Review No. 88 Forza Motorsport 4 - Xbox 360 (3+)

Strong Points:
Decent single player - career mode and free play, as well as others
Excellent split-screen - although two players only
Graphics are great - although don't age well
Weight behind cars and corners - really feel the turns through controller vibration
The Line - useful and shows you when to brake, and can even do it for you

Weak Points:
Menus can be annoying
Top Gear (and other) brands - shoehorned in everywhere and to little effect
LOUD - hard to balance audio with only high/low settings for sfx and music
Auto-Steer - can swerve you into walls if you stray too far off, and can be annoying at some starts

Rating: 63%
In-depth Review:

Release Dates:
North America: 11 October, 2011
Japan/Australia: 13 October, 2011
Europe: 14 October, 2011

Controls:
Left Trigger: brake
Left Bumper: clutch
Back Button: switch camera
Left Thumbstick: steering
D-Pad: toggle telemetry
Right Thumbstick Up: toggle/heat damage
Right Thumbstick Right: free look
A Button: handbrake
X Button: shift down
B Button: shift up
Y Button: rewind
Start Button: pause
Right Bumper: look straight back
Left Trigger: gas

Forza Motorsport is a long running racing series from Microsoft Studios and Turn 10 studios for the Xbox 360. There's a lot that the game did right, but there are parts that went a little askew.

To start with, this game is fun. Not only can you play career mode, upgrading and decorating cars, winning races (I'm on a 26 victory unbroken streak at the moment); but there's also an excellent multiplayer feature, where you and a friend can race with a split screen (with AI competitors, as you wish). There are 27 stages (nine of which are fictional) that each offer a different challenge for you and your car.

The only problems I have with this game are the menus and the auto-steer, which admittedly can be turned off. The menus are annoying and can be hard to navigate but then that's to be expected of a console game.

All racing fans should look into this, the greatest Forza on the last generation consoles.

Euan