#10. TEST DRIVE UNLIMITED 2

Test Drive Unlimited 2 may not have been the perfect game by any stretch of the imagination, with everything from its inconsistent world design and forgettable and threadbare attempts at telling a story to the bevy of technical issues the game launched with dragging the experience down in some pretty significant ways. But there’s a lot of fun to be found here nonetheless. Large chunks of its open world are absolutely gorgeous, and as such, a joy to simply drive around in, while there’s also no shortage of excellent racing events and activities scattered throughout all of that real estate. Sure, you have to cut through some less-than-stellar stuff to get to the good stuff, but when you do get to it, it’s really, really good.

#12. FORZA STREET

An easy pick for the lowest spot in this list. Forza Motorsport has consistently offered excellent simulation mechanics, while Horizon is an incredible arcade series, but Forza Street is really neither here nor there. It doesn’t help that it’s a mobile-only title, which means that it’s lacking in the sort of mechanical perfection, polish, and visual fidelity the series has traditionally been known for. It’s an extremely simplified experience that doesn’t do much of anything you’d expect a Forza game to do. Thankfully, it’s not technically a mainline entry, so it’s rather easy to completely overlook.

#11. FORZA MOTORSPORT 5

As the first Forza game to release for the Xbox One, Forza Motorsport 5 was well-positioned to really leverage the new console to deliver an excellent experience, but the game turned out to be a bit of a letdown, especially coming off of the excellent Forza Motorsport 4. It looked great, the audio design was typically excellent, new features like Drivatars and Forzavista were introduced, and the cars felt really good to drive, but the game was crippled by a shockingly small roster of vehicles and a disappointing lack of track variety at launch.

#10. FORZA MOTORSPORT

The one that started it all. The first Forza Motorsport’s legacy is impossible to oversell, and for fans of racing sims, this was a landmark release. At a time when Gran Turismo ruled the roost, Forza Motorsport came along and defied all expectations by not only delivering an excellent racing sim, but one that was genuinely great enough to be able to go up against Gran Turismo and provide some meaningful competition. Being 16 years old and having been improved upon by numerous sequels, it’s a little hard to go back to now, but the game deserves massive props for setting down solid foundations for the franchise.

#9. FORZA MOTORSPORT 6

After the backlash that Forza Motorsport 5 received at launch for its issues, Turn 10 Studios knew they needed to come back strong with a proper statement- Forza Motorsport 6 wasn’t exactly a strong statement that could make people sit up and take notice, but it was an improvement. The selection of vehicles and tracks was much better, the visuals were beautiful, and the career mode and online were a blast. Mechanically, Forza Motorsport 6 wasn’t as polished in terms of its sim aspects as some other games in the series, which made it a bit of an inconsistent experience, but by and large, this was a really good game.

#8. FORZA HORIZON

Forza Horizon was an interesting and risky experiment for Microsoft’s racing series. After having made a name for itself with four excellent racing sims, with Forza Horizon, the series decided to do something different, delivering a more arcade style of racing in an open world environment. It’s fair to say that the experiment worked out, thanks to excellent driving mechanics and a world that was an absolute joy to simply drive around in. The first Forza Horizon has been improved upon by all of its successors, so by default it feels a little aged, but even so, it’s still a blast to play even today.

#7. FORZA MOTORSPORT 2

Forza Motorsport 2 had a lot of expectations to live up to, not only because it had to build on the success of its groundbreaking predecessor, but also because it was the series’ debut on the Xbox 360, and it succeeded very nearly in everything that it set out to do. It looked and sounded gorgeous, its tracks and cars were brimming with details, the roster of vehicles was vast and varied, and the mechanical polish and sheer range of customization options in the game were staggering, especially for its time.

#6. FORZA HORIZON 2

Forza Horizon 2 didn’t have the novelty factor of the first Horizon game, which meant it didn’t make nearly as big of a splash as its predecessor did, but it was more than a worthy successor, and an excellent evolution of the series’ open world arcade racing branch. The freedom and arcade-style racing that Horizon 1 established were taken to even greater heights in the sequel, while the open world featured here was also absolutely gorgeous and just a pleasure to drive around in. Sadly, the Xbox 360 version of the game as a bit of a mess, to the extent that it almost felt like a completely different game.

#5. FORZA MOTORSPORT 3

As great as the first two Forza games were, it was with Forza Motorsport 3 that the series really came into its own. Turn 10 established the formula that the series would continue to be built on for years to come, and it was with Forza Motorsport 3 that the franchise really solidified its identity and emerged as a true and proper contender to the racing sim throne. Excellent cars, tracks, driving mechanics, career mode, and more came together to deliver what was and still remains one of the best racing sims of its time.

#4. FORZA MOTORSPORT 7

Forza Motorsport hit a relative slump in its Xbox One era, but at least it ended strong. Forza Motorsport 7 wasn’t perfect, no – the microtransactions at launch, for instance, were a bit of nuisance – but in most ways that matter, this might just be one of the best renditions of the Forza formula. Visually spectacular, absolutely overflowing with a ridiculously large selection of vehicles, packed full of content that could keep you busy for dozens upon dozens of hours, Forza Motorsport 7 was a great return to form for the series. Driving mechanics were more polished and refined than ever before, the career mode was excellent, the progression system was genuinely engaging, and the introduction of dynamic weather was an exciting new addition.

#3. FORZA HORIZON 3

Like Forza Motorsport, Forza Horizon really hit its stride with its third instalment. The first two Horizon games are spectacular open world racers though, so that should tell you something about how good the third one was. Australia was an excellent open world setting, not just in terms of size, but also in terms of variety, while the driving mechanics were also better and smoother than ever. It was with Forza Horizon 3 that many started wondering whether the spinoff Forza series had surpassed the mainline games, and it’s easy to see why- this is easily one of the best racing games ever made.

#2. FORZA MOTORSPORT 4

The absolute pinnacle of the Forza Motorsport line of games. Turn 10 kept on consistently improving on the formula with each progressive game in the series’ earlier years, and with Forza Motorsport 4, ended up crafting a veritable masterpiece. Excellent variety in tracks and cars, a ridiculous level of detail that exhibited a true love for the craft, the most polished driving mechanics the series had ever had up until that point- for all of these reasons and more, Forza Motorsport 4 is not only the best Motorsport game, it might even arguably be the best racing sim ever made. It’s that good.

#1. FORZA HORIZON 4

When Forza Horizon spun off from the mainline series, no one could have expected that it would go on to surpass the Motorsport line of games. By the time Horizon 3 came out, the subseries did start hinting at that level of quality- and with Horizon 4, it just blew everyone out of the water. Open world Britain is beautiful, massive, full of varied sights and sounds, and densely packed with a vast variety of consistently enjoyable activities, from excellent racing events to buying houses to competing against Drivatars to just aimlessly driving around the open world. Add to that the ingenious seasons mechanic, which completely changes the world in fundamental ways, and you also get an insane amount of dynamism in the experience. Forza Horizon 4 is easily one of the best racing games ever made, if not the best, and we’d be lucky to see Horizon 5 coming anywhere close to that level.

Forza Horizon 1

Microsoft really dominated the gaming landscape with the Xbox 360, which can be attributed to a far more developer-friendly system architecture that made it relatively easy to work with. While the PS3 did have an incredibly powerful Cell chip, it was extremely difficult to write code for and the hard limit on the distribution of memory between CPU and GPU made lives even more difficult for developers. Microsoft’s first-party produced a bunch of stellar games that showcased what the console was capable of, and Playground Games did exactly that with its debut title, the original Forza Horizon.

Releasing in 2012 right before 343 Industries dropped the system’s swansong exclusive Halo 4, Forza Horizon was incredibly well-received on account of its beautiful open-world and remarkably different feel from the simulation-oriented Forza Motorsport series. Utilizing an updated version of Turn10’s proprietary engine, Forza Horizon renders a crisp 720p image with a steady 30fps cap that rarely falters. Topping off the native 720p resolution is 4x MSAA anti-aliasing which ensures that any and all rough edges are smoothened out.

The original Forza Horizon is set in a fictionalized recreation of Colorado, and features some great draw distances for its time. The seemingly low level of details far off are smartly masked off by the motion blur, but the overall terrain looks a lot barren with a number of canyons and plains su. The original Forza Horizon does feature a relatively drab color palette as compared to its successors. While this is a mostly artistic choice incredibly common within the games of the time, some fans still swear that the game is all the better for it as these darker colors hide any inconsistencies with detailing that might crop up with the relatively weaker hardware.

Forza Horizon 2

Almost two years after the release of the first game, Playground returned with a sequel to its fan-beloved IP. Interestingly enough, Forza Horizon 2 stands to this day as the only cross-gen release in the release. Of course, the added strain of porting the game over to a last-gen machine means that sacrifices need to be made. Sumo Digital did a smart job at nailing the basics right, with the Xbox 360 version of Forza Horizon 2 running extremely well with a solid 30 fps cap. While the game did utilize the original Forza Horizon’s engine written for the Xbox 360, it still looks and feels similar to its bigger brother on the Xbox One.

There are a lot of improvements that players will notice while jumping from Forza Horizon to Forza Horizon 2. Running at a pristine resolution of 1080p, the game flaunts its high-resolution textures, reflections, and a bevy of post-processing effects that all serve to accentuate the now-brightly lit environments. Given the Xbox One boasts more than 10 times the memory of the Xbox 360, it’s quite obvious that the level of detail within the environmental assets themselves has also received a significant boost. The difference is quite stark actually, which can be easily seen from a simple comparison screenshot between the two games.

The  choice of Northern Italy as the setting has a lot of impact on the art direction, with terrestial variety being a noticeable step up from the original. There’s plenty of bloom during the daytime, and the game can look really gorgeous when all graphical cylinders fire in harmony. The samll roadside towns also have some interesting architecture, which all adds towards making its world more alive and beautiful.

In terms of performance, Forza Horizon 2 still runs at a mere 30 fps though, which rubbed many the wrong since Turn 10’s Forza Motorsport 5 ran at a steady 60 fps with arguably higher levels of details. Of course, there’s always the fact that Forza Horizon is an open world that requires rapid asset streaming as players are expected to be zooming across the lands in some of the speediest cars the series had to date while Forza Motorsport features static race-courses which allow the developers to optimize the environments accordingly, which by extension frees up the GPU to pump more frames comfortably within a second.

Forza Horizon 3

After another gap spanning 2 years, Playground Games would return to release Forza Horizon 3. Setting foot outside the United States and Italy, the jump to a masterfully detailed rendition of Australia provides a great backdrop to a great graphical upgrade to the series. Much like the previous entry, Forza Horizon 3 ran at a resolution of native 1080p with a target of 30 fps, which in true Forza Horizon fashion rarely ever falters. It also features 4x MSAA anti-aliasing which creates a pristine-looking image that’s always a feast for the eyes to gorge on.

The jump to Australia as the setting has a lot of implications, with foliage being an integral part of the experience. The track is surrounded by vegetation more often than before, and the vegetation is also more dense and detailed than before. However, the increased level of detail has an unfortunate side-effect of making LOD swapping(or pop-in) more visisble and by extension, even distacting.

In true sequel fashion, there are many obvious improvements as well of course, with weather effects boasting higher-resolution textures and increased environmental draw distances than before. Forza Horizon 3 was also the series debut on the PC platform. Forza Horizon 3‘s PC port doesn’t seem to be an afterthought either, as it is filled with a pantheon of options that allow for tinkerers – such as myself – to find that perfect sweet spot between quality and performance.

Tests seem to suggest that the Xbox One version of the game uses presets similar to the PC port’s high setting – which is a testament to Playground’s excellent understanding of the hardware as running in with that target and visuals required a fairly beefy system at the time. Forza Horizon 3 also received an Xbox One X patch further down the line – as Playground’s and Turn10’s latest iterations of the Forza series became the posterchild to show off the raw grunt of the 6 teraflop beast.

The Xbox One X version bumps the game’s pixel count of the Xbox One version by 4 times to native 4K accompanied by the 4x MSAA found in the original, with a bunch of enhancements to its visuals that match the PC’s highest settings. Interestingly enough, some of the beefiest graphics cards of the time such as the GTX 1070 – would occasionally drop frames at near-identical settings, which served as the basis for comparison for the power of Microsoft’s most powerful console.

Forza Horizon 4

Forza Horizon 4 takes the series traditional Horizon festival and dumps it into a fictional representation of Great Britain, and is all the better for it. The main hook of Forza Horizon 4 are Seasons, which drastically change up the tracks, environments, and most importantly handling of vehicles. Developer Playground Games utilized a number of techniques that involve the use of satellite map data more than previous entries to get a better understanding of the topography of Britain, which allowed for a much richer and in-depth realization of the setting.

With 4 distinct seasons being the highly-touted factor for Forza Horizon 4, it stands to reason that the biggest changes come in the form of deformable terrain and associated weather effects receiving a big bump in quality. There are a number of new feature additions to the mix as well, with ambient occlusion and screen space reflections bringing some added royalty into the ever-expanding roster of cars screeching their tires across this gargantuan map. Of course, it still runs at a comfortable 30 fps on the Xbox One.

Given that Playground Games had access to Xbox One X development kits quite early on, Forza Horizon 4 runs at a steady 60fps on the upgraded machine – a series first for consoles. While it’s sure to knock down the resolution from pristine 4K down to 1080p, but it’s still better to have the novelty of choice nevertheless. Forza Horizon 4 on PC is expanded upon further from its predecessors, giving a bevy of options along with detailed performance benchmarking tools that can make tinkering a joy.

It’s still demanding to pull a 4K 60 fps at its highest settings on PC, but the game is noticeably much more optimized than before. The Xbox One version runs at the same mostly high settings as the PC port, while the Xbox One X achieves greater visual fidelity at 4 times the original’s resolution – matching which would require a beefy GPU such as the likes of a GTX 1070Ti.

Forza Horizon 5

This is the culmination of everything the series has been building towards – mechanically as well as graphically. Utilizing photogrammetry, Playground Games has managed to achieve an unparalleled level of complexity in the materials and meshes used in its environment, which is topped by foliage that looks to be much denser and reactive than ever before. There’s also a revamped volumetric lighting system, which adds a lot to the overall presentation as the atmosphere looks noticeably thicker than its previous renditions especially when the newly-added dust storms come into view. All in all, many of these techniques lend a huge sense of realism to the world at large, which is a fantasy that Playground’s premier franchise has constantly strived to achieve more of.

An interesting point in terms of graphics is that Forza Horizon 5 doesn’t actually have ray-traced reflections, though fans may be forgiven to think so given the high-resolution screen space reflections found throughout car bodies. Ray-tracing is in the game but is only supported in ForzaVista on next-gen.

Forza Horizon 5 is targeting a 4K 30 fps target for the quality mode on the Xbox Series X, while the performance mode will supposedly knock down a few settings to get it running at 60 fps. Since this is going to be a cross-gen release built to support a wide variety of PC hardware and 4 distinct consoles, the engine is touted to be more scalable than before which should in theory ensure that each and every mode feels great to play.

Sunset Overdrive

Sunset Overdrive’s vivid art-style would look absolutely phenomenal in 4K and 60 FPS. Currently, the game runs at 900p and 30 FPS and while the Xbox Series X’s Auto HDR makes it pop, a proper optimization patch would go a long way. Given that Sony owns the rights to the IP, this may seem like a pipe-dream – at least on Xbox consoles – but we can still hope.

]]> https://gamingbolt.com/top-xbox-one-games-that-need-xbox-series-x-patches/feed 0 470052 https://gamingbolt.com/14-weird-methods-of-fast-travel-in-video-games https://gamingbolt.com/14-weird-methods-of-fast-travel-in-video-games#respond Fri, 05 Feb 2021 05:58:25 +0000 https://gamingbolt.com/?p=468166 Fast travel, especially in open world games, is something we take for granted. It’s always assumed that you’ll be able to quickly jump between two points on a huge open map because of course you would. Who in their right mind would walk, drive or sail everywhere? In some games, fast travel is a process befitting the world but that doesn’t make it any less weird. Let’s take a look at some of the weirdest methods of fast travel here.

Fragile Jump – Death Stranding

In Death Stranding, fast travel is made possible by teleportation which isn’t all that odd (it’s the future, after all). However, teleporting is done via an umbrella owned by Fragile. Following some events in Chapter 3, Sam unlocks the ability to fast travel to safe houses by simply looking at the wall where the umbrella hangs and hitting the prompt. Fragile will then jump in with her umbrella, she and Sam will touch heads and off you go. That this isn’t even remotely the weirdest thing in Death Stranding is an understatement.

Crackdown 3

Okay, so Crackdown 3 isn’t the greatest open world game out there. But it offers a decently sized city with plenty to blow up and lots of different things to do. The Skills for Kills system encourages taking down foes with a variety of weapons and abilities, and hunting down different crime bosses while laying waste to their businesses can be mindless fun. It’s Crackdown-rific, and that may work for certain people.

Microsoft has finally unveiled its next Xbox console, except it’s probably not the one you’re thinking. Leaked prior to the recent Inside Xbox show, the Xbox One S All-Digital Edition will release on May 7th. It will retail for $249.99, which is $50 cheaper than the current Xbox One S, and can currently be pre-ordered.

The Xbox One S All-Digital Edition doesn’t have a Blu-ray Disc Drive. Instead, it offers a completely digital solution to potential consumers with three bundled games – Minecraft, Forza Horizon 3, and Sea of Thieves. It also features a free one month subscription to Xbox Live Gold. The initial three months of Xbox Game Pass are also available for just $1 (though this likely applies for new users only).

Later, you can also pick up the recently announced Xbox Game Pass Ultimate for $15 per month. This includes both Xbox Live Gold and Xbox Game Pass, providing both free games and a library of over 100 titles to access digitally. It won’t be available till later this year though, so stay tuned for more details.

Rumours about a completely digital, discless version of the Xbox One have been floating around for a while now. Just earlier this month, reports emerged that the SKU, supposedly called the Xbox One S All-Digital Edition, will be revealed in April and released in May. Now, Windows Central is reporting that as per “additional documents” received by them, those rumours seem to have been solidified further.

As per the report, the Xbox One S All-Digital Edition will launch on May 7, with its release being a simultaneous one worldwide, in all the markets where Xbox has a presence. The SKU is reportedly going to be the lowest prices Xbox One model available, and serve as an entry-point into the Xbox One family and ecosystem. Microsoft does not intend for it to be a replacement to the current Xbox One S variant, and rather means to make it another option in the Xbox One family of consoles- an exact price point hasn’t been mentioned in the report, however.

Windows Central have also recreated box art of the console using Photoshop to mimic the documents they received (in order to protect their original source)- the box art warns of the console’s discless nature in multiple places, as can be seen below. It also touts 4K video playback, HDR gaming, and a 1 TB HDD, but what’s interesting is that it mentions Minecraft, Sea of Thieves, and Forza Horizon 3 coming pre-loaded on the console. The design of the console itself seems to be more or less identical to the Xbox One S itself, other than the missing disc drive and eject button. It also seems a Game Pass subscription isn’t part of the package.

For now, in the absence of official confirmation by Microsoft themselves, it’s best to take these reports with a grain of salt, as is always the case. That said, it’s looking increasingly likely that a discless SKU version of the Xbox One is going to be announced very soon. Stay tuned for continued updates.

Mad Max

It’s a lonely road out there, full of endless deserts and roaming bandits. Mad Max takes the sheer expanse of its landscape and ties it closely to the vehicular play. You’re either roaming the land, scoping out different bases to take out, or assaulting convoys for precious rewards. A decent story and top-notch characterization for Max help push the game past your average cinematic adaptation.

Among the five studios Microsoft acquired to bring into their first party lineup earlier this year, alongside Ninja Theory, Playground Games was probably the biggest of them all. Having worked on the Forza Horizon series alongside Microsoft for a few years, the two parties already had a pretty great relationship, which was strengthened even further with the announcement.

However, why exactly did Playground Games agree to the acquisition, especially considering how proud the studio has always been of its independence? While speaking with Eurogamer, Playground boss Ralph Fulton was asked this question, and his answer was twofold. One of the reasons for the deal was that after Playground Games expanded to turn into a two team studio (the second of which is reportedly working on Fable 4), they started considering how to progress in the future a bit differently.

“We were independent for a long time,” Fulton said. “And we love being independent. When you think we were acquired earlier this year, it came from a place where we love being independent, ew loved what we were doing with Microsoft. A couple of things – one thing that changed between Horizon 3 and now, when we shipped Horizon 3 we were a one-team studio.”

“That’s a very simple business to think about and manage,” he continued. “Obviously since then we’ve branched out and have a new team that we’re tantalisingly close to and you’ll never see what they do. I like teasing that! They’re two very different games, two different genres, both with Xbox – and suddenly when your business is growing like that and your staff is growing, it changes the way you think about what the future looks like.”

Fulton then went on to talk about Forza Horizon 3, and how Playground Games felt that with the open world racer – which is one of the highest rated games on the Xbox One – the studio felt that they had accomplished the most they could accomplish as an independent studio, and that if they were to outdo themselves and what they’d done with Horizon 3, joining up with Microsoft would allow them to do that (And it certainly worked, too- Forza Horizon 4, which launched a couple days back, is one of the best racers of all time).

“The other thing is we achieved an enormous amount as an independent,” Fulton said. “Forza Horizon 3 exceeded expectations in pretty much every respect and felt like as well as an independent studio could do. Our MO is we grow and we improve and we do better than we’ve done before in everything we do, and it felt like the capacity to do that in a Forza Horizon world would only be possible if we became part of the family.”

Fulton also talked about how Playground had been at the forefront of most (if not all) of Microsoft’s biggest steps with first party stuff anyway, from getting the first Xbox One S dev kit in the UK, to being among the first games to support stuff like Play Anywhere and HDR, and how, in light of that, the acquisition seemed to make even more sense.

“We had a curious not quite first-party not quite third-party – okay, second party – status,” he said, “We were an independent studio whose client was Microsoft, but also we worked on a first-party franchise, they’re first-party games effectively and were treated as such. So we were probably right at the front of the queue when it comes to technology – we had the first Xbox One S devkit in the UK, we were the first game on Xbox cross-play. HDR was another one – I think we were the second game to launch with HDR. We knew about these things and were probably clued in before others were. But there was still that partition that’s not there when you’re one of the family.”

Forza Horizon 4, Playground’s latest, is out now for Xbox One and PC.