Recent reviews by Az21

+ Really good visuals.
+ Optimized performance.
+ Main story is good.
+ Combat and stealth feels satisfying.
+ Exploration mechanism is really well done; it keeps focus on the world instead of minimap. More open world games should straight up copy the wind navigation mechanism.
+ Each location is unique. Modern open world games just copy-paste the same place of interest 10 times to inflate the size of the map, but GoT devs have made each location unique.
+ Iki Island DLC is a proper expansion with its own story, characters, armor, skins, and enemies. I wish the the enemies in the main island were also able to switch their weapons to make combat more engaging.

- By the endgame combat feels "figured out" and not very challenging on hard difficulty.
- Side quests were honestly nothing special. Better than Ubisoft slop but nowhere near the likes of Witcher 3. Even the main story is few notches below the quality of Witcher 3.
- Too many collectibles. Some collectibles are tied to upgrades and they it just becomes boring to do same thing over and over again (chasing fox, haiku, cutting bamboo).
- Can't skip cutscenes.

Overall, I really enjoyed my journey and I'd recommend it to anyone looking for open-world action adventure stealth game set in Japan.

Great game with potential to become better. Really happy that VS-like is becoming a new genre.

Long story short, game mechanics and feel on a controller is top notch. Everything else is a let down.

+ Great handling model
+ Fun multiplayer when everyone drives clean (rare, but it happens)

- Multiplayer skill and safety ratings are pointless because they aren't factored in when lobbies are created. S rank players are matched with B, C, D rank. First corner punts to ruin your day remains a hallmark of Forza series.
- Weekly playlists are grindy and repetitive. T10 selects few race tracks each week and calls it a day. It is a far cry from weekly playlist of Forza Horizon 4/5.
- Graphically, everything looks washed out. Like you're playing with HDR on a screen which doesn't support HDR.
- Poor optimization on PC.
- Penalty system is not satisfactory. It needs a lot of improvement.
- Old, inaccurate car models.
- Old, inaccurate track layout. T10 has updated textures, but the minor inaccuracies in track layout remain.
- Sound design is worse than FH5.
- No radar to see cars around you. The proximity arrows are just not enough.
- No update to paint system. Competition allows importing SVGs and Photoshop files, while Forza series is stuck in 2000s with their paint system.

Unfortunately, this game looks done already. It was launched in alpha state and after 9 months of bug fixes, it is barely playable. GT7 has absolutely smoked FM8 in this console generation; it isn't even a competition.

Much better than the first expansion.

Pros
- The map/track design is a huge step in the right direction for the Horizon series. Tracks have twists, turns, and elevation changes. Managing weight shift is a much welcomed addition to the experience.
- Good assortment of races.
- Great replay value.
- Majority of trees are breakable.

Neutral
- Progression system is an improvement over base game and HW expansion, but still lacks that x-factor.
- Dialog is improvement over the over-enthusiastic PEGI-3 script of base game, but still needs more authenticity.
- Co-driver gives instructions from a helicopter. This is understandable because of cars like Peel, but still feels a bit weird.
- Tracks are very wide in context of rally, but again, this is understandable because of online racing.

Negative
- No rally cars were added.
- Pace notes are horrendously off-pace.
- Location feels way too similar to base game (obviously) and therefore does not feel fresh. A proper rally hosting country like Wales, Argentina, New Zealand, or Finland would have been a better choice than Mexico; and a much needed palette cleanser.


Overall I really enjoyed this a lot (much more than HW) primarily because of its track design.
Playground Games uses expansions to test features for their upcoming games, and here the stand out feature is the track design which forces you to manage weight shift. I'd love a similar map design for FH6.

Although swinging around the NYC is very satisfying, the story and side quests are a massive let down. Hacking mini-game and Mary Jane main story quest are infuriating. Side quests/collectibles are copy-pasted 50 times and there is little to no variation. Open world car chases play out exactly the same each time.

I really wanted to enjoy this game, but the everything apart from combat and travelling felt like a chore.

Very addictive game. Each run feels unique. Game wants you to break it and there will be many moments where you feel you've peaked, but it will keep upping the ante.

I wish this game to get reimplemented in a more performant language. Game lags in the final act of runs where you get crazy weapons and enemies fill entire screen. There are limitations to interpreted, single threaded languages like Javascript which cannot be mitigated with code optimization.

Pros

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+ Excellent visuals. The neutral tone of environment and the over-saturated tone of driving effects just makes the artstyle pop.

+ Good car selection with a ton of customization. With how game development works, you either have to settle for 150 cars with tons of customization or 500+ cars with low customization. I personally prefer more customization.

+ Cops are implemented well. It never feels overwhelming or too easy. Maybe a bit annoying when you don't want to engage in a chase during freeroam, but otherwise it's pretty good.

+ Sound design is impressive. Boosts and drifts feel very punchy with the perfectly timed pops. Exhaust tone can be customized.

Neutral

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~ The economy is too tight. The progression feels earned, but I'd say rewards need a massive boost. Ideally, I'd like to have every car in the garage after some grinding, but the current system is too restrictive. Easy way to fix this would be to scale the rewards with heat level; this would also give cop chases a purpose.

~ There is no fast travel.

~ A$AP Rocky's involvement in the game is quite good. Wish he had a more integral part in the story.

Cons

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- Handling model is just awful. It is unpredictable and never really finds the balance even with 100% grip/drift tunes. The drifting handling model feels entirely different to normal handling model and it just throws you off every time.

- Gamepad controls cannot be reassigned. This is just embarrassing.

- Drifting slows you down faster than braking in a straight line. I know it's an arcade, but game design choices like this are the reason why the core driving experience feels off.

- Story is pretty mediocre. We never even meet the person who orchestrates the events in prologue. The redemption arc is horrible.

- It's a matter of personal taste, but the soundtrack is just awful.

- Online experience is very bare bones. Meta cars are leagues better than competition, and there is really only one meta car in each class.

- Locked content in online is outrageous. Play 30 playlists (1 playlist = 3 races) in a specific manufacturer to unlock specific car is too grindy. Money is already tight, so let players buy what they want.

Update After Vol 3

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- The game hasn't evolved much since the release. Post launch content is not up to the mark.

- The paid DLC cars are the final nail in the coffin for me. What little post launch content this game has had is locked behind paid DLC. This game competes with Forza and Crew which have excellent post-launch content, and this is poor showing from EA.

I enjoyed the single player content, and I'd still recommend the game on a deep (70%+) sale.

The sense of adventure is unparalleled.

A modern classic. Genre-defining game. Absolute perfection.

The open world is amazing, but the story missions are terrible. If you so much as breath in the wrong direction, mission fails. There is a good story, but the constant downtime kills my enjoyment. Mission structure is flat, boring, and predictable: go to a location to start mission, ride your horse to the next town, kill people there. Rinse and repeat.

- Fast travel is there, but it is so slow and cumbersome.

- Most of the game is spent just tapping sprint/gallop button, slowly seeing your life wither away.

- Rockstar is still using the same old GTA V shooting mechanic. It's so awkward. Allow me to aim down sights.

- Cover mechanic is still awkward as ever.

- Bullets have a some 100m range, after which they just disappear into the void.

- No agency or choice in missions. Follow hard coded directions, or fail. Rockstar knows this and sometimes throws a 'go left' or 'go right' """""choice""""". I really hope they completely abandon their current mission structure and let the player approach mission however they want in their future titles.

- You know why this game is so long? Because majority of mission time is spent on travelling from one spot to another. This is just useless padding to waste time. Another thing I'd appreciate completely removed; just start the mission where it is actually supposed to start.

- RAGE engine is not designed around stealth, but Rockstar still creates stealth missions.

- The story also comes across as tone deaf. Every single arc ends with you massacring the entire town. This is a constant immersion breaking factor for me.

- The low population virgin lands become home to every American during a shootout. A town with population of 20 somehow spawns 50 people.

- Cores (hunger, deadeye, stamina, horse stamina, horse hunger) were just annoying for me. It's just another downtime. Maybe people who like survival games can appreciate it.

- Wanted system is very undercooked. I understand this from a development perspective, but still immersion breaking when you're in middle of nowhere and still get reported. At least, police response is instant; makes you wonder how crime even exists in Wild West East.

- Killing a person and bumping someone accidentally induces the same response from cops.

- Movement response is clunky.

- Picking items, looting corpse, skinning animals is realistic, but waiting for the slow animation to play out is not fun. It is yet another downtime.

- Weapons can't be reordered. Just a few hours in, you'll be forced to go through each and every weapon just to get to the one you want. The selected weapons are automatically returned to horse's satchel forcing you to go through weapon selection hell every single time. Realistic? Yes. Annoying? Also, yes.

- Reduced speed in camps, buildings, and places of interest. Oh my God, this makes me want to pull my hair out. Some missions also reduce speed on horse while the NPC tells his daily routine.


The most fun I've had was with random encounters which are open ended in execution and you have some level of agency. 70% of this game is just downtime. It is a testament to other teams in Rockstar which have created this beautiful world to still make it worth a play. My suggestion would be to install Rampage Trainer and set the horse speed to 80 to get anything done in this game.