Forza Motorsport General Discussion Thread

[meganinja]

I saw in the private lobby filters that there were a few car types that you can set as restrictions that don’t have rental cars yet, a notable example is the DW 18 (previous generation IndyCar from Forza Motorsport 7).

Likely they tried to put in game but Indycar/MSG has not let them use
iRacing had simillar problems

 

[LumpiestFish]

With the featured Career events, if you don’t do them the week that they become available, do they then become unavailable the next week? Worried I’m going to miss out on this weeks event and then not be able to get the Acura.

 

[Omologato]

I played a little bit, but I've since put my controller down. I'll probably pick it up again soon, but I'm going to let this one stew a bit, not unlike a stew that needs more time, well, stewing.

Like so many of you, I've played every iteration of GT, FM, and even PGR. Heck, I joined GT Planet to get in on the hype surrounding the long-awaited release of Gran Turismo 4, which feels like yesterday. My calendar, however, disagrees with me on that last point. I remember too going to pick up my copy of Forza Motorsport and the subsequent years of fun I had playing it, especially when it came to trying to make a Camry Solara competitive. Each iteration leading up to FM4 (my personal favorite) added to that fun (aside from the will they/won't they discourse regarding the inclusion of Fujimi Kaido,) aside from a few minor hiccups along the way. Forza Motorsport 4 was the benchmark, especially once all of the DLC was released. What made 4 so special--and indeed the preceding three games--was just how accessible the car list was--these were cars that masses of people actually drove and could potentially break into grassroots racing with. Through games like FM and GT I became interested in autocrossing with my old Volvo 240 wagon; these games showed me that I did not need to own some expensive Porsche or the like, and I appreciated that immensely.

And then Forza Motorsport 5 came.

Five wasn't a bad game, per se, but it was different. Stripped back, and allegedly more focused. Sure, we got some of the cars back from 4, but gone were the Toyota Priuses, Ford Pintos and Ford Fusions; they've not been back since. Online racing was its saving grace, which thankfully helped keep my spirits up while I dealt with my shoulder injury. The only thing I remember about 6 is we eventually got the Pontiac Aztek, but of course that felt more like a joke than anything else. Plus 6 was, I believe, the first game in the franchise that banned SUVs from online racing. I got why, but it seemed silly to include them if there wasn't going to be some kind of system in place to ensure they weren't abused by griefers. Especially since I was actually competitive with the Grand Wagoneer. FM7 tried, but it just wasn't the same. The bloom was off the rose, and Horizion was way more engaging. Compared to Horizon (3,4, or 5, you pick,) 7 felt cold, dreary and deeply unfun. Yes, fun could be found, but the lower classes almost seemed like an afterthought, a here you go, I guess.

So when 8 was stylized as 'Forza Motorsport' and there was marketing copy telling us that the game had been rebuilt from the ground up, I was excited. Too many recent racing games seem to fall into the Project Cars mentality of making games strictly about racing actual race/track cars which, while fun, is not something we need replicated in every racing title available. I was optimistic that what the Horizon team had shown with its car list (aside from the absolute overload of flavor-of-the-month McLaren fax machines and exclusive Lamborghinis) would show Turn 10 that yes, there is still lots of fun to be had with more run-of-the-mill vehicles, especially when customizing them a million different ways to Sunday.

I do not necessarily want to heap any more negative criticism onto what's already been said, but 8 has not been the return to form I had hoped it to be. Not yet, anyway. It does have a lot going for it, be it the time/weather cycle, the graphics, and the basic concept, but the starter car choices, the physics, the absolute slog it is to level up a single car and the inability to just hop online in an E class lobby (at the time I'm writing this, maybe it's changed) has been disenchanting to say the least. Games are of course a means for corporations to make money, and as far as FM8 is concerned, I doubt that will be a problem. It will be a commercial success, which I fear may just cement such changes into the permanent discourse going forward. The franchise was aimed at me once, but more and more I suppose I am becoming increasingly esoteric and niche; I need to accept that I am no longer the core customer.

I am well aware that my experience and my thoughts may not reflect those of the community at large, and that's ok. I genuinely hope that people enjoy this game and that it brings more folx into the fold of appreciating cars and racing. Hopefully there are some truly good QOL updates incoming that'll have me eagerly picking up my controller again, but for now it will stay put, and I'll check in from the sidelines.

Happy racing out there, and take care of each other.

 

[whannel]

Neither of these are Reddit posts and nobody said there was anything wrong with balanced criticism.

If you'd quoted @McLaren's post in full instead of using his second paragraph out of context to imply that he was criticising DF or the forza.net post above, I think you'd see why his complaint didn't apply to what you posted and why so many people agreed with him.

My post wasn't really related to Reddit being 'an absolute bloodbath' that McLaren responded to by calling it names in it's recent state, I linked to YouTube instead which is probably even harsher than Reddit, at all times. I was taking it slightly in the direction of the 'even gaming media is extremely negative' part of what he quoted in his post by linking to the DF video, but that was primarily a response to PC vs Xbox complaints, rather than imply anything about the DF video or forza forums post which I couldn't imagine anyone would take that as, but guess I should'be been more descriptive or less snappy sorry.

That post was actually terrible, it was contradictory throughout. Demanding that every car and track be copy/pasted from previous games, then complaining about the result of copy/pasting content

I'm afraid I missed anything contradictory in it, and feel his complaints about copy/pasting content were only that they never used the 6 years to also add more new things, along with the old?

Speculating that their favorite tracks are being intentionally withheld and hinting that they'll probably be paid DLC despite the developers saying that will not happen

I've read some tracks will be free, but not that others won't be sold to us as DLC if this is fully confirmed somewhere?

If they prioritized the Nordschleife instead, we'd be seeing "Why are there only 15 tracks in the game?!" posts

I think he just wanted it copied/pasted.

If they bothered to read or listen to the developers, they'd know the old track models aren't compatible with the new physics.

I'd read/watched that too, but still can't fully get my head around why an old track would so drastically upset a new tyre model? I mean Assetto Corsa has a good tyre model does it not, yet others paste tracks from entirely different games into it without issue no? Are Turn10 just lying again, given their track record?

No, they won't have every car and track from every game every time

Again, why not copy and paste the Asetto Corsa success, provided they can get the licenses?

it comes off as a kid

Wish I had his car history as a kid, why try and belittle the popular poster?

This post in the Forza forums isn't just elementary, it's absolute guff.

Can you cite which parts of his post are inaccurate BS as there's a host of points he raised that most reviewers (on the payroll?) ignored to be voted up to fix the broken game elsewhere in the Forza forums, like most requests there though, none are really receiving the level of support and comments his post did.

Edit* I stopped reading after the 1st paragraph in that Forza forum post. That user does not understand licensing just does not carry over game to game, and they happened to use the 1 manufacturer as an example that Microsoft/Turn10/Playground Games clearly ran into issue with a few years back that may still be affecting the franchise.

Yeah their new game model where cars/tracks can come and go does appeal to me as I missed FM7 being available on the Xbox store due to that, and did wonder why they wouldn't just cut some out and extend others but a new game also appealed more to me and don't think I'll ever go hunting for FM7 on the grey market. Toyota do seem really weird when it comes to games, getting sought after WRC models in FM8 but not in the new WRC title (EA issues or not) has certainly put me off ever buying anything else from them, in favour of their competition.

 

[MroczMR]

With the featured Career events, if you don’t do them the week that they become available, do they then become unavailable the next week? Worried I’m going to miss out on this weeks event and then not be able to get the Acura.

Can somebody finally confirm are those events permanent or time gated?

 

[TheAdmiester]

Can you cite which parts of his post are inaccurate BS as there's a host of points he raised that most reviewers (on the payroll?) ignored to be voted up to fix the broken game elsewhere in the Forza forums, like most requests there though, none are really receiving the level of support and comments his post did.

Not keen on the dismissive sentiment of "on the payroll" but let's tackle the post on the Forza forum instead. Reminder that being liked by lots of people doesn't automatically make it right, but there are a lot of people out there just as clueless about game dev as the OP. The majority of the length of the post is just arbitrarily raving about different models and specs of car for some reason, but I'll highlight some key points from their post and my response:

"I've already beaten the "career" of these [...] in only 3 and 1/2 days of playing" - I'm not sure if modern standards demand that literally every game last forever, but this seems perfectly long to me. Halo 3, although a different genre, took me an afternoon and a morning to complete back in 2007, and I'm pretty sure the first Forza Horizon was 2-3 days.

"What was the time off since FM7 spent doing?" - Evidently, rebuilding the physics engine and rescanning most, if not all, of the tracks.

"Why would the game eliminate tracks from previous games?" - Tracks take a long time to make (see GT7), and if you're rebuilding them all from scratch, that takes a long time to do.

"So many missing cars from history that could have been developed over the 6 years" - Well yeah, last time we saw a truly cumulative car list that missed almost nothing was GT5, and that game was a mess. Every game in existence misses cars, I don't see how this is a mark on Forza specifically.

"That makes for about 25-30 hours of "content" in this game" - ...yeah? That seems decently long to me?

"There are no "race car" specific championships" - I mean this was kind of a given based on "Builder's Cup" and "Built, not bought", they've not exactly kept that one quiet. I presume race car-based content will come soon, but they were very clear about FM being focused on building up a road car.

"It’s not in this game because either a:they’re withholding it for future DLC or b: licensing issues. If it were option b, that causes an issue for the Nurburgring. Why is the GP track in the game, but the 13-mile course isn’t, even though it’s in previous games" - Well there's also option C that was conveniently ignored, being "it's not done yet".

"What does that mean? You can’t just buy a car and then immediately upgrade it to S-class with a racing V12, twin turbos, and weight reduction." - A positive presented as a complaint for some daft reason.

"What about painting/customization, has that EXPANDED in anyway over previous games? NO. It’s the same 3 paint categories." - Finally about 50% of the way through the post we reach a somewhat valid point.

"Why are all modern games released buggy as hell?!" - I find this quite funny in the middle of a post demanding 600,000 new features and cars and tracks. A game can be: 1) Polished 2) Full of features 3) Released soon - you can only pick two of those. Bugs aren't great but games are getting more and more bloated to meet increasing demands of players (see the point about 25-30 hours somehow being bad), meaning more has to be tested and more simply gets missed.

"All cars are now 100% automatic, apparently." - You've highlighted one of a few that has missing shift animations, yes, but this is objectively untrue for all cars


At this point I'm realising my post is long enough, I've responded to points from about 60% of the post, and I'm realising the rest is just regurgitating the same points and continuing to lack awareness of either self or game dev, so I think I've done enough.

 

[tomo 427 S/C]

And for today’s fun mistakes…

The Mk2 Golf’s speedo is in KM/H, despite being an American spec car, but also reads its MPH in KMH (60mph is showing as 60kmh) so it forever looks like you’re going incredibly slow.

And the Mercedes 190E needs an engine rebuild, because the oil pressure reads 1.5. Under any form of revs it should read at 3 and be at where it is now at idle. We restore classic Mercs, this one must be completely buggered 🤣

 

[UKMikey]

DF also said in another video that tracks had to be rebuilt for the new physics, so perhaps this is why they weren't all available at launch. It's not a cash grab if they release them for free.

I've read some tracks will be free, but not that others won't be sold to us as DLC if this is fully confirmed somewhere?

Their exact quote is below. The way it looks to me I think it'd take a pretty bad faith interpretation to read an article that begins "new free tracks" and conclude without evidence that they intend to release tracks as paid DLC in the future, and I feel that any burden of proof to the contrary should lie on the accuser.

Enjoy New Content Every Month with Forza Motorsport’s Evolving Racing Platform

Forza Motorsport will expand with new cars, tracks, career tours and online events. Here’s how we’re building an evolving racing platform to give players a steady flow of new challenges and gameplay experiences.

forza.net

New free tracks will be coming to Forza Motorsport on a regular basis, introducing new challenges for you and your friends to master. Due to the extensive development timeline required to accurately rebuild these detailed environments to work with our new physics systems, our monthly updates may not always include a new track.

With that said, we are excited to reveal that Yas Marina – completely rebuilt using the latest track layout – is coming in November with Update 2.0. The updated circuit features a more flowing hairpin allowing for better racing and overtaking opportunities.

We do have another track planned for December that we will show you soon, and as previously revealed, our most accurate Nordschleife ever will be released in Spring 2024. Every new track we add to Forza Motorsport will include fully dynamic 24-hour time-of-day with weather and track evolution.

---

With the featured Career events, if you don’t do them the week that they become available, do they then become unavailable the next week? Worried I’m going to miss out on this weeks event and then not be able to get the Acura.

They are time gated but you don't have to finish them in the week they come out. You have until two weeks after the week four event to complete them all according to the same article.

Can somebody finally confirm are those events permanent or time gated?

This has already been confirmed earlier in the thread but here it is again.

Featured Tours are limited-time career events organized around themes. The first of these is the Track Tour, showcasing different varieties of cars built for competition on the track. Each week there will be a new series of races featuring different types of track cars, including that week’s Spotlight car.

These series do not have to be completed in a particular week – you have until 2 weeks after the end of the entire tour to complete it; this gives players more flexibility to enjoy the content at their own pace.

 

[MroczMR]

They are time gated but you don't have to finish them in the week they come out. You have until two weeks after the week four event to complete them all according to the same article.

This is still bad news. I was hoping thay will expand on career mode not making „time gated” events. Imagine backlash if PD was doing that to World Circuit Events. This is completly pointless. Why not leaving new Events permanently?

 

[MagpieRacer]

This is still bad news. I was hoping thay will expand on career mode not making „time gated” events. Imagine backlash if PD was doing that to World Circuit Events. This is completly pointless. Why not leaving new Events permanently?

I guess they think that by doing this they’ll create FOMO and people will keep coming back.

In reality it’s really annoying, doesn’t expand anything and punishes people with less time to play.

 

[EngieDiesel]

I have a feeling they're going to cycle them back in eventually as time goes on and they build up a backlog. It would be incredibly foolish to permanently lock players out of getting certain cars just because they haven't been around since day one, especially if they're in a thinly populated racing category, and devoting an entire page of the career section to just one rotating series doesn't make a lot of sense either.

 

[breeminator]

I'd read/watched that too, but still can't fully get my head around why an old track would so drastically upset a new tyre model?

I put a video up a while back showing how FH4 is broken when you run it above 60fps:


So I'd say going from 60hz to 240hz (I think those were the numbers, doesn't matter if the real numbers are a bit different) with the FM physics model could definitely reveal problems with the fidelity of the environments.

 

[MroczMR]

I guess they think that by doing this they’ll create FOMO and people will keep coming back.

In reality it’s really annoying, doesn’t expand anything and punishes people with less time to play.

^this. This game will remain poor in content even after 2 year If they plan to keep it this way.

Also what I hate is... I start the game -> recieve VIP Bonus Pack commercial -> cancel -> go to custom race select class -> first cars on the list are with shopping cart icon despite not being fastest one. This game feels like some kind of f2p full of dlc game. I am really annoyed by that. To be honest? Those MT in GT7 aren't so annoying like most of Forza.

 

[BlackHGT]

I have a question for the players who finished the "career" in a few hours/days. Do you play on the lowest level? Did you start at position 3 or are you just such strong drivers?
I ask because it seems so fast to me.
I myself don't progress that fast. I play on level 7 to 5 depending on track and car. I have a really hard time to achieve the times that are given. That is usually I train 2-3 hours per track ... more familiar routes need less training (Susuka as an example). What I want to say is that I am still so far from the end. That it makes me wonder if I'm just bad at FM or if people rush through it without challenging themselves.

About me
I do not have so much time to play, but 1-2 hours in the evening I usually find. Also, I would call myself a racing game fan, since a good 80-90% of my gaming time is spent on racing games. I am not the best, but certainly not the worst virtual racer. I would describe myself as a better average (in GT7 I'm usually 2-4 seconds slower than the top people, with the exception of the Nordschleife there are significantly more 😅).

 

[Ak1504]

Why not leaving new Events permanently?

You have 6 WEEKS to complete the Events IF you want the free car. In Horizon you have just 1 Week for some cars and nobody complains ?

 

[AutumnalGlow]

You have 6 WEEKS to complete the Events IF you want the free car. In Horizon you have just 1 Week for some cars and nobody complains ?

People do complain. I did until I quit the game over it

Still, why 6 weeks? Why not add it permanently? What does removing content add to the game? To your experience?

 

[breeminator]

Also what I hate is... I start the game -> recieve VIP Bonus Pack commercial -> cancel -> go to custom race select class -> first cars on the list are with shopping cart icon despite not being fastest one. This game feels like some kind of f2p full of dlc game. I am really annoyed by that. To be honest? Those MT in GT7 aren't so annoying like most of Forza.

I learned a long time ago to not bother with Forza unless I'm willing to buy the most expensive version. I look at it as the game costs £90, do I want to buy it at that price or not. I just don't consider for one moment buying one of the cheaper versions. If you buy the cheaper version, the game will make it incredibly annoying for you for ever more.

I have a question for the players who finished the "career" in a few hours/days. Do you play on the lowest level? Did you start at position 3 or are you just such strong drivers?

I play on the hardest difficulty and start from position 3, but still need a decent car to be confident of winning the championships. E.g. the open 500 one I only finished 2nd in the first two races when I used the Veloster N FE, so switched to the '90 MX-5, spent hours developing a tune for it, then won all 4 races easily with that. I don't think you actually have to win the races, though, I think you can simply skip practice, finish every race in last place, and still unlock the reward car?

 

[MroczMR]

You have 6 WEEKS to complete the Events IF you want the free car. In Horizon you have just 1 Week for some cars and nobody complains ?

I am playing Cyberpunk right now, will play Spider Man 2 soon, I want to have a choice what I am playing snd when. My plan was - come back to Forza in January and backlog all added content I can’t because of stupif FOMO mechanic.

 

[syphe]

I have a question for the players who finished the "career" in a few hours/days. Do you play on the lowest level? Did you start at position 3 or are you just such strong drivers?
I ask because it seems so fast to me.
I myself don't progress that fast. I play on level 7 to 5 depending on track and car. I have a really hard time to achieve the times that are given. That is usually I train 2-3 hours per track ... more familiar routes need less training (Susuka as an example). What I want to say is that I am still so far from the end. That it makes me wonder if I'm just bad at FM or if people rush through it without challenging themselves.

About me
I do not have so much time to play, but 1-2 hours in the evening I usually find. Also, I would call myself a racing game fan, since a good 80-90% of my gaming time is spent on racing games. I am not the best, but certainly not the worst virtual racer. I would describe myself as a better average (in GT7 I'm usually 2-4 seconds slower than the top people, with the exception of the Nordschleife there are significantly more 😅).

I'm just under half way through the power tour, I've so far put in 43 hours, including a handful of MP races and some painting. If I look at the remaining races I think I'm about 1/2 way, so maybe at 70-80hrs I'll be through the builders cup. I'm doing the 3 laps practise each race, and placing myself 8th in the grid each time, if that gives any indication

 

[MroczMR]

I learned a long time ago to not bother with Forza unless I'm willing to buy the most expensive version. I look at it as the game costs £90, do I want to buy it at that price or not. I just don't consider for one moment buying one of the cheaper versions. If you buy the cheaper version, the game will make it incredibly annoying for you for ever more.

I am using GamePass version. I think it is not worth the money now. It is very "limited" game in terms of content, quality, and performance on PC. I will consdier it buying in "best" version on discount though, or If they repair all the issusies, but unfortunately I see career mode will always remain "small" with this FOMO 6 weeks events cycle...

 

[JDMKING13]

You have 6 WEEKS to complete the Events IF you want the free car. In Horizon you have just 1 Week for some cars and nobody complains ?

It makes no sense bud.. doesn’t matter if it 8 weeks… Some people will play the game later… they won’t have the chance to do a certain event because it’s timed?!?? So essentially this game will never grow??? Why would they do that… by the end of the first year the game could have a crazy amount of events which would make the game better!

 

[Ak1504]

My plan was

Sorry that a game does not fit your personal plan lol 😂 Such a hard task to do 6 races each week. Man i tell you I'm sweating.

 

[mynameis66]

You have 6 WEEKS to complete the Events IF you want the free car. In Horizon you have just 1 Week for some cars and nobody complains ?

I think the major difference with FM2023 is theres no car to be won,just events to run.Somebody correct me if im wrong.

 

[T0MMY3688]

I think the major difference with FM2023 is theres no car to be won,j7st events to run.Somebody correct me if im wrong.

If the events will be removed then the Acura DPI at the last event will be locked behind a time limited event, since reward cars are not buyable in the shop like the Lexus LFA is not listed in the shop.

The first 4 new cars added for each tour every week is probably permanent in the shop.

 

[JohnyGT]

I tried little comparsion between Horizon 5 and Motorsport with matching surface, hopefully lighting and time of day and i must say Horizon 5 looks stunning in most cases but :

Pros :

• default yellow looks fixed in Motorsport (one in Horizon is from spreadsheet so it's missing GT3 RS sticker)
• Some details looks even more sharper

Cons :

• rim color in default rims and most rims in Motorsport looks atrocious ( these particular looks like something painted in gloss grey or they came from 3D printer ) also you can't paint the green lip around the rims which looks stupid on different color than green
• reflections sometimes look matte even after reset of cosmetic damage

I guess Motorsport have mostly big problem projecting black color in general ingame because everything that is darker shade looks light greyish

Edit : Captured on Series X, both games set to Performance without RT since Horizon 5 doesn't have one on Series X

 

[aguia]

You should be more judicious with copy/paste. That's why games receive negative comments, just like your comment did.

 

[MroczMR]

Sorry that a game does not fit your personal plan lol 😂 Such a hard task to do 6 races each week. Man i tell you I'm sweating.

Ok. So you are ok with that? This game doesn't even have events for race cars, and it won't have them ever because of FOMO?

This time gated content is one of the silliest things we have in gaming right now, and you actually defend it?

Why not just add them to game permanently?

The reason for updates for one game during generation was to have big, and complete title with fresh content regulary, with Forza career mode will remain unfinished because of stupid time limitations.

It makes no sense bud.. doesn’t matter if it 8 weeks… Some people will play the game later… they won’t have the chance to do a certain event because it’s timed?!?? So essentially this game will never grow??? Why would they do that… by the end of the first year the game could have a crazy amount of events which would make the game better!

^This. The carrer mode will remain in the sorry state it is right now. Game won't grow and get better because of this.

 

[skazz]

Basically the same but a 5900x. If I could snap my fingers and fix two things, it would be the stutter and crashing in multiplayer.

Stutter is most likely due to you picking “unlocked” frame rate. Try “unlocked (Vsync)”. This is a tip from the DF video.

Personally I found that my own strange stutter went away when I turned off ray tracing. I dislike the extra shimmer and aliasing from both RT and DLSS in the game right now so I run without them, and the game is silky smooth.

 

[breyzipp]

Is anyone losing saving progress?

1) a few days ago I completed the open tour B class (4 races) completely with the Subaru ST209 FE and got the car from level 1 to 12 while doing so. Even picked the C63 S Forza Edition Merc for the next A class part but then couldn’t continue to some weird error message about fetching the data from the server so I logged off.

2) Yesterday when I wanted to continue playing all my progress from the B class open tour was gone, I had to do all the races again. So nothing of that saved, except that my ST209 FE was still level 12, so that part stayed. I played the 3 first races again (Grand Oak, Silverstone, Indianapolis) and the game crashed when I was in menues for the 4th and final race at VIR.

3) When I started the game up again I was back at only the first race at Grand oak completed. Holy moly I have never seen such a big issue with save files on Xbox before. 😡🤬

 

[r_outsider]

Here's the problem with time-gated content- Everybody pays the same for the game. Some people, for a variety of reasons, simply do not have the luxury of time to put into video games. Yet they get less. At some point you stop playing or buying at all because you start feeling a bit ripped off.

Onto other petty annoyances, posted this on the official forum as well (copy/pasted because I'm lazy), I’ve been penalized for “avoidable contact” four times in the six oval races I’ve done- each time I was holding my line when someone moved up or down into me, one of those times two other players got together on the straight and one t-boned me in the side while spinning. And I got a cut track penalty for moving below the white line trying to avoid getting another contact penalty when yet another driver moved down the track while I was on the inside, just can’t bloody win.

The penalties that generally work okay on road courses simply do not work as intended on oval tracks.