Forza Horizon 2 - Review

Forza Horizon 2 was a game that was not really on my radar, I knew about it and from what I had seen it looked fun, but it was not until I got a chance at E3 to play the game did I actually realise that the team at Playground games were actually doing.

Forza Horizon 2 is a game of many parts and the sum of its parts equal something truly amazing, from the moment you first start the game until the time you put the controller down, the game just works. Upon starting the game you will be introduced to the Horizon Festival by Ben, a faceless man who gives you a little warning not to put your foot down in the supercar you are driving until you are clear of the town. That is it, the entire opening, from there you drive along the coast and along side other racers to the first stage of the Horizon Festival and this entire opening sets the pace for the whole game.

Once you get to the destination you are given a choice of cars, the car you choose will select the championship for you and it is as this point you can drive wherever you want. The game does not limit you from driving anywhere, the entire map is open from the get go and it’s this sense of freedom that the game does its best to give you, but at the same time, some restrictions to keep you focused. As you drive around you will find billboards that are all over the place, with smashing them all a very important task. Some of them will net you bonus XP while others will allow you to fast travel at a lower cost, so keeping an eye out for them is important.

As you drive around, competing in races you will earn XP, while levelling does not grant you bonus stats or anything, it does give you a chance to spin the Horizon Wheel and here you can win cash or cars. Sometimes the wheel will net you 5,000 credits, other times 100,000 credits or should you be lucky enough to earn a car you could score a basic car or something a little more powerful. The other area you will earn points is in Skills, with how you drive being just as important as where you place in a race. Keeping a perfect speed run down a road will net you skill points, but doing it while weaving in and out of traffic will also earn you more. Bouncing across fields, taking out fences and shrubs will help you earn more points, but you have to be careful not to crash, doing that will cause you to lose your score and you want to keep it, because the perks you can select can do things like make your skill multiplier last longer or even net you a discount on cars in the Autoshow.

In fact the choice of cars that you have open to you are just as limitless as the map you can drive on, I mean the game features over 200 cars available to you. Should you want to take the hottest car in the world around the map you can do that, or if you have always wanted to drive a Hummer you can do that too. Cars are key in Forza, it’s the defining part of the series, but in the Horizon series it is more about car culture then tweaking the performance of the car to squeeze out a little extra power. Though you can do that here, if you are into that but its not what the game is about, for people like myself who have almost no car knowledge, tuning the car can be done with an auto method that will show you the increases or decreases of key parts, which will help make that sluggish VW van just a little more faster.

As you drive around the world, you will see billboards but also speed cameras, which is something else to help keep you coming back. The game tracks everything, from the amount of time you have spent in first to how many roads you have driven on and while it may not seem like much while you are on your own, once you join a club these stats will become even more relevant. As you blast past a speed camera you will get your speed, but then the person who is just above you in the club for that point will be shown and you have to decide if you want to turn around and attempt to beat that speed, of course should you beat it, then there is always going to be another score to beat.

This is where the game shines, it is built for social driving, each race, each score everything you do can be measured against other people in your club, which just means you have to keep playing If you want to stay in the race, pun intended. The game keeps the club engaging without being in your face and still lets you explore the world as you want and its one amazing world. Driving down the coast, with the sun shining over the mountains, the vistas that the game delivers are just stunning, in fact the game looks amazing at almost every turn, I say almost because if you actually stop, the game looks jaggy.  As the game is built for speed the odds of you seeing these issues are minor, but you will see them.

The cars are the characters here and they have a sound that you won’t believe, each car that you have the chance to drive sounds unique and when you have a great sound system the bass of some of them sounds even better. But as Horizon is centred around a music festival as well, the music in the game is amazing, in fact I usually disable music in most car games but with Forza Horizon 2, I found myself wanting to hear all of it. The best part of the music is that it is not all thrown at you at once, as your progress through the road trip new radio stations will come online, which means that as you progress through the game your music library will expand, keeping it fresh and new.

It is hard to recommend a racing game, you either don’t like them or you like a type of racer but thankfully this is where Forza Horizon 2 shines; it offers up all the depth of the main Forza series, if you are into it, as well as a more open and arcade style racer. Fans of open world games will find loads to do here and racing sim fans will love the car selection and tuning, but the best bit is that everyone will find a fantastic game that makes you happy to own a Xbox One.

The Score

9.0

Review code provided by Xbox Game Studios

The Pros

+Fantastic open world design

+Presentation is incredible, from the cars to the locations

The Cons

-If car games are not your thing, there is little here that will change your mind

-There are some popin issues with the visuals when at speed