GAME REVIEW: Forza Motorsport 4

Forza Motorsport 4 Hands On
(Xbox 360)

Forza Motorsport 4 is the next title in Microsoft's exclusive racing simulation. But is that all it is? We had a chance to have a sit-down with Dan Greenawalt, the creative director for developer Turn 10 studios and one of just a few people involved with the series since it was originally pitched, all those years ago. In our chat and extensive preview, we found out that the title has so many facets it's difficult to sum up into even a genre, let alone a feature set. In a word? Cargasm.

Let me explain...

In Forza 4, you can - of course - level up. But how you do it and the path you take throughout the various game modes is, well, completely up to you. Keen on advancing through the career mode, increasing the rarity or value of your cars? Great - go nuts, you'll succeed by doing that. If you prefer to stick with Volkswagens, you can do that too - you won't be forced to "upgrade" to Ferarris and you'll keep getting cool new content for your chosen vehicle - it will actually feel like you're playing a VW game, too, rather than something with the large scope that Forza actually sports.

You can even proceed through the various levels by, get this, exclusively playing the game's in-depth, multiplayer, Top Gear football mode. Yep, you can play Top Gear's famous car-based soccer game in 5v5 or 8v8 online-capable modes, complete with customizable cars (no need to stick to the cheap stuff like they do on the show) and more.

It also looks, in a word, unbelievable. The presentation of the cars is second to none, thanks in part to its ludicrously luxurious image-based lighting technology. Without going into techy details, this lighting model, similar to that used in big-budget movies, ensures your vehicles are actually lit by the environment they're in. In a nutshell, the cars look like they belong in the world in which they're presented, and they look amazing as a result. High levels of anti-aliasing (AA) and incredible shader technology also help to ensure that the vehicles stand up to ludicrously high levels of extremely close scrutiny. Even the stitching in the leather of the steering wheel looks real - it's phenomenal and has no peer, on any platform - in any genre.

The attention to detail doesn't stop with the mind-boggling graphics, either. In their ever-evolving goal of simulating reality, Turn 10 tossed out the rubber simulation used to model the way the virtual tires interact with the ground and tasked tire manufacturer Pirelli with a host of custom tests, which were then used to develop the all-new tire system. This kind of obsessive focus on reality speaks volumes about the team's goal of peerless simulated reality, something which is backed up by the conviction in Dan's voice as he hammers home every word. He believes it and, listening to him, you can't help but believe it yourself.

So what else is there? A lot - far more than could ever be detailed in an article of any length. The painting mode is there, including the ability to import your car skins from F3. It's got deep Kinect support, with Track-IR-like ability to adjust the camera based on the way you lean or look, as well as an optional casual-friendly "virtual steering wheel" control method. You can even talk to Kinect, jumping between deep menus without the need to navigate them with a controller.

Forza Motorsport 4 Trailer

There's a car club, which is kind of like a "clan" that you might see form around an FPS game. In it, you can drive your friends cars, get your mates to tune your own vehicles, have a pro painter on the crew to get your vehicles looking like they're in a team and much more. There's rival alerts, with SSX-like social challenges that allow you to compete and earn rewards via asynchronous challenges which you complete at your own pace.

It's the swiss-army knife of racing games, basically, with everything you can imagine and a heap of other stuff as well.

We haven't been able to actually play the game ourselves, so our ability to speak to the nuances of the handling or AI is clearly non-existent. What we can tell you, though, is that after seeing so much of it, we desperately want to. Desperately. Right now.

If you're even remotely interested in cars and like getting bang for your buck, you need to keep an eye on this one - whether you've got a 360 right now or not.

By Alan Bell