NEW EVERYTHING!
As I mentioned previously, this does mean a big shakeup of the GG lineup, plus a revamped history to more realistically reflect the development cycle of even a manic company like GG. I'll be taking this opportunity to highlight how the cars already here will change, which ones can be rebuilt already, and which ones will need to wait for further game development. I'll also provide a bit of information on what will come in the future.
In a non-exhaustive, bare-bones chronology (prone to revision with ongoing changes to the spreadsheet calendar which Cen and I are developing):
Note that while some real-life companies and potentially real-life people will be referenced in this fiction, and this universe makes reference to real-life occurrences, unless otherwise specifically stated, fictional characters and companies do not in any way shape or form purport to have any likeness or event relating to these real companies or people
2011- Wretched Beginnings
- A senior engineer (Hannah) from a major local Australian manufacturer (Holden) is made redundant after ongoing disputes with management. She impulsively decides to open a tuner shop with the promise to make all things wild. Her husband (Boden), resigns from his engineering role at a prominent Italian (German-owned) supercar manufacturer and flies across the world to support her. Mutual friend, burnt-out corporate lawyer and property magnate (Dan) provides the initial capital by sourcing them a garage. By the end of that year, a small group of about a half dozen have a cozy operation restoring and retuning cars (mainly GM/Holdens)... but it is a far cry from their original dreams of 'all things wild'.
- A disgruntled doctor (Strop), suspended from his posting in a non-patient-care related work incident, joins the group as a graphic designer. With virtually zero engineering background and knowledge, he immediately starts stirring the pot with wildly outlandish ideas and constant homages to the most superlative of performance vehicles. While he butts heads with Hannah, his ideas resonate, Dan encourages them to take up a big gamble, pursue their dreams and try to make an Australian supercar manufacturer that will actually survive, and commits the majority of her property portfolio as collateral. Gryphon Gear proper is born.
- Nightfury, their first car, is born from the rebuilt body of an old rat racer, an expensive small volume order from a German engine manufacturer, and a lot of stolen intellectual property. It is disturbingly fast and makes waves on social media. It also causes an incident that leads to Strop impulsively hiring a troubled rookie racing driver (Kai) who suffered a clash of personalities in his first major professional racing gig and found himself suddenly jobless and stranded. Much to everybody's confusion and horror, racing division Team Ninja Horse is proposed and formed before the company is ready.
- Many shenanigans follow. Some companies agree to sponsor TNH and some other outfits, intrigued by the Nightfury's growing performance credentials, start looking to GG for sponsorship. But as the company struggles to garner interest in their street-legal conversion of the Nightfury prototype, this is barely enough to keep them from imploding in a puddle of red ink. It doesn't help when Kai spectacularly crashes Nightfury at a local meet and ends up, after a very tense in-company standoff, 'on probation'.
- After the initial success of Nightfury, Strop naturally wanted to 'slap a turbo on it' to see what it could really do, and used its rebuilding as an excuse to do exactly that. With revamped (borrowed from a decommissioned F1 car) aero, it subsequently broke a number of time trial records. This was part of a plan for GG to move towards its trademark specialty: overboosted turbos, as epitomised by none other than-
- Mephisto. That firebreathing >400km/h somehow-road-legal but never actually useable as a daily driver icon, and the anthem of GG's brute force approach to everything. Priced like a hypercar except even more potent, this was GG's first commercially successful car, coveted by the obscenely rich with a taste for exotica, numbed to everything except the constant threat of death. But being built mostly by hand, the company could only support a staff base enough to build 25 units a year, as part of their bid to be recognised as an OEM for automobiles to further their racing ambitions.
- The pressure was on for the race team (particularly its driver), and happily they delivered. TNH teamed up with Smolensk, DQE (soon to become AMW) and Strkyer to form a supergroup, developing a set of rally cars that took the Bavarian Rally by storm. Teaming up with sportscar manufacturer Dragotec, they contributed to a clean sweep of their respective classes at a 24h Le Mans event. From their own individual efforts, they managed second place overall in an international touring car series. The clientele of their tuning house took a turn for the upmarket, and with a decently improved inflow of cash and capital, things were looking much healthier for GG's bottom line, though their situation was still delicate and kept in the balance somewhat by Dan's collateral... and the investments of several of her connections and partners who made up the Board of Executives.
- As the automotive manufacturing industry sputters and gasps its last in Australia, GG continues its plans for world domi- I mean, expansion, looking to consolidate its position as a valuable community hub, both internationally as a racing shop and outfit, and locally, as an employer increasingly surrounded by town development. As such there were no new cars released, and much of the main company's efforts focused on building and updating their facilities. A separate warehouse was built for the purpose of production, the operations headed by Japanese auto-nerds (and coincidental twins) Luca and Isla.
- In the meantime, Strop was transitioning from impromptu Team Principal of TNH (he was never really team principal material anyway, it was mainly because it was his idea and nobody else wanted to do it) to integrating the small but growing network of engineering and design expertise for their next major development projects: conquering hypercars on every given drivetrain and format: FR, MR, M-AWD and possibly even FF if they could manage it. This involved a lot of liaising with a couple of the more, er, interesting characters of the core group of GG, including the IT guru, shady hacktivist and inexplicable fan of Ponies (Waxwell - a.k.a the guy who did all of their illegal industrial espionage), the master electrician, a surly, ultra hipster snob (Noah), and the materials expert, an over-qualified, esoteric lives-in-the-basement neurotic terrified of the fact he has three degrees in the same thing and is still half a half-assed idea away from Centrelink benefits (Hunter)
- The first fruit of these labours is the prototypical and controversially styled Sleipnir (no presentation available), the MR hypercar all about delivering tight track performance
- Meanwhile, Kai finds his stride racing in GT and Touring Cars, in the Japanese Super GT and as a reserve driver to Australia's own V8 Supercars (incidentally his first job from which he was unceremoniously dumped in 2011)
- Also, GG attempt to host a gumball rally for the lulz. Rumour has it that it turned into something much bigger and badder than that. Also, Kai's former teammate, perennial playboy and layabout dork Sam Neil, invited himself along and crashed their very expensive MR prototype Sleipnir, but somehow manages to get himself hired to be the TNH race team consultant the following year (after discovering that he had, in fact, fractured his spine while wrecking Sleipnir, and thus permanently lost his seat in V8 Supercars). This triggers flares of several cases of PTSD due to the disturbing parallels to 2012.
- The year started with so much promise (well actually it was kind of like a phoenix, rising from the ashes of yesteryear). Out of the PR disaster that was GG's rumoured afiiliation with 'terrorist organisations' (an unpleasant side-effect of the BSLL becoming the Most Wanted League), other riskier, like-minded companies approached and replaced the previous companies as sponsors and benefactors.
- Giddy on rarefied fortunes, GG went on to debut a car they had been working on triple-time, the long-awaited substance to Strop's infamous boast in 2013 that he would beat Hennessey to not just the 300mph mile, but also the 500km/h mark while not going bankrupt. The version of Mercury, that made waves at Geneva was a mule, but also the first ever car that boasted not just a 1 hp:kg ratio, but DOUBLE that, and somehow still made it around corners. But that was the incomplete version with a fixed wing. The production version of Mercury was a car on the level of superlative exclusivity, like a McLaren F1 GTR, Lamborghini Veneno, Koeniggsegg CCX-R Trevita or Agera One:1. More than that, it was seen by many as the ultimate petrol hypercar ever, bridging both the worlds of ludicrous speed and track performance. It was immediately met with clamouring to ban it from every public road, to be barred from racing in any ratified codes, and naturally, pre-orders flooded in to the point the pre-orders were attempting to outbid each other for the bare two dozen to be built.
- On top of this, in a shock-and-awe tactic of sheer bravado, the design team worked quadruple time to announce yet another prospective lineup, this time, the FR hypercar, Daeva. After this, Strop was forced to go on a holiday as he had become extremely difficult to work with.
- But then reality set in. The costs and demands on the Mephisto Maintenance and Repair unit skyrocketed out of proportion. Australia's financial outlook as a whole crashed and burned into a pile of smouldering ashes atop the ruins of the mismanaged mining boom. Suddenly, high risk automotive investments weren't sexy anymore. And with the already unavoidable and imminent doom of Australia's auto manufacturing sector closer than ever, GG had to urgently look for ways to stabilise their assets and secure their output, or, more crucially, become more cost effective. This would require frantic soul-searching over how GG could stay true to their ideal of ultimate performance while delivering more for less instead of more for... more. The most bitter pill to swallow was the reality that they could no longer afford to occupy the ivory tower of impossible cars and expect to remain alive until they had more clearly established themselves.
- Thanks largely to the entrepreneurial work of Dan, a multi-stage plan was enacted. Salvation came in the form of the unexpected partnership with European car giant Znopresk, famous mainly for its efficient, cost-effective eco-boxes and family cars, but looking to impress with their homegrown supercar on a budget, the Zeus. In a flurry of frantic redevelopment, a Zeus GG Tune was well-received and went on to make not only production, but GG was commissioned also to make a limited edition, with an engine supplied from Znopresk subsidiary, BMMA, to run in a Znopresk-supported factory team in the upcoming AMWEC. The payout from the sales of the Zeus alone went on to cover the engineering costs for 2016 and then some, a company-saving achievement given their other measures taken to limit tooling costs as a result of the Zeus phase.
- Following this, GG also entered a limited run partnership to tune an edgier supercar, the Rennen Kusanagi (pictured in the teaser above. With carbon fiber panels and a M-AWD layout compared to Znopresk's polymer and MR, this car would introduce a new kind of philosophy and performance focus to GG, adding a layer of subtlety and challenging them to find the maximum out of tighter restrictions. The result was a car that would excel on the tight and technical, a car more enjoyable to drive on public roads, heralding the possibility for GG to develop cars that were more accessible, while surpassing the performance of even a hypercar on tight, technical tracks.
- As gruelling as the development work was, so too were the race commitments, with Kai signed up for multiple exhibition appearances as well as a full season seat in WEC, in the GTPro class, on top of his already doubled testing schedule. This year was particularly unkind to him, and went largely unnoticed for most of the year due to his unique position of reporting to multiple departments. This, plus a general sense of fatigue among the staff, eventuated in a company wide review of workplace practices and workflow at the conclusion of the year.
- Now that TNH will be joining Znopresk for the forseeable future (though details on who reports to whom etc. are still to be clarified), they have the best opportunity yet to develop their skills as a racing team and work with extensive factory support. Their main involvement will be, as mentioned, racing the Zeus in GT/WEC type races (for the purposes of this fiction, I've therefore prospectively earmarked Sillyworld's AMWEC as taking place across a whole season in 2016 as it seemed more realistic from a world-consistency perspective). This will also mean much less in the way of single and reserve driver type commitments, considerably freeing up Kai's calendar but with prospects of greater earnings and reputation in higher stakes challenges.
- Mephisto's production run has, for now, drawn to a close, and that production line has switched predominantly to honouring the pre-orders of Mercury.
- Rumour has it that major supplements and energy drink company, Scarlet Ox (lol, geddit?) approached GG last year with a view to organising an official exhibition gumball rally in 2015, but the plans were scuppered in the face of increasing financial instability. But in 2016, might we see... a return of the BSLL???
- The development unit must make a decision- they have two prospects, with the potential for a rich legacy, but it is difficult to decide which one to choose... (more on this below)
How Will the Cars Change?
Nightfury
- Remains an F-AWD NA
- Will still have fixed aero at high downforce configuration
- But instead gets a Lamborghini inspired but absolutely giant V12
- Will also remain a F-AWD forced induction
- But will, when the game engine allows, have an ultra-elongated engine bay in which I hope to fit a V16
- Will still require a top speed of at least 400km/h, if not 438km/h
- And will still need to lap Green Hell in under 7 minutes
- Will probably still come with semi-slicks approximating the performance of Trofeo Rs, due to POWAAAAAAA
- Will remain MR
- Depending on how the engine bay pans out, should have either a multi-turbo V10 or a V12 (if the V12 block from Nightfury fits)
- Will still have a goal top speed of 500km/h
- Though will also have a hard limit on fuel economy capped at about 26l/100km
- Will also need to lap Green Hell in under 7 minutes
- It is uncertain whether this car will actually make production
- If so, these cars are likely to ship with sports compound tyres (again, P-Zero sizes)
- These will be the first GG cars to actually feature any kind of radio
- The Aesma version will keep its i6 turbo, but hopefully the turbo will feature variable geometry
- The Indra version will have block from the Mercury, except naturally aspirated
- This will still aim to be the first FR hypercar that laps Green Hell in <7 minutes
So what were the possible 2016 cars?
Orphiel
- Mephisto's little cousin (the "redeeming" side of Mephisto)
- F-AWD, every bit the spiritual successor
- May get a bi-turbo V8, but may need something with more cylinders than that. Maybe a detuned version of the V10 from Mercury
- Will have a 1:1 power to weight ratio
- Will have a radio (but pretty basic)
- Actually runs sports tyres (again, P-Zero level) in similar dimensions (i.e. max width 345 rears)
- Still needs to get around Green Hell in under 7 minutes, and generally it does not need to be said that it will still be batshit fast
- But needs better fuel economy than the Mephisto, however
- Will have an Automation MRSP of about 250000
Salamander
Mule model only, design as yet incomplete
- GG's first M-AWD car, cunningly adapted from work done on the Kusanagi
- Many firsts for GG, this is also the first engine not to be sourced from a certain magnesium specialist, as it's AlSi. In fact, it's the Australian produced Holden 3.6L block, with DOHC 4 valve VVL/VVT technology, except reforged, blueprinted, port and polish, rebalanced etc. to GG standards, to pay homage to the Australian manufacturing last hurrah (and they're honestly not bad improvements, but unfortunately too little, far too late). This v6, however, has some Borgwarner-sized turbos strapped to it, and will develop 800bhp while maintaining excellent reliability (like, 77)
- This will therefore be the first GG car to not have >1000hp or a hp:kg ratio (thus making it ineligible for BSLL style contests)
- The engine will be mounted transversely, which lowers engineering and service costs
- As usual for GG's more accessible rides, P-Zeros
- Has SIX SPEAKER radio, handsfree connectivity and standard trimmings
- 0-100 in 2.4s onto a top speed of >350km/h. Think Aventador SV minus the Lambo obesity
- Still gets around Green Hell in under 7 minutes (and Airfield in 1:08!!!)
- Has a mixed fuel economy of 11.6L/100km (i.e. better than the hybrid hypercars, and less than half the fuel an Aventador SV consumes, and the best a GG car has ever done by a very long margin!!!!!!!!!)
- Considerably cheaper at MRSP 165000 Automation units, but also generally weaker as a hypercar due to lower prestige (except still CF because like hell does GG spend all that time setting up a premium CF pipeline then stop using it, geez)