Forza Motorsport positions itself as one of the few motorsports-focused racing titles with a career mode, but as someone deeply invested in simracing and real-world motorsport, I find it misses the mark in almost every area that matters.
FM tries to sell itself as a simulator, but it simply isn’t. Even Gran Turismo edges closer to the spirit of motorsport, though still imperfect. Forza’s physics model feels caught between arcade and sim, leaving neither camp satisfied. Tire behavior, weight transfer, and braking dynamics lack the nuance you’d expect from a game that claims to represent motorsport seriously.
The absence of basic motorsport etiquette is baffling. No blue flags, no proper multi-class race logic, no penalties for divebombs or reckless blocking. You’re thrown straight into a Le Mans Hypercar in a fictional endurance race when you first start the game. Sounds thrilling, until you realize slower classes actively fight you for position instead of respecting race order. It’s just chaos.
Force feedback is only serviceable at best. With extensive tweaking, its usable, but it comes at the cost of fidelity and has plenty of noise. Compared to true sims like iRacing, rFactor 2, or even ACC, FM’s wheel feel is shallow and disconnected. This is unacceptable.
The AI is a disaster. They plow through obstacles, fail to recover safely, and treat Bathurst’s walls like suggestions. It feels like a train simulator AI copy-pasted into a racing game. Worse, this poor AI teaches newcomers bad habits like ramming, blocking, and impatience. Behavior that has bled into the wider simracing community.
Race design rewards aggression over skill. What I mean is that clean overtakes, patience, and strategy aren’t encouraged. Instead, the fastest way forward is ramming your way through the pack. Career progression is shallow, repetitive, and lacks the sense of climbing a motorsport ladder. It reminds me of the original Assetto Corsa "career mode", which really is just a bunch of races thrown together to seem like there's progression of some sort.
I wanted to love this game. I’m a fan of Forza Horizon and the first four Forza Motorsports (Especially FM4), and I hoped FM (2023) would finally deliver a proper motorsport experience. Instead, it’s a confused product that disrespects the fundamentals of racing.
Unless Turn 10 radically rethinks its approach to prioritize authentic racecraft, have a more robust AI, and meaningful progression, this franchise is over as it is. Forza Motorsport (2023) may well be its swan song, and perhaps that’s for the best.
