Polyphony Digital has been hard at work on Gran Turismo 7, and looks like the studio is pushing on the gas of development, going on a veritable hiring spree in search of new talent.

The studio posted opportunity ads for thirteen new positions, including AI Engineer, Online Engineer, Graphics Engineer, Game Engine Development Engineers, Game Script Engineers, Sound Development Engineer, Data Engineer, Test Build Engineer, Pipeline Tool Development Engineer, Mobile Application Engineer, In-House Tool Development Engineer, Vehicle Simulation Development Engineer and Physics Engine Development Engineer.

We can also glimpse a few interesting facts from the specific ads themselves:

• Polyphony wants to improve the situational awareness of AI drivers, and their reactions to the ever-changing conditions of the tracks, giving there a more human-like behavior.
• Implementing specific regulations for racing series like GT, rally and NASCAR is mentioned, also for events and "mission races."
• Polyphony plans to implement a tool to render audio based on 3D space infomation.
• The studio plans to implement a companion app on mobile that can interact with the series on PlayStation via the network.
• The studio is collaborating with production sites around the world, and needs to develop communication tools to make the process smoother.
• The use of GPU compute for physics is mentioned.

The candidates will work on PS4, PC and mobile, but this shouldn't be taken as an indication that Gran Turismo 7 is going to be on those platforms, PS4 aside. Polyphony has part of its development pipeline on PC workstations, and mobile development is required for the companion app.

This sudden acceleration in hiring might definitely indicate that we're getting close to an announcement for the game. Tokyo Game Show is incoming, and Paris Games Week will be soon after. The Gran Turismo series is massively popular both in Japan and in Europe, so it's not unlikely that we might see the game unveiled there.