I’ve been playing on a PC with a Logitec G920 wheel, this is my initial impression after playing most of today.
The Pros:
This game is absolutely beautiful! The new weather effects are incredible, and really feel dynamic. The cars look gorgeous, and the new “rattle” affects give a better sense of speed than we got in 6.
The redesigned mod system is a huge step up from Forza 6. I did not like the roulette system in Forza 6 that usually gave mods. this was especially bad because the mods in Forza6 felt poorly thought out. I like that the new system feels purely optional. However, it seems like you should always be running a full set of mods for maximum payout (just buy the 20k crates).
I like that the progression system gives the choice of a car, or cash, or a suit. I don’t know why I’d care about the suit, but perhaps someone else does. The choice of a car or cash feels better than the roulette from F6.
The force feedback on the wheel feels more refined than in F6. Forza 6 often felt overly jittery. Forza 7 it feels much smoother, but still conveys useful feedback.
The Cons:
Crashes. It has crashed 3 times on my today. Hard crash, the process just disappears. Again, I’m playing on PC, so perhaps it isn’t going to be as stable as console with fixed hardware. Still a little disappointing.
Graphics glitches. Once I had large swaths of the terrain just disappear, I was basically driving in a grey void. Only happened once though. I’ve noticed that some of the spectator animations don’t loop properly, and look very glitchy.
The structure of the campaign feels questionably designed. The early series sometimes require you to own a car that is completely unaffordable. This basically limits your options to less than half of the available series because you can’t afford to participate in all of them.
You always start near the back of the pack. Why? If I finish first, in the first race of the series, why do I start at the back in the next race? My starting position should be based off my overall position in the series. The first race could have a single lap qualifying for start position. The fact that you always start near the back is made worse by the next con, AI.
The BIGGEST CON is that the AI is still broken. The AI will drive straight into the back of you. This is especially bad on maps with an early hard corner, like Mt Panorama. Basically, I have to slow down for the cars in front of me, but the AI behind me doesn’t respond to my braking, and just rams me. This is made worse by the fact that you can’t rewind to the beginning of the game, nor can you easily “restart” the race. The game just ends up feeling like a constant struggle to fight through traffic that drives you off the road. This is true even when reduced aggression is enabled.
I actually think that the bad AI contributes to a bad multiplayer experience (I’m basing this off my experience from F6, I haven’t played MP in 7 yet). How does AI affect multiplayer? Well, I think that new drivers get used to playing with AI that rams them, and they get the feeling that this is normal, and just part of racing. Then the jump into a multiplayer lobby and don’t think twice about slamming into people. There should be penalties for hard contact in both single and multiplayer. Single player needs to have a penalty to teach people how to race respectfully, or at least strongly reward people for doing so.
Overall, I’m really enjoying it, but I still feel like it could have been better.