forza horizon

Forza Motorsport 3 was the Forza title that sunk its hooks into me. The rewind function, adjustable difficulty, driving lines, and sublime controls were instrumental to my enjoyment of playing the game. The sleek presentation made races exciting compared to the calm melodic stylings of a Gran Turismo. But as with all things, things began to grow stale. Forza Horizon took the Forza Motorsport formula and injected it with even more excitement. I thought Playground Games’ spin off looked neat but not enough to warrant a purchase at the time.
 
It took a new generation of consoles, a PC release and a new game subscription service model before I finally gave another Forza title a chance.  
 
The other reasons I took the plunge was the ability to run the game at 60 FPS on the Xbox One X and PC. I heard of the troubles with attaining higher framerates beyond the default 30 FPS in Forza Horizon 3, so the 60 FPS mode for Xbox One X owners made the decision to jump in even easier. Racing games are playable at 30 FPS but they come alive at 60 FPS and Forza Horizon 4 was no exception.  
 
I tried to run the game at 4K 60 FPS on my GeForce GTX 1070 but it would dip far too frequently. After some tinkering, I settled with 1440p and a variety of adjusted settings. The Xbox One X version ran at 1080p and an unwavering 60 FPS. I switched between both versions and I was really impressed by the console’s output. I also have to commend the cloud save support which was seamless. 
 
Forza Horizon 4 followed its predecessor’s footsteps of unleashing the Forza Motorsport driving into a large open world. For this installment, they chose a chunk of England to carve up for our racing pleasure. Dirt roads, long winding courses, and open fields were all used as courses for players to race through. The inclusion of seasons gave all those tracks different aesthetics and feel making variety a non-issue.  
 
Like other open world games, there were tiered content. In Forza Horizon 4, a variety of races peppered the map including dirt rallies and street races. These came in the usual point-to-point or lap variety. The Story missions came with window dressing like light cutcenes and voiceovers setting up the crazy scenario in which I ended up behind the wheel of a extravagant hypercar. The crème of the crop were the Showcases which is just the over-the-top Top Gear races involving trains, planes, and bikes were pitted against cars. 
 
I had my fill of Forza Horizon 4 before finishing all those Story or Showcase events. The inclusion of Seasons added a level of dynamism to the world that sounds awesome in theory but a bit disappointing in execution. It turns out that I just don’t like driving in the rain or snow very much. Playground Games changed the seasons on a weekly basis. As a result, if I only enjoyed racing in the Summer or Autumn seasons, I would be sitting out two weeks while I wait for the seasons to change again.  
 
I preferred how they handled the seasonal changes during the first 25 or so levels where I could trigger when to change over to Winter. If I wanted to bang out more long epic races in Autumn, I could do so at my leisure. With the live nature of the game, I have to schedule my choice of events around the seasons.  
 
The material changes between the seasons meant that I was slipping and sliding on wet roads without winter tires, but it also meant I could drive on frozen lakes to reach new areas in the winter. I found these details to be incredible additions. 
 
My only other gripe with the fast travel system. Charging precious in-game currency to warp around the map is annoying. I realize it’s a bit silly to want to exclude driving in a driving game but sometimes, I just want a change of scenery without having to drive across the map. The annoyance was exacerbated when I forget to change my “home” and end up back at the other side of the map at the beginning of the next session.  
 
Those quibbles aside, Forza Horizon 4 was a blast to drive through. I’ve set it down for the time being but there’s a whole lot of game waiting for me if I decide to revisit. It’s one of those games that’s just bursting at the seams with both quality and quantity. It’s easily one of the best racers I’ve played in years.  

Verdict:
I like it

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