Welcome to Your New Home

Launching fully in 2026

Welcome to OptionZ.

Gran Turismo has been a presence in my life since it first hit consoles back in 1997. Before I was even a teenager, Gran Turismo was teaching me how to drive, how to race, and how special driving is as an activity and sport. It was even my first introduction to Japan and Japanese culture.

The game is described by many as a racing game, and it is, on paper. We pick cars, we head to a circuit, and we compete with other people or an AI. But, I’ve always felt that this description and even that of “driving simulator” misses something. It misses the romance.

It’s incredible to see how far we’ve come since 1997 (Source: OptionZ)

Gran Turismo is, in my opinion at least, a love letter. A love letter to the artistry, engineering, culture, and emotion that cars have provided to us all. I’m firmly in the camp of thinking that cars have souls, personalities.

Almost everybody in the world has a car story. They’ve taken us to all the places we need to go — good and bad. A first date, a funeral, a holiday, an interview for a new job. People have been born in them, and people have died in them. Dreams have been chased in or with cars. They’ve been to war, they’ve carried groceries. Perhaps nothing else in the world does a better job of expressing the romance of this undeniable intertwining of car and human than Gran Turismo.

Our stories are tied to the story of the car. When I grew up, I became an automotive journalist. I was lucky enough to drive an astonishing number of vehicles in locations all around Europe on both road and track, hell, even off-road too. I’ve visited secret testing facilities, thrown a rally buggy around a working quarry, taken a Rolls-Royce to a Scottish distillery, and crossed multiple borders on long, rich, and meaningful road trips. And then? I stopped.

OptionZ’s first offering… (Source: OptionZ)

When your dream job shows its true face, you eventually get tired. Tired of not being paid on time, tired of dealing with difficult people, tired of not getting an e-mail back. Standard office stuff, mostly. Work stuff. Except for the being paid on time. Getting a “normal” job ensured I never had to sit in a Rolls-Royce again after having my card declined trying to buy bread — and that’s a true story.

I didn’t miss it. I still don’t, really. I had the opportunity to live a dream briefly, and I have no regrets. Actually, that leads me back to Gran Turismo. I always missed Gran Turismo.

Earlier this year, I was reflecting on my experiences with cars. My insight into the media madness behind the industry, hours behind the wheels of exceptional vehicles, I wanted it to be worth something. I wondered what I could do with Gran Turismo. How do we continue to innovate on Kaz and his team’s love letter to the car?

I came up with OptionZ. It is an attempt to bring the experience of owning a car out of the game, and into the real world. We spend many hours driving cars, refining their feel, and telling a story. Sometimes, we have to roll with the lore a little, but OptionZ is a digital tuning company brought to life. We don’t have a dealership in the game and you can’t buy cars from us with credits directly. What we can do though, is send you a brochure, photography, the story behind the build, and a full list of parts and the specific tuning setup we refined over the course of our hard work. We can also supply you with an OptionZ livery, numbered, and available only to you.

So, what is an OptionZ build? And why should you drive one?

Let’s leave that until next time.

Thank you for reading!

J.