I had played FM3 a little bit. I bought it after I was already well into Forza 4, because of the long version of the Positano/Amalfi map. I didn’t do anything creative in the FM3 Paint Shop, and spent 99% of my time on FM4. I have a friend with a serious illness who raced with me nearly every day, sometimes for hours. This guy is a genius at tuning the Forza 4 cars, and we spent so many enjoyable hours painting, tuning and driving. His medical condition is worse now, and he can only go online for 30 minutes or so at odd times of the day.
Anyway, Forza 4 no longer works very well at all for me. In the FM4 Discussion forum there is a thread describing the problem. Short version: I can still paint and tune Forza 4 cars, but driving has become almost impossible.
All this has caused me to come back to Forza 3. I’m now starting to appreciate some facets of this game which are, IMHO, superior to the successor. In their quest to make the simulation aspect more “realistic,” I think the developers may have thrown out some of the more enjoyable parts of the racing experience. My personal opinion (and I don’t claim to be a high-falutin’ expert on anything to do with games) is that many cars were much more fun to buy & drive in stock form in this game. In Forza 4, some of my favorites (one example: Corvettes) have been turned into slow, poor-handling losers, and can be improved with upgrades and careful tuning but still seem handicapped compared to other GTLM & GTD-type cars. Some, like the Hannessey Venom or Koenigsegg CCGT, are just wildly unstable until you get in there and tune the suspension. I also feel they’ve let their fondness for Japanese cars like those in the __Fast & Furiou__s series distort their goal of accurate simulations, but since I’ve never owned a “street tuner” car, I could be wrong about that. My point is, it’s a mistake to go whole-hog into ultra-realism if you’re not going to be completely objective. Just because J. Clarkson hates certain (American) makes, that doesn’t mean they’re terrible cars. As for me, I’d rather have a C5.r than a dozen Aston-Martins. See how crazy personal preferences are?
In Forza 3, there are lots of cars which handle well and are competitive with no tuning whatsoever. Not to suggest everything in Three is perfect. Certain cars are still surreal in their performance, like the Saleen S7 and the Time Attack HKS Mitsu. Sure, the real cars are great, but not that great. These are nitpicks, I think.
The point is, I’m loving this older game and will be sad when it goes away. One way you can tell I’m content is that I’m spending waaaaaay too much time painting cars and creating vinyls. Now if I can just learn to get around midtown Manhattan without smacking into those tire barricades…