Batman!

This is mine








The Mosler MT900S. My favorite S2 road racer at the mo






Forza is a very vibrant Mexico, a pretty big map with a number of biomes, all quite good looking





It's one of my least capable machines, but it's the third appearance in this thread for the old '56 Ford. here I come back down after completing one of the seasonal objectives, a jump with a class restriction that meant this was the chosen tool. Modded up to class C for a little extra pep. But anyway, a shot to show the terrain in FH5

Hey Bill, if you threw that hotlap at me feel free to send some more. First time a new notification showed up for me under RIvals, so surely you sent it. I gave a it a good go in the 250 GTO. Feel free to send more of these. I have to see how it's done, to issue the challenge like that. I enjoy this sort of stuff. If we had more players we could have a daily SimHQ hotlap, pick a track and a class and see who can manage the fastest clean lap (no collisions, no rewinds).

Your lap around Goliath inspired me to give it another bash and turned a clean 12:04 in the Mosler, but I'm sure I left a few seconds out on the track. Sub-12 is possible but I'd need to drive better.

Anyone besides Bill and I playing Forza at the mo?

I reckon not

I was running some more hotlaps and had a look at the Colossus sprint and saw Bill put up a good A class laptime there, so I set his lap as the ghost and ran against it. Colossus is a 34 mile track that weaves all through the map. A good challenge. Traffic is removed for the rivals mode. It feels like running the Nordschliefe or Solitude or one of the classic road courses. I really enjoy this type of driving/racing.

For my unsolicited matchup with Bill Grant I chose my top A class racer, the Ferrari 360 CS, a car very much like the Modena, but better in every race-related way. Bill ran the Bone Shaker, which is like a Hotwheels hot rod. And what a spectacular race, even though you weren't there haha. But your ghost thoroughly enjoyed it haha.

I got the crisper start, and opened up an early lead, maybe a hundred and fifty yards which I held for the first 20% of the race where you closed the gap and shot past to lead by about the same amount through the 50% point. Then I came back and eased ahead, and for the second half of the race we were separated by just a few car lengths. That Bone Shaker is a rocket out of slow corners let me tell ya! It was a hell of a battle to the line and I nicked it by nine-tenths. In the ranking I saw you had run this lap without ABS and that's a heck of a good run with those brakes. I bet you could crush it with ABS on.

Would like to get a few more folks around here playing to get some more friendly ghosts to run against

DBond, the Bone Shaker is pinnacle of the A800 Class. In FH4, it was banned from online racing. When you want to absolutely crush a time or race, the Bone Shaker will deliver. So if you beat my time, that is beyond awesome!

Yeah I just nicked it by less than a second, clean lap. And after 34 miles that's a mighty tight affair. But I ran ABS on, and that's a lot easier than off. I played the first hundred hours with it off, but it was just too painful. These are some of the best road cars in the world with advanced braking technology. Yeah maybe if I'm tooling around in a '57 Testa Rossa or something that would authenticate the experience haha, but otherwise the game is much better with that on I think, while keeping the other aids off. It's flexible anyway and anyone can find their groove.

I bet you'd smoke my ghost in that Shaker if you ran it again with ABS on.

I now own every Ferrari in FH5. There are 33 of them, and they cover all classes aside from D. So many cool cars. I spend way more time in Ferraris than other cars.

A surprisingly good side to this game is the tuning. The class structure and extensive modification options are a lot of fun to experiment with. There are a ton of easily applied player tunes. A couple clicks, sort through a bunch, pick one and boom a fully modified class car. I did this for a while, because it's the express route to solid setups and optimal performance modifications. All wheel drive is king in this game, and virtually any top car will be converted if it didn't roll out of the factory that way. But after that, there is a lot of flexibility to round out the build, and make a good race car, or drag, or drift or whatever you're after.

But two things nagged at me. One, wheels are part of the tune, since they have performance properties (like weight). And since player-shared tunes are locked in Forza, you get the wheel they chose. Is there a way to change only the wheels?

And two, different drivers like different handling balance. Chassis setup is part of the tune too. So if you don't care for the balance it cannot be tweaked. This locked setup is pretty restrictive, and basically if you download another player's tune, as good as they are, you're locked in to that car's balance. I actually really like the way it works here, a player gets more recognition for being good at this stuff, the way it's locked. But personally I need more control over it, so I'm doing my own, at least for my main cars. I was finding -- especially in the AWD tunes -- that I was often getting too much entry understeer, need more lift oversteer, and you need to be able to change things like springs, roll bars and differentials to fine tune cornering balance to your liking I think.

Anyway, it's super easy, and very effective to ignore this whole side of the game. there are a ton of amazing player shared ones to install. But on the other hand, for some more personal tweaking to taste the setup options are at least as extensive as what you get in sims like F1 2021. And add on top of that all the performance stuff, like blowers, alternate engines, lightweighting, brakes, transmissions, aero and on and on and it's a lot of fun to do this and hunting better lap times.

And I get the wheels I want

Some more Ferrari porn. Yes, there are other marques in FH5


1957 250 California





2013 Laferrari





2013 458 S. This is my main whip. It now has red calipers, but this shot was taken beforehand. These wheels add 26 pounds, but style is the main thing

My Brother from another Mother! The Ferraris are the FIRST car group that I wanted to fill out. The 250 California is a dream driver, the 250 GTO is a Race horse, and the 458 bodies are my favorite in seat drivers. Love to whip them around the mountains in the 170mph range.

Troodat.

I do that all the time, just jump in the 458 and rocket along the roads. Every now and then another player or two catches on and it's catch as catch can. Good fun. Did you get all Ferraris Bill? Yeah that was what I wanted to do too and got the last few a couple days ago at auction. Needed the 250 Cali, F50GT and Enzo to cap the lot of them. My son said "that's not what I would have done with my money Dad". Ha! Kids. He seemed entirely unimpressed.

That 458 S might be my S1 class weapon of choice, but the 360 Stradale continues to ward off all challengers in class A. I've hit it with every top A class car I acquire, but none can beat it for me. Here she is in action on the Riviera sprint I think it is. At the top of A class you race cars like 911s, Lotus Elise, Ferrari F50 and that sort.

I thought perhaps the '87 Porsche 959 would give the 360 a run for its money. It too, fell short. But it's a beauty!





Ferrari 599 Evo




Lambo Centenario




Storm Runner




One of this week's challenges is a speed zone with a Classic Rally class restriction. I chose this '67 Racing Escort to complete it

New season kicked off Thursday, and a new thing called the World Cup. I decided to support the good ol' US of A and drove a Mustang Shelby GT350R. I saw that the requirements included road and off road stuff, and for whatever reason the Mustang has pretty good off road capability. It's only a blue rarity car, but it's fast and I like Mustangs.

I hadn't logged on in a couple weeks while playing Hitman, and got the Car Pass cars released since then. That included the Ferrari FXX K Evo, which is sick. Without even modifying it at all I set a new PB in one of the speed zones. It starts at 998 and it's even still in RWD. I only played about an hour and still I got like eight new cars. It's insane how it works in this game, and I now have about 390 unique cars. I give so many away as gifts. Got notified of an incoming gift, saw the barn was really close, and then completely forgot about it so who knows what it would have been. Usually it's crap, but every now and then you're gifted a top car from another player.

There's a Chinese car theme going on, including a pretty good electric that's used for the monthly time trial. Handles nicely and is fast, but I can't have a silent car. I give away all electric cars. I'm not interested really in any of them. I need my engine to sing, or growl, or rumble.

New series kicked off today.

A few weeks ago a change was made to wheelspin payouts. Many small money denominations are now included, and what used to be a reasonably lucrative mechanic has been nerf-hammered to death. It really sucks now. I'm glad I started playing when I did (just before Christmas) so that I got a lot of cars before this change.

On a positive note, for the first time I actually qualified for the 40-point season reward, a Zonda R this week. Didn't have it, wanted it, got it. Mastery included a super wheelspin. Payout from that spin, 25k and a pair of socks. And that's far from a one-off, they're almost all like this any more. Socks. And that wasn't the first pair of socks I spun yesterday. Bring back the old wheelspins!

Hey Bill Grant, I've been playing FH5 a bit over the past few days. I was sitting in my car along the side of the road, looking at the map. When I exited the screen and looked out the front windshield there you came, blasting around the corner and flew right on by. Nice to finally see you in the game haha.

I hadn't played since last December according to Steam, but there has been a lot added to the game, new stories, new events, and it was enough to draw me back in and it's been a blast.

What's the deal with the test track? I went there, did an upgrade like it told me to, and then what? Is it just a way to try upgrades for free and everyone else is removed from the map or something? I don't get what this is about.

When I played before, I was using a controller, but now I have my full wheel and seat setup in place and man what a difference. So much better.

No Bill Grant?

Still don't know what the test track is for.

I bought the Rally Adventure DLC. It's not bad. A new (small) map, new events/traps/zones to hit. Lots of free vehicles, but of the off-road variety of course.

I blew through it in a few days. Worth 20 bucks? Probably not with a critical eye, but if you like Forza it probably is. Or if you enjoy off road and rally type driving then yeah, probably. I'm not a massive fan of off-road, but I don't hate it either. My jam is the road racing (on tarmac), especially the Rivals mode. Hotlapping ladder racing.

In Rally Adventure you're handed a number of unique vehicles, but most of these are the purpose-built baja type trucks, the ones with a few spares mounted on them. They are kinda heavy and not well balanced. I appreciate the freebies, but I actually like this sort of racing best in a hot hatch style car. Like the Cossie you get early on. Mini Coops, a Golf, and that sort of thing, outfitted for rally racing. These cars handle well, have good balance and traction, and are not a nightmare to drive from first person cockpit view, unlike some others. Especially over the jumps that are so prevalent here. Rally Adventure is fine, but get it on sale if you can.

One nice side benefit of picking up Rally Adventure is it opens up a couple more festival events. As 'Badlands Champion' I got two extra events this week, a speed trap and another seasonal race circuit.

In the past, I've rarely hit the second tier of car reward for the week, which takes 40 points. I don't get in to much of the PvP stuff, event lab or team racing, so I am always short of 40 points. But now, those additional 7 points from the extra events let me hit 40 and get the second car. You can get the same from Hot Wheels, but I've skipped that. I play in first person cockpit view and looping tracks are nearly impossible to navigate in this view. GTA 5's Stunt racing mode showed me how lousy it is, and I am thinking it must be the same with Hot Wheels tracksin FH5, so I've ignored it.

No one is posting in this thread so this is in to the void I fear, but did anyone manage to win the seasonal event called 'Escaping the Heat'? The AI is smoking me in this one. Which car did you use?

I'm nearly at 500 unique cars in my garage which is crazy. This game throws them at you, but about a year ago wheelspins were nerfed hard so the rate has slowed, but they are still piling up.

And I figured out how to use the Test Track, what it is all about. Not a big deal, but it does let you try the modifications before buying and installing them. I've used it a lot over the past week.

Broke down and bought Hot Wheels too. I thought it would suck for driver cam players and it does. These looping tracks don't work when you drive from the cockpit as you can't see what is ahead if the car has a roof. This forces me to drive in chase cam which I don't care for. The content itself isn't bad, a neat twist and fun diversion. But this would be the last DLC I would buy (and it was!) and could easily be skipped altogether.

I was a little kid in the 1970s and Hot Wheels were hot, although honestly I was more of a Matchbox kind of kid. But racing on these Hotwheel tracks is fun. Some are magnetized, some are ice and it's a neat twist like I said.

As mentioned I dig the Rivals mode in FH5. It is ladder racing against ghosts. All disciplines are represented, but it's the sprint road racing that I like most. All of my old times were set with a controller, and now I'm giving them another pass with a wheel and the times are dropping nicely. If there is anyone around playing this game who likes Rivals, I'd like to add you for more ghosts and laps to run against. But then again, if anyone around here were playing they'd probably be posting so I won't hold my breath lol.

I also bought the Itailan car pack so I could get the 296 GTB. I'm a massive Ferrari fan, and especially the mid-engined V8 Ferraris, and even more especially, naturally aspirated mid-engined V8 Ferraris, which has made the 458 S my most driven car by a country mile. Those days are over and that mantle has been taken up by the 296 in my mind, so I was keen to get my hands on it. Modded it to the top of S1 and it's good, but a little heavy. Must be that battery.

I'm sat now on about 520 uniques. That is quite a stable.