Forza 5 Multiplayer - My Candid Thoughts

I have spent between 4 and 5 hours over the last couple of Saturdays running Forza 5 multiplayer action with a group of guys over at ISR.  I thought you guys might be interested in my thoughts about the multiplayer experience.

First, I have to say that Forza 5 with the TX wheel and standard pedal set is absolutely sublime in the graphics, FFB and physics department.  We all agree about the graphics, the game looks amazing, but the FFB and physics, as communicated by the wheel, are stellar.  I can feel exactly what the car is doing, and the FFB is nice and strong.  I can feel the cobblestones at Prague, for example, which is pretty fricking cool.  The stock TX rim is not my favorite, and so I am using the GTE and F1 add-on rims, both of which feel great.  The cars sound drop dead amazing and there are no lemons in the garage.  The car selection is the most diverse in the history of the franchise.  Forza 5 is easily my favorite of the Forza series and yes, every prior Forza game was a Day 1 purchase for me.  I think Forza 5 is my second favorite racing game/sim, right behind iRacing.  I do think I like it better than GT6.  I am over level 130 now, with no end in sight.  I cannot get enough of this game, even though I have been playing it almost daily since Black Friday 2013.  The gaping hole in my review, however, is multiplayer.

So, what about multiplayer?  I had not tried any lobby racing until last Saturday.  Lets just say I am glad I did give multiplayer a shot.  Getting into a lobby is easy.  Yes, you first need to connect with your group via party chat.  The host then sets up a lobby and sends out invites.  You accept the invite and then we are in there.  It was very easy to change my car to the car we were running in the lobby.  I also was allowed to "rent" a car, but I would not get credits or experience points while using a "rented" car.  That is fine with me, I have plenty of credits to buy cars thanks to Forza rewards, plus Turn 10 has been more than generous in sending me free cars.  You still cannot practice while in the lobby.  Those of us that play GT5 and GT6 know what a benefit that is, since it allows the host to wait for stragglers, while those of us in the lobby practice.

Once I got to racing, the experience was quite good.  There was no lag whatsoever, even though we had racers from all over the world, including the US, Europe and Australia.  Yes, you read that correctly, no lag.  Period.  The voice chat is similarly superb, even though I was using the Kinect mic.  Several of the other racers were using controllers and the included headsets for chat and you can clearly hear their voices, and no ambient noise.  Another racer, like me, was using the TX wheel and pedals and the Kinect for the mic and I could hear him fine, although I could tell the mic was not right in front of him.

So, those are my thoughts so far.  I know there are aspects of multiplayer that I did not address, but I nonetheless thought you guys might be interested in my thoughts to this point.