Hyundai i30 Fastback N revealed

275hp and 450 litres of boot space; Hyundai's hot hatch gets all sensible on us

When did manufacturers start bodging product names together so haphazardly? In a similar vein to Mercedes-AMG's awkwardly named new GT 4-Door Coupe, i30 N Fastback would have undoubtedly sounded much slicker than i30 Fastback N. Do the teams of product and marketing execs that devise these things ever say them out loud, you have to wonder, or are they merely typed onto spreadsheets and press releases without a second thought?

If the Fastbacken is as good as its regularly-hatched sibling, though, then its peculiar moniker ought to be about the only complaint - and there's no reason to expect otherwise. Unveiled today ahead of a Paris show debut, it features the same 2.0-litre petrol engine, putting out the same 250hp as standard or 275hp in Performance guise. The same 18- or 19-inch wheels wrapped in the same (spec dependent) Michelin Pilot Super Sport or Pirelli P Zero tyres, same front-end styling cues and same interior all make appearances too.

When it comes to differences, aside from the obvious one, there are a few - though they'll be short-lived, as adjustments made here are expected to find their way back over to the hatchback in the not-too-distant future. They include suspension and anti-roll bar tweaks to make the car "not softer, but a bit more rounded in areas, to make the comfort a little better" and a paring back of the N mode to ensure "performance with comfort."

Don't let all this talk of comfort deceive you, however. Hyundai insists that the changes have been kept deliberately mild in order to ensure a consistent driving experience across all N products. The car will still be heavily performance-orientated, though the firm does anticipate that Fastback customers will be looking "more for refinement and sophistication, and a certain kind of understatement."

With our long-term i30 N currently impressing so thoroughly - more on that on Friday - giving a broader range of buyers access to its superb slew of attributes can only be a good thing. There's no word on pricing yet, though in line with the standard versions of the cars, the i30 Fastback N is expected to see slight increase over the hatch, putting the Performance version at just under £30,000. Now, who do we see about that name?