Re: Official Forza Motorsport 4 Thread

[JeffH16]

Loving the new physics with Simulation on

[ckBrenneke]

Well, that's it preordered. Just got the standard edition with the preorder BMW 1M Coupe, need to speak nice to my friends at Game to see if they have a spare Subaru WRX STi I can have...

[Richy59]

Don't know if this has been posted already, but the Unicorn car list has grown a lot and has some pretty good cars that will be sorely missed if they are really hard to obtain. Mainly it's VIP and DLC cars from FM3, but some of the standard cars are included now as well, including the Old Civic and Intergra Type R...

Title says it all. I believe this could be a nice thread to know the confirmed unicorn cars so far.

AFAIK, all of these are and/or will be unicorns (appologies in advance if i'm wrong on any info):

The 3 originally from FM3:

- Subaru Impreza S204

- Chevy Camaro SS Coupe

- Mazda RX-7 Spirit-R Type-A



New ones introduced in FM4:

- Ferrari 430 Scuderia

- Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera

- BMW M3 GTR "Street Version"

- Ferrari 360 CS

- 2007 Ford Shelby GT500

- 2004 Hunda Mugen Civic Type-R

- 2002 Honda Mugen Integra Type-R

- Top Secret Nissan Silvia S15

- Mitsubishi HKS Evo CT230

- Lamborghini Murcielago LP640

- Honda NSX-R GT

- 1993 Mine's Nissan R32 Skyline GT-R

- 2002 Mine's Nissan R34 Skyline GT-R

- Top Secret Toyota 0-300 Supra

All of them are marked as such on Badneds list as well.

[Biggsy tv]

Duncan, popped your waterproof pants on? Then you may click to watch this video...

[CQR Rogue]

omg omg omg omg omg omg omg

wow

3.54 sun glare

DTM Classic for sure

[LMR DarthMario]

FM4's unicorn list is somewhat understandable with the rarity of the cars on the list, except the '07 GT500. Idk how it became a unicorn, and the Scuderia and Superleggera are FM3 transfer cars. IMO, the 22B should be a unicorn as it had a lesser production run than the S204

[Biggsy tv]

Off the Merc symbol on the steering wheel! Never noticed that

[nickyf1]

Right, if we do classic DTM, we need a race at the Top Gear Test Track (or its proper name: Dunsfold) to emulate this track:

[CQR Rogue]

o problem
The random text between paragraphs are photo captions (one being a 1977 Aston V8 going very sideways)



9.5/10

In Eric Bana's 2009 documentary Love the Beast, Bana and Top Gear's Jeremy Clarkson are sitting at a picnic table on an overcast day talking about cars. They're talking about Bana's first car, a 1974 Ford XB Falcon hardtop that he purchased at the age of 15 – and car he still owns, and the car around which the documentary itself is based.



Clarkson is making a point about car people and non-car people; he believes non-car people just can't see beyond the wires, glass, metal and rubber. They can't see the personality behind the engineering, the soul beneath the surface. It's a position Clarkson expands upon in the introductory sequence of Forza Motorsport 4; that car lovers are being marginalized in a world where practicality trumps adrenaline. A world where we're told to think of economy and the environment rather than excitement and enjoyment.



With Clarkson's help Forza 4 is positioning itself as an ode to the automobile of sorts. A celebration of all things four-wheeled and fun in one accessible package. Forza 4 is Turn 10's tilt to create the world's best and most comprehensive racing sim, to build an essential destination where car lovers can gather to trade, tune and take each other on.



And it's hard to argue the crew hasn't succeeded.


Drool...


Booting up Forza 4 is like slipping back into your favorite jacket and finding $50 in the pocket. It fits just as comfortably as it did the last time you wore it but it comes with a pleasant bonus. The DNA of Forza 3 is strong in Forza 4, lending a certain familiarity to proceedings, but welcome tweaks and additions across the board strengthen the overall offering considerably.



With your first foray behind the wheel automatically muted by a suite of driving aids, the first thing you'll notice will be the improved visuals. Forza 3 was no slouch at the time but two years on and Forza 4 is a marked improvement. It's all thanks primarily to Forza 4's new image-based lighting model, which basically means the cars look perfectly seated within the game's tracks. Harsh sunlight burns bright against bodywork and cabin view is a great way to observe the shadows that dance smoothly back and forth across dashboards. It's excellent stuff.



The car models themselves are also hugely impressive. The finest aspects are reserved for the game's special Autovista models, a mode that allows you to absorb even the tiniest of details, but every car stands up to close inspection. They look as good in motion as they do static, too. The frame rate is buttery smooth and they look fantastic circulating around the game's bright and crisp tracks.



Still, Forza 4 doesn't just look and feel better, it sounds better too. Turn the music down and the volume up, up until you can only communicate with other people in the same room by shouting – or perhaps blinking in Morse code. That's the sweet spot. The older cars sound the best. The howl of a D-Type Jag will rattle your nipples off, and if the snarl of a 351 Cleveland V8 in Forza 4 can't bring Steve McQueen back from the dead nothing can.



The richer engine notes may weave a symphony of power and violence but Forza 4 is actually quite a fresh audio experience in other areas too. There are new sounds for collisions, wind rush and more. The inoffensive but bog standard music may not blow your skirt up, but the thick tapestry of sound effects should.


Somewhere, somehow, Mad Max is nodding approvingly.


The real stars here, obviously, are the cars. Turn 10 has really nailed the roster this time around. If you can't find cars here you love then you honestly don't love cars as much as you think you do. It's really that simple. Turn 10 being forbidden from including Porsche has surely stung, but Forza 4's slate of over 500 vehicles from 80 manufacturers really does have something for everyone.



Forza 4 embraces car culture from all over the globe, and it does so without a disproportionally large focus on vehicles from just one country. You won't find 135 Nissans and only 12 Ferraris here. Hot hatches, classic British sports cars, Hollywood heroes, JDM favorites, German super sedans, timeless American muscle, exotic Italian thoroughbreds, even an immortal Australian icon – they're all here, and more.



Forza 4 captures the cult of cars better than any racing game before it. It's a game that understands what makes a 20-year-old high-performance pickup truck just as important to some people as a brand new Lexus LF-A. A game that understands that a 1977 V8 Vantage is just as desirable as a 2010 V12 Vantage. A game that understands why you can't have five Ford V8 Supercars without five Holden ones too.


Aussie petrolheads have killed each other over less.



Visuals, sound and a robust garage are still but one part of a larger equation. All of it means naught if the handling is bunk. Fortunately Forza 4 feels more authentic than ever. Turn in is sharper and the feeling of grip, particularly under heavy braking or aggressive cornering, is really well translated. The lock-to-lock steering rate has been increased dramatically and Turn 10 has added a simulation steering option (which removes the subtle steering assist that makes it easier to drift by interpreting your inputs and automatically modifying your steering angle accordingly). Forget slow and soggy steering rates; jerk the wheel in Forza 4 and your car will twitch and lunge ferociously.


"Arrrrrrrrggggghhhhhh!"


As far as the braking goes, it's been massaged in a bunch of ways. With ABS off you'll note there's a larger sweet zone before lockup. Turn 10 has also worked with how more subtle braking inputs are handled in order to improve how light braking techniques are represented, like trail braking (gradually releasing brake pressure past the corner entrance to keep weight transferred over the front tires for longer). These braking and steering upgrades, coupled with the tire data Turn 10 has gleaned from its Pirelli partnership, have worked wonders. With far better feedback regarding the loading and unloading of tires you get a better feel for your car's behavior, especially in stressful areas like corner entries.



The Fanatec wheel is the obvious choice for the hardcore but the bulk of players will be using a pad, and we have no complaints with the controls. Of course, if all this sounds like far too much to process Forza 4 still comes with a full set of driving aids that should keep even the world's worst driver on the asphalt.



Opponent AI has been tweaked too, meaning closer and ultimately more satisfying racing. In World Tour mode the AI is dynamic, becoming tougher the better you perform, making for more competitive racing.


"This guy's harder to pass than a kidney stone!"


Outside of World Tour there are four different AI settings (up from three in Forza 3). Crucially, Turn 10 no longer removes power from AI cars to slow them down for players on the lower difficulty levels. Underpowered cars made it easier for less-skilled players to keep up but allowed them to blitz the hamstrung AI on straights. This time Turn 10 emulates lower level AI by giving them less confidence going into corners, so they brake sooner and carry less speed through them (like an actual novice driver would). The key to outfoxing lower level AI is outbraking them, because all AI levels will be pedal-to-the-metal in a straight line. Combined with an increase in the amount of cars on track this ultimately means more doorhandle-to-doorhandle racing and less lonely laps way out ahead of the pack.



The best part about the whole thing is how Forza 4 incentivizes you to keep pushing, and how it lets you control this progression to a certain extent. The RPG style approach of Forza 3 has been enhanced considerably.



The speed to level 50 has been ramped up to give players new cars more quickly, and the overall level cap has been pumped up to 150. This way players will be rewarded for longer, rather than maxing out with plenty left to accomplish but nothing to be gained from it. This time around you'll be given a choice between a number of gift cars at every level up to level 50, rather than a predetermined one. Each set of choices is themed and gives you far better control of the cars you want to have in your garage.



Car leveling has been changed too. In Forza 3, once a car hit level five there was no longer any real incentive to keep driving it. In Forza 4, cars no longer level. Instead, the player builds manufacturer specific levels, called affinity levels. With this new system, if you race in a Ford, you gain Ford-specific XP. The same car, a different car, it doesn't matter as long as it's a Ford. Instead of five levels per car there are now 50 levels per manufacturer. Hitting level five will reward you with a 100 per cent discount on performance parts, and there are large cash bonuses up for grabs beyond that.



What's particularly satisfying about Forza 4 is that you earn XP (and credits) everywhere, not just in World Tour mode. Forza 4 is a hugely robust single-player game. The event list is enormous and the amount of cars you have at your disposal to tackle them is immense. Hop online, however, and things get even better.


And even more sideways.


We're not talking about the ever-impressive conventional multiplayer either, which by and large is quite similar to Forza 3, albeit with the return of user-hosted public lobbies. We're talking about Rivals mode, which is easily the most addictive part of the whole game. Rivals mode is basically a combination of events that allow you to play against your friends or other Forza players online, even when they're offline. Your rival will be represented by a ghost car of their attempt at any given challenge and you need to beat them. By beating your rival, you'll get bonus credits based on that rival's position on the leaderboard, and the size of the board itself. If your rival is in the top percentile on a well-populated board, their bounty will be significant. If you challenge and defeat a rival who also happens to be a friend or fellow club member, they'll receive a message inviting them to try and beat you again.



There are seven different Rivals tabs with a series of individual events in each. Some of the best Rivals mode races are the Track Days (trying to post a competitive and clean lap time while fighting a rival, constant slower traffic and the circuit itself is an intense racing experience) but beyond that there are Open Time Attacks (which allow tuning) and Spec Hot Laps (which don't), Autocross events, bespoke Top Gear challenges (including the "Reasonably Priced Car" challenge, one lap on the Top Gear Test Track in a Kia cee'd), Drifting and a stack more.



You can level up using nothing but Rivals mode, if you want. Indeed, we found it a great place for Forza 3 veterans to start. It's pretty unlikely Forza 3 graduates will be too keen on being forced to beetle around in any one of the uninspiring starter cars. Rivals mode will be a great place to become accustomed to the adjusted handling and build up some XP, credits and cars before heading back into career.



It's worth mentioning that Forza 3 alumni will be rewarded with a bunch of gift cars immediately based on what driver level they reached in Forza 3 and what cars they had in their garage. With the far more flexible World Tour mode offering events based on the cars you want to drive you won't have to bother with a starter car if you'd rather not.


And why would you?



There have been a number of additions to the customization options too. The livery editor has been bolstered by a host of new shapes (chosen by the community) so expect to see even more impressive creations on the Storefront.



The general car upgrading system remains largely the same but Turn 10 has added upgrades specifically for the game's electric cars, a drag racing tire compound and a variety of new aero and appearance options. Some muscle cars now boast aftermarket hood scoops, and many cars with discrete front and rear bumpers now have the option to remove them entirely. Also, many older cars also have painted headlight covers for an old-school look.



Outside of Forza 4's main package there's Autovista, a bespoke mode not associated with your Forza 4 career. Autovista, as you probably already know, is a new feature of Forza 4 that allows you to virtually explore some of the game's most exotic and iconic cars. When you begin you'll have access to around just a handful of the cars. To unlock more you need to pass a specific challenge for each one. Do so and you'll be able to pore over the hyper-detailed model of it in Autovista and listen to Jeremy Clarkson's thoughts on it (which are sometimes refreshingly candid).


There's text on the bolts. On the bolts, people.


But beyond all that, Forza 4 is still one big automotive sandbox. Want to race a mate up Top Gear's mile-long runway at full speed in your favorite cars? Do it. Want to flog a Hummer H1 around the Nurburgring for kicks? Experiment away.



Is Forza 4 beyond improvement? Of course not. It's disappointing Turn 10 was unable to see to featuring night racing this time around, like peers GT5 and SHIFT 2 manage. Weather effects, like those we enjoyed in the likes of PGR4, also remain absent.



While we're at it, we'd say SHIFT 2 has a slightly superior assortment of tracks overall too. Forza 4's tracks look great but US circuits noticeably outnumber the remainder. SHIFT 2 is a little more egalitarian when it comes to tracks, with the likes of Monza, Mount Panorama (Bathurst), Brands Hatch and Spa-Francorchamps all featuring. Hopefully we see these sorts of tracks find their way into Forza in the future.



Turn 10 has improved the look of general scratches and scrapes, the kind you get by kissing a wall or rubbing against an opponent, but on the whole car damage is still quite underwhelming. It falls fairly short of the sort of damage we recently saw in Driver: San Francisco, which itself is several rungs below DiRT 3.



While the Kinect functionality is actually quite excellent for head tracking, allowing you to check mirrors and look through apexes with exceedingly minor head movements, its much-touted role in Autovista fails to ignite much interest. It's far less finicky to just use a controller.



There'll likely be some resistance amongst fans regarding the new car tokens (players who don't want to save up in-game currency to buy cars can exchange Earth-dollars for car tokens via Xbox LIVE – the most expensive cars in Forza 4 will cost three tokens) and how upgrades are now free after around 30 minutes play per manufacturer. How it'll impact the in-game economy remains to be seen.


What were we talking about again?


But these flaws hardly register. Above everything, however, Forza 4 is a game that wants you to enjoy everything it has to offer. It doesn't hide the bulk of its cars away, or make you jump through hoops to unlock tracks for general use. In free play you can drive any car on any track you want. It doesn't make you earn colors to paint your cars; it wants to create whatever you wish, when you wish. It doesn't stop you from buying cars you want to own because you haven't leveled up enough. If you've got the credits, the car is yours. There's still a deep, broad game here that you could play for years, but it's not being strangled by its own design.


Closing Comments

Like the step up from FIFA 11 to FIFA 12, there's no going back to Forza 3 now. The changes and updates are too welcome and widespread. The improved visuals, the added cars on track, the wealth of new race types, the tweaked AI and closer racing, the ferocious sound and superior sense of speed, the even better livery editor, the lot. With Forza 4 Turn 10 has crafted a driving game like no other; it's hands-down this generation's premier racing simulator.

[CQR Rogue]

Review: Forza Motorsport 4

Words by: Richard Berry | Posted on: Thursday 6th October, 2011 | Filed under: Features, News, Retail Games, Reviews.



0digg

The world of Forza Motorsport – there’s no clever storyline, no rise to fame through a faceless character, just you, few hundred cars and the open road. This is more than a game, it’s an experience and one than can be tailored to any play style and level of skill. The latest game in the hugely successful franchise finally sees the addition of Top Gear, which includes the iconic Top Gear test track and commentary by the man himself, Jeremy Clarkson – I am however still yet to bump into The Stig in-game though!

The game can be played in two ways, with Kinect or with a controller and Kinect. Going into the game exclusively using just Kinect gives you full Kinect-ivity in Autovista (Forza’s new car showroom) as well as being able to drive any of the cars on one of the games many tracks using just your hands. While this is super enjoyable as Kinect is extremely responsive, there is hardly any competition to be had here. The game accelerates and brakes for you leaving you to concentrate on taking a virtual grab of the wheel and enjoying the spectacular scenery Forza has to offer, think of this mode as more like a Sunday drive in the countryside.
You can also take on a friend locally in split-screen for a head-to-head Kinect race. You can choose from a small selection of tracks and cars, but there are one or two issues with the Kinect only mode that make split-screen rather painful. Firstly the navigation of the menus isn’t great (which is also an issue in the single player modes). You can scroll through the cars and tracks by swiping your hand across the screen, sounds simple enough but the execution of this in Forza 4 is one of the worst menu navigations I’ve seen from a Kinect enabled game. Not only is it a bit of a fiddle to grab the pane and swipe across to navigate, it’s practically impossible to navigate through one pane at a time. This can be particularly annoying when playing in split-screen as you watch your opponent wrestle with the navigation to look through ALL the cars on offer. Once in-game and racing against one another, Kinect seemed to struggle somewhat with my movements, they didn’t seem to be as responsive when compared to the single player modes.

The main beauty of the Kinect only mode of Forza 4 though is Autovista. This is Forza’s car showroom and while not all the cars are available in this mode there are certainly enough to keep you entertained for a long while and I would certainly expect Turn 10 to deliver more through DLC during the game’s lifecycle. Initially not all the cars are available for you to explore and you must unlock them by completing a challenge which can be from completing time trials and races to passing as many cars as possible. Autovista mode remains the same whether you choose to explore it using the power of Kinect or by a controller – although challenges are a lot easier to complete using Kinect.
Once you have selected a car to explore you are able to virtually walk around and look at the various parts using head tracking, which works pretty much faultlessly. There are multiple points of interest on the car which when selected, you are treated to a brief narration on that part. There is also a hotspot on the car that will play the Top Gear presentation, which is narrated by Jeremy Clarkson and shot in a very Top Gear-esque fashion. This feature looks and sounds great and wouldn’t look out of place on the TV show, you learn a bit about each car and what Jeremy Clarkson thinks about them. This is a great little feature and you will certainly want to look at the other car’s in Top Gear modes.
Outside of the information hotspots on the cars you can navigate around, open doors and even get into the car all through the power of Kinect. Head tracking works particularly well, allowing you to peer around and inspect the car’s finer points and there are plenty of ‘fine’ points. The cars look absolutely unbelievable, like they are ready to leap out of the screen. The reproduction and detail in the vehicles is breathtaking, they look stunning and it isn’t until you get a closer look at the alloy wheels and the rubber on the tyres that the illusion of looking at a real car is shattered. When using a controller you can look around the car using the sticks and while the experience is relatively the same it’s more fun and immersive to use Kinect.

With such great integration to head tracking in Autovista it’s a shame that Turn 10 didn’t integrate this into the racing side of the Kinect mode. While I can see that this may have been too distracting while racing with your hands, I would have liked to of been given the option to turn it on or off. Likewise there are no voice commands available to you when in Kinect mode, which if there was, could have helped the navigation issue I experienced. The Kinect racing modes may all be played while sitting down, but you need to stand to make full use of Autovista.
The Kinect only mode is just the tip of what’s on offer in Forza, the main game is experienced with a controller, or in the case of this review, a steering wheel. Starting the game you will be treated to a Top Gear presentation about the new game before being thrust into a celebration lap of new level – the Bernese Alps. You now have the option to import your Forza 3 profile and receive a nice achievement as well as cars and credits from your Forza 3 career. Now you can pick your first Forza 4 car in which to begin your World Tour. Similar to previous games in the franchise, you begin by selecting from bog standard “small” cars – I went for a Toyota Aygo.
When using Kinect in contoller mode you can call out ‘Xbox’ and make a voice command to jump straight into a menu or mode at anytime. Don’t worry, all the possible voice commands are listed in the menu just like in the Kinect dashboard. Now, before you begin to sink your teeth into the main game you can if you wish install disc 2 to your hard drive which enables an extra 250 cars to be available in the main game. You can opt to install the whole disc or choose packs to install.

Kinect doesn’t just stop with voice commands, Kinect delivers one of the finest intergrations of the system into a game, head-tracking. To enable head-tracking you must delve into the options screen and switch it on. Here you can also tweak a variety of options to best suit you. You can adjust the sensitivity on head yaw, lean sensitivity and also adjust a setting called “head yaw with lean” which roughly means a setting to adjust the neutral position when you look straight forward. You can also adjust Kinect’s ability to clip out unwanted objects in the background. It’s an impressive set of options but does it work? Oh my word does it!
So how does it work? well as the name suggests, Forza can now track your head movements and translate them directly into the game so now you can look down and round a bend or even check your rear view and wing mirrors. Head tracking becomes even more noticeable when you start drifting around corners at high speeds, the view looks into the corner you are drifting round and through the side window rather than transfixed out front, it’s an incredible experience and is a stand out feature of Forza 4.
The thing I have loved most about using a steering wheel and cockpit view in Forza is the level of immersion it creates, it’s as close many of us will get to sitting in a real car and racing around a track. Many games have carried the better with Kinect tagline and I think that Forza 4 is the first game to really prove that it certainly is, this feature alone makes having Kinectability with Forza 4 worthwhile, I love it!
Just to make sure head tracking is a worthwhile addition, try turning it off after using it for a prolonged period of time. Instantly the cars will feel very rigid and the game will be less immersive. It’s a tremendous accolade to be able to boast the best Kinect support in a game and one that I think Turn 10 will be proud of and deserve.

Turn 10 haven’t just fiddled with Kinect-ability and intergrated Top Gear, they have also delved into the physics of the game making each of the tracks feel like a fresh challenge as you battle against the road surface and the condition of your tyres, the level of immersion just keeps getting deeper. Like previous games you can also tweak the difficulty to suit your skill. On easy, the game will assist you in just about every aspect allowing you to concentrate on steering – Sunday drivers apply here! As the difficulty increases the game gives you more and more control over the car until you are on full simulation mode and have to deal with the clutch as well as driving without any assists such as ABS (I can recommend using a steering wheel if you plan to go for this mode). You can of course also select a difficulty and then tweak individual elements that make up that difficulty, for example, you could opt for medium but instead of limited damage you can change it to full simulation. The possibilities are endless and there really is a difficulty for everyone, as you get better you can keep stepping up the difficulty until you are a racing pro.
There’s nothing worse than playing a racing game against AI that is clinical and overly aggressive, well in Forza 4 the AI has been tweaked further since the last game and while you will come across some overly aggressive drivers who will force you into a spin, you will also see plenty of errors in the way that they drive. On only my second race the AI was out in front with me hot on their heels, as we approached a tight S bend the AI bottled it and spun off the track just as if I was racing a human player, it was truly exhilarating stuff. Unfortunately though there are no options to directly control the AI difficulty in World Tour, their skill does scale with how you set up your car difficulty but there are no direct options to control their skills or levels of aggression which is kind of a shame considering how in-depth most of the options are in Forza. Playing the game in free play\quick race or by choosing to race an event from the list in career mode does allow you to set your opponent difficulty. The event list mode also allows you to set the opponent upgrades and class restrictions, so I felt it was rather odd to leave these settings out of the world tour mode.
Other than new physics to contend with in Forza 4, gameplay wise it remains the same, it’s racing, but in Forza 4 the guys at Top Gear are on hand to help “mix things up”. Bowling anyone? That’s right, knock over pins as you race around the Top Gear track and this is part of the career mode. It’s a shame that there aren’t more of these modes to mix up the standard race career. All of the different circuits of the Top Gear track are available in Forza 4 including the ability to race in the classic Kia cee’d. The only thing I found that was missing was Mr Clarkson’s voice warning me as I approached hammerhead, just like in the celeb hot laps.
As well as catering for just about any level of skill, Forza 4 also caters for a wide range in car taste, from the everyday family car up to the top of the range sports models. Finally I can now drive the family car decked out in a body kit that my wife would never consent too. The cars all feel and look great, each coming with slight differences to the way they handle. Each is so intricately detailed that I’m sure only the nerdiest car fanatic could pick holes!

The single player element to Forza 4 remains vastly unchanged, take part in World Tour, a mode that sees you make your way up the car classes through a plotted path of events across the world. At anytime you can jump out of this and take on events at your pace and at your own choosing by playing through the event list mode. Each event in World Tour gives you a set of options, you may choose to take on the track in one of three ways, these come down to making a choice as to what car class or type you would like to race in, each coming with its own unique bonus reward which is from bonus credits, driver XP or car model affinity bonus. Be warned though going for the best rewards might not be the easiest route through world tour, early on in your career you can jump from E class cars to B class if you want that large juicy reward bonus.
Progress through Forza is pretty much all about self progression and improvement. You can complete the game by chosing easy and just driving mindlessly through the games hundreds of tracks and even if you don’t finish first you can still proceed to the next stage. It’s all about the enjoyment of driving around tracks and improving the simulation experience by increasing the control you have over the car.
The new edition to single player is Rivals mode which can also be played amongst your car club in multiplayer. Rivals is a mode where you compete against other gamers lap times and scores in an effort to better them and place yourself on the line for others to beat. While playing in rivals you continue to earn driver XP and affinity XP and there are various rivals races in which to compete giving every type of Forza player something to compete in. What’s more is you don’t have to race the rival that the game chooses for you if you don’t want to, by pressing Y you can select to take on a rival from your friends list or car club. You can take on a racer from the top scores on that track, racers that are located “near you” or from any you have “favourited”. The game really does cater to what YOU want to do in a racing game and how YOU want to play it.

Graphically Forza is one of the best looking racers out there. I mentioned before Autovista mode looks truly stunning and while not quite as gorgeous, in-game racing still looks superb and will certainly give a wow factor especially if you have people over and the game happens to be on in the background – Forza is eye bleedingly beautiful, I just want to sit and stare at it’s lucious curves all day long. To be fair Forza has always looked pretty awesome but Turn 10 have upped their game further in 4. The tracks look more real than ever, the lighting engine has been improved and makes the cars look so real as light bounces off of them and coupled with a steering wheel and head tracking on Kinect you really can’t get any closer to the real thing.
Forza has always been about the community. The game has offered multiple tools over the years which have all linked in with the website. Picture and video sharing was the tip of the iceberg, Forza features a very comprehensive art tool where users can decorate their cars and create vinyl sets which they can then sell to other users through the storefront or even put one-off designs and cars up for auction. The community has also seen a strong rise in creative flair as gamers try to produce stunning pictures or gameplay movies. In Forza 4 you can now take HD pictures to upload to the website and you can record up to 30s worth of video in either web or high quality format and upload it to the forza website, this can be a lengthy process to record but worth it if you want to show off your greatest driving feats.
The lastest addition to the Forza 4 community is Clubs. Clubs is an extension of the online community that has formed over the years and is best described as a clan. Club members can race against each other, beat each others records in Rivals and best of all share cars and tuning setups. Forza loves it’s community and the attention Forza 4 shows towards this is evidence that the community is a mighty strong and active one. The only issue I found with clubs is that you have to type in gamertags manually to send out invites to join your car club, there didn’t seem a way to access your friends list to fire out invites directly.
There are plenty of modes to race online and you have direct access to invite either friends or club members into your party. The usual race modes are ever-present here but there are also several fun modes to play around with in the playground. The online will certainly extend your Forza career but for me I much prefer the solo experience although with the new club mode I can see myself getting rather competitive with one or two gamers from my friends list and club mode could open up the world of online racing to me, something I’ve never really got into before.

I’ve enjoyed past iterations of Forza but none of them have grabbed me and immersed me as much as Forza 4, it’s utterly fantastic and the best racing game I’ve ever played. Maybe it’s the head tracking but never before have I ever felt like I’m in the car so much as I do with Forza 4, in fact after thrashing the family car about the tracks I have to refocus myself when driving said car in the real world. It just feels all so right, a little too real – I just can’t see how Turn 10 will better the game in the next version which will undoubtedly release on Microsoft’s next console.
What I love about Forza is you don’t have to race on a certain track X amount of times before you can unlock a new track or buy a new car, you don’t have to be the worlds best racer to enjoy all its modes. The game caters for everyone and every skill. It’s not just a racing game but an experience and one that Turn 10 continually improve upon in every iteration. Just when you think the game is at its pinnacle Turn 10 break out the Turtle Wax and elbow grease and bring in something new and squeeze more beauty out of the games graphic engine. The competitive nature of the AI is spot on, the physics feel great particularly the force feedback coming from the road through the steering wheel, which at times makes you really feel like you have to fight against it! To top off the authentic nature of the game you will even get road rage!
If there is one racing game you buy this year make it Forza Motorsport 4 now I’m off to thrash the family car around the Top Gear race track one last time!


Review: Forza Motorsport 4 Results

What we liked:
Superb Kinect integration, particularly head tracking
Incredible graphics, especially autovista mode
The best racing game/experience on Xbox

What we disliked:
Terrible menu navigation in Kinect mode
Can't directly adjust the AI in world tour
I would of liked more modes like bowling or cone gates in World Tour Review: Forza Motorsport 4

Words by: Richard Berry | Posted on: Thursday 6th October, 2011 | Filed under: Features, News, Retail Games, Reviews.



0digg

The world of Forza Motorsport – there’s no clever storyline, no rise to fame through a faceless character, just you, few hundred cars and the open road. This is more than a game, it’s an experience and one than can be tailored to any play style and level of skill. The latest game in the hugely successful franchise finally sees the addition of Top Gear, which includes the iconic Top Gear test track and commentary by the man himself, Jeremy Clarkson – I am however still yet to bump into The Stig in-game though!

The game can be played in two ways, with Kinect or with a controller and Kinect. Going into the game exclusively using just Kinect gives you full Kinect-ivity in Autovista (Forza’s new car showroom) as well as being able to drive any of the cars on one of the games many tracks using just your hands. While this is super enjoyable as Kinect is extremely responsive, there is hardly any competition to be had here. The game accelerates and brakes for you leaving you to concentrate on taking a virtual grab of the wheel and enjoying the spectacular scenery Forza has to offer, think of this mode as more like a Sunday drive in the countryside.
You can also take on a friend locally in split-screen for a head-to-head Kinect race. You can choose from a small selection of tracks and cars, but there are one or two issues with the Kinect only mode that make split-screen rather painful. Firstly the navigation of the menus isn’t great (which is also an issue in the single player modes). You can scroll through the cars and tracks by swiping your hand across the screen, sounds simple enough but the execution of this in Forza 4 is one of the worst menu navigations I’ve seen from a Kinect enabled game. Not only is it a bit of a fiddle to grab the pane and swipe across to navigate, it’s practically impossible to navigate through one pane at a time. This can be particularly annoying when playing in split-screen as you watch your opponent wrestle with the navigation to look through ALL the cars on offer. Once in-game and racing against one another, Kinect seemed to struggle somewhat with my movements, they didn’t seem to be as responsive when compared to the single player modes.

The main beauty of the Kinect only mode of Forza 4 though is Autovista. This is Forza’s car showroom and while not all the cars are available in this mode there are certainly enough to keep you entertained for a long while and I would certainly expect Turn 10 to deliver more through DLC during the game’s lifecycle. Initially not all the cars are available for you to explore and you must unlock them by completing a challenge which can be from completing time trials and races to passing as many cars as possible. Autovista mode remains the same whether you choose to explore it using the power of Kinect or by a controller – although challenges are a lot easier to complete using Kinect.
Once you have selected a car to explore you are able to virtually walk around and look at the various parts using head tracking, which works pretty much faultlessly. There are multiple points of interest on the car which when selected, you are treated to a brief narration on that part. There is also a hotspot on the car that will play the Top Gear presentation, which is narrated by Jeremy Clarkson and shot in a very Top Gear-esque fashion. This feature looks and sounds great and wouldn’t look out of place on the TV show, you learn a bit about each car and what Jeremy Clarkson thinks about them. This is a great little feature and you will certainly want to look at the other car’s in Top Gear modes.
Outside of the information hotspots on the cars you can navigate around, open doors and even get into the car all through the power of Kinect. Head tracking works particularly well, allowing you to peer around and inspect the car’s finer points and there are plenty of ‘fine’ points. The cars look absolutely unbelievable, like they are ready to leap out of the screen. The reproduction and detail in the vehicles is breathtaking, they look stunning and it isn’t until you get a closer look at the alloy wheels and the rubber on the tyres that the illusion of looking at a real car is shattered. When using a controller you can look around the car using the sticks and while the experience is relatively the same it’s more fun and immersive to use Kinect.

With such great integration to head tracking in Autovista it’s a shame that Turn 10 didn’t integrate this into the racing side of the Kinect mode. While I can see that this may have been too distracting while racing with your hands, I would have liked to of been given the option to turn it on or off. Likewise there are no voice commands available to you when in Kinect mode, which if there was, could have helped the navigation issue I experienced. The Kinect racing modes may all be played while sitting down, but you need to stand to make full use of Autovista.
The Kinect only mode is just the tip of what’s on offer in Forza, the main game is experienced with a controller, or in the case of this review, a steering wheel. Starting the game you will be treated to a Top Gear presentation about the new game before being thrust into a celebration lap of new level – the Bernese Alps. You now have the option to import your Forza 3 profile and receive a nice achievement as well as cars and credits from your Forza 3 career. Now you can pick your first Forza 4 car in which to begin your World Tour. Similar to previous games in the franchise, you begin by selecting from bog standard “small” cars – I went for a Toyota Aygo.
When using Kinect in contoller mode you can call out ‘Xbox’ and make a voice command to jump straight into a menu or mode at anytime. Don’t worry, all the possible voice commands are listed in the menu just like in the Kinect dashboard. Now, before you begin to sink your teeth into the main game you can if you wish install disc 2 to your hard drive which enables an extra 250 cars to be available in the main game. You can opt to install the whole disc or choose packs to install.

Kinect doesn’t just stop with voice commands, Kinect delivers one of the finest intergrations of the system into a game, head-tracking. To enable head-tracking you must delve into the options screen and switch it on. Here you can also tweak a variety of options to best suit you. You can adjust the sensitivity on head yaw, lean sensitivity and also adjust a setting called “head yaw with lean” which roughly means a setting to adjust the neutral position when you look straight forward. You can also adjust Kinect’s ability to clip out unwanted objects in the background. It’s an impressive set of options but does it work? Oh my word does it!
So how does it work? well as the name suggests, Forza can now track your head movements and translate them directly into the game so now you can look down and round a bend or even check your rear view and wing mirrors. Head tracking becomes even more noticeable when you start drifting around corners at high speeds, the view looks into the corner you are drifting round and through the side window rather than transfixed out front, it’s an incredible experience and is a stand out feature of Forza 4.
The thing I have loved most about using a steering wheel and cockpit view in Forza is the level of immersion it creates, it’s as close many of us will get to sitting in a real car and racing around a track. Many games have carried the better with Kinect tagline and I think that Forza 4 is the first game to really prove that it certainly is, this feature alone makes having Kinectability with Forza 4 worthwhile, I love it!
Just to make sure head tracking is a worthwhile addition, try turning it off after using it for a prolonged period of time. Instantly the cars will feel very rigid and the game will be less immersive. It’s a tremendous accolade to be able to boast the best Kinect support in a game and one that I think Turn 10 will be proud of and deserve.

Turn 10 haven’t just fiddled with Kinect-ability and intergrated Top Gear, they have also delved into the physics of the game making each of the tracks feel like a fresh challenge as you battle against the road surface and the condition of your tyres, the level of immersion just keeps getting deeper. Like previous games you can also tweak the difficulty to suit your skill. On easy, the game will assist you in just about every aspect allowing you to concentrate on steering – Sunday drivers apply here! As the difficulty increases the game gives you more and more control over the car until you are on full simulation mode and have to deal with the clutch as well as driving without any assists such as ABS (I can recommend using a steering wheel if you plan to go for this mode). You can of course also select a difficulty and then tweak individual elements that make up that difficulty, for example, you could opt for medium but instead of limited damage you can change it to full simulation. The possibilities are endless and there really is a difficulty for everyone, as you get better you can keep stepping up the difficulty until you are a racing pro.
There’s nothing worse than playing a racing game against AI that is clinical and overly aggressive, well in Forza 4 the AI has been tweaked further since the last game and while you will come across some overly aggressive drivers who will force you into a spin, you will also see plenty of errors in the way that they drive. On only my second race the AI was out in front with me hot on their heels, as we approached a tight S bend the AI bottled it and spun off the track just as if I was racing a human player, it was truly exhilarating stuff. Unfortunately though there are no options to directly control the AI difficulty in World Tour, their skill does scale with how you set up your car difficulty but there are no direct options to control their skills or levels of aggression which is kind of a shame considering how in-depth most of the options are in Forza. Playing the game in free play\quick race or by choosing to race an event from the list in career mode does allow you to set your opponent difficulty. The event list mode also allows you to set the opponent upgrades and class restrictions, so I felt it was rather odd to leave these settings out of the world tour mode.
Other than new physics to contend with in Forza 4, gameplay wise it remains the same, it’s racing, but in Forza 4 the guys at Top Gear are on hand to help “mix things up”. Bowling anyone? That’s right, knock over pins as you race around the Top Gear track and this is part of the career mode. It’s a shame that there aren’t more of these modes to mix up the standard race career. All of the different circuits of the Top Gear track are available in Forza 4 including the ability to race in the classic Kia cee’d. The only thing I found that was missing was Mr Clarkson’s voice warning me as I approached hammerhead, just like in the celeb hot laps.
As well as catering for just about any level of skill, Forza 4 also caters for a wide range in car taste, from the everyday family car up to the top of the range sports models. Finally I can now drive the family car decked out in a body kit that my wife would never consent too. The cars all feel and look great, each coming with slight differences to the way they handle. Each is so intricately detailed that I’m sure only the nerdiest car fanatic could pick holes!

The single player element to Forza 4 remains vastly unchanged, take part in World Tour, a mode that sees you make your way up the car classes through a plotted path of events across the world. At anytime you can jump out of this and take on events at your pace and at your own choosing by playing through the event list mode. Each event in World Tour gives you a set of options, you may choose to take on the track in one of three ways, these come down to making a choice as to what car class or type you would like to race in, each coming with its own unique bonus reward which is from bonus credits, driver XP or car model affinity bonus. Be warned though going for the best rewards might not be the easiest route through world tour, early on in your career you can jump from E class cars to B class if you want that large juicy reward bonus.
Progress through Forza is pretty much all about self progression and improvement. You can complete the game by chosing easy and just driving mindlessly through the games hundreds of tracks and even if you don’t finish first you can still proceed to the next stage. It’s all about the enjoyment of driving around tracks and improving the simulation experience by increasing the control you have over the car.
The new edition to single player is Rivals mode which can also be played amongst your car club in multiplayer. Rivals is a mode where you compete against other gamers lap times and scores in an effort to better them and place yourself on the line for others to beat. While playing in rivals you continue to earn driver XP and affinity XP and there are various rivals races in which to compete giving every type of Forza player something to compete in. What’s more is you don’t have to race the rival that the game chooses for you if you don’t want to, by pressing Y you can select to take on a rival from your friends list or car club. You can take on a racer from the top scores on that track, racers that are located “near you” or from any you have “favourited”. The game really does cater to what YOU want to do in a racing game and how YOU want to play it.

Graphically Forza is one of the best looking racers out there. I mentioned before Autovista mode looks truly stunning and while not quite as gorgeous, in-game racing still looks superb and will certainly give a wow factor especially if you have people over and the game happens to be on in the background – Forza is eye bleedingly beautiful, I just want to sit and stare at it’s lucious curves all day long. To be fair Forza has always looked pretty awesome but Turn 10 have upped their game further in 4. The tracks look more real than ever, the lighting engine has been improved and makes the cars look so real as light bounces off of them and coupled with a steering wheel and head tracking on Kinect you really can’t get any closer to the real thing.
Forza has always been about the community. The game has offered multiple tools over the years which have all linked in with the website. Picture and video sharing was the tip of the iceberg, Forza features a very comprehensive art tool where users can decorate their cars and create vinyl sets which they can then sell to other users through the storefront or even put one-off designs and cars up for auction. The community has also seen a strong rise in creative flair as gamers try to produce stunning pictures or gameplay movies. In Forza 4 you can now take HD pictures to upload to the website and you can record up to 30s worth of video in either web or high quality format and upload it to the forza website, this can be a lengthy process to record but worth it if you want to show off your greatest driving feats.
The lastest addition to the Forza 4 community is Clubs. Clubs is an extension of the online community that has formed over the years and is best described as a clan. Club members can race against each other, beat each others records in Rivals and best of all share cars and tuning setups. Forza loves it’s community and the attention Forza 4 shows towards this is evidence that the community is a mighty strong and active one. The only issue I found with clubs is that you have to type in gamertags manually to send out invites to join your car club, there didn’t seem a way to access your friends list to fire out invites directly.
There are plenty of modes to race online and you have direct access to invite either friends or club members into your party. The usual race modes are ever-present here but there are also several fun modes to play around with in the playground. The online will certainly extend your Forza career but for me I much prefer the solo experience although with the new club mode I can see myself getting rather competitive with one or two gamers from my friends list and club mode could open up the world of online racing to me, something I’ve never really got into before.

I’ve enjoyed past iterations of Forza but none of them have grabbed me and immersed me as much as Forza 4, it’s utterly fantastic and the best racing game I’ve ever played. Maybe it’s the head tracking but never before have I ever felt like I’m in the car so much as I do with Forza 4, in fact after thrashing the family car about the tracks I have to refocus myself when driving said car in the real world. It just feels all so right, a little too real – I just can’t see how Turn 10 will better the game in the next version which will undoubtedly release on Microsoft’s next console.
What I love about Forza is you don’t have to race on a certain track X amount of times before you can unlock a new track or buy a new car, you don’t have to be the worlds best racer to enjoy all its modes. The game caters for everyone and every skill. It’s not just a racing game but an experience and one that Turn 10 continually improve upon in every iteration. Just when you think the game is at its pinnacle Turn 10 break out the Turtle Wax and elbow grease and bring in something new and squeeze more beauty out of the games graphic engine. The competitive nature of the AI is spot on, the physics feel great particularly the force feedback coming from the road through the steering wheel, which at times makes you really feel like you have to fight against it! To top off the authentic nature of the game you will even get road rage!
If there is one racing game you buy this year make it Forza Motorsport 4 now I’m off to thrash the family car around the Top Gear race track one last time!


Review: Forza Motorsport 4 Results

What we liked:
Superb Kinect integration, particularly head tracking
Incredible graphics, especially autovista mode
The best racing game/experience on Xbox

What we disliked:
Terrible menu navigation in Kinect mode
Can't directly adjust the AI in world tour
I would of liked more modes like bowling or cone gates in World Tour

[CQR Rogue]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/video-games/...

Video Game Reviews
Forza Motorsport 4 review
Forza Motorsport 4 is a meticulously crafted, engaging and accessible driving simulation, writes Tom Hoggins
4.5 out of 5 stars

By Tom Hoggins, Video Games Editor

9:25AM BST 06 Oct 2011

CommentsComment

Format: Xbox 360
Developer: Turn 10
Publisher: Microsoft Game Studios
Age Rating: PEGI 3
Released: 14 October 2011

Driving simulators have always had a reputation for lustful car voyeurism, cameras caressing every polished angle of their digital Ferrari F40 or Koenigsegg CCX... mmm, shiny. It’s natural. I don’t earn enough money to even peer through the window at a car dealership without the manager coming along and shouting “begone, peasant!” I’d imagine it’s the same for many of you. So it’s virtual admiration for us. And, my word, Forza Motorsport 4 has you covered.

There hasn’t yet been a driving game so flagrantly obvious in its desires. It’s unabashed car-porn, and Turn 10 embraces it wholesale. Take Autovista, a new mode that plonks a beautiful car, rendered in excruciating detail, in the middle of an aircraft hangar and lets you wander around it, crouch down to look at wheel spokes, open the bonnet to see how many horses are under there and clamber into the driver seat to (my favourite) beep the horn. “Take it for a test drive? Why, of course, sir, how do the Bernese Alps sound?”

On the road, Forza 4’s handling is deliciously pliable. It’s fiercer and more terrifying than the previous game, with cars eager to plough into under-steer or aggressive over-steer as you blister into the corners. It’s doesn’t quite have the precise realism of Gran Turismo 5, choosing to deliver a light but wild arcade kick to add flair to the racing. It’s a decision that serves Forza well, with enough depth to give each car definable characteristics, while keeping the heart-rate up as V12 supercars threaten to spit you out at every hairpin.

That’s with the assists turned off, mind. Forza has always had a brilliant way with accessibility, pioneering the racing line that guides you around the complex, twisting tracks and giving even the least skilled or familiar drivers the opportunity to soak in the simple pleasures of just driving really fast. The ease of use was more or less perfected in Forza 3, with the addition of a rewind button that allows you to spool back to that corner on which you barrelled into the gravel and have another go. It’s a similar story for Forza 4, with a plethora of options allowing you to customise your racing. The easiest mode even takes away the needs for braking and gives you assistance on steering. But there’s a level for everyone here, right up to a new full simulation mode. Which I tried once, and was gobbled up so dramatically I was too afraid to try again.

But I found my level. And once I did, Forza 4 became -simply- the most enjoyable racing sim I’ve ever played. There’s a delightful connection between the car and the road in Forza’s handling that make it a sheer pleasure to just ... drive. There are some issues on track, largely lying with the opponent AI, which remains strangely erratic. At times it works brilliantly, jostling for position ahead of you, blocking off your pass and even making natural mistakes which see them plough off into a wall if they mess up their timing. However, just as often, the AI will seem completely oblivious of your presence, resolutely sticking to their racing line and bumping you off the track. It appears that the AI seems slow to account for unpredictability on your part, an aggressive pass or manoeuvre not seeming to register, even when you have right of way. It's also disappointing to see there are still no weather effects, turning dry tracks into altogether different beasts as they become slick with rain.

Still, it’s not enough to get in the way of your fun and it helps that Forza 4 is a little bit gorgeous. Quite apart from the astonishing detail on the cars, with more care and attention lavished into the in-car view, the environments in Forza 4 are the prettiest and most characterful they’ve ever been. It’s quite something to be zipping around the Catalunya circuit in the late evening, the Spanish sun dipping towards the horizon casting a fiery glow over the tarmac, a bright spark kissing off the chrome of your Lamborghini Diablo. Yum.

There's certainly more personality throughout Forza 4. As with Gran Turismo, the Forza series has been criticised for sterility, and it's no accident that Turn 10 have taken the gloves off and let loose. They're not fooling anyone, mind, the injection of character is as precise a work of mechanical construction as the cars the game so worships. But it works, deliberately staying away from brashness to present a slick and classy front end. Gone are the blinding white menus, replaced with a friendlier, more understated UI and BBC TV show Top Gear has a telling influence. Jeremy Clarkson lends his voice to the intro cinematic, and gives his, uh, colourful views on certain cars in AutoVista. The Top Gear test track at Dunsfold provides the arena for hot laps and quirkier challenges such as bashing over giant bowling pins or playing car football. The Top Gear stamp is prevalent throughout but, if you're not that fond of Clarkson et al, it's not invasive enough to spoil things. Elsewhere, Kinect integration for AutoVista, head-tracking and steering prove responsive but ultimately limited novelties. But voice commands to navigate menus is a useful tool to explore Forza 4's layered shell.

And there is a lot to get through. Career mode has been streamlined further into World Tour. You hop between pre-set tracks across the globe, and the game offers up three different events to choose from base on the car you're currently in. If you don't fancy any of the ones on offer, switch to another car in your garage and you'll get a new selection. Usually though, the choice is a little too narrow. There's variety in the world tour, certainly, with multi-class races, slalom hot laps and the aforementioned Top Gear bowling alley, but these quirkier events are offered a little too sparingly as you progress through each season and driver division. However, the straightforwardness of the main singleplayer campaign coupled with the excellence of the driving does mean World Tour has a definite 'one more race' pull ingrained within its simple DNA, even if it can become a little bit of a grind.

The online portion of Forza has been further expanded. It's not simply 'multiplayer', a word that does the sprawling setup an injustice. In fact, Forza 4 is more a car lovers social network. A community. There's a terrific setup for online racing, with customised races mixed with Turn 10's suggested events of the day. The storefront and auction house return, with you able to browse other users' tuning setups and extraordinary paintjobs made in the game's extensive livery editor. You can share photos and videos, the best of which are chosen and featured on the homepage by Turn 10. And new this year is the Car Club, where you and a group of friends can sign up to your own clan, share cars in your club garage and compete together on club leaderboards. This also ties into a Rivals challenge mode, where you compete against your friends' ghosts in set tasks. Spending a morning desperately trying to beat other journalists' times around the Top Gear test track in the reasonably priced Kia Cee'd was a particular highlight.

It's a brilliantly engineered use of Xbox Live, and a welcome advert for the kind of community the service can breed. Forza 4 is just that kind of game; welcoming, slick and meticulously built in order to give its audience what it most desires. Because whether it's the feel of the road, the fury of competition or good old fashioned wish fulfilment, Forza 4 really does have you covered.

[CQR Rogue]

[CQR Aero]

Get More: GameTrailers.com, Forza Motorsport 4 - Nurburgring Battle Gameplay HD, PC Games, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

[CQR Aero]

Get More: GameTrailers.com, Forza Motorsport 4 - Cuda at Hockenheimring Gameplay HD, PC Games, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360

[CQR Aero]

Damn I wish I could create original designs as good as Adam's, here's yet another one to expect on his Storefront from Day 1:

[Richy59]

[CQR Aero]

Oh wow! Finally the replays have reached the point I always hoped they would. No more "magic camera" floating somewhere around the car, now we seem to have fixed emplacements, "crane cams" and "rail cams" giving us a much more "TV-style" look. I like a lot! (Check out the full-screen replay from 3:15 on this vid).

[Stonewall458]

^WOW! Looks absolutely stunning!

[CQR Rogue]

Well me and Richy got to play the full game today, all I can say is OMG we can not wait

[VVV GunDaM]

Will I need online to get the "Player loyalty awards"? Im just checking

[LMR DarthMario]

i dont think so ben. the 'player loyalty' i believe is based off your Fm3 game-save, and probably being online wouldnt count, but time will tell once we've got the game

[Richy59]

Well me and Richy got to play the full game today, all I can say is OMG we can not wait

Yeah and it was incredible, can't wait get my hands on the game this week. Many thanks to John for giving us the opportunity. Even got to set up the TORA car club early

[AMR of the Apex]

Oh well they ruined that advert by putting that awful "song" over the video

NOBODY WAS MEANT TO HAVE ALL THAT POWER
I GOT A PAKKIT OF SELF RAIZIN FLOOOOWER

[Biggsy tv]

Damn I wish I could create original designs as good as Adam's, here's yet another one to expect on his Storefront from Day 1:

I love how the front splitter isnt hideously huge like FM3. WINNING!

Anyways, more FM4 photos to drool over.

[ckBrenneke]

WHAT IS THAT!?

If we're not getting the Cruze, I think that might make a decent body double!

[Sponsored content]