Hello to everyone. I started this topic to gather together all the feedback and suggestions that couldn’t possibly make it to FH4 updates. Not only my suggestions, but also yours. This is not really about bug fixes and little mistakes, it’s more about the game design itself, so very big changes that aren’t very likely to be implemented in an already finished game.
This thread is about brainstorming. This means that a “No” is not an answer, but at the same time we shouldn’t come out with totally crazy and unrealistic suggestions. If you suggest a feature that has already been introduced in a game, it is more likely to be feasible.
Since I know there are many different views on how the new Horizon should be, I think that we could organize them in several “game concepts”, instead of having them thrown in the Feature Request thread. This means that not all the requested features could be helpful for this Concept. If you want the next FH to be creazier and playful, open a new Concept thread or find the one that best suits your point of view.
This could also help the developers to choose which path to follow for designing the new game.
Oh and a new section for FH5 hasn’t been opened yet, so I’m posting in FH4 section because I find it the most reasonable one. If it’s not the case, please move the thread somewhere else but please don’t delete it (unless it goes against rules).
My point of view for a new Horizon could be summed up in some points (I may add more in the future):
1) Inspired to Goodwood Festival of Speed
2) Grand Theft Auto player experience
3) More immersive customization and car-management in general
4) Reproduction of real famous automotive places
1)
What I mean with this, is that I don’t really like the mood of this chapter. It’s way too flashy and colourful, not only for character/player dresses, but for things like the festival, or the festival signs around the map, or for the ramps that ruin the landscape (e.g. the one in the sea castle).
I’d really love if it would be set more like a Goodwood event, with haybales to limit track, banners instead of screens, the crowds not too cheerful
2)
a- This means multiple things. The first is that I’d really like a map where distances are smaller than reality, but with way more points of interest, like it is for the Grand Theft Auto series. I’d like that every zone has something meaningful that rewards (not literally) the player for the time spent there. In FH4 there are lots of forests which seem hiding something, but they haven’t anything inside, they’re just a lot of threes. Grand Theft Auto V is a good example for me of how the map should be, but I also reckon that FH speeds are realistic, and not decreased like in GTA.
b- The second is that I’d love a property system that works like GTA’s one. Especially, I’d love to have actual garages and not houses where the player can access all his own cars like they’re on a cloud streaming. That also means having like 20 or 30 properties all around the map available to be purchased, including home+garages or garages alone.
c- Tight roads and variable traffic, meaning that at night it is possible to race illegally, while at day the roads need to be closed by the organizers. There could be also rush hour traffic, but the LODs system needs to be improved a lot to make it possible, because textures load very slowly even with a few cars in the city.
3)
a- Cars are “physically” stored in each garage, meaning that if you want to drive a car you have to reach the garage with the current car (or leave it parked and take a taxi), and take the new car. Each property could be equipped with a trailer or a flatbed, so the player can move multiple cars from a garage to another, or pay a company to do it autonomously. This would also mean that there would be different types of garages: basic ones, with a couple spots; little hangars, with four to six spots; and large warehouses, with lots of spots and cool architecture, one different from the other, so the player can walk around and take photos to the whole collection, or just a car by moving it to a different spot of the garage, adjusting the lights that shine over each spot to hide other cars, etc.
b- Car setup and adjusting would be divided in different level of complexity.
The first level comprehends the changes the player can make by itself on the road: tyre pressure (maybe deflating only), auto gearbox logics, electronic aids presets, electronic suspensions modes if car has them, electronic aerodynamics, 4WD engange/disengage, convertible top, switch low range/high range gears, etc.
The second level modifications could only be carried on in service areas, which would be spread all over the map, with bigger and smaller stores. The service area should be inspired to Autobacs shops in Japan, where to buy accessories like wheels, suspensions, bodykits, exhausts. And interior customization parts, like it was for Midnight Club LA, or with spots where the player can place accessories, like in Euro Track Simulator.
There would be two or three service area companies, that sell slightly different things from each others, but all of them would have a repair shop where the car damage could get fixed (with time differing from lighter to heavier damage), or the setup could be adjusted. The adjustable parameters would be: all the first level parameters; suspension tuning, aero tuning, gearbox tuning__*__, electronic aids fine tuning (they shouldn’t be in the difficulty settings, and could maybe hugely condition the performance index of the car), basic ECU tuning (including turbo boost and other baisc parameters that modify torque curve), steering rack modifications (different levels of steering ratio).
__*__How gearbox tuning should work: the player can buy gearboxes from existing cars (especially when swapping an engine, the gearbox is often carried over), but not all the transmissions match with the car and the engine. This means that the player can buy a synchro 6 speed manual, 7 speed manual, 5 speed torque converter, 7 speed dual clutch, 8 speed ZF gearboxes, and fit them on his car. It would be awesome if it was possible to buy pairs of gears to fit in a stock transmission. Player can also buy racing straight cut transmissions for 5000-7000 cr, that have fixed gears, or develope new pairs of gears to have different ratios for each gearbox speed. A complete customized gearbox would cost around 20000cr, while each set of gears would be 5000cr.
c- Cars could be driven by AI instead of the player itself. Inspiration could come from Gran Turismo’s B-Spec mode, but in this case it would only affect commuting driving and not racing. Through an assigned button (or a quick menu like in F1 games), the player can switch to AI, if he’s currently in the nearby of a recognized road. The AI will take place smoothly, both from a standstill start and while cruising (under a certain speed), and would follow the path of all other traffic cars in the game. Like in Gran Turismo B-Spec mode, it would be possible to choose the pace, which would condition general cruising speed, accelerations, braking, cornering speed, etc. The car would follow the route generated by pointing a destination of the map, or would follow some basic inputs that could be: changing lane, exiting, turning at intersections, speeding up, slowing down, etc.
This feature that could be called “Cruising mode”, would have two benefits: the first is an alternative to fast travel, and can be useful for those who don’t want to spend money on that but also are tired of driving to the next race. The second one is that players can enjoy better the map. I play with keyboard and I always end up rushing from one side of the map to the other, but I don’t enjoy the beauty of the map and the landscapes.
4)
This would maybe require more islands and would slow a bit playing experience with loadings, but I think it could be worth it.
In FH4 there are some abandoned racing facilities that are supposed to be used for official events. It isn’t quite plausible to me that an official festival’s drag strip has bad paving and literally no safety measure nor runoff area… That the only test track of the map should be abandoned (a railway is crossing it) but also easily accessible and visible from the road, and despite its purpose is to be used constantly as the only race track on the map, every time you get to it the fences and the objects on the racing line are refurbished, as the State actually cared about what would be an abandoned facility…
The developers need to choose between a fancy, cheerful, and flashy festival, with screens and colours all over the place, and abandoned racetracks and dangerous drag strips. I’d go for the second, as the 1) chapter suggests. This is why I think that it would be brilliant to have more abandoned facilities where the only races would be illegal. This facilities would be inspired by places like: Laurel Hill tunnel, Stiges-Terramar circuit, an abandoned track like Reims or Charade/Clermont Ferrand…
Some important design fixes:
- auctions without actual cars, but only a couple of photos of it, so the auction itself loads faster. This means that auctions could be moved to an external app
- LODded model of cars everywhere, not only during gameplay, since the game struggles rendering the car in the cutscene before a race, when the doors open and the interior is visible.
- separated video settings for gameplay and photo mode, because trees’ textures suitable for driving at 250MPH are crap for taking photos, and same is for car’s level of detail.