It’s been a long while since there was a new Forza Motorsport to talk about. The series was my introduction to the Xbox ecosystem, with Forza Motorsport 4. I loved its original tracks, along with the roster of real world circuits. This new Forza Motorsport is a reboot of sorts, having taken more than five years to arrive as Turn 10 improved upon its engine ready for the next generation. Now, three years after the start of that next generation with the Xbox Series, it has arrived.

Starting things off with an opening race on Maple Valley, I could see immediately just how improved this is over the previous games. This rebuilt original track has a lot more detail to it, with a very autumnal feel with its Maple trees lining sections of it and more going on outside of the track boundaries. This is also similar with the other tracks, too. In fact, it wasn’t long before I started breaking out the photo mode just to admire all that extra detail.

The introduction sees a lap of that opening race, which teaches the basics of driving, followed by the Builders Cup Introduction. This gets deeper into the gameplay, with a choice of three cars before you start. After choosing one of the three, with me going for the Honda Civic, the practice session of the first race begins. These practice sessions require you to complete a minimum of three laps and to beat the benchmark time it gives you. With the minimum three laps complete, the session lasts for ten more minutes, though you can skip to the race at any time.

Knowing my way around things, I set the difficulty before the game informed me it was possible to do so. Here, there’s two settings to toggle. The AI difficulty from 1 to 10, and three rulesets that dictate whether rewind is available and how many penalty systems are active. I’m not the most confident driver against opponents, so I only nudged the AI up a bit to 3, but I made sure all the penalties were on with rewind off. If I make a mistake, I want it to be felt, after all.

Not that I really did make many. The penalties system checks for whenever collisions happen or when you go off-road. If it detects such actions were purposeful to gain an advantage, it will add a penalty to your end time. I’ve not had too many of these, though I have certainly collided with other drivers and been off-road owing to braking too late or not enough. Which happened quite a bit as I adapted to the more realistic mechanics behind Motorsport.

This isn’t Horizon, where the cars feel easy to control. There’s a heaviness to the steering, to the braking, and to the acceleration that gives a more refined feel than the furious action of the open world sub-series. That’s not to say Horizon isn’t also about the races, with the same focus needed for them, but Motorsport is not about the chaos. It’s about consistency. Making small gains through small improvements. And quite a bit more technical with its upgrades. Which is unfortunate.

Unfortunate because of the progression systems involved. During races, experience is gained through accurate driving for that particular vehicle. Levelling up will unlock upgrades until, at level 50, they are all unlocked. But only for that particular vehicle. Duplicates not included. When so much of the Builder Cup career mode talks of the importance of upgrades and tuning, to first need to unlock the ability to touch them seems against that sentiment.

It will take a lot of time to even level one car up fully, so with the other sentiment of the career mode being to try out different vehicles, a lot of time will likely be spent in free race to get the tools to be competitive. Though on the easier AI difficulty, needing to upgrade and tune is less important. Of course, I was always going to spend most of my time with a Forza Motorsport in free race, anyway. Choose a track, get in my Mini, and take a spin round the Bernese Alps. Except that track isn’t in the game yet.

So far, there are 20 tracks in the game. Usual favourites such as Laguna Seca, Road America, and Silverstone are joined by some newcomers such as Grand Oak Raceway and Kyalami Grand Prix Circuit. New additions will be coming over time, with Yas Marina coming in November, and the Nordschleife route of the Nürburgring will be added some time in Spring next year. December also has a track planned, though nothing has been revealed yet. I’m hoping it is Bernese Alps.

The introduction to the Builders Cup gave me enough money to buy the Mini I wanted. Soon I was in free race driving around those tracks, messing around even more with the photo mode and seeing how the various weather effects changed things up. Both fog and night reduce visibility. The dynamic day cycle will change the time of day and the weather if there’s enough laps to see it happen. A cloudy sunset slowly losing its redness, rain thundering down hard on the track transitioning to a drizzle, fog breaking to a clear, powerful sunlight. It does look good.

From my experiences of racing around with that Mini, Forza Motorsport is a great racer. For a serious racing experience, it handles great. For more competitive racing, it is unfortunate that upgrades are locked behind the levelling system, keeping players from being at their best in the rivals and the multiplayer modes. For those who are less interested in such competitive modes, it is a joy to just drive these tracks, no matter what position you end up.

Forza Motorsport will be getting new content other than just tracks, with new cars and additions to the Builders Cup said to be coming. And all for free. That the game will expand over time for many months, perhaps even years, means there will be new things to come back for. At present, I can give this a recommendation to those who will play through Game Pass. Since it is an ever-evolving game, that recommendation will get easier, especially if there’s types of racing that get added.

Images Taken From:
Forza Motorsport | Xbox Series S