Ahhh, the Skyline. When many gamers think of the Gran Turismo series, the Skyline is one automobile which immediately comes to mind, and for several reasons. As a population, the Skyline lineage comprises the most common model in any GT game, unfairly outbalancing any other model made by any other car-maker. Go ahead, pick a Gran Turismo. Look at its list of Skylines. There are are far more Skylines than any other model of any make, even amongst Japanese manufacturers. 

It's something which can annoy us more than it pleases us at times, as we imagine this huge list of cars PD "could have put into the game, if only they'd take out a few Skylines". Yeah...and this behavior from PD and their fans gets repeated game after game after game.

So it may come as some surprise that despite the fact that there are so many variations of Skylines, the weakest portion of this website happens to be its Nissan Skyline pages. I know this. At this writing, here's how they break down:

> I've reviewed the KPGC10 series ('71 Skyline GTR) for GT2. And haven't made it to any later games, yet.

> The R31 ('87 Skyline) comes next, and is the only review to date which feels the most "complete", with a couple games addressed.

> The R32 and R34 reviews? Both incomplete. Specs, testing, and write-ups for these generations are dismally far behind those of many other portions of the site. I even wrote something about Barney during one of these so-called "reviews".

> R33? There are no R33 era reviews yet. :-/ 

It's something which has bothered me as a writer, something to be embarassed about, and over all these years, I've been meaning to finalize the situation. It would literally take ages to do, though, especially for the later generations. There's so damn many of these cars, how the hell should they be added to the site? One at a time? Or as sort of a mishmash of several models per review (as the R32 portion sits at the moment).

So here's what I've come up with, my dear readers. I've decided to go back...all the way back...to the beginning. Let's look at the very oldest Skyline which appears in a Gran Turismo game. This happens to be the '62 Nissan Skyline Sport Coupe. I figure if I start here, perhaps I can maybe build up a bit of momentum, assuming I just focus on Skylines for the next few months.

Perhaps we can call this my "Skyline" phase. :lol: When they write my Wiki page, it'll go: "...sometime late in 2011, Parnelli entered his "Skyline" period... years behind the rest of the racing world" ha ha..  

Sorry. Anyways, I'm starting with the '62 Sport Coupe, the Skyline which "started it all" in a way. Even though the '62 has many lacks, it is supposed to be a sports car. Although far from being a "Kenmeri or a "Godzilla", the sole fact that the Sport Coupe was supposed to be Prince's fastest, most stylish model makes it the Godfather of all Skyline GTs in a way. Prince didn't know yet how their vision would wind up; didn't know yet the amazingly vivid future the Skyline lineage would eventually have. In truth, this car (the '62 Sport Coupe) was not the earliest Skyline, it just happens to be the earliest found in any Gran Turismo to date.

 

And oh, here's something of interest. In both of the games the Skyline Sport Coupe appears, it is listed as a Nissan. This is wrong. Matter of fact, the Skyline Sport Coupe is not a Nissan at all!  It was actually made by Prince Motors, which was a subsidiary of Fuji Precision Industries or something. Prince didn't merge with Nissan until 1966, and according to lots of websites still operates within Nissan, even though all Skylines after 1966 are known as Nissans and not Princes. But the 1962 model which appears in both GT4 and GT5 is a pure Prince model, and has nothing to do with Nissan at all.  

If I'm feeling embarassed about the lack of Skyline material on this site, I can't imagine how Polyphony Digital must feel, since they've been labeling the '62 Sport Coupe as a Nissan for years now. Is the Japanese version correct? In other words, is the '62 Sport Coupe properly labeled as a Prince in the Asian version of GT4 and GT5? Or maybe it's just easier (in a contractural, monetary sense) for PD to just call this car a Nissan, since Nissan has their rights to call it a Nissan?   

Ugh. I say they've got it wrong. Whether Nissan or PD is to blame, this car IS and SHOULD BE labeled as a Prince. It's just the right thing to do.

Prince started way back in 1946 as Fuji Precision Industries, which I'll just shorten to "FPI" for the sake of this write-up. 1946 was obviously a time when Japan's economy was struggling to gain traction; World War II had just ended of course. FPI's first car was a small, slow electric vehicle called the Tama. We can assume this car was electric because fuel was possibly scarce for Japan just after the war ended, but that's just a speculation on my part. Before 1946, FPI was known as the Tachikawa Aircraft Company, maker of the infamous Zero warplanes during WWII. This is interesting mainly because this means that Prince's roots started in a company which made small, lightweight airplanes designed for speed and maneuverability, something which of course some Skyline models would also possess years later.   

In 1952, FPI became Prince, named after Japan's Crown Prince. At the time, nobody was making a true higher-end luxury automobile in Japan, and Prince was the first to attempt to do so with their Gloria and Skyline models. The 1957 Skyline was the first Japanese car to feature quad headlights, something of a rarity outside of the United States. Although Prince was not on the level of Lincoln or Cadillac or Rolls Royce, surely this was a carmaker on a quest. I haven't been able to find out how much an original Prince cost back in its day, but it's probably a costly figure.  

By 1961, Prince's third generation of cars was now extant. Prince wanted to up the ante, and wanted to make a sportier model than their regular Skylines, and soon the car codenamed "BLRA-3" was in progress.

Prince went all out, and commissioned the Italian designer Giovani Michelotti, to design the BLRA-3. Michelotti then came up with this handsome design which my girlfriend dug the first time she saw it. Actually, the first time I saw the Sport Coupe, I had no idea what it was. I assumed it was an American car; perhaps a Studebaker had made it into GT4!?! Nope. It's just another Skyline.

But it does have somewhat American looks, does it not? Um...it almost looks as though it's from the generation of American cars just after they lost their tailfins. The Sport Coupe does not look Italian or even Japanese, not really. It it is interesting that no other Skylines following this one would share the '62 Sport Coupe's unique appearance. The Sport Coupe was hand-built, was rather a heavy car in comparison to other Japanese of its time, and not very many of them were made. Some websites say a "few hundred" were produced, and one site mentioned about 60 Sport Coupes were made in 1962; certainly making them rarities.

Perhaps rarity has something to do with this car's enormous price tag in Gran Turismo. Good lord. Even as a used car with 18,412 miles on its odometer, this one costs over $272,000 !!!!!!!!!  Goodness. In the world of auction houses, museums, and stuffy buyers looking to fatten their automobile collections, such a price might make more sense. But in a racing game? Who actually buys one of these for racing???

Oh wait, I do. But at least I have an excuse for my expense!

So anyways let's get to it. Let's see what (if anything) the earliest Skyline of GT might have to offer....