Italian city upset with Gran Turismo 5

By Tom Bramwell Published 23 August, 2010

Includes some pictures of flags or something.

Sony has come under fire for including a representation of Piazza del Campo, a medieval square in Siena, Italy, in Gran Turismo 5.

The Consortium for the Image protection of the Palio of Siena has had a moan in the Italian press (thanks Kotaku) after it noticed the Piazza in videos of GT5's kart racing sections.

The Palio of Siena is a mental-sounding bareback horse race contested by the various districts ("Contrade") of the city, and it's the use of Contrade flags that the Consortium's wound up about.

"You cannot use images of Contrade, in this case the flags, without authorisation," Consortium CEO Anna Carli explained. According to the original report, Carli and friends will ask Sony nicely to desist from doing so and then break out the lawyers if the Piazza remains.

You can read more about the Palio di Siena on Wikipedia, although don't look at all the gratuitous photos of the flags or Carli will get upset.

This isn't the first time Sony has annoyed somebody with a videogame recreation of a real-world landmark. In 2007 the Church of England had a gigantic moan when it discovered Manchester Cathedral not only used in Resistance: Fall of Man, but host to a giant shootout.

The Church eventually forgave and thoroughly patronised Sony over its naivety and we all lived happily ever after.

Gran Turismo 5 is due out in Europe on 3rd November.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000. Follow him on Twitter.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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