Forza Horizon 5: The Final Preview

It’s actually only a few weeks until Forza fans get loose on Forza Horizon 5 and its slice of Mexico presented in typical Playground Games style – a picturesque and idyllic driving paradise. But with the full game just around the corner, Playground has given us early practice for roughly the first 90 minutes of Forza Horizon 5.

It’s certainly just a brief snapshot in the context of a Horizon game where you’ll likely spend hundreds of hours playing, but it’s definitely enough to get a preview of some of the campaign and a first idea of ​​some of the others. improvements that Playground has. it has been promising.

After nearly three years of playing Forza Horizon 4 pretty much every week, collecting every new car and testing every new content, I suppose you could assume that I might be tired of the Forza Horizon formula. The reality, however, is that I really am not, and the prospect of immersing myself in Mexico and doing it again is enormously attractive.

You may already be familiar with the Forza Horizon 5 opening unit – Playground Games itself removed the cover from the opening minutes of Horizon 5 at Gamescom, but playing it myself, I was amazed at the success with which it instantly transported me to a place a world away. Forza Horizon 4’s Great Britain 4. Horizon’s signature opening boosters are always impeccably curated experiences designed to propel players into the world of Horizon at full throttle, but here in Horizon 5 it does a particularly ingenious job of illustrating the impressive breadth of the wonderful and varied map of Mexico from Playground. The UK of Horizon 4 is still beautiful, to be sure, but the Mexico of Horizon 5 has quickly made a big impression on me.

The most important thing to me is the sense of scale, and there is no clearer place than the top of the colossal volcano in Horizon 5. Playground Games has adopted a significant elevation change before, with the Blizzard Mountain expansions of Horizon 3 and Fortune Island. from Horizon 4, for example, but the Great Caldera volcano from Horizon 5 dwarfs both. It’s such an impressive sight, and it very effectively makes me feel small in a vast new space that I want to explore.

Biomes in Forza Horizon 5

After the opening trip, Horizon 5 takes us straight to a Showcase event, which long-term fans will recognize as the series’ main race type – a frantic point-to-point sprint, usually versus anything other than A car. In this case, it’s an airplane, which we’ve certainly raced many times in Horizon games before, although a mid-race change introduces new opponents and a late-race twist that I don’t necessarily want to spoil here makes the conclusion more exciting that I had guessed it.

After the exhibit, Horizon 5 presents a couple of its new Horizon stories, one focused on the challenges of photography and another that begins with a find in a barn that I think anyone with a basic understanding of Mexican automotive culture will have. foretold. After this, a small range of challenges and more conventional racing types are revealed.

However, even as Horizon 5 starts to settle into its typical Horizon pace, I’m already noticing a number of improvements starting to emerge. Visually, of course, it’s absolutely splendid (and the tire smoke is so much better!), But there’s so much more under the surface. The handling settings Playground has discussed above are subtle but absolutely remarkable (for example, I think the return torque in steering seems to feel a bit more natural). The revamped car audio is wonderful, and I love being able to preview the changes that performance customization parts will make to the sound of my cars.

But even though I’m already having a good time, there are still a lot of things that I haven’t seen that are not part of this part of the game. The new Horizon 5 expeditions, for example, promise great road trips across the map to expand the festival. Horizon’s Arcade mini-games should be a lot of fun. Most excitingly, Horizon 5’s EventLab, a large-scale event editor with a set of tools similar to the one used by the developers at Playground Games, sounds like a drastically expanded version of Horizon 4’s Super7 mode and I can’t wait to see it. . what I can create.

After an additional year on the rise, Forza Horizon 5 arrives as the first game in the Forza franchise created specifically for the Xbox series consoles from the ground up, though it will also hit the Xbox One and PC consoles. Playground Games will give players the keys starting November 5 for pre-orders of the premium edition.

Luke is a game editor in IGN’s Sydney office. You can find him on Twitter every few days. @MrLukeReilly.