Hi Gang:

Last weekend my 13 year old son bought himself an XBox360 with a gift card he got for his bar mitzvah from two of my wife's cousins ($500! nice gift!).

We bought Forza with it - it's an original XBox game, rather than one specifically for the 360 - it requires an update of the XBox360 system software, which is easy to do.

What a fantastic racing sim - I just got done competing with my son at Road America, a place where I've done track days in other cars I've owned and in borrowed race cars, and the fidelity of the track, the elevation changes, etc. are all simply amazing.

I know there's a lot of Forza fans on this forum - what's your favorite track? My son got a cheat code off the web which gave him $999 million to spend on cars - LOL, so he's going bonkers and buyin all kinds of stuff.

Stew

i loved playing the simulation career mode.. it was good times, and got REALLY DIFFICULT near the end.

Fav Track - The Downhill Mountain Point-to-Point Run.

-hS

that game is great. the rx8 has great handling in it, as it should. you can even put a 3 rotor in it. only downside is that the lotus elise and exige should of had better handling, they should have made the exige a 6 speed since there is no 5 speed, the saleen s7 is slow, and it says the rx8 is front engine, not mid.

I thought Forza's physics were a bit wonky. It's a really good sim - easily the second best on the market - but Gran Turismo feels much more like driving a real car, imo. I think Forza's cars slip and slide around a bit too much, while Gran Turismo gives you the feeling of adhering to the road and breaking traction feels much more natural.

Anyway, just as a game - not under comparison, it's really really good. Physics are consistent and predictable, lots of cars, well made tracks, lots of mods and the really cool paint shop all help make the game top notch.

Forza 2 should be dropping for the 360 sometime in the nearish future, you'll definitely want to keep your eyes peeled for that. Project Gotham 3 is another great racing game if you ever feel the need to further feed your addiction (real world courses are lacking though). Enjoy it! :D:

that game is great. the rx8 has great handling in it, as it should. you can even put a 3 rotor in it. only downside is that the lotus elise and exige should of had better handling, they should have made the exige a 6 speed since there is no 5 speed, the saleen s7 is slow, and it says the rx8 is front engine, not mid.
The RX8 isn't a totally true mid engine car. It's a front-mid engine design, but it's still very much front engined. A true mid-engined car is mounted behind the driver, like in a Ferrari 360 or MR2.

i agree with you completely, the physics where ehhh.... could be better. Anyways, yup, gran turismo is still the best driving sim out there. But its a fun game to play, i love the online feature on it. Thats the one thing that attracted me to the game in the first place.

I spent about 2 hours playing yesterday afternoon while it was raining here. Reality is that without a force feedback steering wheel and four monitors, it's just a video game. It's a great, fun video game, and the visuals are really high-fidelity (having lapped at a few of the tracks in this, the sightlines, elevation changes, views through the corners, etc. are all terrific.

I found that the non-pro cars (i.e. stock) such as the RX-8, the Mini Cooper, etc. were all just too slow to drive well and fun. The RX-8 seems to be really twitchy on the steering and seems to slide all over the place.

My favorite car to drive so far has been the Audi R8 Infineon race car - AWD, V10 engine, etc. Goes like stink, and the physics are fabulous.

Regarding the feeling of reality, I lapped Laguna Seca a number of years ago in a race-prepped Acura NSX and when you come over the hilltop and into the Corkscrew and as you grab that left turn at the top of the corkscrew and the world just falls away from you, you wind up with your stomach (and most of the rest of your guts) up in your throat. Interestingly, once I started really going fast in the Audi on Forza, I could actually get that feeling a little bit coming through that corner!

Anyway, good fun.

Stew

I saw the Preview video for Froza 2 the other day for the 360, that game looks awesome.

Forza is a great game, it sucks in the later races like the P1 ones becuase the computer is programmed to ram into you when you are in a corner and try to send you off the course.

yeah forza is a fun game. its fun to turn off all the traction and stability features and race manual especially with the cadillac (cant remember the name at the moment but its the most expesive car)

The computer AI was pretty horrible, but hopefully that will be improved in Forza 2.
I can't wait... it looks to be great.

-hS

Sadly, I'd say it's some of the better AI featured in a racing game to date. It easily trounces Gran Turismo's AI, but that's not exactly saying much. Love GT, but they implement some absolutely useless opponent AI.