Bring back Unicorns

Forza Horizon Legacy Horizon FH2 Discussion
1

Throughout Forza 3, 4, and Horizon, I have been collecting Unicorns. I never got them all but that was ok as it was something to work towards. Horizon was great in that there were weekly scavenger hunts with the reward being a Unicorn. I loved this as it made exploring the map more fun and there was a sense of achievement in finding the item, taking a snazzy picture, and then getting a rare car as a reward. Even if you didn’t do the scavenger hunts there were plenty of opportunities to get them. Not enough so that everyone had them all but certainly enough so that it wasn’t too hard. More than this, they encouraged people to take part in the community. Most of my posts on the Horizon forums were scavenger hunt pictures and posts in the weekly update threads, but at least I was posting and participating. In Forza 5 the only reward is credits. I don’t have all the cars I want but credits aren’t exactly hard to get. With Forza Rewards I get a million credits every month for Forza 5 and I get them just for winning races. It doesn’t matter if I get a lot, the point is that credits are something I can get on my own. A unicorn car on the other hand is something that only Turn 10 can give out which makes it worth working for. Even if I didn’t get the scavenger hunt item I always had fun.

Brian Ekberg said this last year: “One other thing that I know will be of interest to the community: Unicorns. As of Forza Motorsport 5, unicorn cars are a thing of the past. We don’t have a list of cars that we are holding back – cars that you can only get by doing something specific in game – yet we will still be able to gift cars to the community. The cool thing is, by putting more value on each of the cars in the game, essentially any expensive car in the game will have real value and exclusivity. Going forward we will still have lots of opportunities for players to win gift cars via community contests and, as you’ll find, some of these prize cars will be truly amazing.”

Without Unicorns the idea of a gift car seems kind of moot. It’ll be nice to get them but if you don’t get them then all you need to do is get the credits and buy them. So you won a car? Are you any better off than someone who’s just bought it? Anyone can buy a car and find a tune for it, but a unicorn? That’s something special. That’s something you don’t see every day. It’s unique and something that made me want and made me get involved with the community.

So, please, bring back Unicorns for Horizon 2.

2 Likes
2

Please don’t.

8 Likes
3

Unicorn cars were a good way to get fans to participate in events for rewards but now that’s all in the past, they’ve stated before Forza 5’s release that Unicorns are no more because of how you can’t get the cars after they are done with the special events thus making it impossible to acquire those cars. It was great in the past but that’s all in the past now, just be grateful that you can have all the cars in the game without worrying about ‘‘secret cars’’

3 Likes
4

They were nice and all, I agree there, I had fun getting the 40+ I had in Forza 4, and the 20 to 30 something I had in Horizon, but I feel Turn10 made the right choice by not having them anymore. I like to think of the Day One cars as Unicorns to a certain degree, especially the rare Audi R8.

2 Likes
5

If the community is up to it, there could always be community-created unicorns. Cars by tuners with tunes they don’t share, or painters with paints they don’t share, etc, etc, etc.

But what’s to say that the receiver of one of these sudo-unicorns won’t try to re-turn or re-paint one of the cars they receive simply because they can…

Official unicorns, while the idea was alright, it ended up being a bit of a mess with people asking for them without even reading how to get one. There would be a “unicorn plz” thread every day or so… Then all the illegel distributions and sales of them which result in more “Why am I banned” threads…

1 Like
6

I really wish they would bring them back for the people who like to have a challenge of collecting them. I really loved collecting them

1 Like
7

No thanks…

I do like the option, like in FM5, to EARN a very special car like with the Community Bounty Hunts where SKILL and DETERMINATION “decide” which very limited cars you get in your garage.

2 Likes
8

No. I liked each of the cars that were Unicorns, but I had too hard a time getting them. The special editions with custom liveries are encouragement enough for me to participate in special events. If I decide I want to catch them all the hard way, I’ll play Pokémon.

1 Like
9

That quote is no longer applicable with the cost of cars dropped in half due to impatient whiners.

There very well may be unicorns since the work to earn high end cars (one of the few great changes to fm5) failed miserably.

3 Likes
10

What I thought exactly dang W.K.B.W.'s lol it’s a movie quote

11

^ Right here.

The original goal for FM5 was to have rare cars be rare in-game by having them be fairly difficult to buy. However, because the game shipped with token-shilling popups out the wazoo, everyone jumped on the fact that they were offering you a shortcut to these expensive cars by laying down insane amounts of real-world money. This created a massive backlash, causing T10 to restructure the economy so that the tokens were completely unnecessary, but also made it very easy to attain even the most expensive cars. The system might have worked if there weren’t tokens in the game to start with, but that’s an argument for another day…

In the end, you don’t play a fantasy racing game to not be able to drive the cars of your dreams, right? Unicorns were a clever idea for community interaction in the past, but now that many community features are integrated into the game itself, there’s no point to blockading them off. Might as well have all the cars available from the start, as we do now.

We don’t need them back in FH2.

3 Likes
12

I am most certainly indifferent on this issue. On one hand I’d love to see unicorns return because of the fun and satisfaction of receiving them; however, I understand many don’t have the time to be involved like some us and to know that they are missing out on some decent cars - and possibly their favorites - just doesn’t sit well with me.

So, with that I say bring on the unicorns only if a marketplace system can be established where they may be purchased at a respectably high price tag. If not for that, the hacking by some and the disappointment of others is sure to continue.

2 Likes
13

I agree completely, unicorns not being a meaningful part of the in-game economy meant that if you were skilled at the legitimate methods of acquiring them, you could end up with multiple (essentially worthless) copies of many of them on your way to collecting a full set.

DISCLAIMER: Most of the following is intended as deadpan humor, please don’t read too much into it. :slight_smile:

My main reason for not wanting unicorns to return in their previous form is that they became extremely devalued if you fell into this category. After placing in enough Horizon photocomps I finally got my full set and 2-3 extras of some before realizing I could request them to be sent to friends instead. Even though it’s nice to have separate cars, each with a different build/in multiple classes for online play, at some point it’s just hoarding since you can’t give the ones you already have away or sell them for a decent price. Opting out of receiving them altogether was an option, but it seemed better that someone should be getting the benefit rather than letting a reward go to waste.

So, I created a spreadsheet to track the unicorns that were gifted on my behalf & carefully made sure that they were evenly distributed, to avoid creating the same problems for those I intended to help. Despite my efforts to do what I thought was best, It still felt like I was doing other players a disservice by continuing to enter & win unicorns that my friends may not have wanted as badly as the people who were trying to earn them on their own.

I really enjoy sharing my photos, having the best ones recognized & hopefully learning, improving, and inspiring others. I don’t want to stop competing, but it’s become a more stressful than enjoyable experience trying to work out what the perceived value and appropriate time expenditure relating to these “rare” cars was.

Here’s a full accounting of what not caring entails in regard to photocomps:

In game - take photos, upload them with “Photo Mission (insert current week#)”
In game - If you place, drive the unicorn cars or not/do or don’t worry about multiple copies clogging up your garage, whatever!

Now the conscience-laden, unicorn-overvaluing version I submitted to:

In game- take photos, upload them with “Photo Mission (insert current week#)”
On computer - Check Photo Mission thread for the unicorns awarded for the current week’s
contest.
On computer - Check spreadsheet to see who you haven’t sent those cars to & make sure you request them for the appropriate individuals in the Photo Mission thread.
On computer - If you place, update spreadsheet with the appropriate data to ensure duplicate unicorns aren’t sent in the future.
In brain - stress out about whether you’re doing the right thing, wasting too much time doing/not doing the right thing, getting enough sleep, or actually playing the game that motivated this entire process.
In game - stop playing because you’ve run out of time/lost focus on driving & photography.

1 Like
14

I was a fan of the elusive unicorn. They brought me to the forums, and the news, which I had previously ignored. But I understand why they are gone.

1 Like
15

Barn finds are good enough in Horizon. Unicorns where a really hard to get in Horizon 1. Forza 5 did not need then and so will Horizon 2. They always attract hackers and moders because of their rarity people will do ANYTHING to get them.

1 Like
16

No thank you.

17

Huh? You’ve surprised me right there!

18

I always liked them because you have to be skilled to get them people just whined too much is why I feel like we lost them. Just because of those people the thing I thought was fun and prolonged the game was taken out collecting all 17 in fm4 was a challenge and I thought it was awesome then collecting all 7 in horizon wasn’t too hard but still took some time to get each one. Unicorns made bringing a community together good. people would just complain and whine after they didn’t get one I see it as a reason to get better

19

Not exactly.

20

More cleverness and luck than skill…

1 Like