Review: Forza Motorsport 2
Right off the starting line, Forza Motorsport 2 roars to a near-perfect finish as another high quality Xbox 360 racing game. I don’t know if Kazunori Yamauchi and the team at Polyphony Digital are checking their rearview mirrors, but Microsoft’s latest track burner comes off as more polished than Gran Turismo 4 in a number of key areas, although GT4 still has the edge on the older system. Naturally, it’s a bit unfair to compare the two given the age of the PlayStation 2 hardware. However, Turn 10’s efforts just might force yet another lengthy delay to Sony’s seminal racing franchise as they add and improve features for the PS3 update. Forza 2 includes the return of the robust car/decal/paint customization from the first game, excellently revamped online play, the ability to gift or auction off cars to other live players and much more. The game also sports outstandingly photrealistic next-gen graphics and a wide selection of over 300 vehicles from classic foreign and domestic street machines to some of today’s fastest prototypes. There are a few minor bumps in the road, but they certainly don’t keep this from being one of the best pure racing games this year.
Then game is broken up into Arcade and Career modes, each with its own set of goals to accomplish. In Arcade, you’ll be able to play through and unlock cars in Exhibition or Time Trial, while Free Run is a brilliant way to learn any track in the game at your leisure. The hard part comes in choosing which car you’d like to hit the road in, no matter what type of track. The game has ten classes to choose from with a few dozen available rides that range in speed and power ratings. If you’re anywhere near borderline obsessive, you’ll possibly spend the better part of a week or so taking on each track in every car until you’ve experienced them all. You might have a favorite car when you start a new game, but after a few hours in, you’ll be hard pressed to pick less than ten or twenty (or more) that you’ll want to rely on for in single, multiplayer and/or online play. If you’re good at the game from the outset, you’ll be unlocking loads of cool Arcade cars and earning Achievement Points as you smash track times by a few seconds.
Whether you’re a novice or returning Forza veteran, the sweet handling model gets you into the game and the assorted driving aids will make sure you stay on the road. Both new and old players will appreciate the excellent (and optional) racing line that shows when to accelerate or brake properly. While this does make the game easier, it’s a must if your prime racing experience is closer to Ridge Racer’s simple (and unrealistic) one touch sliding around curves. If you’re up to snuff, turn off the driving aids entirely and have at it on some amazingly tough courses. Speaking of courses, you’ll get around 40 real life and game-specific tracks to blaze around on, some with reverse versions that add extra challenge to skilled drivers. The eight real race tracks here (Road Atlanta, Laguna Seca, Mugello, Silverstone, Sebring, Nürburgring, Suzuka and Tsukuba Circuit) are perfectly rendered and a pure joy to drive in any vehicle. The custom tracks are also great, particularly those that echo GT4’s lineup of interesting layouts. There’s a New York City track that also focuses around a realistically recreated Times Square, a devilish test track that’s hell on those unprepared for its twists and turns and some solid road courses that range from super short to longer, curvier models.
In Career mode, you’ll be able to start in one of three “home regions,” Asia, Europe or America. This determines the types of cars you’ll get from the start, but not the tracks you’ll race on. Depending on the difficulty level you choose, race earnings and penalties will be smaller of larger, something that forces you to race as cleanly as possible on higher levels. As you compete and win, both you and your cars level up, unlocking discounts on parts and better cars from specific dealers. Like any racer worth its salt, tuning plays a key role in winning races and Forza certainly doesn’t disappoint when it comes to tricking out your rides. You’ll be able to fiddle with just about everything you can on a real car, turning a low-speed lemon into a performance machine that blows the doors off the AI and a couple of Xbox Live lead-footers. Of course, if you boost your formerly family four-door into a rumbling monster, expect to go up a few classes as you’re excluded from some events.
You’ll find it best to keep a few different cars from each class in your garage just in case, but as mentioned above, with so many prime makes and models; it’ll be tough to decide what to keep and what to sell off. After a few weeks with the game, don’t even ask what my favorite car is, as I can rattle off a few dozen I love for any number of reasons. Like GT4, there’s a nice set of 60’s hits I haven’t seen for ages around here, so getting to drive a Plymouth Barracuda, Chevy Chevelle SS or Pontiac GTO brings a never ending grin to my face as much as a more exotic Panoz, Pagani or Bentley. Between the car choosing and constant tweaking, it’s entirely possible to spend less time on the track and more time under the hood or at the paint shop, but that’s not a complaint at all. In terms of creativity, you can create pretty much anything you desire between the color and vinyl options. Want a thousand layer vinyl Swamp Thing artwork on the sides and top of your car? If you’ve the patience and skill, knock yourself out and them some. You can even “lock” a custom design in so that if you decide to sell off or trade that ride, the new owner can’t deface (or swipe) your creation without it deleting itself from their hard drive. Off topic for a second: this particular feature made me wonder if a variant of this sort of protection could be added to game discs in order to prevent piracy in general.
Meanwhile back on the track, in single player mode, the AI is generally fierce, but occasionally an opponent will ram into you at the start of a race or hit you from behind as you’re braking for a sharp turn. Having a penalty second or two added your total time can be a pain particularly when you’re not at fault, especially when you restart a race and the same AI driver automatically crunches into your door. Eventually, you learn to just take the time deduction and make it up on the next lap, but since every second counts here, you’ll wish these automatic hits weren’t part of the experience. Oh, if you’re a fan of the “rubbin’ is racin’” style of play, you’ll be a bit annoyed. Forcing cars off the road or into spins will actually lessen your prize when you win a tough race. The included Photo Mode allows you to snap high quality pictures and save them to your 360’s hard drive or even post them on the game’s official web site. In addition, you can save replays and view them anytime you like offline or watch live online races through the Spectator mode.
Online, Forza 2 is even more spectacular, as well as spectacularly difficult. No matter how good you think you are, there’s more likely than not a car lover who’s going to make you gawk at his or her skill behind the wheel. In addition to up to 8-player multiplayer via System Link or Live, Xbox Live Tournaments allow for 8 to 32 brackets, which translates to anywhere from 64 to 256 racers competing for gold and glory. Winnings over Live are sent to you Career bank, a nice way to make some extra scratch when you’re in the mood for some real competition. Microsoft promises a combination of virtual and real-world prizes for the best of the best, so you’ll definitely want to get to know each and every course inside and out before hopping into a bracket. If you’re more capitalistic and creative, feel free to do up a custom car and auction it off. Some of the rides I’ve seen up for bid have been amazing recreations of real-life racers while others show off some supremely talented artistic types who might want to consider opening up custom paint shops at some point.
Visually, Forza 2 screams along with only a barely noticeable hiccup or two during replay angle switches. The cars are all minutely detailed; sporting real time reflection mapping and some solid cosmetic damage modeling that includes smashed windshields, dents and scratched paint in assorted degrees. With the HUD off and racing a perfect lap, you’ll truly feel as if you’re on the track. If I had to pick a favorite track, the sprawling, graffiti-scrawled Nürburgring would get my vote as the perfect ride with the Sebring long course coming in second. Both are tests of pure driving fortitude that are best driven a few times slowly just to see all they have to offer before tackling them in an exotic supercar at over 200 MPH. In addition, Forza 2 will absolutely make you appreciate the bumper cam or hood viewpoints, period. Trying to make some of those nastier turns with your lovely (but soon to be mangled) screamer forcing you to take a turn a fraction of a second too late will get your goat after a while. If you’re one of those folks who just never liked a first-person driving view just imagine playing Halo 3 in third person and you’ll never go back, trust me.
I was hoping for more real life courses such as Le Mans or Monaco, but I guess we’ll have to see if these can be licensed for the next game. It’s too bad the game doesn’t have an inside the car viewpoint like the one found in PGR3 or even Test Drive Unlimited. I would have sacrificed one of the external views or even the hood cam just to get that truer-to-life feel and the awesome panoramic viewpoint found in PGR3. Nevertheless, if you’ve a couple of 360’s, HDTV’s and willing friends handy, you can link up a superb super widescreen mode that’s worth the time and effort. On the sound front, the cars all sound spectacular, with sampled engine, tire and even a few crash effects (complete with appropriate vibration effects). The in-game music is nice, but in the end, it almost seems an afterthought. You won’t hear any mega-hit name bands screaming away, but Custom Soundtracks are definitely supported if you crave that sort of thing. I generally race without music as it allows much more concentration on the road.
While the game is mostly fantastic to play and watch, the only other issues I had were the lack of any off-road tracks or severe weather racing and some longish load times here and there. However, once on the track, all I could think about was winning and winning some more. There’s a ton of stuff I didn’t cover, but that’s because Forza 2 has tons to offer and more to come as new content and challenges are added over Xbox Live. I’m hoping Microsoft takes the number of non-HD owning, non-Xbox Live 360 users into account and releases as much content as possible on upcoming OXM (Official Xbox Magazine) demo discs. Like it or not, we’re still not 100% into the broadband era in the US and leaving out those gamers who want to experience such a feature-packed racer as much as possible is a bad idea. Nevertheless, there’s absolutely a lot here to love if you’re a car nut and this is one of those games that’s going to be constantly in your 360 when you’re feeling the need for speed.
Score:A
- Greg Wilcox
