Forza Horizon 5 is the hottest title in the arcade racing genre right now and it continues its predecessor's winning streak against more established titles like Need for Speed. Truth be told, it's just what the genre needs in order to become more exciting again, especially in the face of new industry innovations from other genres.
With that said, Forza Horizon 5 is not a perfect game. As with most titles that just recently launched in this current age of gaming, it can get a little rough around the edges (or corners, in this game's case). It's not just the technical aspect that needs some tender love and care but also some of the game's mechanics and fundamentals. Thankfully, these issues seem like they're easy to fix. The solutions are somewhat simple.
8 Skippable Cutscenes
There's already a glaring problem as soon as players start up Forza Horizon 5. The cutscenes are notably unskippable at the time of writing. For a game that rewards players that love to go fast, it's rather intent on wasting their time. The opening cutscene, while short gets old quickly with all the over-the-top shenanigans.
It's not like players need to see several different cars getting dropped off a plane. Nor is there a need to understand what's going on in a rather unbelievable car festival. Some simply want to jump into the driver's seat and race. It's an arcade racer, after all— and they've never been known for their digestible stories.
7 Weaker Beginner Cars
After the opening sequence, Forza Horizon 5 will suddenly shower the players with three of the best vehicles in the game. One is for going fast in a straight line, one is for drifting, and the other is for off-road. Most other races will simply give the players the base models. Budget cars with horsepower barely going past 200 or often lower. This gives players more incentive to progress.
Now, since Forza Horizon 5 already gave some of the best vehicles, they robbed some of the players of their goals. Want to work hard for a recent Corvette or Supra? No need, they're given like candies. They're not optional either, they're the only three cars the players obtain so using them in a race is mandatory.
6 Fairer AI
So why would players be compelled to stick with the three semi-best cars that Forza Horizon 5 gives them? Because racing with the AI is an uphill battle in the game. This is quite apparent as early as the starting line. A lot of the AI cars will magically accelerate faster (even when turning), and when the players get these cars, they don't come with the advantage.
This leads to rather one-sided and repetitive races where players are almost always trying to catch up to the top cars even if their car is modded better. Other times, it can also lead to players employing dirty tactics such as crashing other cars just to keep up. The game AI simply needs to abide by cornering and physics rules.
5 Bringing Back Ranked Mode
Ranked Adventure mode is a competitive aspect of the previous game where players race against others online in order to see who's the best digital driver. For many, it's a good progress metric or goal especially when achieving all cars in the game is already a doable and easy endeavor.
Sadly, Forza Horizon 5 ditched this aspect of multiplayer. It's a more casual experience since there's no more optional Ranked mode online. This has a rather negative implication as the elite players will end up getting thrown into casual races. Not a pleasant experience for newbies. Bringing back some kind of Ranked mode will make the experience more fun for all kinds of players.
4 Shorter Loading Times
Another thing that doesn't really sit well in a racing game is the rather long loading time. Because races tend to be fast or even short depending on the difficulty or the track. Granted, Forza Horizon 5 came with an updated and beautiful game engine so the loading times are more or less justified.
That doesn't mean they're tolerable though. In singleplayer, the loading speed isn't too bad. However, online is where the long load times get compounded with connectivity issues. Such is the case for all platforms. It's a tradeoff for having a fully-realized open-world game but after unlocking the fast travel option, the long open-world driving quickly gets replaced with long and annoying loading screens.
3 Better Racing Wheel Support
Funny enough, Forza Horizon 5 actually came with a slew of compatibility issues for racing or steering wheel controllers. One would think that they'd have full support for all models, but they actually needed a hotfix or a quick update in order to make some of the most common gaming wheels function as intended.
Even when the updates were implemented, there were still many problems with the wheels. Some of the lesser-known ones don't function well in the game. The most common issue is random disconnects. Those that manage to get the wheels to work will be met with feedback issues or lack thereof. Some players had to resort to third-party software to make things work. Eventually, wheel support might become better as more updates roll out.
2 Server Stability Fix
Forza Horizon 5's online component is where the meat of the game mostly lies. It's elaborate. Complete with an auction house for vehicles and many modes of play sprinkled all over the open world like cake confetti. Too bad that aspect of Forza Horizon 5 is also a source of headache for a lot of players.
Server issues are to be expected in such a popular game but it involves a worrying amount of wasted time as disconnect loops are rampant. Waiting 10 or even 20 minutes for a two-minute race is not uncommon as players who don't want to wait can quit and this will make the game pull new players into the queue. If more players quit during that waiting time, then the endless cycle of quitting, waiting, and queueing will ensue.
1 General Bug & Optimization Solutions
Then there are also technical problems that are separate from the server or online gameplay. Because even if players opt to play solo or offline, they'll still meet some nasty bugs or glitches. Crashes (game system, not car) are fairly common and are still present after hotfixes. They tend to happen during loading as well.
If the game does run, do expect a myriad of inexplicable framerate dips, stuttering, texture pop-in, and draw distance dysfunction during gameplay. This is the case for all versions of the game. Of course, one can expect this to be fixed in the near future, possibly sooner.
Forza Horizon 5 is available now for Xbox Series X and Series S, Xbox One, and Microsoft Windows.