Forza Horizon 5 – Gameplay modes and customization details revealed

Forza Horizon 5 stormed onto the scene (literally) in its reveal trailer during Microsoft’s E3 2024 presentation. The new open-world racer from Playground Games has garnered a massive amount of attention, which is expected given that the series’ following has grown substantially since its PC release back in 2016 with Forza Horizon 3. The initial reveal trailer provided a look at the intense new weather events, vast new map of Mexico, and a look at some of the new cars that will be in the game. However, even more official details have come out regarding customization, gameplay modes and more in Forza Horizon 5.

Over on the official Forza website is an FAQ page that contains a lot of extra details that some folks may have missed.  Playground describes the new Horizon 5 as “the largest, most diverse open world ever in a Forza Horizon game set against a vibrant, ever-evolving landscape with limitless driving action in hundreds of the world’s greatest cars.” The FAQ describes that weather events will play a big part in the Horizon Story mode, as players will be “battling the elements.” Additionally, there’s the new Forza LINC which is the AI-assistant will track you, and also the people you meet online, thus allowing you to connect with them and play together. Forza Horizon is no stranger to minigames, and now Horizon 5 will have a new Horizon Arcade mode with a hefty helping of 130 challenges that will span across 11 different game themes.

Gameplay modes aplenty

The new EventLab will allow for creating custom races, gameplay modes and entire gameplay experiences, giving the more engineered-focused players more freedom. This could be a potential build on top of Horizon 4’s Super7 mode that came out a few months ago. In terms of pure online play, there’s Horizon Open and Horizon Tour. Horizon Open is the PVP experience, that’s more focused on “fun,” will allow players to compete in Racing, Games, Drift and Elimanator modes. Horizon Tour will allow players to globetrot between races and meet up with fellow players to race against average-class Drivatars. Playground describes this as more of a virtual “car-meet.”

Other aspects of the online play are the new Kudos system and Gift Drops. Kudos will act as the social currency between players they can receive “for positive acts.” Kudos can in turn unlock flairs that players can attach to their label. These flairs will be visible to others. Finally, the Gift Drops will allow players to send and receive gifts, such as sending a friend one of your cars. Speaking of the cars, it’s about time we finally know more.

More toys to play with

Playground isn’t revealing the car list just yet. It’s simply stating that the game will “feature hundreds of the world’s greatest cars.” In terms of customization, however,  it has been revealed that one highly-requested feature from some enthusiasts will now be available: the ability to lift and lower convertible roofs. Additionally, there are now “100 new rims, hundreds of new visual upgrades, and thousands of performance upgrades.”

Interestingly enough, the FAQ also mentions something that isn’t going to be in Forza Horizon 5 at all: mod-support.

Although the game is coming to Steam (a few days after the Microsoft Store/Xbox Game Pass versions), the game files will continue to remain locked as was the case with both Horizon 4 and Horizon 3. With the Horizon titles now being more online-focused than ever, this could be a reason why Microsoft and Playground have taken such a staunch approach to mods.

On a lighter note, the E3 trailer isn’t the only media that  Playground released for the shiny new title. As icing on the cake, developers from Playground sat-down and provided a bit of a deeper dive into the new Forza Horizon 5’s Mexico map, car customization and more across a near full 40-minute video.

More details will be gradually be revealed in the weeks and months leading up to Forza Horizon 5’s full launch on November 9 (with early access for Premium Edition players on the 5th). In the meantime, you can prepare your PC to run it verifying that it meets the minimum requirements.