Page 68 - The Book For Men Spring/Summer 2024

A T LAST YEAR’S TOKYO MOTOR SHOW, THE BIGGEST SHOCK WAS A dared to line up against it. According to the Japanese automaker’s records,
cyberpunk-y sports car concept from Nissan, dubbed the “Hyper Force.” Setting aside its off-brand superhero name, it was clear that this car was something special even before the silk sheet had been whipped off. The outline of an oversized Formula One rear wing was clearly visible under the fabric, and the concept’s long, low silhouette led everyone at the show to jump to the same conclusion: Godzilla had returned.
Indeed, Godzilla is back, but not in the way we’d imagined. The Hyper Force concept is a thinly veiled peek at a future Nissan GT-R, the car affectionately known as “Godzilla.” But, this time, Godzilla has gone electric, hiding a technological breakthrough underneath
that outrageous, futuristically styled rear wing. Created in-house by Nissan, it’s a development that changes the game for electric vehicles: all-solid-state batteries (or ASSBs).
Of course, even the most enthusiastic driver’s eyes tend to glaze over when discussing EV battery chemistry, which is why the Hyper Force concept is so important. Because this 1,300 horsepower, all-wheel drive monster exists to prove what’s possible with this new, exciting technology.
For the uninitiated, some backstory may be necessary. The GT-R earned its nickname in the early 1990s when it annihilated every competitor that ever
the car won “29 consecutive races in the All Japan Touring Car Championship between 1990 and 1993, scoring back-to-back victories in the 1990 and 1991 Spa 24 Hours, and taking the top prize in the 1990 Nürburgring 24 Hours.” The GT-R also dominated the Australian Touring Car Championships, winning the 1991 and 1992 iterations of the beloved Bathurst 1000 endurance race so easily that series organizers changed the rules to effectively outlaw the Nissan. It was local Australian reporters who first coined the “Godzilla” sobriquet.
But, while the GT-R has evolved over the years, its fundamentals remain unchanged. It is, and always has been, a high-tech tour de force — a show- case for what’s possible when engineers combine brute-force horsepower and intuitive computing power. Lately, however, auto industry experts assumed that the GT-R was dead. The current R35-generation model has been in production since 2007, and that makes this monster an old-timer in car years. The brand may have kept it fresh over the decades with minor tweaks and updates, but the ground beneath Godzilla is shifting. Cars are going electric, and the GT-R is swiftly becoming a relic of the combustion age.
At least, that was the narrative until the Hyper Force concept landed in Tokyo and blew attendees’ minds.
“It’s a little bit contrary to the jelly beans,” Alfonso Albaisa, Nissan’s senior VP for global design, admits to The Book For Men. Albaisa is referring, of course,
68 BFM / SS24 AUTO / CYBERPUNK 2030