Grand Prix Legends - Commercial Success

Commercial Success

While acclaimed by the press in 1998 as the most realistic racing simulator ever, GPL did not sell very well, especially in the US where a Formula One-based racing game holds less appeal than it does in the rest of the world. Also, the cars were difficult to drive, while the game's hardware requirements meant that it did not run well on many computers at the time of its release.

GPL's lack of inbuilt support for 3D accelerator cards other than those produced by 3dfx and Rendition contributed to a decrease in sales when those cards became obsolete, since at the time there was no Direct3D support.

As of 2004 total sales were around 200,000 units. Many of these sales came quite late in the game's life, when increase in CPU power made the game run more smoothly, and after Papyrus had released patches to allow GPL to work with modern graphics accelerators. The addition of Force Feedback support also helped. The release of the game on budget ranges, the inclusion of a demo CD with the Nürburgring in the track's official 1999 season magazine as well as its giveaway in Germany in a 2001 issue of the magazine PC Action, also encouraged newcomers to GPL.