A lot of things come to mind when you think about Forza Horizon, but in terms of distinction from other open-world racers, the Showcase Events are probably the most notable. Players have raced against trains and even a Pelican from Halo, creating some incredibly memorable moments. The only problem is that they never went back.
It’s a problem that hasn’t escaped Playground Games’ notice. Level design director Tom Dillow noted to IGN how, “We went back and looked at our telemetry from Forza Horizon 5, focusing in on Showcase events. And we noticed, for the most part, our Showcases are one-and-done.
“So the player gets given the Showcase as a reward, they go there and have an amazing three minutes, but then they drive off, and there’s no incentive to return. Now, we do try to remedy this in our live program, where we’ll take an existing showcase and we will change the time of day and the weather and the car choice and the music, and we find a lot of our players will return and play that event, but once that’s done, they drive off and there’s no incentive to return again.”
With Forza Horizon 6, it’s trying something different: Horizon Rush. Unlocked by earning wristbands during your Horizon Career, there are three available at launch, with locations ranging from a Tokyo City dockyard and Alpine ski resort to a spaceport. Akin to obstacle courses, you have to essentially beat the timer. The difference is that these are replayable and also support co-op and competitive play.
While they’re not as bombastic as the two new Showcase Events (though Dillow notes that they “may or may not make a rocket take off” so look out for that in the spaceport) – Horizon Rush introduces some much-needed replay value.
“If we build these amazing events, we want our players to enjoy them over and over again. And then we asked ourselves, what does replayability mean to us? And for us, it was a high score, or a better time. It was course mastery – so being easy to play the first time, but hard to master. And, most importantly for me as a level designer, it was about it being fun. If it’s not fun, I’m not going to go and return and play it. So that’s what replayability meant to us.”
Event Lab from Forza Horizon 5 also served as an inspiration for these courses, though Playground Games has designed the locations to tailor to the courses first and foremost. “The Rush courses take place in our gameplay locations, which are whiteboxed by level design and have a heavy focus on gameplay,” says Dillow. “Typically, in previous games we would build the whole location in one go and work events in afterwards; however, this time we built the Rush courses first and then built the locations around them.”
“Each Rush course starts off with a paper design, so with the docks, for example, we knew we wanted to begin on a rooftop, drive through some containers, enter an off-road section, then finish at the warehouses. Instead of building the docks and then trying to work this route in afterwards, we built the course first in isolation and then built the rest of the dockyard around that course. This ensured a premium quality experience for Rush and a final result we’re very proud of.”
Whether Playground Games will add more in the future or even make the event a permanent fixture of the franchise remains to be seen. For now, it’s a means to compete against others, but more importantly, oneself, as they attempt to master whatever Horizon Rush throws at them.
Fortunately, we won’t have long to see what that may be, as Forza Horizon 6 launches on May 19th for Xbox Series X/S and PC (though PS5 players will need to wait till later this year). Check out the admittedly reasonable system requirements here.