Automobilista’s Reiza Studios working on GTR Revival

Former Slightly Mad Studios Ian Bell is resurrecting the beloved GTR sim racing series under his new development house, Straight4Studios.

Now, Straight4 Studios has announced a new partnership with one of the most underrated sim racing developers. With this combined talent, GTR Revival just got a lot more interesting.

Reiza Studios teams up with Straight4 Studios

As part of a strategic partnership, Straight4 Studios is teaming up with Reiza Studios, the Brazilian developer behind Automobilista and Automobilista 2. Straight4 hasn’t detailed Reiza’s involvement, but Automobilista 2 is arguably one of the most underrated sim racing games on the market.

Two renowned sim racing developers teaming up to work on the upcoming GTR reboot, currently known as GTR Revival, is an extremely exciting prospect.

“Renato and I have been discussing this possibility for a long time, going back to when they were creating Automobilista 2 using our then proprietary Madness Engine,” said Ian Bell, CEO at Straight4.

“All of us at Straight4 were enormously impressed with what Renato and his studio were able to create in terms of feel and handling with Automoblista 2. Combining our studios’ talents is exciting news for all of us at Straight4, and I’m really confident this will also be fantastic news for the sim racing industry as a whole.”

Reiza Studios Renato Simioni added: “Ian and I have been talking about this strategic partnership for some time but our studios have always ended up on varying projects at varying times, delaying any kind of decision. Finally, with Ian and his team working hard on their upcoming game, the time was right for us to join forces.

"Having seen inside the new project Straight4 is working on made this an easy decision for Reiza to sign up to a project we believe is going to be the next great sim racing title. We’ll have further news on our portfolio of games for our fans in the next few days.”

Straight4 Studios is made up of former Slightly Mad Studios veterans who have worked on Project CARS and the original GTR racing simulations. Together, the two studios will “combine their decades’ worth of experience creating iconic sim racing titles.”

GTR Revival release date

Ian Bell has made some bold claims about GTR Revival. The former Slightly Mad Studios CEO says it will have “the best mod support ever” and recently teased a “game-changing concept.”

That concept is adaptive AI commentary, with a video showing how the AI can impersonate real-life commentators and react to the action on the track. 

GTR Revival is also said to boast cutting-edge graphics and a newly developed physics engine.

Published by Plaion, Straight4’s unnamed GTR reboot is targeting a Q4 release on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S. This will be the first time GTR has come to consoles.