It has been interesting to see how getting the Xbox Series X has changed my gameplay habits in a way that the PlayStation 5 has not yet. In part some of it is the fact that I set it up in the living room and after a few years of working from home, I feel the need to escape my office each evening. Another part is Microsoft Game Pass. I am not sure if you can fully explain how liberating it is, to be able to just download any game that I might even having a passing interest in and be up and running in very short order. The thing about Forza Horizon 5, is that I never would have purchased this game on my own. The irony of that statement is that there is a version of me from the past that used to love driving games. I played a ton of Gran Turismo and Ridge Racer on the PlayStation and even gravitated towards the Crusin series and Daytona in the arcades. However as a modern gamer… I never really spent time playing racing games because it felt like they doubled down on the simulation aspect whereas I was more interested in big dumb arcade fun.
For awhile now folks had told me that the Horizon series from Forza was their version of big dumb arcade fun, and after spending some time with it I would agree. Sure there is some simulation there, but you can also mostly turn it off by lowering the difficulty. This is a fact that I forgot when I briefly got excited about winning. However while we are on this screen I want to share my biggest complaint about the game. There are no beard options… what the fuck is up with that? I give them props for having the ability to include various prosthetic limbs, but I do get annoyed by this babyfaced schmuck every time I get out of the car. Apparently I am not alone in this notion with reddit threads offering to start a GoFundMe to get Microsoft to add beards.
I will say one thing that almost makes up for it however… is that while you are limited in the names that you choose for yourself, they are all voice acted. There are a whole slew of common names you can choose, but I noticed with Horizon 5 you can also add a list of “nicknames”. Among these is “Bell” which while I don’t put two Ls in my spelling… it sounds the same, which means every time I do anything in game I get called by my chosen online moniker. Honestly… I would probably rather have this than beards given how little time I actually spend out of the car. I’ve never really gotten to experience this in a video game and I think it is exceptionally cool.
One of the weird things that this game does when you are doing solo races… is it populates all of the other drivers from your friends list. At first when I saw this screen I was getting all excited that I bested Nimgimli in the race, until I had a slight realization. I thought it was showing me the record times of all of my friends and that I had beaten them all. Instead I realized it was just showing me winning against a bunch of low level bots that happened to be named the same as my friends. Granted racing actual friends is a thing that can be done in this game and at some point it might be worth trying. I still would rather race against a bunch of names I recognize than completely random bots, so I guess it is still neat.
The other time that I have spent some time doing is customizing my vehicles with new paint jobs and wraps. I thought it was really cool that there is a whole community driven thing where folks can upload their favorite skins and the community can vote on them. If I was going to have a Jeep Wrangler hard top… and a Jurrasic Park skin was available… there is no way I was not using it. They had some skins that were more true to the movie, but I personally liked the one the best. If I get a Ford Explorer I will have to see if they have that skin as well.
My favorite vehicle so far is the 2021 Ford Bronco that you get as part of the initial allotment of vehicles. I would love to own one of these in real life, and I greatly prefer driving a more off-road friendly vehicle in this sort of game. I am having a freaking blast with this game, and again this is not a title that I ever would have purchased on my own. I used to love driving games and this has rekindled that in me. It makes me wonder about exploring some of the other genres that I used to love but mostly abandoned when I got so heavily into MMORPGs. In line with this… I have been playing a ton of Lumines on the Xbox as well and I downloaded Tetris Effect and Bejeweled 3 which were also on Game Pass. There are rumors that Sony is working on their own Game Pass like service and I legitimately hope they make good on that concept. For now however… for the sheer aspect of getting to try out a lot of different things… Game Pass is a phenomenal deal.
Sorry for the double post; I should’ve researched first. Here’s an article from Game Developer about the drivatar system:
https://www.gamedeveloper.com/design/how-forza-s-drivatar-actually-works
If memory serves, once upon a time they claimed that “Drivatars” somehow reflected the racing style of the real player. Like if I raced conservatively my drivatar would too. If I was someone who jostled other cars and wasn’t above deliberately causing someone to spin-out, my drivatar would be equally as aggressive.
I’m not sure if it was true then or if it was, if it is still true today; it may have been marketing pseudo-facts.
The one place you can compete against real friends without being in-game with them is stuff like speed traps where your friends’ actual speeds are listed.