I really like the seasons, I really like the map, and I really the variety of challenges. But I’m not digging the structure of the game. FH3 was not much better (arguably worse, but it did feel more like you were making progress).
In at least one case that “other bonus” is a whole other car.
You should be buying the Miura anyway because it’s a beautiful thing, but one of its rewards you can unlock is another free Lamborghini.
One thing I like about the structure is that they hide the overwhelming content in the game from you at the beginning.
FH4 is all “Oh hey there, we just have these 4 or 5 different types of events. Just go ahead and do any of these 4, mmmkay?”
And then you do one, and it opens up 3 more of those type. And you do two of those, and it open 3 or 4 more. And pretty soon, there’s so many events and icons that you start feeling overwhelmed, but then hey, wait! It’s Seasonal events to the rescue! Seasonal events will be gone in a week, so you should do those first. And you do them, and then the season changes, and there’s new Seasonal events. So you can filter for just those and the content doesn’t seem overwhelming anymore.
Slowly, my impressions are a bit less glowing, in my mind I’m placing it just behind FH3.
The best feature of the fourth part is the better graphics + better performance combo. The rest? I think I preferred FH3.
Finished all of the story chapters, speed traps, and races. Bought all of the houses but the castles. Found all of the Travel boards, and all of the roads. Bought one car from the Autoshow the entire game.
Currently have 147 cars in my garage (could have more, if I claimed all of the cars from the DLC packs for my garage), nearly 4 million credits left over, and I’m around level 140. Haven’t done any farming of money or XP in the game, or on Mixer (yet).
The game is extremely un-stingy with rewards - it ramps up more and more, the longer you play. I’m just having cars thrown at me left and right now.
Tip:
Find a car for the dirt series events that you like, and upgrade the Mastery for it. You’ll be generating an absurd amount of skill points just from running the events. My Austin Cooper rally car seems to generate between 5-7 skill points PER RACE for me, without even really trying to get them. The perk that lets you collide with something without breaking your chain, is huge. And spending skill points also awards you Influence.
The off-road series is also pretty good for this, to a lesser extent. I find I don’t generate a ton of skill points road racing.
Oh, and Legendary-tier cars all have a one-point perk that gives you an instant 5k influence, so if you have a few spare points, find your oranges and put one point into them.
Best Horizon game yet.
See, none of that is fun to me. In a game like this, I want the progression to basically be earn money to upgrade your car, to let you compete better in races, to let you unlock a better car, which lets you compete in more difficult events, so you have to upgrade your new car, and so on. The driving is fun enough and beautiful enough that I still enjoy individual races, but the whole structure is fighting against me.
Forza 5 is the game if you enjoy that type of progression. But Microsoft got a lot of negative feedback from that structure, sadly (I’m a big fan of that progression too), so I don’t think they’ll be trying that again.
Yeah but that’s never really been what Forza Horizon is about. I haven’t played 4 yet, but in the others it’s less about getting better cars to drive better than about getting more cars to drive in different events. You can usually get into a pretty decent car that will take you pretty far (hey!) early on. The peak performance cars, yeah they cost a pretty penny. But you almost don’t need them, certainly not to compete.
Sure I understand that, which is why I’ve never liked FH’s structure. But I like open world driving, so I put up with it.
See, none of that is fun to me. In a game like this, I want the progression to basically be earn money to upgrade your car, to let you compete better in races, to let you unlock a better car, which lets you compete in more difficult events, so you have to upgrade your new car, and so on. The driving is fun enough and beautiful enough that I still enjoy individual races, but the whole structure is fighting against me.
What you describe IS the essence of the game’s competitive progression, though. Upgrades and cars cost money. You earn money by competing in events, and by earning influence through other activities.
Nothing in the Car Mastery trees actually make you faster, make you a better driver, or let you take shortcuts in the actual event - the majority of the perks are to enable the earning of more skill points, which allow you to unlock more perks, which allow you to earn more skill points, which…
There’s some rewards peppered in there too, like wheelspins, the odd credit bonus, some influence, and even a free car in a select few of them, but 90% of them are just for accumulating skill points. But the only way to meaningfully progress through the actual game, is by completing events. Doing donuts through stone walls until you hit the 500k point ceiling isn’t going to unlock anything on the map. Earning player levels without also leveling up in the various race/activity disciplines, isn’t going to unlock anything on the map.
I actually like the way they’ve implemented progression in FH4, versus any of the other games in the series. It makes virtually everything you do build towards the progression of SOMETHING, but also still makes the core events of the game necessary to truly progress through the overall game.
I’ve never even bothered buying the super-expensive cars in the Horizon games. I just wait to get them via a wheelspin, or event reward.
It’s actually fun to just go through what you win by playing and find something you like.
Heck, the Escort Cosworth you can get for free near the beginning of the game is, in my opinion, one of the better rally cars in the game.
Exactly. I want them to. Or rather, I don’t care about what they do in FH4. They let me “progress” faster, but progression doesn’t get me anywher;e.
Sure, but the upgrade money is trivial in the grand scheme of things, and there’s nothing gating access to cars. So you can get, and upgrade as much as you want the “best” car for a given event type in very short order. All progressing does is give you more options. Which is fine, but it’s not what motivates me in a game like this.
I usually end up buying one, assuming I don’t win one, like the Bugatti Veyron because I know I’ll be able to blow through speed traps without half trying.
I usually end up buying one, assuming I don’t win one, like the Bugatti Veyron because I know I’ll be able to blow through speed traps without half trying.
That’s a good point, though I have the Ultimate Edition so I got the Agera for “free”, which kinda took care of that need haha. Also got the Forza Edition Aventador with one of my first spins, which is a rocket in a straight line.
No Teslas in the game? They were in FH3 IIRC, so did they ask for more money (like Toyota)?
I’m going through the topic since launch and adding any gamer tags I come across. Feel free to add me – I’m not very good at the racing so my exploration numbers are creeping up there – GT: some piranhas
I’m just playing the game and not thinking about whatever progression I’m doing. I just drive and do whatever comes up or I find. This is a game that would drive a completionist crazy with all the things on the map to do or find.
This is it. I play, doing whatever, and buying a new car only if forced. I don’t pay attention to money or level or influence or whatever.
I finished the first year yesterday or the day before. I’ve gone through the whole Stunt Driver storyline. I’ve done all the Cross Country off-road tracks, except the last- I actually attempted that twice, but started over twice at the last turn because that turn is bullshit and I couldn’t rewind due to the 1st car already having crossed the finish line and all the other cars rush past you if you do anything wrong even a little. Still, fun. I haven’t even bought any houses yet. I do jump on every Barn Find I can, though- I only have 4 or five left according to the silhouettes, though I’m not sure how many are season-specific, or if there’s more than that or what.
I’d love to see Tom take another crack at the Horizon series with this game (especially after he was so disappointed in TC2) - I think he might actually like it? Maybe? Pretty sure Horizon 2 was the last one he actually played? Haha.
Another question for everyone: Anyone have a season they prefer over the others? For visuals, I think it’s probably a toss up between autumn and winter for me. For racing, I quite like spring, because the mud can spice up the dirt races a bit.
Welcome to the forums @ShakesMcQueen :)
I use Kwizzam on Xbox if anyone else wants another horrible drivatar.
“Why the hell do people keep inviting me to 50 lap Goliath races??”
Looks like there was a huge exploit they just fixed. 2 million cr & 75 wheelspins in minutes. Over 75,000 people were doing it from the Superstar achievement… yikes. I’m going to pretend that auction house doesn’t exist for awhile.