Forza Motorsport 2 [Xbox 360]

"fm2 is a great game and a must have for the racer at heart. The ability to customize your vehicle is unreal from horsepower to handling fine tuning your suspension to get that tenth faster.I was 48 fastest overall hotlap in fm1 i feel they had lost a lot in d through a class theres something missing in the points system. The problem lies in the theres no medium in the parts for tracks meaning its either all horsepower or all handling the ability to put 1000 horsepower in a car and no handling and just switch on traction control in a 40 year old car and run faster than a new corvette or porsche. What im trying to say is there needs to be work done to the multiplayer to have competitive classes thats all turn 10 needs to fend off gt5 and figure out collision long live forza motorsport greatest platform online simulator. "

"forza 2 is an amazing game for anyone that likes racing games with a huge feel of realisticism and who can drive well. much better than any of the PGR series."

"forza motorsport two is a good game im wondering how to play multiplayer with the same cars on split screen because if im using my file and a friend wants to play and i pick one of my career cars he cant pick none because as soon as i pick the only thing he has to choose from is from D to R1 and none of them have alot of cars and i would like to race against my friend on the same xbox splitscreen with him and me using my career cars because if i use a class U car he cant because he doesnt have my career file"

"On the Xbox, Forza Motorsport 1 was what Gran Turismo was on the PS2: the best racing sim on the platform. Was FM1 better than GT4? Who cares. Will GT5 be better than FM2? Who knows, at the moment we have only seen a demo of GT5 and FM2 is available now. So forget the Forza versus Gran Turismo war and just enjoy yourself playing Forza Motorsport 2. You won't regret it.

The graphics
Let's start with the graphics, because I can be short about those. It all looks very realistic and detailed, especially the cars. I had the feeling that the GT HD demo had a little more detail, but that's probably just because of the higher resolution it runs in (FM2 only runs in 720p). The framerate never drops, which is essential for a racing sim.

FM2 has a Photo feature, just like NFS Carbon and here it actually works. You can pause the game at any moment and then go to Photo mode. In that mode you can point your camera, zoom in and out and compose a nice shot. The photos can be saved and uploaded to ForzaMotorsport.net. I had a great time composing cool shots for the screenshots on this page (click the screens for hi-res versions).




A lot of attention has been given to the user interface of the game. The menus and settings screens are well designed, using cool details of the Porsche 997 Turbo in the backgrounds. They work well too, which is important for a game where a lot of time is spend navigating through menus for buying cars and parts and for tuning car settings. The intro movie, featuring the Nissan 350Z, is very nice too.



The controls
In Forza 2 you can make the controls as realistic (and hard) as you want. You do this by switching on or off so-called "Assists". ABS, traction control and stability management are the most important assists. Personally, I like to drive with ABS, TCS en STM switched off. It makes the game behave like a racing sim and it gives you the best feeling of control over your car. Initially you will regularly end up against a crash barrier, but as soon as you come to grips with the controls, the handling is wonderful. I especially liked how you can feel (and hear) the car slowly loosing grip, which enables you to drive the car on the edge of its capabilities. With these three assists switched on the handling is a bit easier, but no where near arcade style controls.



Another assist, and a typical Forza feature, is the Suggested Line. This feature displays the ideal racing line on the track. The line changes color too, green means accelerate, when it's orange or red you should let go of the throttle or even brake. You can also choose to show the line only when you need to brake. The Suggested Line is ideal for learning a new track. But in general the lines on the tarmac take some attention away from the racing itself.
Then there's the damage settings: in simulation mode the damage is visible and noticeable in your car's behaviour. Hit another car hard and you will find that the car's steering is out of balance. In the "cosmetic damage only" mode, the damage is visible only and doesn't impact the handling or performance. Crashing will still cause bits and pieces flying around though.



These assists are meant to make the game more accessible for a larger audience. Gamers with little racing simulator experience should be able to switch on all assists and drive a lap without much difficulty. The smart bonus system motivates you to switch off assists later on, as it gives you bonus credits when winning races. In my opinion you can only appreciate this game with ABS, TCS and STM switched off, otherwise you will miss the essence of the game.



The career mode
Of course the core of games like Forza and Gran Turismo is the career mode. Let me explain the basics: You start off with a set amount of credits, using which you can buy your first car and maybe even upgrade it a bit. By winning races with this car you earn credits and win cars. The cars you win can be used in races or sold for more credits. With all these credits you can upgrade your current car(s) or buy new faster cars. These faster cars can then be used to compete in more difficult races in which you can win better cars and more credits. And using those credits you can... Well, you can see where this is going...



A career mode needs to be well balanced. You have to be able to make some progress continuously, not too slow, but not too fast either. In Project Gotham Racing 3 the progress was too fast. After one day of gaming you were driving a Ferrari Enzo and after that you could just do your laps and easily win everything. Booorrrringgg...
In the Gran Turismo games there have always been moments where you could only progress by repeating the same race 10 or 20 times and win enough credits to get your next upgrade. Not very exciting either.



Forza 2 however has not been dull or frustrating for one moment. I started off with an Audi TT V6 and was able to earn enough credits to keep upgrading it and win more advanced races. On top of that you can often compete in races using prize cars, sometimes unchanged, sometimes with a few small upgrades (racing tires are always a good start). For example, the Lancio Stratos that you win is a perfect fit for the "classic sports car" race, the Corvette is useful for the race with naturally-aspirated cars and the Porsche 914/6 is just what you needed for the Porsche 914/6 race (one of the best races in the game by the way). A lot of fun, because it lets you drive in many different cars.



By the way, it's good to be able to make at least some use of the prize cars. Selling these gift cars is useless in Forza, they earn you 100 credits only. In comparison: a set of racing tires for a Corvette will cost you about 20 thousand credits.

The game gives you a lot of freedom to choose your own route through the career, because there are always multiple "unlocked" races to choose from (as opposed to PGR3 where the career is a pretty linear affair). Still it never gets too easy, after a day of gaming I had gathered just enough cash to get me a Lotus Exige (I needed one for the Flyweight race). So earning enough to get an Enzo will take you a long time. Progress is slow but steady, which only makes it more addicting.



Multiplayer
Forza has three different multiplayer modes, split screen, System Link and of course Xbox Live. The split screen mode works fine. I had expected it to drop some frames here and there but that's not the case. And even without any visible loss of details. Impressive. But of course racing using only half of the screen is not ideal.

The online racing is using the excellent Xbox Live match system. It's fun to race against real live human beings. And in the Career matches you can earn credits for use your offline career, so you're not wasting valuable time either :-)



So get it!
For me this is the best racing game available (for now at least). Not because of the amazing graphics, not because of the enormous list of available cars (including Porsche and Ferrari), not because of the online features. But solely because of the delightful car handling and the addicting offline career mode.

The die-hard race game fans already own it of course, but for the rest of you I recommend to get it as soon as possible.

Don't own an Xbox 360? Then is THE reason to purchase one. Just put your PS2, Xbox, PS3 and/or Wii on eBay if necessary. You won't have time to use those anymore anyway.
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