Toyota's Kevin Hunter revealed the FT-1 Concept sports car in Detroit on Tuesday. Photo credit: Toyota
We've heard of cars inspiring video games -- but did a video game inspire this radical new Toyota (TM 0.55%)?
Toyota says that its FT-1 Concept car was "devised by Calty Design Research in the Sony (SONY -0.06%) PlayStation Gran Turismo game environment." It's a futuristic riff on several historic Toyota sports-car designs, and it might -- might -- be a preview of a future Toyota Supra.
Would Toyota really build a car inspired by a video game?
It might. Toyota CEO Akio Toyoda has been pushing his company to make vehicles that inspire what Toyota executives call wakudoki. (That's Japanese for "a palpable heart-pounding sense of excitement," Toyota says.)
The FT-1's looks are somewhat polarizing, but it certainly has way more wakudoki than a beige Camry ever will. It may be a concept car, meaning it isn't officially intended for production, but Toyota hinted that something like it could appear in the not-too-distant future.
The Fool's John Rosevear and Rex Moore spent some time up close with the FT-1 at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit this past week. We got a good look, but we didn't learn much about it, because Toyota hasn't said much about it. About all Toyota would tell us about the FT-1 is that it would have a "high-technology, high performance internal combustion engine" in the front, and its drive wheels in the back. How fast will it go? How much would it cost? Would the production version really be called "Supra?" We have no idea.
Still, there's something intriguing about the car. It's a sign that Toyoda's charge to his company's employees has been heard, and Toyota is welcoming ideas that might bring a little more wakudoki to the company's bread-and-butter lineup.
Check it out in the short video below. Then scroll down to leave a comment, and let us know: Would you buy a sports car that started life in a video game?
