Forza Motorsport 4

It concerns me and pains me deeply that, short of some amazing financial windfall, by the time I am anywhere near being able to afford a proper, full blown supercar, there won’t be any left to buy. Chances are we’ll all be whizzing about in silly flying cars or simply teleporting from place to place. More worrying still, future generations will probably never even get to hear the gargantuan roar of a V12 engine, or smell the delightful fumes as a heavy throttle sears through another gallon of fuel. The fact is that, after over a century of refinement to the same basic principle, the petrol combustion engine may actually be reaching its twilight years, up against the world’s environmentalists telling us we all need electric-hybrid-nuclear pods that run off cow manure. Times, they are a’changing. In fact, the way things are going, by the time you’re done reading this review your car and its belching carbon emissions will already be outlawed for poisoning a panda bear.

There is a last bastion of hope though, for those who still yearn for the jaw-clenching rush of a supercar at full tilt. It’s in the world of video game racing that we get as close as we can hope to get to living out our most extravagant motoring dreams - and nowhere is this fantasy brought to virtual life as vividly as in Forza Motorsport 4. Building on years of success in the Forza series, this latest edition is streets ahead of its predecessors in every way. Not only is Forza 4 the best in the series by far, but a fair contender for the title of best racing game across all platforms - ever. As bold a claim as that may be, once you’ve spent some time under the hood of this rumbling beast of a racer you’ll be hard pressed to find grounds to disagree.

Forza 4 is the zenith of motorsport gaming for any number of reasons, but what makes Turn 10’s latest masterpiece stand head and shoulders above the rest is the undeniable love and passion with which the developer has approached the subject matter. That in itself is something made visible through a host of factors - from the awe-inspiring vehicle models, to the vast collection of cars - young and old - available to obsess over, to the impeccable vehicle handling and plethora of game modes on offer. Ultimately Forza 4 is not about one thing, it’s about the coming together of many parts, each tuned to perfection to create this motoring dreamworld.

Without delving into hyperbole, Forza 4 really is an amazing achievement from a game design perspective. Everything about it has clearly been worked through to the finest detail, and it shows in the finished product. As astounding as Forza 3 was, it had its faults and had its (often justified) detractors; beyond any technical shortcomings, it was cold and clinical and didn’t suffer fools gladly. Forza 4 is still the hardcore car enthusiasts dream, but this time the whole experience has been put together in a more stylish, approachable package. Gone is the predecessor's habit of making you feel like you are being dragged from event to event and being shoved from race to race, replaced with a more organic, natural progression system for the career mode. The world tour is now more compelling and accommodating, making room for newcomers and veterans alike thanks to widely customizable difficulty settings and a huge variety of event types to test your mettle.

Small tweaks abound - things that aren’t necessarily unique to Forza 4 but which combine with everything else to make an even more comprehensive racing package. On the track, each corner, overtake, drift and high speed moment is rated on the fly with a score out of four popping up unobtrusively in the corner of the screen; this soon became an obsession for me, as I found myself taking far more care not to veer onto the grass during a turn or to swap paint with an opponent as I snuck past, all my focus on scoring the top rating for each maneuver, which in turn nets you more points at the end of the race. It’s subtle additions like this which can change your approach to a race. There are badges to unlock for completing various tasks on the track, and everything is tied together with a well implemented XP system. Experience is split between you, the driver, and the vehicle marque you are driving at the time - race more with one marque and your vehicle affinity increases, unlocking more badges, netting you better discounts and so on. Leveling up your driver gives you free cars, chosen from cleverly organized themes, giving you more control over the contents of your virtual garage. The integration of the XP system between online and offline play adds extra incentive to keep at it. All in all it’s not far removed from the leveling system from Forza 3, but it is more streamlined and concise and makes reaching that next level just that much more compelling.

Of course the heart of the whole experience rests in the actual racing itself, and this year the Forza brand has made an even stronger showing than before. Forza 3 was far from an arcade racing romp, but Forza 4 has an even more precise and nuanced feel to it on the track. There is a more obvious feeling of weight to each car, a pull, dip, sway and roll that comes with each change in pace, direction, even surface type. The cars you start with feel sluggish though, cumbersome even, but that’s to be expected from 1.4L econoboxes, and once you start throwing some money their way - in the form of wonderfully detailed and customizable modification options - even these slow dogs learn some new tricks. Your opponents seem far more lifelike this time too, showing signs of human ingenuity and stupidity which helps to alleviate that feeling of racing against flawless robots. They will charge aggressively or hold back timidly depending on the situation. Unlike many racers where it seems it’s only when you push them that they make mistakes, here the AI aren’t immune to bad racing lines, trips into the sand barriers and even massive accidents without your involvement.

The on-track action is clearly the basis for a racing game, but what gives Forza 4 such depth and character is its wealth of motoring content beyond just going faster than the next guy. It wouldn’t be Forza without a truly monumental car garage to wade through, and as you can expect Turn 10 has delivered the goods. I’ll admit that even with such a vast collection of cars to admire, buy and modify, I still wanted more - I guess it’s like they say, the more you have, the more you need - but rest assured that there are more vehicles on show here than you will have money to buy them with. Each of them has been lovingly recreated in the most sumptuous detail, with astounding attention given to texturing, lighting and reflections, making the cars in Forza 4 as close to photo realistic as we can hope for in this hardware generation. The race locales are also stunning and exquisitely detailed down to the smallest element, although some might have hoped for a wider selection of tracks. Still, their quality outweighs any possible complaints of quantity, and there are a number of race configurations for most of the tracks too, and different tracks suited to specific events to mix things up.

Part of what gives the career mode a needed jolt of personality this time around is found in the different event types spread out among the traditional circuit races. Mountain Chase mode takes a page out of the Need for Speed: Carbon book, pitting your skills against a rival on a mountain pass littered with other slow vehicles not involved in the race, while the addition of Multi-Class races has a fleet of supercars sharing a track with F-Class hatchbacks, a race which will quickly remind you just how far apart these vehicle classes are in terms of ability. These events and many more also add a lot of variety to the online game, a luxury in a genre where multiplayer is often dumbed down to simple circuit racing and little else. A game of car-based “tag”, or cat and mouse - where teams of stronger “cat” cars need to protect the small “mouse” car from the other team’s cats - as well as more traditional drag races and even Top Gear inspired car soccer add up to a fully featured online component. Not only is there a lot to do, but the racing itself is smooth and almost trouble free - I did once find myself trailing a Ford Focus which kept hopping about 15 feet into the air. Add in the robust and neatly presented lobby system, brilliant marketplace for buying and selling cars, paint jobs and more, and the ability to create or join Car Clubs to get a sense of community spirit going, and you have a multiplayer experience here just about unrivaled in the genre.

The multiplayer aspects, just like the racing, the visuals, the presentation and almost everything else here, are just so completely polished - nothing about Forza 4 feels rushed, instead every element of the game exudes confidence. The only time it ever felt like the game lost traction for a moment was with the much vaunted Kinect implementation - primarily through a simplified race mode where you control only the steering while the AI controls your speed, which just feels at odds with the brilliantly poised controls of the standard game. Kinect is used to better effect in the new Autovista mode, which gives you a perfectly modeled supercar and lets you explore it via motion gestures. It’s incredible to see just how far we have come with this hardware generation, and nowhere is it more obvious than with these breathtaking Autovista recreations.

It’s quite incredible to explore the wealth of motoring-related content that Turn 10 has squeezed into Forza 4; no surprises then to see that the game comes on two Xbox 360 discs. More impressive still is that very little of this content feels like unnecessary filler - content for content’s sake. Obviously there will be elements here which some people will overlook as inessential, but that’s a matter of personal preference and not a judgement on the quality of what is on offer. A motoring enthusiast could easily become completely absorbed in the Forza 4 world for months, surfacing once in a while just do download the obligatory car and track packs which are bound to come our way; at the same time, the structure of the game is such that even casual gamers who enjoy an occasional burst of speed will be able to sink into the glorious motoring playground that this game represents. Turn 10 can take a well deserved victory lap, because Forza 4 has raised the bar for racing games on pretty much every possible level.

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