It's important to note, however, that while the shared world experience is Playground’s vision for how best to enjoy Forza Horizon 4, it’s not an online-only game.
“Always online is a problem for people,” admits principal game designer Mike Brown. “Sometimes you just don’t want to play with other people; sometimes people are just put off by the idea of having to cope with other people.”
“It comes with loads of other problems, such as your internet goes down, you can’t play. Our servers go down; you can’t play. So we solved that problem by saying that Forza Horizon 4 will not be an always-online game. As much as this is a shared-world game, and we believe it’s much better played with other people, you can totally just click a button and play the entire game in single player with Drivatars if that’s your wont.”
Offline, the seasons will still change weekly, based on your system clock.
“We sidestep the issues people have with losing connection to the server, or having poor internet, or losing their internet when they move house,” says Fulton. “We’re not forcing you to be online, and the game handles very gracefully either you opting out, or you losing connection – maybe our servers go down. What other games tend to do is maybe they’ll boot you out, you’ll be back at the front end, maybe you’ve lost progress. Doesn’t happen in our game; it’ll very seamlessly transition you back to an offline state of play, which is great.
Of course, there are other problems that plague online-based experiences, but Playground explains it’s already intercepted and addressed a series of important ones to protect the traditional Forza Horizon experience. Yes, you can still pause the game. Yes, you can use photo mode. Yes, you can even rewind. And, no, you can’t be griefed by strangers.
“You can imagine the scenario,” begins Brown. “You’re flying through a drift zone, you’re about to nail your all-time high score, someone flies in from the side, ploughs into the side of you, ruins your day.”
This can’t happen in Forza Horizon 4, at least not with strangers. Players unknown to you will be ghosted on contact.
“Now any player you meet online who you’re not a friend with, who’s not in your convoy, they won’t be able to negatively impact your experience,” says Brown.
AI-powered Drivatars of Forza Horizon 2 and 3 are being replaced by real players within a 72-player server.
So everything in the game world is synchronised for all players. Time of day is synchronised. Weather conditions are synchronised. Seasons are synchronised. So seasons last one week per season, and then the season changes. So you will play in spring, for example, for a week, and then we’ll countdown to the season transition and you’ll move into summer.
There’s also a quick chat system available via the d-pad for players without a mic, or who may be separated by language barriers. We’ll also be able to form convoys with players met within Forza Horizon 4 instantly and take part in every race and every activity in up to six-player co-op.
The hourly content is something Playground Games is calling Forzathon Live, which will be open to any players currently roaming the map who wish to take part (Forzathon Live supports 12 players).
“What happens is you get 15 minutes and a group target of something like a Danger Sign, or an area where you have to do skills in, and it’s this cool piece of chaotic gameplay where… everyone’s taking part,” says Thaker-Fell. “If you manage to beat stage one in the time limit you then go through to stage two, and then eventually to stage three.”
“Then, at the end of it, everyone gets the same reward, which you can spend in this new area called the Forzathon Shop.”
There are no individual scoreboards; just a group target. The idea is that it’s geared around teamwork rather than competition.
Brown explains that players who just want to explore, photographers, tuners, and painters will all be able to work through Horizon Life in Forza Horizon 4 in their own way. Even streamers, via Mixer, will be able to earn progress based on how often they stream and the viewers they amass.
“In Horizon Life you’ll be able to earn progress in the game… and level up and get rewards through any of those activities,” says Brown. “If all you want to do is paint, the game will recognise that; it will give you objectives and challenges and rewards, and you can level up and see all the game’s content just through being a painter. It’s the ultimate evolution of Forza’s play-how-you-want philosophy.”
Another feature, which Playground is dubbing Horizon Stories, adds a host of bespoke driving opportunities spearheaded by a large injection of new characters to the Horizon world.
“In previous games, everyone you’ve ever met at the festival, worked or lived at the festival,” says Brown. “Because you’re living there now we wanted to try and add more life to the world, so through a feature we’re calling Horizon Stories you’ll now meet people from around the UK; [they’re] colourful characters which will give you loads of really cool driving opportunities.”
Brown explains we’ll be able to pick up gigs like being a stunt driver in a movie, or assisting in a car documentary shoot.
http://uk.ign.com/articles/2018/06/10/f ... rst?page=1