Is this franchise completely screwed?

Biased much?

I TRIED to post this under it’s own comment, but kept failing, so here’s hoping I’m allowed to here:

Also, I wrote this before trying to post it, so I truly want it posted on the official forums “somewhere…”

This game does SO many things right… I started the Forza games with Horizon 4, but have been playing racing games since Atari, where cars barely looked like cars… but racing games truly started getting good, to me, with Gran Turismo, of which I first played GT2… and being a game which is about track racing, I am honestly NOT a fan of Forza’s version of track racing games.

The Horizon series is the pennicle of the Forza games, as there is no comparison. From the graphics, to the tracks (which are ALL custom-made, and are excellent), to the cars (from how they look, sound, and are able to be customized in looks and upgrades)… as well as the open-world maps… with the challenges of speed traps and zones, jumps, drifts, as well as the multiplayer challenges which allow us to earn Forzathon points… which, with the 5th game, we can actually solo, unlike with the 4th (which, to me, is a MAJOR improvement) and I haven’t even talked about the online play, which, is a constant challenge, to me, and with ANY racing game, keeping it challenging is HOW you keep players engaged in the game…

For such a good game, that gets SO many things “right…” I don’t see why the developers “punish” the players… so much…

What am I talking about? Let me explain…

  1. I guess my biggest complaint, is how, when we go to download other people’s tunes… we download it originally, yet, the specs AREN’T fully “transferred,” in which we have to go to our tunes, and “install” it again… for them to be FULLY transferred… and so, we HAVE to do it twice, for EVERY tune… which with so many cars to tune… can take FOREVER…
  • Then… for EVERY tune we use, it gets “saved” to our tunes… and after a certain amount of tunes downloaded… and saved… we get “full…” meaning we HAVE to delete “old” tunes… in order to add “new” tunes… and while, deleting “old” tunes DOESN’T erase the old tunes from the car (like deleting paint jobs does), there is NO way that I’ve found… to mass delete “old” tunes… so we HAVE to go through EACH car, one-by-one, in order to delete EVERY “old” tune… just so we can add new tunes… which, again, takes for freaking ever…

  • I don’t understand WHY we CAN’T have multiple tunes for every car… ready to go… whenever we want to “switch” tunes… to something else… and while, yes, I DO understand how allowing us to do that, on their servers requires, more server space for them… why can’t we just use OUR memory, to do so… just “allow” us to use as much as we want… so we don’t get “full…” and… allow us to mass-delete them, if we desire to… and most (or all) of this, can be also said about every “design” for cars in “My Designs…”

  • Then, regarding “favorite tunes…” every one we save gets saved to a long list… which ISN’T “sorted” by ANYTHING… when we chose a car, if we are TRYING to find a tune which we saved to our “favorites…” it is IMPOSSIBLE to “find” the “favorites” for that specific car… why can’t the favorites ONLY show the favorites for the specific car we are driving? instead of having to scroll through a long list? HOPING to find the car we are looking for…

  1. I guess my second-biggest complaint… is regarding the “favorite” system… which, for me personally, is what makes it extremely difficult in choosing the “right” car, when racing online… against other people… to which, I “sort” them by “favorites,” then by “car type…” then try to find the “right” car to use… for a specific set of races…
  • Yet… first off… there is ONLY one “set” of “favorites…” for ALL cars combined… it would be EXTREMELY helpful… if there were “more…”

  • Also… or perhaps, instead… when sorting cars by “car type…” All “rally” cars AREN’T “together…” All “offroad” cars, AREN’T “together…” all “GT” cars, AREN’T “together…” and so, it just makes “choosing” the “right” car… in the short amount of time (which, the time-limit IS needed, and DOESN’T need to be extended), but to choose the “correct” car for the specific “set” of races… can be extremely difficult… due DIRECTLY to “this…”

  • Also… it would be EXTREMELY helpful, if the “type” of races was able to be “displayed…” AS we are “choosing” our cars… as, I OFTEN find myself backing-out, in order to “see” what kind of races we are racing… so that I “choose” the correct “type” of car… it is self-defeating, especially the more time that has already passed…

  • And so… I would LOVE to see… more “sets” of favorites… instead of just “one…” perhaps, for EACH “type” of car… in the game… so that it’s easier to “choose” the car we need… when “searching” for the car we want… in the “limited” amount of time that we have… for things like online races…

  • And also… perhaps… another category… for cars that we “dislike” also… or, cars that may be “good” for solo racing, but AREN’T “good…” for online racing… against other people…

And so, these two things mentioned preveiously, are my BIGGEST complaints… and are things which I consider ways the developers “punish” us, the players… and… are things, which MOSTLY, “should” and “could” be VERY EASILY resolved…

A few “other” things… that I have complaints about… are:

  • Why the HELL… do we have to “view” each and every “new” car… that we HAVEN’T ever “entered…” with the “extended” preview… EXCEPT when we do so in the “Designs & Paints” section… of which, we CAN’T “sort…” by “recently added…” which… is absolutely INTENTIONAL by the developers… which can be assumed… to FORCE us to have the “extended” viewing for ALL new cars… as I just described…

  • While I LOVE how we can gift cars to others, especially when “winning” duplicates on the “wheel…” it REQUIRES so many button-presses in order to do so… we should be able to have a “default…” which ONLY requires one or two button presses (at the most) in order to do so… and while yes, we ALL fully understand how every car we gift makes the game “better…” to me, that message is just ANOTHER button-press that is required… just to “gift” a car… when, if we DON’T “gift” a car… it is ONLY “one” button-press NOT to do so… again… it’s ALL so self-defeating… to which, I TRULY believe, contributes to people NOT “gifting” cars… because of all the button-presses that it takes…

I KNOW I have more complaints which I’m forgetting about here… but, this covers the most significant that I have…

I want to again state, that I LOVE these games… yet… these are just a few things that could make them a WHOLE lot better… quite easily… at least, in my opinion…

I’m sure that this little message won’t have much influence in the future development of these games… but it is my sincere hope, that some or all of what I’ve said, is at least considered…

EDIT:

I also wanted to add how much I’ve played these games… which I’ve added a couple of screenshots from Steam.

For FH4, I’ve played 1,265.8 hours - on Steam - I also own the FULL game, with ALL of the extras through Microsoft, just like with Steam… which I did because first, I got it on Steam during an excellent sale, but, it just always seemed to play better (for FH5) on Steam, which after buying, found that it was the same for FH4. And so, if added both together, I imagine total hours played between the two versions, would be much closer to what it is for FH5, below.

And for FH5, I’ve played 2,108.9 hours.

I wanted to add these, just to show that I have played these games a whole lot… and continue to play them… (mostly FH5 now), but I TRULY like these games… yet, there are a few things that could be… a WHOLE lot better…

FH4 Steam Hours Played

FH5 Steam Hours Played