Forza Motorsport 8's New Physics Hints

Forza Motorsport Forza Motorsport (2023) Discussion
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Chris Esaki on the latest Forza Monthly revealed a handful of physics charges that will be coming to the next iteration of Forza Motorsport, so I just wanted to list those and give my hopes and thoughts for what they actually mean.

  1. New Tire Model.

Hard to tell what this means exactly because is very vague. I actually quite like Turn 10’s tire model that we have currently but if I have one complaint, it’s that the tire doesn’t compliment the suspension enough when it comes to damping. I hope the new tire model has a more soft and squishy property to it so that it actually works with the suspension in damping.

  1. New Way Tire Heat Effects Tire Pressure.

Pretty self explanatory. Currently, running around 28 to 28.5 PSI cold is the best pressure for almost every car in Forza Motorsport 7. Tire heat doesn’t increase the tire pressure enough from cold to optimal temperature, which I think will now change. Look at V8 Supercars for example, they sometimes run a minimum of 17 PSI. That simply wouldn’t work in Forza’s current model.

  1. New Air Pressure & Air Density Model To Effect Aerodynamics & Power.

Main things I’m hoping for here are really only three things. Firstly I’m hoping we get a basic altitude system where the closer you are to sea level, the more downforce and power the car produces and the opposite effect the further away you are. I’m also hoping cars have a bit more drag in general as I don’t think downforce has enough of a negative effect currently. Finally I’m really hoping that dirt air is simulated better than it currently is. For extreme downforce cars, like F1, LMP, IndyCar and such, once you get within around two seconds of the car ahead, dirty air should be minimal but start to have an ever so slight effect. The closer you get, the less downforce, particularly at the front should be produced.

  1. Track Temperature Effect Grip

I’m pretty sure that it’s going to be pretty much a ported system from Forza Horizon 4 where the colder it is, the less grip there is and vice versa. This is a feature in FM7 currently but it’s not dynamic to my knowledge which I expect FM8 to be. Maybe things like cloudy weather will have an effect now? Hopefully it’s fully dynamic.

  1. Track Now “Rubbers In”

Quite self explanatory but I wonder how complex or dynamic this will be and how high an effect this will have? Hopefully we get stuff like marbles off the racing line, though I wouldn’t count on it. I also wonder if the “Rubbered In Line” will actually be dynamic with where the cars are driving or if it will follow where the Driving Line is? Could be interesting to see.

  1. New Suspension Model

This is something I’m happy about. The main thing that needs to change is how Bump & Rebound works. It’s just wrong in almost every way. This has a negative effect on how weight transition works upon acceleration and braking in this game. The fastest method in this game for most cars is to run F1 car style of Rebound with Passenger Car style of Bump. Hopefully, the ratio between the two changes and becomes more accurate.

  1. New Suspension Modelling

I found it interesting that Chris differentiated between the two. I assume this means that we’re getting tweaks to current suspension models and new suspension models will be introduced. I’m predicting that we’ll get this:

Stock Suspension (classic & modern)
Street Suspension (classic & Modern)
Sport Suspension (classic & modern)
Race Suspension (modern only)
Drift Suspension (modern only)

Perhaps drag suspension? I’m pretty sure it was teased in a FH4 stream that they were messing around with the concept. Could be interesting. Either way I expect all of those suspension systems to be refined upon and improved upon. I also expect a few tweaks specifically to Truck suspension which was updated for FH4 and I fully expect that to get ported over with a few tweaks. Drift suspension when added to FH4 was also tweaked compared to FM7 so I expect there to be some revisions for FM8 as well. I expect spacers to come back as well but my guess is that Open Wheel cars will get the biggest overhaul, specifically push-ups suspension. I’m hoping that reacts completely differently in the new title.

I think these teasers have huge potential and promise and I’m really looking forward to see how they develop!

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Tyre wear. Can we have tyre compounds. Like you know, every other racing SIM. Oops, sorry I used the SIM word. Track temps effecting tyre life. Pit strategies to make better use of tyre compound.
Better collision simulation.
Weather done property.
Fuel loads please. I don’t need to fill up every time my one size fits all tyres are worn.
Kers and DRS. No point driving LMP’s and F1 without it.
Give us propper rally tracks or remove rally cars. Whichever one will do
AI in MP would be nice. It’s also obvious
Customisable HUD
Pits. Let me drive it. Don’t grey it out. Pit limiter and all.
Propper drive unit damage not generic one size fits all percentage
Flags

I just hope next FM is an ultimate driving game. What I hoped this one woul be.

Sorry guys, I know not all of this is physics. It kind of got away from me…

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I would love to at least have a much larger variety of tire compounds then what we have now.

As well as time of day. I really would like to see proper dynamic weather and time of day, GT5 did a far better job of it on PS3, surely FM8 can do it on Xbox Series X.

YES, we need proper simulation of Hybrid/KERS/DRS systems. As well as the Torque vectoring systems making it’s way to modern Electric performance cars.

Rally tracks please. No removal of cars in my opinion, even if they seem useless I sometimes like to do silly stuff in Forza.

I miss this from FM4

A few more things I’d like to see.

I know some people are very vocal about the Homologation system in FM7, Personally I want it to stay, but with a few tweaks to improve the overall experience.

  1. DO NOT Auto-upgrade every car to homologation spec when acquiring them. This alone lead to a lot of confusion from people thinking they can’t upgrade cars at all for Career mode, sinse the cars where already pre-upgraded to the PI limit of their division homologation restrictions. Plus you can often get a far better setup reverting it to stock and upgrading for homologation yourself (to the point that “Unbeatable” AI is too easy for me on some tracks).
  2. Open up cars to qualify for multiple divisions. Some cars in FM7 I would have put in a different division, or I think could work in more then one. This would open up the possibility for someone to take a car they love into more Championships in Career mode.
  3. Maybe multiple tiers to some divisions, like Street Spec, Sport Spec, and Race Spec, with each tier allowing for grippier tire compound, more HP and higher PI limits. Though this would add a ton of extra leaderboards for every sub-division.

For the Career structure, I’d like to see multi-bucket race Championships in Career mode. One of my favorite things to do in FM7 freeplay is to set up multi-bucket “Division Battles” between Divisions that have the same or very similar PI limits and see how they fair across a variety of tracks. Would be cool to do something like that in Career mode with the option to choose which division you want to race for. Also Le-man/WEC style multi-class races with LMP and GT cars on track at the same time. so you have to content with faster/slower cars on track depending on which class you are racing in. Though that really would need longer races to really work. I’d also like some Open PI Class Championships in Career mode that let us bring any car with any tune within the PI limit.

I would also like Career mode races to be a bit longer by default. I know FM7 did add the option to change length of Career mode races, but it is hidden away in the Assist settings and only appears when in the pre-race lobby screen of a Career mode race. Which lead to a lot of people that did not even know the option exist complaining that the races are to short to get to the lead without playing dirty and shoving the AI out of the way through each corner. Essentially promoting the Ramming playstyle that plagues many online races. My “solution”, Make the race length setting MUCH more apparent to casual players, Maybe even having a popup at the start of the game asking the player for their preferred race length. Make the “Normal” race length 50-66% longer (2 Lap race becomes 3 laps, 3 Lap becomes 5 laps, 4 laps becomes 6 Laps), and add a Short option that reverts to the stranded race length we have had in previous games.

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Absolutely YES. I could never understand why this is default with no option to change it.

Definitely. I’d like that too

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Couple of things:

Yes tire wear needs to be better and not glitched like it currently is. There needs to be a noticeable feel in tire grip loss when you have high wear and the wear needs to accelerate the with the more wear you have.

Different compounds are needed but it doesn’t need to be convoluted. A simple system of Hard, Soft, Intermediates & Wet would be enough imo.

There needs to be “sticking together” or magnetic effect in the collision system and I think the cars need to be less heavy.

Weather is done properly imo, it’s just not a 24 hour dynamic cycle like it should be. We need that + full control over the weather and how fast a day to night to day cycle takes.

Fuel loads and weight would be nice and it would be great to be able to adjust how much we want before the race and in the pit stop.

Now, to the big one, ERS… you see, Forza’s current model isn’t inherently unrealistic, in-fact, it’s more realistic than F1 2019 because, like Lando Norris pointed out in a stream, ERS is almost completely automatic. So the baked in system Forza has isn’t actually bad. You don’t change ERS & Fuel mix 50 times a lap like in F1 2019. A compromise between the system is what’s best. A simple OFF/AUTO/HIGH mode system would be perfect. They’re doesn’t need to be 6 modes like in F1, it’s unnecessary.

DRS should be manual and stimulated and we need DRS zones but imo, it’s not that important. Active aero simulation is far more important that DRS imo.

Pit limiter and manual drive in would be nice. I’d also like a warm up lap and manual starts / rolling start.

Flags and safety car is a must.

I’ve always been a huge advocate for a car list purge. 200 to 300 cars is more than enough. The benefits outweigh the negatives by far.

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Yup. That would do it

Puddles, gradually drying tracks - I know it’s there but it needs to be much better. Kind of like PC2. Definitely dynamic day / night cycle.

If ERS is now included in the cars’ performance it is still done wrong as it is then assumed to be infinite. Charging needs to be simulated. I would have nothing against having it automatic, linked to throttle position for instance (fully manual ERS would probably be too much work anyway). It should be possible to run out of electric boost.

I couldn’t agree more. In FM8 I hope the developers will spend less time creating beautifully made cars most of us don’t ever drive (hot wheels for instance) and use the development time to bring us better, motorsport focussed features. 300 cars is more than enough. 200 would do too.

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I’ve always said that 200 to 300 cars with a maximum of 8 cars per division is more than enough. That’d give you lots of variety for divisions and more than enough of them, it’d be easier to balance the division and would make it possible to release Balance Of Performance patches to certain divisions, it would help in balancing the PI system, it would improve car sounds and maybe car model quality, it would improve the physics because the developers would have more time to refine each car. The list goes on and on.

As for ERS, yes, I’d like all of what you’ve mentioned though if we keep the current system, I honestly wouldn’t mind. They could just decrease the power of cars that use ERS to make them seem to be running in a lower mode so it wouldn’t look like they have infinite ERS. ERS though cook, isn’t a big priority for me.

The biggest thing that needs to change is this:

A TCS, STM & ABS slider from 1 to 10 that can either be adjusted mid race or saved per car. This would transform Forza imo.

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I hope to see a few screen shots of Forza Motorsport 8 before 2020 begins. Sort of a Christmas :christmas_tree: gift :gift: from Turn 10 for their devoted Forza Franchise fans.

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Wasnt too impressed by any of this info to be honest. It’s pretty standard fair before any new release by turn 10. They ramble on about these invisible super advanced simulation “no ones doing anything like this” updates to the physics that you pretty much wouldn’t know existed other than them telling you. If anything this new info has me kind of worried because it’s the same old song and dance only difference is it’s now Chris instead of Dan performing it and I honestly dont believe either one of them.

I hope they’re paying as much attention to the quality of life issues the motorsport games have been suffering from as much as their new air pressure/density model. Only time will tell but if they start getting vague with the details about the game this summer like they did with forza 7 this will be the first forza game I pass on. Theres just too many solid options out there to deal with this nonsense again.

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Why you getting all wound up for? It wasnt even a stream dedicated to FM8 or any major announcement of the game. Why would anyone expect them to release loads of new information about the game on a stream like that?
I think the information they spoke about was quite impressive actually. I don’t think I’ve known a sim to include air pressure and density into their game. The rubbering will be interesting also, especially on endurance races.
On a side note, we all know Forza Motorsport 7 is hardly talked or searched about these days. The developers know this. I think they’re going to have to tease us with the game a lot earlier than we’re expecting to build hype. Hopefully we’ll have a lot more information within the next 3 months. If the new xbox is being released in june/july/August, I doubt they’re going to drag out talking about all the details a few months before the release. I hope the wait will be worth it! I can’t wait for this.

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Watch a video from a past motorsport reveal or interview around the time of a reveal and you’ll see a pattern. They like to tout forzas sim prowess by babbling about some super duper advanced technical improvements to try to grab the attention of their former base, but it usually adds nothing tangible to the game. Forza’s missing so many basic sim options, a simple look at pcars 2’s options will point out quite a few, yet for this next game they’re adding an air pressure/density model, for what reason exactly, other than to say they have it. The fact that it impressed you kind of proves my point, that was their goal, they are good at pr. Imo they need to get the basics done first and then they can go down whatever nerdy physics rabbit hole they want to.

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I’m sort of confused about your post because of two things:

  1. I’ve never seen Forza tout themselves as a “SIM”. Yes they talk about their physics model and updates to it like tire models and so on but I’ve never seen or heard them say anything to indicate that they are aiming to be a SIM until recently when Chris Esaki came on scene.

  2. What more basics need to be done to the physics? Apart from ironing out bugs to do with damage and tire wear, the foundation is set already. They need to expand now because we’ve had the same model since what, Forza Motorsport 3 with tweaks and adjustments here and there. It’s time for changes and big ones. They can’t hang around on the basics forever, especially considering the basics aren’t bad at all in Forza already.

What causes Forza to be more arcadey than it seems is the car list. The base physics are decent, I’ve always argued that but when you have 830+ cars, no car gets the refinement, time or attention it needs. Take a look at these videos for example, ones a comparison between Forza’s stock 1991 #55 Mazdaspeed Mazda 787b and my Realistic Tune & Setup for the 787b and one video is just me driving my version in a race at LeMans at night.

It shows how far the base physics can be pushed. No mods involved or anything, it’s all completely in-game and within the bounds of the current physics engine.

Like I said, Forza needs advancements and it looks like it’s getting it finally after 10 years.

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1-sure they have if I have time I’ll link some vids. Forza was made to compete with Gran Turismo which also touted itself a sim, but things have evolved since then and both games cant really be considered that anymore. I really thought Motorsport 7 was going to head in that direction because of games like Assetto Corsa, Pcars 1 & 2 and of course GT Sport releasing on consoles but it clearly didnt.

2-Like you said things have been largely the same since forza 3. At the time that was the standard but things have changed since then. We’ll see if they are going to bring things to the current standards for this genre. I’m not going to list every thing that forzas missing or exists in a pretty basic state. I feel as though Pcars 2 although rough around the edges has the tuning as well as race options that a modern motorsport game should have.

When the nascar expansion released in forza 6 I really thought they were going to add per side adjustments to the suspension which is important for oval racing, but they didnt. The fact that these tuning options are missing means they arent part of the physics and these are the kind of basic standards I’m talking about. GT Sport is also missing many of these things, they also have more work to do in that regard but they’re race day focus offers imo a better racing experience.

I dont consider motorsport arcadey because of the car list, but I do believe it’s something that will always hold it back because its impossible to accurately simulate all these cars as well as upgrade them in the way that forza does. It’s also what I believe is forzas strong point and I don’t believe they should remove it. But I do think they could add better race day options such as qualifying, fuel load, multipliers to fuel usage and tire wear, tire compounds etc. I think these would’ve gone a long way to help motorsport 7. So we’ll see what happens with the next game.

I didnt watch your vids because I dont know what they’re going to show me but either way I dont have an issue with the physics so much as i think they need to be updated in the ways i stated above. Not to be disrespectful but you cant really have a “realistic tune” when the tuning options arent available in the game. It also doesnt help that theres certain unrealistic ways of tuning in forza that give the best performance no matter what the car and has been used by the fastest players for the last 10 years. F1 games have a similar problem, but that’s also a game on an old engine that hasn’t evolved much in this regard either.

I know I come off negatively in my posts but it’s because forza was my favorite racing franchise and I really believed and wanted it to stay that way. But game after game comes out and they have tried to talk up the sim aspects of the games but imo the lack of improvements have come up short and has played second fiddle to what I consider meaningless additions. It’s easier for them to add driver suits and shaky cameras than it is to revamp the physics and tuning options because its 10 year old code made by people that dont work there anymore but I think the time has come to change that.

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I’m hoping different tyre compounds and a better implementation of wear will come into play with the next game. I think additions like that are great because people have more choice to tailor the experience to how they want it.

I think you could be right, I see the same issues crop up with the supposed “hardcore sims” too.

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I agree with ^. Forzas physics arent what hold it back really. its the lack of features that encourage proper racing. No flag system, 10 min sprint races. A hopper system that constantly rotates which completely discourages practice. Lack of a real pit stop etc. Forza could get by without a major overhaul by adding these and some other features. I am highly suspect on a physics overhaul also, they have said things before that they were making big changes and in reality it was nothing. iirc there was a complete pi overhaul recently no?
Pit stop with fueling and choosing amount of fuel
tyres that wear more dependent on driver.
get rid of 10 min sprint races except for maybe 1 lobby with races all being a minimum of 20-25 min.
Tone down rain, and get rid of the puddles which make rain racing the dumbest thing ever.
add qualifying
add rolling starts
some sort of schedule where each lobby stick to one track for a minimum of a day. That way people arent going to be going in blind every single time.
Add a system that encourages clean racing FRR is a start
continue to improve FFB

I am sure i could come up with more but thats a start.

@ evan -
Forza has always called themselves a sim since the beginning, but they also basically said we dont think a sim needs to be overly difficult which is why line, tcs auto brake etc were implemented.

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Apologies for the late replies to the thread, with this virus outbreak a lot of things have gone haywire here. Hope everyone is doing okay.

I pretty much agree with everything you say here Baby Cow.

No flag system is frustrating. I don’t think it needs to be overly complicated but I’d like a blue flag system (even if back markers are ghosted) just to warn drivers that other cars are approaching from behind. I’d like a yellow flag system as well that prohibits overtaking. I also think that there needs to be more rules with regards to overtaking when off the track (unless there’s an incident), cutting the white lines on pit exit and entry and how one rejoins the track.

10 minute sprint races are terrible. Agreed. Completely agree about the hopper system discouraging practise. Complete agree with lack of real pit stops.

Pit stops with re-fulling (that effects fuel weight) is a must.
Tire wear bug needs to be fixed and we need different compounds of tires (Hard, Medium, Soft, Intermediates, Wets)
Imo, races should be a minimum of 30 minutes. I like GTS’ system of the Daily Races where it’s one division on one track for a week solid. We need qualifying, practise and warm ups too imo.
Toning down rain I agree with. Imo Medium and Light rain are the best conditions in this game. I love the way the extreme rain looks in this game but no series would race on a track with puddles like that. Keep the visual and grip effect of the most extreme rain but get rid of the puddles imo.
Totally agree about rolling starts.
We need a safety and driver rating imo

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I’ve always been a Forza fan, I play the series since FM2 but 4 days ago I gave a GT Sports a try and the physics model for suspension and tire model is amazing! When in Forza I’m trying to fight the car and keep it on the exit of the corner in GT Sport it’s a pure fun when I push the trottle and car starts to drift a bit and I feel that I’m in control not fighting the handling but enjoying the moment, just playing with a car. I know that the fastest lap in most cases is the “grip” tactic but in GT it’s just so fun to feel this drift, how tires slips a bit how the weight transfers - it’s just seems real and natural. After playing three days I just can’t live without that feel of the car and suspension. I really love Forza and I hope new suspension model will add this details into the next Forza game because the good graphics is great but there are things that can stop us believing in what we see on a screen and the suspension of the car it’s movement, sliding, weight transfer, car sounds and different tire sounds - are those things that matters the most.
Just watch the GT Sport replays online and see how the cars tails wipe on the exit after full trottle how they catch the road in that moment, how they bounce on the springs when you hit the pedals - the cars live on a track and I hope we will see this details in a future Forza games.

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I don’t play online, but do usually complete the single player campaign, so a couple of things that could be added to single player campaign:

Shortest length races should be about 15 minutes - no of laps to be decided by division / class of car.
Multiplier of above between 2 and 4 to add variety
In races using multiplier of 3 and 4, add mandatory pit stop(s), possibly between lap x and lap y
Dynamic weather / time - this could link to a weather app - day, night or rain (not deep puddles as in FM6) as that location recorded 1 hour previous

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Some people won’t have the patience for that.
Personally I say make the “Normal” race length double what it currently is in FM7 while adding a “Short” option to reduce it back to what the current normal is.

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I think they should scrap laps completely in all honesty unless the series itself actually uses a lap system (such as F1).

It would be so much easier just to say 10 minutes for short races. Though I hate how the current system just abruptly ends the race. That’s extremely jarring. I think it would be best to say 10 minutes and finish the lap you’re currently on.

10 minutes for short, 30 for medium, 60 for long imo.