Autumn leaves scatter along the British roads as this week brings another opportunity to unlock exclusive cars and cosmetics on the Festival Playlist, most notably headlined by the 1999 Ford Racing Puma, a front-wheel drive retro rally car by the American automotive giant sold exclusively in the UK.
What makes the Puma an incredibly rare and peculiar car is that out of the 1,000 Racing Pumas that were planned, only 500 of those ever rolled off the production line. This was also the final limited-edition Puma produced and it features an advanced 4-piston motorsport braking system, a beefed-up body with lightweight aluminum components, and a racing-inspired interior.
You can drive the Puma around its distant homeland by unlocking it in the Cool Cats Seasonal Championship, available alongside this week’s other Festival Playlist events and rewards until Thursday, March 23:
Yeah,trial is a pig.Lucked out in the 3rd race by getting awarded one of those random wins when you’ve actually lost, to give us a 2-1 win. I normally like tough trials,but the ai advantage in that one is just nuts,even when they aren’t cheating
Try either of these 2 cars. Hoonigan Focus RS RX WP or Hoonigan RS200. Both are fast but the Focus is easier, RS200 doesn’t have rally tires so while it’s high handling is good on dirt but it’s more slippery on grass. The Hoonigan Escort is pretty good too. I had a bad 1st race on the Focus thanks to the super AI physics and invisible force push.
After the first race I was surprised that people were saying they had trouble, since our team ran away with that one…but then the next two happened. I’m still kicking myself for the second race because I wasn’t paying attention and missed a late turn that cost me a couple of positions, and that wound up being the difference. (To be fair, there were two players in dead last, so I certainly wasn’t the only reason we lost.) The second time around, I straight-up won the second and third races, but sheer incompetence reigned for the rest of the team. (I was the only one who scored any points in the second race.) On top of people knowing how to drive, the AI seems like it’s in full spastic mode here.
But yeah, like Constin said, the WP Hoonigan Focus is the way to go. When I did manage to survive the carnage, I drove away from the AI fairly easily in that.
Glad you found it helpful. The Focus wouldn’t have been my go to for rally other than dirt trails as it’s pretty fast which so happens to be closely similar to cross country racing which works here. The RS200 and Escort are probably still best overall for dirt racing for rally monster category, RS200 for dry weather and Escort for wet/winter.
Having completed the World’s Toughest Rally (Weekly Forzathon) I’ve been trying out the 2013 MINI X-Raid All4 Racing Countryman; and while I’m still fairly new to the game, this is the first car I’ve come across that appears to require tuning in order to remain competitive (max difficulty, manual w/clutch).
Thus far I’ve only adjusted the final drive (gearing) setting which has allowed me to take wins on a few short tracks, but others (City Outskirts Cross Country, for eg) appear neigh on impossible, probably due to the MINI’s relatively lacklustre top speed.
Is this normal/expected? Should I start delving deeper into the tuning section and/or look at making some more major upgrades?
Thoughts appreciated.
(As said, I’m still fairly new to the game: completed the Dirt Series and about halfway through the Road Series.)
The Mini is capable of beating out Unbeatable since that’s my default difficulty. I’ve tuned one to max of A class for the weekly and championship.
The mistake most people make is upgrading tires. For offroad vehicles, the offroad race tires offer more grip for asphalt but it’s the stock ones that are more ribbed for better offroad grip and the saved PI points can go into engine upgrades.
If you’re still thinking about the car for the road championship, try tuning the XE-S. I had over 15s lead on the unbeatable AI during the last circuit race with it.
Edit: I may have misunderstood the post. Yes, It’s not unusual to expect not all cars are competitive at stock or even after tuning, only a few are out of many, some may be better in a certain class but worse under or above it. Tuning may improve performance or suit a personal style. The usual disadvantages prior to tuning is likely losing time due to lack of power or handling/grip causing understeer/oversteer through corners.
The MINI’s default config seemed a little odd to be honest: very low top speed, with the first few gears worked through almost immediately. Changing the final drive alone transformed it, allowing me to beat the unbeatable AI on a few tracks, but when a high top speed is required it just seems impossible (without the AI making a mistake, anyway!).
I’ve barely touched the upgrade and tuning sections of the game thus far. Finished the Dirt Series with the Subaru WRX '05 and working my way through Road with the Jaguar XKR-S '12; both cars stock (will take a look at the XE in future, but enjoying the XK at present). Was thinking of tackling the Cross Country Series with the MINI, which was when I ran into this ‘problem’.
Anyway, I guess I’ll take a look at upgrading it; will try and keep it in B Class, initially at least. Thanks for the tips!
It’s a difficult one to work out.
I was interested to look deeper into tuning as it’s something I’ve only dabbled with in the past.
After some recent discussions by various people on the Mini '65 I recently decided to have a closer look.
I took a stock Mini and built it with some small power / speed upgrades and some suspension upgrades and stuff to unlock the settings. Managed to get it to a D, 497 but then ran out of options for more upgrades without going into C class. Did some tuning and got it fairly competitive. Then tried the ZipperrPL tune which was all basically stock (so no real tuning options available) but it was more towards low weight and downforce.
Very similar outcomes between a heavier more powerful option and a low power / speed with reduced weight. I think I need to relook at something more in the middle of the both ways to go.
One thing that I’ve found with the Mini Xraid IIRC is the default diff settings are high. The front accel and decel settings are at 100%. I don’t recall what I ended up setting them to but I would drop them down, particularly the decel. It should help turning quite a bit.
I’ve reset to the stock tune for the mini, the gears are indeed too short and the car tends to want to straighten itself which causes understeer during cornering.
Leaving everything else stock, I did a guesstimate and simply adjusted the final drive to 3.86, increased camber -2/-1/7 and adjusted antiroll bars 1/35. Tested it on the 1st two tracks of this week’s trial on unbeatable and the mini is still much faster than it’s peers.
I’ve only played a bit of FH5 on game pass, only quite recently bought FH4 during the holidays sale. So playing these recycled playlists are like brand new to me too. IMHO, it’s never too early to dabble into tuning and it can be very helpful to your playing experience. The next trial is B dirt and ideal car is probably the Subaru 22B, which is very simple to tune. Try tuning that, it’s pretty good as it is even. Just figure out the upgrades you want and then drive it a bit and start making minor changes. The default rally suspension settings are good as is so try minor tweaks here and there and see if you can’t make it better.
Edit: Thought I changed the tire presure but I didn’t.
This may be the first Trial since I started doing every playlist that I’m not able to compete, and it’s through no fault of my own. The sheer incompetence of the playerbase this week is staggering. I’ve now had multiple races where I manage to pull off an outright win, yet multiple of my teammates are stuck in dead last. And that even included the first circuit race, which should be much easier than the other two! Like, learn how to freaking drive, people. Or at the very least, if you wind up in dead last, do everyone a favor and quit. There’s a special place in hell for Trial players who insist on finishing out a race even when they know it’ll guarantee the team loses.
Thanks for all the tips, guys; I’ll try out some of the suggested settings this eve.
Current final drive setting is 3.6 (everything else stock) which makes the car very competitive on some tracks (I picked up four ‘unbeatable’ wins on the Riverbank Cross Country Circuit with relative ease), but as I say, on others – namely City Outskirts Cross Country – it just seems underpowered. This course is a breeze with the Subaru 22B, so it’s not as though I can’t beat it; it’s just that I’d like to be able to in the MINI… The second half of City Outskirts is particularly frustrating: basically the car just doesn’t have the oomph.
I will be attempting next week’s Trial as I definitely want to pick up the Subaru WRX '04; my car will be either the Subaru WRX '05 or the 22B. This will be my first Trial event. Aside from the odd FPS, I tend to avoid multiplayer; are there any tips for competing in these team events? I notice @PD_Top_Gun suggests quitting if you screw up (heading for last place for eg) – is that the general consensus/considered good form?
Top speed of 220km/h seems pretty par with the AI, plus you don’t reach it most of the race except a couple of instances. Issues you might be having could be losing speed from hitting the random obstacles common in CC races, and losing speed from slowing down to make turns due to the understeer. The latter could be sorted with simple oversteer tuning, even my guesstimate with no testing made the car faster but it’s not ideal after running the races, with just a bit more oversteer tweaking it was much faster through corners.
