Forza Horizon 4

[Nag 1,927]

Depends what you trying to accomplish, I suppose... I hate time trials so it's no good for me.👍

[Craymen Edge 808]

I probably was playing the mainline Forza Motorsport games wrong when I played them. I spent more time in the livery editor than driving the cars, and most of my driving time was alone on a circuit pushing for my best laptimes.

[Nag 1,927]

Seeing some of the designs people were able to come up with I can see that's a definite thing for some...

[illdog 1,810]

I think i'd definitely fall down that rabbit hole if there werent so many games to play, livery design is pretty good fun.

 

I've just hit Level 42 (Mark King 4 lyfe) and the game continues to dump shit on my map to do. I do find myself looking at the clock when im home, thinking "there's gonna be a Forzathon in 5 minutes". I knew that would happen.

[wiivo 2.0 287]

Livery is something turn 10 have done right for a decade. As soon as you could put any livery anywhere, resize, angle, colour the possibilities became endless. Which to begin with mostly meant naked anime girls. Then for none skilled artists the marketplace was a great addition. 

[Nag 1,927]

Did the Halo Showcase earlier, now that was actually pretty special... accompanied with authentic music and radio chatter...

 

Spoiler

 

Perks of being a Microsoft first party studio now, I guess...

[Craymen Edge 808]

I don't think I like that. I don't know why, it just feels off-putting to me.

 

 

Edit: I just realised that with Horizon 4 being a Play Anywhere title, I can sign up for Game Pass and play this on my PC. 14-Day Free trial, here I come.

[Manicm 369]

Downloaded this via the game pass, didn’t like the snow, pretty much sideways most of the intro track, it looks pretty even on a non 4K tele, should put more time into it over the weekend.

[Hendo 1,500]

18 hours ago, Manicm said:

didn’t like the snow, pretty much sideways most of the intro track

 

I was fine with the snow, it was the mud that really messed me up.

 

First impressions are it looks great. I’m not having the full 4K HDR experience but it still looks fantastic.

 

Nice touch on the set up - along with the usual brightness toggle, there’s 3 or 4 colourblind modes to choose from. Should be standard at this point, probably.

 

I need to find out how intelligent this intro is.

I finished the 4 seasons intro and the AI woman who meets you, before choosing your character model, says out loud, “is Andy here?”.

I wondered if that was another AI character you meet, but then I realised that my real name is on my Xbox profile, so now I’m wondering if they pull that info and have tons of names pre-recorded. I can’t imagine that it’s that smart?

[Nag 1,927]

It said Phil to me which I was quite surprised by, it's one of the names that usually gets skipped.

[Hendo 1,500]

Yep just searched on YouTube and sure enough, it is that smart!

 

 

 

Skip to 8:20

[regemond 945]

Said Marc/k to me too. I thought it was just pulling from Horizon 3 though.

[wiivo 2.0 287]

It’s pretty common in racing games. I think GRiD was one of the first to do it. 2008 😬 That was selecting your name tho. 

[Hendo 1,500]

This is a step beyond that. I'm not gonna link the video, because the people who made it sound like the most annoying teenagers in the world, but one of them had their Microsoft name down as Brah, and the game calls him that all through it.

[Nag 1,927]

With all the leaps in things like Cortana and Alexa it has to be running something similar... I don't know how shit like this works but it's pretty cool when it does.

[Blakey 1,847]

Started this last night and I have to say I’m a tiny bit disappointed with it.

 

FH3 is one of my favourite racing games of all time so this had a lot to live up to and so far I’ve just bounced off it a little bit. 

 

The opening is fantastic and everything feels as good as it did in FH3 but I’ve just not felt that transcendent connection between the environment, music and car like I did with 3.

 

I hate to say it as I really thought the U.K. setting would be incredibly cool but I’ve just found it rather dull compared to the rainforests, deserts and gleaming cities of Australia. Looking at the map it seems tiny compared to the Oz map in FH3 and I can only see one city in Edinburgh which is rather disappointing too.

 

I guess it was ineviatable after 3 previous entries but it just feels a bit overly familiar and I’m just going through the motions at the moment. I don’t mean to be too negative though as it does most things excellently it’s just I’m not having an incredible, goosebump-enducing experience with it like I did with 3 yet.

 

Previous games took me awhile to get into too so I’ll hopefully change my mind the more I play, feel a bit guilty playing this for £2.50 as well 😂

[Hendo 1,500]

On the flip side, I’m loving it.

 

I’ve played a few of the Horizon games before, I liked what I played of the one in Australia but this is pretty cool being set over here.

I had memories come flooding back when I got to Edinburgh as it’s very close to the actual layout of the centre with the castle and everything.

 

I found this elsewhere, but I’m gonna have to find this livery in the game if I can.

 

[Nag 1,927]

4 hours ago, Blakey said:

I hate to say it as I really thought the U.K. setting would be incredibly cool but I’ve just found it rather dull compared to the rainforests, deserts and gleaming cities of Australia. 

 

Truth be told, when it was announced it was set in the UK I was worried it would be a bit bland and boring... I've got to say after spending time with it that sentiment couldn't be further from the truth, there's some truly beautiful scenery in the game and I've got to admit I already prefer it over Australia. 

 

Maybe it's due to spending some time in Edinburgh last year but once I arrived there in game I had a big old smile all over my face, the roads in and outside of Edinburgh are loads more interesting to drive than the previous game too.

 

4 hours ago, Blakey said:

Looking at the map it seems tiny compared to the Oz map in FH3

 

I definitely don't see that, drive from one to the other... It's a right trek.😂

 

This is my baby now, specced right up to X Class, it eats speed cameras for breakfast...

I've always been a Porsche man... If I ever win the Lottery I'll die in a Porsche.🤣

[Blakey 1,847]

I checked the map size and it was actually a bit bigger than Oz in FH3 so my brain is just doing weird tricks on me, I guess there's less open spaces maybe so that's why my dumb brain thought that? Who knows.

 

I hit Winter tonight and arrived in Edinburgh and my thoughts on the game have gone up exponentially. Now really enjoying it, something about Winter is just so damn awesome and that showcase event with the train along with the song that comes on is just so damn cool.

 

I unlocked a Lambo Huracan too which means I can properly hoon it for the first time which probably helps too. The music is still a big disappointment compared to 3 so far though, there's no 'Runaway (You & I)' here  

[Nag 1,927]

It'll be interesting to see what this does in the weekly sales chart what with it being on Games Pass and all, I definitely don't expect it to dethrone FIFA from number one but I'm wondering if it'll knock Spider-Man or SotTR down a place or two.