Forza 5: Lets go for a spin
Forza 5 is the latest entry in Turn 10's vaunted racing simulation series. The crown jewel in Microsoft's launch line up, Forza 5 brings simulation racing to the XBox One. At it's core Forza 5 is a great simulation with some rough edges, and some ugly dark corners in the form of micro transactions.
The core simulation in Forza 5 is better than ever. The biggest improvement that most would be racers will notice immediately is the use of the XBox One's haptic feedback triggers. As with previous Forza installments, braking and acceleration are mapped to the XBox's left and right triggers respectively. What sets Forza 5 apart is that it now provides feedback through the XBox One's haptic feedback engine. When braking the trigger will rumble as your brakes begin to lock up. The strength of this rumble is proportional to how much you've locked up the brakes. Conversely the accelerator trigger will rumble proportional to how much traction you are losing from acceleration. Combined, the haptic feedback in the triggers makes controlling Forza with a game pad more enjoyable than ever. We can also expect to see aftermarket pedal setups which use the haptic feedback to provide even more feedback options to true sim die hards.
The cars themselves look and sound amazing. The rendering engine in Forza 5 has gotten an obvious face lift from previous installments, and at times the rendering of the automobiles can be downright breathtaking. The sound engine is also incredibly well put together, complementing the visuals being displayed and wrapping the entire package together.
While everything about the driving in Forza 5 is top notch, everything outside the driving could be best described as rough. The menus that you must navigate through can be confusing and frustrating. Important options like Setup and Tuning are hidden deep within other menus and can be confusing to use. Even knowing which car you are currently tuning can be a confusing mess, with the menu system seeming to stick to the last car you used. A tried and true system of simply allowing you to select which car you want to tune, without backing all the way out to your garage, would have gone a long way here.
The infrastructure around racing can also be frustrating and confusing at times. Even simple actions such as quitting after a race require you to load the next circuit, then quit out. This is needlessly cumbersome and makes the act of moving from race to race annoying at best. The multiplayer racing system is equally frustrating, using a hopper system which gives little to no feedback about who is racing where. You are given some feedback about how many friends you have racing, but no easy indicator to tell you what they are racing. Combined with the XBox One's notoriously bad party and grouping systems, and this leads to a lot of frustrating when trying to race with your friends.
Then there are the micro transactions. On some level I think most gamers have come to terms with micro transactions in sixty dollar games, but it still stings when they are made this obvious. There is a VIP club option which essentially gives you double credit payouts when gaining a driver level. In addition, you can purchase an XP doubler to raise the rate at which you gain driver levels. You can also buy cars with tokens (disclaimer: As of this writing, there is no way to actually purchase tokens with real money, but it's coming) in addition to the normal credits. Combined with the fact that each car is significantly more expensive relative to past Forza versions, and the obvious push to have you spend real money to speed things up is glaring. As a whole, this feels gross. Micro transactions in full priced games can be done right and it can be done wrong, and I feel it was done wrong here. I am sure there was a lot of influence from Microsoft to go this route as other XBox One launch titles have similar systems, but it's almost insulting to the gaming public what an obvious grab at extra money this is. Remember, this is not a free to play game or a $20 dollar budget buy-in.
As a total package Forza 5 is an enjoyable launch window racing sim that is worth playing. The menus and system navigation are frustrating and confusing at times, and the micro transactions are downright yucky, but the soul of a great sim racer is still here. Here's to hoping that Turn 10 can patch some of the menu madness and that Microsoft realizes that making micro transactions this obvious of a money grab in a sixty dollar game is insulting to your customer base.
Recommendation: Play it, but don't get in to the micro transactions. Best way to show your displeasure with this sort of behavior is to not participate in the marketplace.
