The way legacy Forza games have been treated is anti-consumer and completely inexcusable

Miscellaneous Xbox & Games Industry
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So I’m pretty sure it’s common knowledge that every single Forza game before 2018 is inaccessible digitally, DLC included.

I just can’t fathom why this needs to be the case.

“But Novaly!” you say. “The reason is that the licenses for the cars and music expire! They can’t sell the game anymore!”

That’s true. But did you ever stop to consider the fact that the licenses can be renewed? This is the case, using the horror game Alan Wake’s licensed music as an example. The game was delisted in 2017. Less than a year later the music was renegotiated and the game was put back onsale.

Now look, I don’t know how licenses work, you probably don’t know for sure either, but let’s set aside Alan Wake and compare Forza to other games in it’s genre: Racing games.

Every single mainline Need For Speed title from 2010 onwards is onsale, DLC included.

Midnight Club: Los Angeles from 2008 is still onsale 14 years later.

Every single Flatout game, starting with it’s release in 2005, is still onsale.

Both Burnout Paradise and Revenge are still available, both over a decade old.

Need For Speed has had seven titles released in the last decade. Midnight Club: LA has been available for 14 years. Both of which have licensed cars. All franchises I’ve brought up have licensed music.

Forza right now is more successful than all of these franchises combined, and has probably generated roughly a comparable amount of money. What’s their excuse? If they’re worried about wasting money by relisting all this stuff, why not promote the older games on social media and encourage the newer players to check them out and experience the titles that made this franchise so great in the first place? I know I and probably millions of other people would shell out money for older Forza titles, including their DLC. Would be a good way to pass the time since Horizon 5 clearly isn’t delivering and we have a good ways to go until the next Horizon game.

This tactic of removing content as early as 2017 is anti-consumer and predatory. I can imagine the Hot Wheels DLC for Horizon 5 was partially done because Horizon 3’s was delisted. Recycle an idea, make people pay for it again. Not to mention, the only Horizon titles that are available are the two that the community regard as inferior, locking people who weren’t around to play the older titles permanently out. It’s frankly insulting how Forza’s licensing works compared to other game franchises, especially ones that are nowhere near as rich or successful as Forza. For the love of god, relist all the games you can including their DLC. You could actually begin to make even more money and even discourage people pirating these games using emulators. There’d be more ways to try out Forza games. Right now, there’s not a SINGLE way of playing ANY Forza Motorsport game on PC, or playing it digitally on console.

You’re shooting yourselves in the foot, and it’s screwing the community over too. At least TRY to relist these games and their DLC. It’s all I can really ask for.

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I would pay plenty of cash to get the rest of the DLC in FH2 and FH3. I’d love for them to relist these games but I know, deep down, they won’t. They don’t care.

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Licensing wouldn’t have been my first thought here. Often when these things get delisted people who already own them can still redownload them, after all. I’d suspect somewhere along the way there’s a calculation for how much it costs to keep something available versus how much money it makes over a period of time. Potentially accounting for how much it’s out-competing newer products, though I imagine that’s not nearly as relevant as those with a cynical view of the newer games would like it to be.

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3rd party sites are still selling digital keys for FH3 and FM7, which don’t expire. Microsoft isn’t going to relist them.

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I don’t have any FH, but bought a code for FM7 just 3 months ago.
Not knowing how it works that DLC addons are not available anymore I might have bought an ultra deluxe version with everything included instead.

But still impressed after 5 years they still throw out challenges on FM7 and various events. I found those rewarding since leaderboards worldwide are there and you can compare to some extent how you are doing or progressing and such.

It takes employes to keep these things happening and also taking place on servers etc.

Looking at leaderboards for recent events on FM7 there are worldwide about 30 000 participants. It’s not millions as total sales might have as numbers. So this is active players to some degree.

I saw some numbers for events that are there since start - it said around 300 000 on leaderboards.

Some kind of return of vintage FM will probably turn up in next couple of months in next Forza.

I have FM6 and will check out how leaderboards look for those as well. How much it differ from 7, if any players active still.

It is a business after all making games driven by demand. If we look at what non market economy do with our tax dollars we see how inefficient it beccomes over time. It only survive because we feed them constantly with more money, not driven by demand.

Being retired now but having half my active time with my own software business I know how it works. You constantly must look at costs to survive.

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Normally, I don’t side with developers and I would actually the like to see a return of the DLC from Horizons 1 and 2 (as these are the only DLC packs I’m missing), but I’m not surprised with the route Turn 10 and Playground took when it came to licensing.

After all, before Motorsport 8 and Horizon 5, Turn 10 and Playground were religious about releasing a title of some kind every year. As a result, in their minds, it probably didn’t make sense to negotiate licensing contracts longer than five years.

As for the other franchises you mentioned, well, your examples are pretty much your answers. Flatout and Burnout never featured licensed cars and their licensed soundtracks was usually under fifty songs. As a result, it was probably pretty cheap to renegotiate those licenses compared to relicensing over 200 separate cars in a Forza game.

As for Need for Speed, well, EA is EA after all. I wouldn’t be surprised in the slightest if the main reason why so many NFS games and DLC stayed up as long as they have/had was that EA simply forgot they existed, and the record labels and car manufacturers just couldn’t be bothered to make an issue over it because either they didn’t notice themselves, or the games were just too dirt cheap by then to raise a fuss.

I mean, it wouldn’t be the first time a developer has done that either. Horizon 2 on the Xbox 360 is still purchasable some how. The DLC for Dirt 3 isn’t available on the Xbox One and Series X Microsoft stores, yet is available to purchase on the Xbox 360 Microsoft Store. Heck, the DLC for Test Drive Unlimited 2 is still purchasable despite the fact that Atari and Eden Games as we knew them at the time went bust almost a decade ago.

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Last time I checked (I used to own the game on 360 and I own that DLC) the servers were turned off and consequently the DLC no longer works. There was some discussion about this on True Achievements. I’d be interested to know if the situation has changed, and if it hasn’t, why Microsoft are still selling it. You literally can’t do anything with it without the servers being up.

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Well, I admittedly don’t know if the purchases go through, so you have me there. However, they are still listed, and there is actually a work around in the game that allows you purchase the DLC in-game without having to buy the DLC itself. Works on everything except the motorcycles.

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I think one of the reasons you can’t buy the old games anymore is because they want you to play the new game. If people buy and play the old games, there are fewer people playing the new game. It’s a bit too executive to me…

I mean, if people could play the old games, I think they would appreciate Horizon more and would play 5 too. They’re all different games because of the map. It’s not like Motorsport where every game is basically the same, save for a few cars and tracks.

So either they relist the old games or they remaster them, which would be good too because then you have updated graphics and higher fps.

Licensing will always be a thing though, at least with Forza. I get the idea that with Forza, the executives and investors want to maximize their profits a bit too much and it’s seriously hurting the game. Just look at other franchises like you mentioned. Why are they able to add certain cars and bodykits but Forza doesn’t??

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Horizon 1-3s car list is significantly smaller than Horizon 4 and 5. They could easily renew these licenses for the most part. Especially considering lots of these cars have been in every horizon game.

If they really wanted to they could. In general these games have way less licensing

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I’m thinking of the casino, in TDU2 it is a separate location which is closed off unless it connects to the server.

I see they are still selling it.

https://marketplace.xbox.com/en-gb/Product/Test-Drive-Unlimited-2-Casino-Online/b814a37c-6f76-4bf5-aed1-6a0533fa283b

It went offline in 2018 so I wonder if it’s back. Last I can find news is from 2021 confirming it’s all closed down in which case the above DLC is completely useless.

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I don’t get this licensing thing - isn’t that resolved by royalties?
Then beneficiaries earn the more it sells, a certain percentage.

Seems strange to license for a defined period and pay one time sum upfront. Then you are stuck and cannot sell the product any longer after that date.

As a business strategy it seems odd to me.

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I personally hate it I love forza horizon and currently playing through them all and currently on horizon 2 and wishing I could play storm island and have the game constantly through stork island in my face and I can’t do anything to get it I’d definitely pay to play it if they sold it again it’s ridiculous and I never understood how the licensing is a problem when so many other games still being sold

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I wish I could do the two FH2 DLC’s as well but it was due to me being a colossal tight wallet that I haven’t.

I think people have forgotten they were heavily discounted before they were pulled, really heavily.

FH3 is a different story though, it’s DLC was discounted too but not by anything worthwhile, Hoonigan pack was separate + was seldom on sale, and FH3 was where the trend of Forza games being offered on GWG before delisting time was stopped, FM5 + 6 and FH1 + 2 were all GWG in I think the September of their respective delist years.

What was different about FH3 I don’t know but I can only come to the conclusion it was down to misguided greed.

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I definitely remember that H2 discount before being removed from the store. Very glad I bought the lot at that point - fantastic bargain.

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All the horizon games had their “ultimate versions” available for final download at $19.99 and the base games for $9.99 before being delisted.

Digitally, that is.

If you want to play Horizon 1, 2 etc…just go buy used copies of the discs off ebay. They still work and update, they simply won’t sell new copies (digital copies) anymore unless the keys are already printed and out in the wild (which is why you see keys show up on 3rd party sites).

I think you can still get digital keys for FM7, FH3, FH4 and of course FH5. FM7 and FH3 are sunset but keys are still available in the wild for them…

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But those second hand copies don’t come with DLC anymore, do they? The DLC codes are already used by the previous owners on their own accounts.

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You are probably correct there, I have never owned a “Ultimate” version of a disc based game so can’t comment. Note that if you already own the game digitally, they are still available. I can still download the base games and the digital DLC’s for all my Horizon games assuming I owned the DLC’s when they were delisted…but for someone who just wants to go back and try those games for the first time, well, there are limitations.

We all saw this coming 15 years ago when Steam became a thing and people stopped wanting CD or DVD based install discs that took time to boot up and so forth…we lease software now, we never actually “own it” as this thread indicates.

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You’re right, we buy a software license when buying digitally.

I remember being able to play the FH2 FNF DLC when it came out. But I can’t find it in my account anymore. I’ll check again tonight.

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The ultimate edition of FH3 did not include the expansions or Hoonigan pack.

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