the shape of Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve and Yas Marina Circuit. As expected, these have been added to the Americas and the renamed Europe-Middle East regions, and each sports a single layout.

• Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve – Full Course (2.71 miles)

• Yas Marina – Full Course (3.28 miles)

There’s a Circuit Experience for both circuits too. The Canadian track is split into four sectors and offering a 200,000cr prize for passing all five stages and 1,000,000cr for setting gold times in all five using the Mercedes-AMG GT3 ’20. Yas Marina’s event uses the new Ferrari 296 GT3, with the same prizes but only three sectors alongside the full lap.

In addition to the two entirely new circuits, both making their game debut, there’s a little surprise waiting in terms of the track count with one additional layout now available for an existing track. It’s perhaps not that little though, as it’s a reverse course version of the 14.83-mile Nurburgring Endurance track available only in Time Trial mode.

That one’s going to take a little bit of time to process (and learn), but given the nature of one of the new-ish cars in the Power Pack DLC, it could be a reference to the Eifel Rally which does use some of the Nordschleife backwards.

One other new entry is a Circuit Experience at the Eiger Nordwand Reverse track. This uses the Alpine A110 ’17 road car, with three sectors and the full lap offering 200,000cr for a full set of passes and a further 1,000,000cr for an all-gold sweep.

Gran Turismo 7 Spec III: Eight New Cars (and Six Less-New Ones)

Information on the eight new cars coming in Spec III has been dribbling out over the past ten weeks, starting with four being (mostly) revealed in the initial announcement, two more coming at the GTWS Los Angeles event, and more recent confirmation of the others. One thing we’ve not been fully across though is the price and availability of them all, until today:

• Ferrari 296 GT3 ’22 – Brand Central – 500,000cr

• Ferrari 296 GTB ’22 – Brand Central – 1,200,000cr

• FIAT Panda 30 CL ’85 – Used Cars – 14,000cr

• Gran Turismo 3500-B – Brand Central – 1,000,000cr

• Mine’s BNR34 GT-R N1 Base – Brand Central – 3,000,000cr

• Mitsubishi FTO GP Version R ’97 – Used Cars – 35,000cr

• Polestar 5 Performance ’26 – Brand Central – 120,000cr

• Renault Espace F1 ’95 – Legends Cars – 2,000,000cr

In total, this makes 1.65 the third-most expensive update to date, behind only 1.20 and 1.54 which each contained eight-figure cars, at a combined spend of just under 8m credits.

Additionally, the six prize cars from the Power Pack DLC can make an appearance in the base game too — and not only that, you can buy them in several different liveries once you have unlocked them.

The status of these cars is something of an unknown at the moment, but from what we can tell they don’t have their own Collector’s Book entries and instead qualify as their base car siblings. For completeness we’ll list them below, but they don’t entirely class as “new” cars:

• Ford Mustang 2015 American Racer – Brand Central – TBA cr

• Nissan Skyline GT-R GP-Tuned – Brand Central – 700,000cr

• Porsche 911 Turbo Rally (930) – Brand Central – TBA cr

• Toyota AE86 Levin D-Tuned – Brand Central – 200,000cr

• Toyota Supra GT Road Car – Brand Central – TBA cr

• Volkswagen Beetle 1966 Desert Racer – Brand Central – TBA cr

Gran Turismo 7 Spec III: New Events and Menu Books

We already found out the broad strokes of the new events and collection-based Extra Menu Books with the initial announcement yesterday, but the rewards and race formats were under wraps until now.

Most of the seven new events highlight one of the new cars in the game, for a pretty broad spread of pace, and of course five of them use the two new circuits. As there’s no new Bonus Menu Books this time round, there’s no entirely new events and all seven are additional races in existing series.

• European Sunday Cup 400 – Goodwood (4 laps) – 52,000cr

• Ferrari Circuit Challenge – Yas Marina Circuit (5 laps) – 90,000cr

• Gr.1 Prototype Series – Yas Marina Circuit (15 laps) – 300,000cr

• Japanese FF Challenge – Blue Moon Bay Infield A (4 Laps) – 50,000cr

• Nissan GT-R Cup – Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve (5 laps) – 88,000cr

• Super Formula – Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve (15 laps) – 250,000cr

• World Touring Car 800 – Yas Marina Circuit (10 laps) – 200,000cr

The four new Extra Menu Books are as noted yesterday. You’ll need to pick up the Alfa Romeo Giulia TZ2 for two of them as it appears in both the Alfa Romeo Legends (48) and Legendary Road Racers (49) books. These are pretty pricey books though, each comprising three cars from the Legends dealer (none of which are currently available) and offer Six Star-Roulette tickets for completion.

For the Audi TT book you’ll need to own all three generations of TT road car in the game, with a Four-Star Roulette ticket your reward. The Mazda book needs you to own a classic (Mazda) Eunos Roadster, the RX-Vision concept car, and the CX-30 SUV for a Five-Star Roulette ticket.

• Extra Menu Book 48 – Alfa Romeo Legends – Six-Star Roulette Ticket

• Extra Menu Book 49 – Legendary Road Racers – Six-Star Roulette Ticket

• Extra Menu Book 50 – Audi TT – Four-Star Roulette Ticket

• Extra Menu Book 51 – Mazda – Five-Star Roulette Ticket

Finally there’s the new Seasonal Menu, which you’ll find in the top-right corner of the Cafe screen. At first blush this looks to be a transient collection task, requiring you to own three cars from the most recent update — currently the Panda, FTO, and Espace F1 from 1.65 — with a reward for doing so.

We’re not sure what we can infer from the fact that the current version of this Menu runs only until December 21 (the day of the GTWS Nations Cup Final), but you’ll score a Six-Star Roulette Ticket for this instance.

Gran Turismo 7 Spec III: New Features and UI Changes

The new Data Logger is the headliner for new features, and we have an article covering this feature extensively following a reveal last month. In essence you’ll be able to compare telemetry details for any two laps at a given circuit, in any cars, across any single-player event — including Online Time Trials.

However, likely due to the fact that a lot of telemetry in online racing is best-guess as recorded by the local console, you won’t be able to use the feature with multiplayer events like Daily Races or GTWS rounds.

Speaking of multiplayer, the previously highlighted improvements to online races focus on the Lobby mode. There’s new options to select in race settings — including pit stop and tire change requirements — and new filters, while a Room ID feature will allow only invited players to join private events.

You can also keep an eye on sneaky players, with a feature that allows you to display the specifications of all cars in the lobby with a single button-press.

Elsewhere there’s a couple of changes to the World Map and World Circuits screens, with Weekly Challenges now appearing as a side-docked pane in the map allowing you to view the new events without entering World Circuits. This is replicated in World Circuits too (but with a little more detail), and there’s a slight change to the Event Directory overview there too.

Gran Turismo 7 Spec III: New Engine Swaps

Update 1.65 sees the biggest single engine swap drop since the feature made its debut, with 20 vehicles getting swaps and a total of 22 new options — although we’ll have to debate both numbers later.

Right at the forefront at the new F3500-B and its F3500-A sibling, which can now swap engines between each other and also both receive the engine from the Espace F1. This basically gives you the option to recreate both as V8-, V10-, and V12-engined cars to make the mid-90s F1 grid of your dreams — especially given the various visual parts you can pick up for both.

There’s two other homes for the Espace’s V10, coming in the shape of the Megane Trophy V6 and the Toyota GR Supra RZ ’19. Both will be pretty wild.

It’s a case of W16 all the things this month too, with six cars gaining the option to install the Chiron’s eight-liter monster. Four are Chevrolets — the Corvette C5 Z06, C7 ZR1, and C8 Stingray, alongside the Camaro ZL1 — with the 2016 Shelby GT350R and Lamborghini Urus also jamming Bugatti power under the hood.

With the Mine’s BNR34 making its debut this month, its engine is immediately put to use for swaps. Both recipients are fellow GT-Rs, with the R32 NISMO and R33 V-Spec getting the benefit. Meanwhile bike power comes in for two kei cars. The compact engine from the Honda 2&4 Concept can now slot into the Honda N-ONE RS and the Suzuki Carry KC truck for some high-revving action.

That leaves us with some oddities. The Mazda Spirit Racing Roadster 12R finally gets some tuning options this month, and immediately gains a 13B rotary swap, while the new FTO gets the traditional Mitsubishi Evolution “Final” Gr.B engine. There’s Aventador V12 power for the De Tomaso Pantera, and LFA V10 chaos for the GRMN-tuned Toyota 86.

We have two final unknowns, coming by way of two of the Power Pack cars. The Skyline GP-Tuned and AE86 D-Tuned both have engine swaps listed, but the cars require unlocking to discover what they are. As neither has a separate Collector Book entry and both are based on existing cars, we’re assuming them to take the same engines as their regular brethren: Skyline Super Silhouette and MR2 3S-GTE respectively.

Gran Turismo 7 Spec III: Other Changes

Four new Scapes curations await this month, comprising 50 new spots and a curation of 20 existing ones with additional lighting options.

Naturally both Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve and Yas Marina get their own sets, including on-track and pitlane locations (the pit tunnel at Yas being a highlight), while there’s also 15 set at various tuning shops around Japan like GReddy, Mine’s, and Spoon.

Dunlop makes its first official appearance in the game since becoming the tire partner, with Dunlop-branded tires as standard across many cars (not all, likely due to real world partnerships) and a museum in the Brand Central overview and within the Japan section of Asia-Pacific.

One that’s going to please players with the game’s official steering controllers is, at long last, support for Fanatec’s FullForce feature. This should allow for far more detail in the force feedback system, and we’ll be giving it a whirl as soon as we can.

That leaves a few other adjustments, with tweaks to the F3500-A (including a fixed typo!), the motor simulation on the Corvette CX Concept, sound fixes on the Elantra N and Opel Corsa VGT, and the addition of dirt/snow tires for the Ioniq 5N.

Last but not least, there’s also a new intro video which — regardless of settings — will play when you first boot up Spec III. Set to the usual Moon Over the Castle, the cinematic highlights new content introduced since Spec II in November 2023.