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General Motors drew heavily on its sporting heritage for the official launch of the 2010 Chevrolet Camaro late this afternoon, debuting the car in the final assembly garage of its storied Technical Center where many a GM concept car has been born. The Camaro drove into the garage with strains of heartland rock’n roll still hanging in the air; a not-so-subtle reminder of how much GM needs this car to appeal to the widest possible swath of American consumers.

Most interested parties have been able to make up their minds about at least the looks of the production Camaro for quite some time, as images of the sports car have leaked out at a steady rate for months now. Still, the red RS seemed to make an overwhelmingly positive impression on the gathered and massed members of the media, who fawned over nice details like the squared brake lights, towering rear haunches, and the wide, toothy grin of a front grill.

GM Global Design VP Ed Welburn was on hand to introduce the car, gushing over the new Camaro and characterizing it as a better and more complete car than the 1960s examples that inspired the design. While purists and baby-boomers may still argue for the classic exterior, we’d guess that they would be more prone to agreeing with Welburn when it came to the modern car’s well-resolved and classy interior. The blue lighting of the center stack gauges and the slightly dubious center-console cluster may be prone to premature aging, but there’s little question that the quality of material and workmanship in Camaro’s cabin is the highest the marque has known.

The 2010 car is also the highest specification Camaro yet, with available modern niceties like Bluetooth and USB connectivity, rear park assist, remote start, and GM’s ubiquitous OnStar system. More importantly Camaro will come with the buyer’s choice of two inviting engines; a 6.2-liter 422-horsepower V-8, and a thoroughly modern direct-injection 3.6-liter 300-horsepower V-6. The DI V-6 is also estimated to deliver a reasonable 26 miles per gallon on the highway.

It’s in large part on the sensible economy of that V-6 engine that GM is pinning a lot of its hopes for the new Camaro. GM North America VP Ed Peper admitted that the car will be an emotional purchase for many buyers but said that it could also register as a “very rational” vehicle as well. Peper also noted that the Camaro was going to have to attract “a new breed” of customers to succeed on the scale that the company is aiming for. That means that boomers and their kids are going to have to buy-in to the Camaro ethos if the car is to be a real triumph for GM, passing on Ford’s dominant Mustang entry-level sports car, as well as a host of excellent options from the Japanese companies that younger buyers have come to identify with.

Is the newest Camaro a sure-thing homerun for Chevy and The General? Take a look at our gallery of images from the car’s launch, and then throw us your opinion, in comments.