Compete in GT4's online league

If you're one of the hundreds of thousands of PS2 owners who've bought Gran Turismo 4 since its release last Wednesday, you may be surprised to learn that you can actually battle against likeminded drivers on the Internet at www.gt4league.com - despite Polyphony Digital's infamous excision of the game's online mode late last year.

Game guide publisher Piggyback, who you may remember published a very detailed Metal Gear Solid 3 guide that we took a liking to recently, is running a European Gran Turismo 4 league, ranking players based on their lap times on specific courses in a series of some 50 challenges over the next seven weeks.

To enter, just play the specified track in Gran Turismo mode in-game, save the Replay, enter the rankings sub-menu and hit Start on your best lap time. This throws up a 32-digit code, which you then have to log in to the league website, which then adds you to the rankings. The top-ranked players for each stage will receive points.

All of this will help go toward the publisher's 310-page Gran Turismo 4 guide, which is due out in May and promises to cover everything in the game (including the game's line-up of more than 700 cars) and even include notable performances from the GT4 European League, which concludes at around the time of the guide's release.

As well as strategies from the best racers and input from Piggyback's editorial team (the largest it's ever assembled, apparently), the guide will also include the best examples of images captured using GT4's Photo mode - for which a series of eight challenges have also been set up on www.gt4league.com. You can see some of the Photo entrants there too.

Head to the website for more details, a rundown of the rules and a GT4 League forum.