After six long years, the wait's over - we're finally getting a look at the new Nissan GT-R.

The worldwide embargo officially lifts at the Tokyo Motorshow today, and that's where I'm reporting from, standing right next to the Nissan stand.

The GT-R is the undoubted star of the show and one of the most important cars of the decade. It is a storming blunderbuss of a car, a proper tech fest and one to scare the living heck out of Porsche, Ferrari and every other supercar maker in the world.

In fact, Porsche will probably be one of the GT- R's first customers. They'll want to dissect one as soon as possible.

No, it's not a Skyline. Those were the old days... this is something newer and far bigger. Skylines in Japan are a bit like Vauxhall Vectras - or maybe a little bit more prestigious than that, maybe the equivalent of a Peugeot 407, with both coupes and saloons on sale.

Previous Skyline GT-Rs were super-high-performance versions of the Skyline, using the same body as the coupe, which put limitations on how far things could be pushed. Anyway, the new GT-R is a bespoke, global supercar from Nissan, where the previous R32, R33 and R34 Skyline GT-Rs were sold only in Japan (and in limited numbers elsewhere).

This is a huge, brand-building, mega-high-tech monster thing, built from scratch with money virtually no object. Nissan has every right to be extremely proud of it.

First, to the basic facts: it has a brand-new 3.8-litre, twin-turbo V6 which makes 480bhp. It goes from 0-60mph in 3.5 seconds. It has a top speed of 193mph. It has a co-efficient of drag of only 0.27... incredibly slippery for a supercar, and about equivalent to a Toyota Prius.

And yet it still develops 100kg of downforce at max speed. It laps the Nurburgring Nordschleife in 7mins 38 seconds, faster than a Veyron and almost as fast as a Porsche Carrera GT. That lap time was set with some of the track damp, by the way, so Nissan engineers reckon it'll be a smidge quicker again when they go for a proper record. It'll be on sale in early 2009 in the UK, price yet to be confirmed, but expect about a £60K tag.

The GT-R has a sophisticated four-wheel-drive system similar to that of the last R34 GT-R. It also has an amazing feature in its independently mounted rear transaxle.

Sorry to get a bit techy on you, but basically it means the gearbox - a new twin-clutch six-speed semi-auto paddle shift unit - is mounted at the rear of the car, rather than behind the engine at the front. The 'box is combined with the rear diff and transfer case, which sends drive back to the front again when it's needed.

So, think about it: you've got drive going from the engine back to the rear gearbox, then forward again... so it needs two drive shafts. And it's got them.

With the gearbox out back, it means weight distribution is perfect at 50-50. This car should handle incredibly well, and traction out of corners will be tremendous no matter how slippery the surface with its active four-wheel drive figuring things out.

In fact, it measures how much drive needs to be thrown forward every 0.2seconds, and varies it depending on grip, speed, steering angle, throttle and a myriad other conditions. Maximum drive forward is only 50%, though - mostly it feels rear-drive.

It has a sophisticated traction control system, and driver-adjustable suspension and gearbox settings. The suspension can be set to soft for town work, normal for fast regular driving and R for hard track work.

When the gearbox is set to 'R' it delivers lightning-fast shifts, so the engine stays on boost. It is one of the quickest gearboxes in the world, engaging the next gear in preparation for the next change.

Inside it's beautifully laid-out. The big central data screen was designed by Polyphony, the people who brought you the Gran Turismo series of games for the PlayStation. Nissan admits that Polyphony are better at designing screens and menus than they are, so they asked them to do it. The screen shows just about every reading you can imagine, including G forces and all sorts of temperature and engine readings.

There isn't much room in the back seat, unlike previous GT-Rs, and the boot's a bit small, but Nissan reckons that doesn't matter. The other important factor, and one which Nissan seems to be keeping largely hidden, is that they're discouraging tuning of this car.

They've designed the engine and systems to be tamper-proof, to make it as difficult as possible to be messed with. Maybe they reckon the aftermarket tuning of previous GT-Rs doesn't fit in with the new Nissan supercar image.

Hmm. I think the tuners will have something to say about that, and maybe it's possible this is an error from Nissan when it comes to appealing to traditional GT-R customers. We'll see.

In the meantime, you can enjoy reading about this amazing car and looking at its awesome shape. We'll be driving it soon enough. Can't wait...

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