The question asked of the GT-R could have come from Autocar magazine’s Ken Sutcliffe: “Will it drift?” After running through some standard MT performance runs, the cars were let loose around El Toro airfield to find the answer. You can see the video and find out…

Click here to view the embedded video.

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Subaru’s parent company, Fuji Heavy Industries, has been working with Toyota on the development of a new RWD sports car for about a year now, but the continuing soft market and poor 2009 outlook have led the companies to shelve work on the car. Saving production costs in a cash-strapped market is part of the reasoning, but also introducing a new car right now would almost certainly doom it to sales failure, according to Japan’s Nikkei.

But the Toyota-Subaru joint project isn’t alone. All new production projects are being reviewed in an effort to help realign investment and development budgets with newly reduced profit forecasts. Last month the Japanese carmaker cut its future profit figures by 56% thanks primarily to poor sales in Europe and the U.S.

The much-anticipated RWD sports car hasn’t been canceled altogether, however – at least not yet. It is still scheduled to begin production, but not until 2012 of later. Plans had previously put the car’s launch in late 2011, branded as a Scion in the U.S.

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It looks like that powerplant will be around 2.0L in size and put out around 200 horsepower. Based on an all-new RWD platform, the affordable coupe should show up Stateside by the end of 2010, or possibly early 2011. That new tC will probably be joined by a version of the iQ minicar in Scion dealerships as well, also according to Carscoop‘s Toyota insiders. A reborn, rebadged Celica and a Smart-fighter could be a compelling pair for Toyota’s youth brand. As always, we’ll keep you posted.

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Making the conversion possible is the fact that the tC platform is based on the Japanese market Toyota Avensis and Caldina all-wheel drive vehicles. RS*R was able to rotate the engine to longitudinal mounting to send its power directly through a driveshaft and to the rear wheels. The motor itself is a turbocharged 3SGE Beams unit with a host of upgrades that push output to 400 horsepower, versus the stock engine’s 161 ponies. A G-Force five-speed sequential transmission, RS*R coilovers, and Enkei RPF1 wheels all contribute to transform the mundane tC into a true Formula Drift series competitor.

Adding to the tC’s Formula Drift championship hopes is the person behind its wheel. Well-known drift veteran Ken Gushi will be piloting the RS*R Scion tC for the 2008 season that starts on April 12 with the opening Long Beach, California event.

Still, we can’t help but think that this is the tC that Scion should have built. As a cheap, tunable, rear-wheel drive sports coupe, the tC could have attracted legions of young (or just frugal) enthusiasts looking for a simple, fun, rear-wheel drive runabout. Are there hopes for a production version of this tC’s rear-wheel drive setup? Scion vice president Jack Hollis said in a release, “At this time we do not have any confirmed plans to produce a tC rear-wheel drive, but a lot of people will want to take one home.” We agree, Jack.

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With backing from Toyota, the aftermarket firm RS*R converted a run-of-the-mill tC into a rear-wheel-drive monster utilizing a BEAMS-built 3S-GE engine and taking advantage of the Toyota Avensis/Caldina all-wheel-drive chassis on which the tC is built. RS*R ripped out the abysmal 2AZ-FE 2.4-liter four-pot from the stock car, fabbed up a series of new mounts to facilitate the transverse to longitudinal conversion and dropped in the 3S-GE after fitting the four-cylinder with an HKS GT3037 turbo, intercooler, Blitz dual SBC boost controller and an AEM EMS engine management system. Approximately 400 hp is now routed to the rear wheels through a Tilton triple carbon clutch and a G-Force, five-speed sequential gearbox. RS-R coilovers keep things suspended on all four corners, and are hidden by the custom wide-body kit and Enkei RPF1 wheels wrapped in Toyo Proxes R1R rubber.

The RS*R tC will be piloted by Ken Gushi, the youngest driver ever to compete in the D1 series, beginning at the season opener on the Streets of Long Beach on April 12th. Hit the jump to read the full press release and check out Formula D’s website to see when the competition will be heating up in your area.

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