The lack of progression hurt my enjoyment of FH5. I put a few hours into it around launch but just didn't find myself going back to it. I'm glad to hear there's more of a focus on this.
@@dln.sweeney same, when fh5 first released I was able to get a few hours in before I got bored because there was a lack of progression. Now I'm able to put way more hours and grind the hell out of this game due to the expansion
@@neblolthecarnerd They've done that a few times. Blizzard Mountain was a test of snow. Fortune Island was a test of trailblazers and really long drift roads.
Yeah. It would honestly be amazing for the game. But here's the thing. Isn't their first DLC always testing something that will be in the next game. I haven't gotten that far into the DLC, so I honestly think, if they are testing something, it has to be progression or maybe the physics, which if it was the physics it will be pretty disappointing
If you're struggling with massive FPS drops, especially in the jungle biome, turn particle effects quality down to low and exit the pause screen so that the game can generate the lower quality particles. You should see your FPS climb slowly back to what it's supposed to be.
Recently I've had fps drops in Mexico as well, especially in the dense city. It used to be like this on the early days, but it got better overtime. Well, until the last few patches before the dlc. It sucks.
Is unofficially confirmed that FH6 will have progression -Fortune Island brought the riddles/treasure chests, now a seasonal event in FH5 -The Lego DLC had the brick challenges as the way of progressing through the story to become the Lego speed champion, and FH5 has the accolades (exactly like brick challenges) as the way to unlock tokens for the story and how to end up in the HoF -I saw someone point out the snow for Blizzard Mountain could have been a test for the snow season in FH4 There’s a pattern of Turn10 and Playground using the DLC as a test for community feedback for future games and I wouldn’t be surprised if this Hot Wheels Academy is used as a test dummy for FH6 (a game we are 2 years away from)
Yep, Turn 10 always uses DLC to test new ideas. FH2 had the stormy island to test more extreme weather. FH3 had more extreme weather (but not as crazy as we have now) FH3 had Blixzard mountain which links to FH4 like you said. FH4 had Fortune Island which tested extreme weather again which has been added to FH5. Every game has 1 DLC for test9ng new features and 1 DLC to be their "silly" fun. Personally I've been asking for Hot Wheels again ever since FH3 because I love it so much. It's by far my favorite. But I am curious to hear what they're planning on doing for the second.
I hope so, the player experience behind the two recent games puts so much focus on the sandbox aspect of the game, that it makes the progression kinda aimless and dull
@@o_sagui6583 I'll be honest. I much prefer the "lack" of progression. I put it in quotes only because FH5 still has progression. It's just a different form if progression compared to what you would expect in most games. IMO it's actually a selling point. If a friend gets FH5, it only takes them 2 hours to be able to really start doing stuff with me.
@@dblevins343 I get what you're saying. Helps to get someone who isn't already into racing games on board. Like, the amount of non-racing fans who swear by Horizons 4 and 5 are insane, and I feel like the lack of progression is what helps. You can hype it up as much as you like but a Corolla is still a Corolla, and the early hours of say, GT, can be a real snoozefest, especially when all you do is race. In Forza, you're already given exciting cars and the freedom to do what you want with em. And not only will the game acknowledge that, it rewards that.
@@0uttaS1TE exactly. I'm a huge racing guy. I have a wheel stand and PC basically just for it. I hate spending hours in slow cars as if I've never played a racing game before. The reality is most of us are ready for the fast stuff as soon as we load up the game. The freedom to do what we want and not be inhibited is a huge selling point for me.
Well tbh you could probably do that with just the standard asphalt parts we already had in game. Would be probably more accurate. Unless you actually want that Hot Wheels feel.
@@DonatProdanSimRacing the hotwheels tracks would make it smoother, I’ve driven LS remakes on the base game but it’s all rough and bumpy which kinda ruins it
@@RidgeRunner4501 that's just creators being lazy and doing a poor job out of those tracks. 90% of eventlabs are just garbage. But I just recently made a custom banked final corner for my track, spent about 4h on it and got i smooth as butter, while keeping some nice grip (I think identical to default roads) and of course, the asphalt texture.
As far as DLC goes, this is probably the most bang for your buck DLC in a horizon game/forza game period. 10 great cars that all have decent performance online. Eventlab props. New outfits if thats your thing. I do agree that they missed the mark with EventLab not letting us delete Hot Wheels tracks cuz i definitely wanted to make my own sort of Hot Wheels goliath with my own custom track pieces, and I do have my gripes about the dialogue. I love Haley's excitement and her narration of the history of hot wheels, but I just can't help but feel annoyed with Forza's narration with Rami and Alejandra (which is a shame cuz i really want to like these characters), but Forza isnt really a narration based game so you can just get over it. I also wish they did more with the Nexus. One of my favorite things about FH3 hot wheels was the big modern city. I was hoping this DLC would bring a modern city to the game as one has been missing from the last 2, but i guess we just have to keep waiting
@@yeetsus5449 Well I agree that cities can be fun. I just think modern cities are really boring to drive in. Most modern cities (like FH3) are just a bunch of 90 degree turns making squares and rectangles. I much prefer the streets of the older cities where you get more natural curves.
@@dblevins343 I think a modern city is so popular because the Mexico map is so historic…It lacks almost any modern areas (except the resort) and people wanna get that nfs style neon experience. It would be great for street racing as well which Guanajuato is quite bad at. Also modern cities are always busy and atmospheric while Guanajuato feels quite dead and just a bit silent.
Thanks Hoki for a great review - finding myself in a position of “hesitant but open to being persuaded” so the perspective of your assessment was perfect for me.
To touch upon the track editing the hotwheels unleashed game also has it's own editor that while not quite as user friendly as Horizon does have more options including the ability to toggle barriers on and off as well as some other gimmicks. So hopefully PGG can include the feature too, it should be easy enough to implement into the UI. It also seems like magnet track isn't included in the editor? Which kills my chances of some more of my fiendish ideas.
By far the best Hot Wheels overview video on RU-vid! Great work! I just subscribed to your channel given that you seem to be one of the few RU-vidrs that are still producing useful, helpful content for other active fans of the game. I appreciate that. Keep up the good work!
Really enjoy that you’re not biased. You explain from all POV’s. Rare too find that on RU-vid. Personally I love this DLC! Would recommend to any Horizon fans.
I’m so blown away by this expansion!! Even though I expected something fun because it’s hot wheels, I feel like PGG have taken a huge step up from fh3. 10 incredible cars, all unique and interesting to drive, much improved progression system, a bigger more diverse map…but for me the selling point is the driving experience. Somehow they’ve made this feel even more fun than fh3’s expansion. They really aren’t lying when they say it’s a theme park because every road feels like a rollercoaster…the new tracks make it feel so much more exciting and diverse, and I adore the sense of speed you get! Hands down to PGG for proving a lot of people wrong saying this was a copy and paste!!
Great review, thanks! I count myself as a skeptic but I'm new to Forza in general so I will check it out - what is your favorite Subaru/WRX/STI version in Forza 5? I just play single player if that helps.
Heck yeah great review!! I'm at the S2 class, 100% the previous ones I thoroughly enjoy the FH5 HW expansion. I'm glad they talked about the history of Hotwheels because I'm a bit of a collector and its super cool. This was no Copy n paste. This fixed many of the glitches and mishaps from FH3 expansion and still delivers more and better content. I also had my stomach drop in some spots on the map but as you said thrilling.
I think they should really add the class progression in horizon For example: before you reach the official horizon event, you need to unlock the x class
I only really have positive things to say about this, I love Hot Wheels and I love Forza Horizon 5 so combining the two was only a plus for me when it was announced, it exceeded my expectations of just being good, and turned out to instead be, great.
Thanks H.H.!! Great review. 👍 I've enjoyed the heck out of this so far!! It is loads better than the hot wheels in Forza 3!! I'm really hoping that in a future update they'll allow us to remove all the preset track and allow a clear open building environment, but otherwise....IM HAVING A BLAST!!!
I gotta say this expansion actually looks really awesome because the base game Map was extremely extremely underwhelming my underwellman hands down the worst forza horizon map we have ever received this D this DOC actually looks like a lot of fun I might ask you go back to the game just to try out the DLC
How come, that I rarely ever hear criticism about the tracklayouts? The only thing viable is pure speed, handling is absolutely redundant... I enjoyed that when I started playing the DLC, but now, with almost 100% completion, its more than exhausting to just hop in whatever class and go 400 km/h regardless of the race youre doing or the part of the map youre currently driving in while just scooting around in the open world. Currently, S2-class is being dominated by the mosler, with a powerbuild, S1-class is being dominated by the xjr... featuring solely powerbuilds; A-class is being dominated by the dart . . . only powerbuilds to be seen, same goes for B-class. I do understand that the whole spirit of HotWheels is rather speed than handling, but the extent of limitation it puts on possible carchoices is way worse than I anticipated it to be. Plus: I will probably never feel the urge to hop into HotWheelsRivals, as, while playing the singleplayer content, wallriding proved to be unbeatable due to the absence of narrow corners in conjunction with every corner being perfectly round because of the design of the HotWheels trackparts. Clean racing felt very unrewarding and due to AI-behaviour on unbeatable (or even expert) almost impossible, because the AI defended the ideal racing line quite aggressively, widening the gap to the first place, diminishing the chance of ever catching a, judging by their start, AWD monster effortlessly hitting 400km/h on straights-AI-Alien. I do understand that there are slowdowns for wallriding in onlineplay, but as wallriding wasnt faster on conventional maps (most of the times) anyways, it felt like it was implemented to get crashers to only ruin one out of three races instead of all three. With HotWheels, wallriding slowdowns feel like a way to prevent players from reaching "cheesy" laptimes by prohibiting arcady gameplay while throwing the player into an arcade playhouse with every (((viable))) car going far above 200 mp/h, almost regardless of class. It just does not really check out for me, the DLC would play itself alot more fluently, if missing your racingline would actually be punished instead of granting you advantages. Other than that, loved the design. I dont wanna shit on it too much, I got alot of entertainment out of my money, still, felt like fundamental problems that shouldve been tackled while designing the DLC-layout.
Being able to remove all the hotwheels track would be amazing for the event lab. I can see so many rally/offroad tracks being made in the 3 biomes. Adventure maps and photoshoots as well
Can you go into free cam mode and zoom way out to see the large view of the world in the normal campaign map of Mexico?? Looked awesome. Would be cool to see the normal map like that
I recommend to disable wheel assistance if you play the DLC, I couldn't drive because my wheel became crazy in loops trying to "correct" my car handling
One day I want them to make hot wheels accelerators DLC. It take FH to the next level when it comes to hot wheels dlc. The cars, the tracks/realms maybe, powers maybe not sure on that one. And the story that carried with it would make An amazing DLC imo. Hot wheels unleashed game scratch that itch with some cars and some customs maps. But a full on accelerators DLC would be banger
The one thing that disappointed me was in event lab the fact that mag tracts and water tracks can’t be used, you cacnt place them or anything which really disappointed me as I thought I’d be able to use them
Pretty solid dlc, I hope for the same progression in the last expansion, but more to a real life small city like map, with lots or drift areas, and they go all out customisation wise with the dlc cars for it, like a tuners expansion
Great review. I gotta say, the thing im excited for most is the new progression system, as PG tends to implement changes first introduced in DLC into their main games later. its still not horizon 1 with both class and brand restrictions for most races but its still much better than what we have in the mainland of horizon mexico. I would still love to see more tryhard players be rewarded with cleaned up leaderboards and maybe ranked but even I gave up on those dreams and started playing FH5 more casually, unlike Horizon 4
There is scope for further development, but this DLC is fun with a high return for what you put into it. If you think about Event Lab in FH4 and what that has become, then it’s certainly possible for Hot Wheels to get more features in the future. In the meantime, there’s always Mexico to fall back on!
Is if possible theyxoukd add any of those features you mentioned to the event lab for hot wheels? That sounds so amazing, and any ideas what the second dlc will be? I was super happy with this one and still having fun with it! More so than I thought I would
Looking for tips on getting best performance on Hot Wheels tracks, like shift points, especially at the speed boosts. I also see people riding the walls a lot, but it only seems to slow me down.
Why is it so hard to understand that people can have different opinions? I did come into contact with Hot Wheels as a child. It was ok. But that doesn't mean that I want it in a video game...
@@benn87 And therefore I stated, "In my opinion". I don't claim them as hard facts or virtue and I still will stand by my opinion. Your statement is kinda ironic don't you think?
when i was younger i did collect hotwheel cars but they where only normal cars with hotwheels written on them and i only got fh3 hotwheel to get the zenvo since its from my home country and arctic truck from top gear
I mean i paid for the Season Pass already anyway... i'm neither hyped nor miffed about this... it makes sense because of the track building. But it is a bit odd that they did Hot Wheels twice now... and even weirder is that i still have FH3 installed so i can just fire that DLC up right now. AND then there is the Hot Wheels game, which i also have installed and not even touched yet. I never even played with Hot Wheels, i was a Matchbox and Micromachines kid ...
@@kaiserruhsam what's that? Sorry, hard time hearing through all this hair...not sure how it got this long and unruly. Almost like I've been sleeping a few hundred years.
@@magnusequus I find it hard to believe the people that crash in the intro. I play on a goddamn MacBook and I've had no issues..not even fps drop from normal map to Hot Wheels area.
@@thisissupposedtobeanonymous there where many posts about it on subreddit. Btw to fix it you have to set graphics to low, ride past one exact place where crash occurs and set them back on
So far, I really haven't enjoyed much of my time with this Hot Wheels expansion. I wasn't really a fan of the Hot Wheels expansion in 3, as I just hated how confining all the orange track made the world seem, and I think that's even more irritating in 5 when you consider how much more detail there is in the world below (or above). It's nice that you can go off-track, but even that fell short, as there're so many points where you can get off the tracks where it seems pointless to do so. I may stick with it a bit longer based on your review, since it does sound like the race variety is better than I assumed it'd be, so I at least thank you for your review, especially since you approached it from a mindset not too similar from my own. Honestly, of all the different toy car brands to go with, I think Hot Wheels is arguably the least interesting pick. Do a Matchbox expansion with those cool playsets represented in the game. Do Micro Machines! Also, while I can understand your lack of enthusiasm for the Lego expansion for 4, I do think it made for a more interesting world than Hot Wheels has up to this point.
Eh, Hot Wheels is good. The narrow tracks are the point, this is a racing and exploring game. You got the whole world and 3 biomes to explore, so the tracks are good for driving and racing part. It makes more sense to me than Lego and seems somewhat realistic aside from it being in the sky. Real life Lego people is not even half realistic and same with the animals. This brought back nostalgia from being a kid and I think it was the perfect thing to do as a DLC. Can't please everyone I guess.
This DLC looks like so much fun, I would buy it in heart beat but the only reason I can play FH5 is because I got 1 month of game pass ultimate for a dollar, even so I fell in love with the game almost immediately and I've been playing for hours for the last few days, hopefully I can save some money before my game pass subscription expires
Let the Gamepass expansion expire. Buy 12-month Xbox Live Gold cards for $55. They convert at a 1:1 ratio meaning you get a year of Gamepass for less than $60. You can do this for up to 36 months. Just make sure your sub is not active or it converts at a 3:1 meaning you only get 4 months for $55 and not 12.
I've been playing it on a Series X and I've been loving it. I'm maybe 95% through it in terms of content, challenges, and unlockables. The map is bigger than I thought it would be, and I like that the areas are themed. I also like that they clearly marked the sections of track without edges, so you can see where you can go off-track, which is vital for breaking billboards and popping balloons. There's a bunch of unlockable cars and clothing. More than I expected, even though there's not that many actual Hot Wheels cars. The story mode is cool, albeit short, and it kinda sounds like someone from Hot Wheels gave them a bullet point list and said "make sure you include all of this!", lol. I love the progression system from B class up to X in "Hot Wheels Academy". You can play through the entire thing with friends, including the intro part. It also includes Open and Rivals. I only have 2 minor complaints: - 1. When you're doing an online multiplayer race, the leaderboard is slow to update. For example, I could go from 6th place to 2nd, but the leaderboard will still show me in 6th for several seconds, then it eventually updates. It's not like that when doing a race in Mexico. 2. The magnetic track makes a buzzing/humming noise when you race on it, but if you enter the main festival site, sometimes that noise plays really loudly while you are in the menus at the festival, which is kinda annoying. Overall, I think they knocked it out of the park. When they added that stunt park in the stadium a few series back, I found it kinda janky/buggy with invisible walls and some weird car behaviour here and there, but this is WAY more polished than that.
I'm already over it. We waited all this time and everything's completable in a couple of days and being it's the 2nd time around I'm not even bothered to keep playing
i would have never paid for this if i didnt get it from the season pass... but i actually enjoy it quite alot.. gives me strong f zero vibes.. i encourage people to go into user made maps instead of only the normal ones people are making some INSANE tracks in this... i do believe for the best multiplayer experience you need to make sure somehow theres no litle kids in yuur race otherwise its just gonna be a rediculous mess.. that being said if you can find some actual grown ups who want to drive this expansion is really fun
I played a lot of transform races in gta online and I loved them, this reminds me of them...I played Fh3 never played the expansion back then, I'm excited to see what's in store
Rob,you sound like a different person when you do these reviews compared to your live videos lol.Really enjoy your thorough breakdowns of the good and bad.Followed you on Instagram👍
I don't like that they didn't add in more Hot Wheels cars :( I love collecting physical Hot Wheels cars (I only collect green ones! lol) and I'd love to see more of my toys in this game.
Really weird that the track coloring is forced to Orange. In Hot Wheels Unleashed, the official HW game, there's orange, red, blue, yellow with orange stripe and black with orange stripe. Kinda weird they just didn't port it over.
while the hot wheels update was downloading my son decided to play fh5 and crashed the xbox. now the update is gone, but it never downloaded, what do I do
Because I bought the ultimate version I have played this but sorry for me they should have left this to the stand alone hotwheels game. I'll probably try to finish it but for me it will be a chore and not an enjoyable experience.
Lol, I'm honestly amazed at people like you. These are tracks. In a racing game. There are new beautiful biomes. Jesus Christ, your life must be dull to you.
Yep. ATM I can't even be bothered to try it out. Racing on these tracks looks boring as fuck. If theres Rivals in this DLC, I might end up giving it a go when I have absolutely nothing else to do. I suppose PGG wanted this DLC to appeal to younger audiences and speak to nostalgia for the older audience, but I'm in neither of those groups. I really hope the next DLC will speak to my demographic. The generation that grew up on street car culture, tuning, JDM, DTM, MC3 and NFS Underground games. There are millions of us willing to spend money on that when it's made well.
I don't get why people are so obsessed with realism in Horizon. Even in the base game you can stick to the ground while cornering at 200+ MPH and jump off a mountain for points
I dissagree strongly about the colors! it's hotwheels, not "skytrack" hotwheels tracks are orange, I dont think hotwheels would have been ok with that but also it wouldn't even seem like hotwheels
They should've given us a LOT more Proper Hot Wheels Cars for this Expansion !!! There are LOADS of Really Cool and Unique Hot Wheels Cars which they could simply copy into the game for us to blast around the nostalgic orange tracks BUT instead, we only get 4 Proper Hot Wheels Cars to drive and customise.....Why !?!? Hot Wheels is all about the Cars.....Hence the name.....Hot WHEELS.....Where are all the Cool and Funky Unique cars.....I REALLY HOPE they give us a MASSIVE INFLUX of Proper Genuine Hot Wheels Cars ASAP !!! EDITED:- Added the last paragraph !!!
It’s a good dlc, but I’ve already seen this. I would have loved if they took everything new they added and put it into something we haven’t seen before. FH5 feels stale and to be honest I don’t see this dlc holding peoples attention for long.
This is me at the moment. I'm so underwhelmed especially since FH3 did the Hot Wheels expansion better (and not because it came first lol). FH5 as a whole lacks the showmanship of past Forza titles including FH4 which imo has the best intro to the main game. FH5 stunt events were boring as if they were enviromental tours rather than showcases compared to past titles. I think it comes down to the even more arcady physics this time around and a more static camera akin to past Gran Turismo games. What I get is a game that's less satisfying to race and cruise around in. Made even more noticeable when I pop in FH2/3 from time to time. I think FH4 kept a similar model while making it more arcade which works. FH5 feels way too arcade now. Kind of like how Ragnorok had a good balance of seriousness and funny, but Love and Thunder just goes extreme humor. No balance. This is FH5 to me lol
While i enjoy FH5 hot wheels, something feels off. Horizon 3s just felt better. my cars all feel so much slower, and i clearly stick to roads more than i should. i had to almost fully stop on the top of a loop before i fell off.
