Forza Motorsport 4 [Review]

FULL REVIEW

The very notion of speed as a consumable evokes burger-sized chunks of pure adrenaline, but it need not necessarily be a fast food. Microsoft and Turn 10 Studios take the art of speed and swirl it around in a clear glass, the mixing right-brain and left-brain aspirations evenly. It's vintage distilled and refined to a perfection. Forza 4 is all about pure automotive love, and does a fantastic job of showing it.

The Forza series is Microsoft’s answer to Sony's acclaimed Gran Turismo. Both are racing simulations that focus more on realism in every aspect of the all encompassing verb “to drive”. Each interaction of the game focuses on delivering the player closer and closer to the experience of actually being behind the wheel of some of the best automotive engineering of tommorrow, today and yesterday.

There’s nothing new in most of the features of Forza 4. In fact, there’s a lot of Forza 3 that's already in the latest game. What the developers have done is streamline and reshuffle everything around. One of the biggest features, to fans and non-fans alike is the addition of Jeremy Clarkson and the Top Gear franchise, integrated into the whole experience. Many times you will recognise the smug, dry-witted drawl of the famous TV show host as he gives his valuable insight on cars, within the AutoVista Mode. Everything about Forza 4 screams of the highest production value.

Forza 4’s career mode is a world tour that takes you across the globe, where you can pick specific races based on your car, which then nets you credits, so you can buy more cars to unlock the higher-tiered races. A lot of Forza 3’s tracks make it back into the game with minor facelifts. While most people might think this is a minus, if you think about it, and it's not dissappointing that they left out Nurburgring.

All of the tracks are rendered in glorious detail. Having been to the Hockenheim ring in Germany, it surprised me at the level of detail in one of the sunset races. Some of the Switzerland tracks are beautiful to the point of you just wanting to stop and stare. It would have been absolutely fantastic if tracks had weather conditions to spice them up. Possibly some thunder and rain, if not night tracks. You also get to drive on the Top Gear test tracks in a series of interesting puzzle-like minigames involving bowling pins. You also have other minigame tracks such as weaving through cones, drifts and drag racing to pep things up.

One of the most interesting innovations in Forza is the inclusion of multi-racing events, where there’s another race with another class of cars happening on the same track. So you have to not only watch out for your cars, but you also have the added problems of higher-level cars to fight past, each with their own agenda.

Forza 4 provides a fantastic driving experience for both casual and hardcore gamers alike. The cars control well, and feel great on the tracks. Forza 3’s car models were beautiful, but had a weird sense of disconnection with the tracks; that's not the case with Forza 4. For beginners, you get a pathing line which breaks for you around corners, generally letting you just concentrate on getting the feel right. For the more serious gamer, he can turn all these assists off, and actually choose to drive in manual, but also a manual with clutch, giving you amazing control of your vehicle on the curves. Don’t forget to put it in a lower gear on the inclines.

Tweakers can go in deeper into their vehicle setup. You earn credits to buy your own cars, with each race you can tweak everything from tyre pressure,  differentials, gear ratios, to eke out every last ounce of power from your car. You can also use your credits to upgrade your car opening up more tweaking options. When in the race you can view stats, such as tyre heat, so you can monitor these in real-time, then course correct in your next playthrough of the track. You can also pause the action midway, and go into the photo mode, to take stunning shots of your car in action.

The AI is quite capable in Forza 4. Earlier in the game it sort of lets you win, but once you get the hang of a few tracks, turn off a few aids, the AI ramps up and provides quite a challenge. With each race, you and your car levels up, like an RPG. Not only that, your brand affiliation also nets you extra points and credits.

The cars in Forza 4 will leave you speechless. The game has included a superb AutoVista mode, which lets you actually feel like you’re walking around the car, interacting with the various parts. The presentation is breathtaking, as classic, new and yet unreleased cars like the LexusLFA are showcased with interchangeble background environments. All the cars look so real and the camera angles make it all so much more fantastic. There are spots where the aliasing kicks in, ruining it, reminding you again that this is a console, but those are just a few spots. The Xbox 360 does a fantastic job pushing such visuals.

The background in the Autovista mode can be switched to a whole bunch of lighting modes. There’s natural and indoor studio lighting, and you also get the ever familiar Top Gear hanger. Each of the cars in AutoVista has audio cues, which plays out in a very nicely presented typographic on visual loveletter to that car. You can also take photos in AutoVista mode, bringing out the car photographer out in you.

Forza 4 has a bit of Kinect intergrated into it. However, it’s not the level of what the hype machine had built it to be in the initial reveals of the game. Kinect is just present in a few instances in the AutoVista mode. Very insignificant.

The online world is intergrated very well into Forza 4. All your badges and stats appear online, including the photos you have clicked. All the cars that you have won or bought and levelled up appear for use online as well. All those cars can be customised in a surprisingly detailed editor. You can take all of this online and participate in massive 16 player races. There are car clubs online where you can share tuning settings, paintjobs etc.

Forza 4 is a complete package. It has everything to please both sides of the fence, the casual player to the advanced tweakers who are insane about cars. If you love cars, driving, and Top Gear, and you happen to own an Xbox 360, there’s nowhere else to look but Forza 4.