First of I would like to state I have been playing racing games since the GT days back on PS1 and that I think FH4 is actually a really good game, the open world semi-sim genre is appealing to a range of different gamer’s. Those who want to cruise, drift, drag or a little bit of semi-serious racing. FH4 was a hit when it was initially released because of that but it seems that PG have now lost direction on where they are going with all these new updates and token features. I see all the requests for more cars or “bring back the Supra” threads but in reality this game has so many good car options in comparison to other games, and if Toyota don’t want to licence their brand to Forza there is not much PG can do.
That said… a game that is essentially built around the ability to drive different ways (as above) should cater for those different drivers. Locking exclusive cars behind achievements is nothing new, but I think PG have lost the plot with Season 7. Ranked adventure is already a nightmare, no fix to the fundamental ramming / wall riding issue for 6 months has put people off playing it and now PG are essentially forcing (I understand it’s a choice, but on the basis you want the exclusive cars) players who don’t want to play ranked adventure to complete at least 8-10 to qualify. I played ranked adventure yesterday for 2 hours and I managed to complete 4, there was the usual waiting, disconnect, ramming / wall riding chaos but now there are thousands of non-interested players doing burnouts at the start line just to complete the quota. PG have essentially diluted what was already a pretty poor semi-competitive racing league.
My solution – lock exclusive cars / content behind “monthly influence levels” for each of the main racing types or alternatively for “skill based challenges”. For example lock the Hoonigan RS200 behind a total Rally influence level for the month or lock the M3 GTR behind 5 x monthly drift zone scores set noticeably higher than 3 stars. You could even lock a car behind 5 x monthly rival events where there is a set timed lap you have to beat for each one. I know we have these types of challenges already but they are a minor part and add no value, the current rivals event is “complete 1 clean lap”.
(Another concept would be to have more than one car as a reward option, that way a player would pick his/her reward car (say out of 3) which would bring some variety to the game and allow players to select a car more in line with their play style).
These are all solutions that both online and offline players could compete with a bit of skill / grind. I would much prefer to have an actual challenge of setting some difficult drift scores, lap times or influence levels over the month for a “reward” or choice of “reward”. Instead I have to log on later today to complete “1 ultimate skill chain”…………
“Be happy! There are like seven new cars this season!”
“If you don’t like it dont do it!” (so seven new cars, but don’t get them)
“You can buy them in auction house!” (Wouldn’t it be better to have them earnable through play?"
I agree with a points total, and actually suggested that one the day they announced this silly concept. Recommend putting your suggestion to the support page which has a category for suggestion submissions.
I like the points one, but I would have it a little different. I would keep it like it is now, but only need to do everything if you do minimum. Higher rank in multiplayer? More progress. Beat the championship on expert instead of normal? More points. Score 500 point average for your team in trial instead of winning but always last? Earn more point! Now we can all win our way with same challenge, but also now with choice in how we go about said challenge.
Your comment about the dis-interested? That was me. Tired of DC and issues with the FFAA, I had to do team. I tried a couple seriously, but got tired of being rammed. I loved being sideswiped off the track when passing for the lead. So I just drove stupid fun cars. I didn’t care about the race, wanted my progress. If I got rammed off at start? Well wasn’t going to win so whatever. Burnouts or run the circuit in reverse. I want that 914, but I also wanted to minimize the frustration while doing it. Freeroam rush time and the road route is nowhere near the cross country directness? Well I will hang out in aerodrome and earn skillpoints. Not going to even waste my time trying to compete against the AWD people while I am in my MD NSX with road tires.
I agree with everything you said these are some suggestions I could get behind. Unfortunately a mid will be along soon to move this thread into the 20 page playlist thread where it will get buried and no one will see it.
I avoid multiplayer in games (being average at best), so I have been excluded from getting the 100% from these Seasonals. I am sure I am not the only one to find the decision to include Playground Games a frustrating addition to the game.
I’m not particularly happy either about the weekly/monthly grind now required to unlock exclusive cars, including hours in online adventure that I almost never play. But I’m not going to sweat it. Because like I alluded to in another thread, I’m not going to be playing the game as a weekly chore anymore. I’m going back to playing it as an open world racing game that I can pick up and put down at my leisure. Unless it’s a car that I really, really want, (I can really only think of one or two) I’ll just accept that it’s a car that I’m going to have to get some other way, or live without it. I might do the odd championship if there’s a car up for grabs. But I’m going back to playing it the way I enjoyed playing it before.
I think that’s the only way to get our point across. You want to communicate to the devs that you don’t like online grinding for prizes, and would rather they be primarily available in single player? You want to communicate to the devs that you don’t like the tight window available for some of them? You want to communicate that multiplayer is no fun because it’s infested with bad actors and wall riders and rammers, and it’s high time they do something about it? Complaining on this forum hasn’t gotten us anywhere. But they track gameplay statistics. They know what we’re doing in game. They know what events the majority of people participate in. So if you don’t like it, don’t do it. If people stop doing the weekly championships because they don’t like grinding for 50% or 100%, they’ll notice, and they’ll try to decide what to do about it. If people stop doing the Trials because they don’t like being rammed by their own team, and rubber banded in the face by unbeatable AI, they’ll notice, and they’ll try to decide what to do about it.
Now that I’ve typed that, it occurs to me that it might fail for multiplayer. If nobody plays multiplayer except the rammers, then they’ll start catering to the rammers. So we’ll have to find some other way around that. But for the single player experience, I think it holds true. They put more weight into gameplay statistics than they put into people complaining on the forum. So that’s where we need to put our focus.
Play the game the way you want, and don’t sweat the grind. That’s the only way to play. Perhaps it always was.
Locking this thread as there is already a discussion here (for festival playlist) and here for this season and we’re trying to reduce duplicate threads.