Like Falkor, I’m seemingly part of a neverending story. I’ve been here, writing these near exact words, time and time again. But I’ll keep writing them.
I have no doubt I’ll stick more than 100 hours into Forza Motorsport. If that’s not recommendation enough, then you clearly value your time less than I do. But I can’t say that Forza Motorsport excited me. It’s not really the game’s fault, or the dev team’s, or Xbox‘s, or mine. I’ve just been in this place before, looking at a wonderful feat of engineering and art, pushing the technology available to make me feel like I am a race car driver. It’s not so much the easy go-to of “diminishing returns,” as it is simply returning. I’ll keep coming back, but that “New Road Layout” sign has been there for years now.
Race cars (or mostly one car for a long period of time, upgrading it along the way), earn credits, buy parts or new cars, enter new race series, gradually pull back the assists and ramp up the rules and simulation. I’m sure previous Forza Motorsport games weren’t set up with this structure, but honestly I’d struggle to tell you exactly how they were different. That’s not a criticism, just a fact about how I perceive these games. There’s only so many ways you can present racing in a serious fashion, no matter how much work goes into shaking things up.