"Forza 3" Catch All

What Thin_J said...

I missed the 94 Miata... I really really want a 94 miata as a summer roadster here in Ottawa, but even only summer driven ones are worn out and busted at this point.

polq37 wrote:

There's nothing there for the kid with the beater Civic or the hand-me-down Altima who wants to find out what new tires, a lowered suspension, and a couple of other cheap mods might do for his ride.

I'm sorry but... what?

From the list:

2006 Ford Focus ST
2003 Ford Focus SVT
2006 Honda Civic Si Coupe
2009 Honda Fit Sport
2004 Honda Civic Type-R
1999 Honda Civic Si Coupe
1994 Honda Civic 1.5 VTi
1995 Honda CR-X Del Sol SiR

1994 Mazda Miata
2007 Mazda MX-5 Roadster Coupe
1990 Mazda Savanna RX-7
1995 Mitsubishi Eclipse GSX
2009 Nissan Versa SL
2005 Scion tC
2009 Scion xD
2006 Saturn ION Red Line
1998 Subaru Impreza 22B STi
2003 Toyota Celica SS-I
2008 Toyota Yaris S
2004 Volkswagen Beetle
2001 Acura Integra Type-R
2004 Chrysler PT Cruiser GT
2003 Dodge SRT4
1998 Chrysler Eagle Talon TSi Turbo

And I skipped a few that were newer models of cars on that same list. I highlighted the dirt cheap honda cars that every high school buffoon I knew was driving when I was in school. Now those cars are a fraction of the cost they were then. And I highlighted the focus because I bought one of those when I was working at Toys R Us for $8.50 an hour.

There's plenty of regular cars in there.

Stylez wrote:

What Thin_J said...

I missed the 94 Miata... I really really want a 94 miata as a summer roadster here in Ottawa, but even only summer driven ones are worn out and busted at this point.

The miata's actually gotten popular as a platform for engine swaps. I've seen a few videos of them after the 5.7L LS1 V8 from the '98-'02 era Corvette/Camaro/Trans Am has been squeezed in there. Pretty disgusting.

I'd totally drive a miata if I could fit in one. No chance in hell of that though. You could cut my head off and I'd still be too tall to squeeze in. Same goes for the S2000. Everything about that car is just about perfect except that I can't sit in it with the top up.

Here's the list for those who're curious. It still suffers from the 'a lot of the same car' problem we usually see in games with this many cars, but I'm seeing a lot of cars that I'm looking forward to trying out. As far as the blind spots in the list, I guess we can hope for some DLC packs to remedy that?

PT Cruiser GT
Focus SVT
Civic Si Coupe
Civic VTi
Civic Del Sol SiR

There are very few base model cars in the game. 9 out of 10 Focuses on the road are not SVTs. For the 98% of us who've got sensible non-performance cars and want to see how they might handle thrashed on the track, Forza offers squat.

Not long ago, I was at a Volvo dealership coveting a C-30. Forza 3 has something called a C-30 R-Design. Is a C-30 R-Design similar to a C-30 R? How do they compare to a base C-30? For me, Forza would be a much more interesting product if it answered questions about how base model vehicles compared to factory tuned racers or racing spec vehicles.

Not a single one of those cars is a tuned racer or racing spec. They're all tiny cars with lawnmower engines in them. All that GT/SVT/Si/VTi/SiR crap means is they probably suck down premium fuel.

In the case of the focus you got a really nice suspension and about 20 horsepower, putting you at a whopping 135-140 at the front wheels. Newsflash: you get that from a Corolla. The '99 Civic Si netted you a motor with potential if you wanted to dump money into it and upgrade everything but it was just an everyday 4banger with a slightly higher redline on the tach when it was stock.

Similar things can be said about every car I listed.

Thin_J wrote:

Not a single one of those cars is a tuned racer or racing spec. They're all tiny cars with lawnmower engines in them. All that GT/SVT/Si/VTi/SiR crap means is they probably suck down premium fuel.

In the case of the focus you got a really nice suspension and about 20 horsepower, putting you at a whopping 135-140 at the front wheels. Newsflash: you get that from a Corolla. The '99 Civic Si netted you a motor with potential if you wanted to dump money into it and upgrade everything but it was just an everyday 4banger with a slightly higher redline on the tach when it was stock.

Similar things can be said about every car I listed.

That's what I was about to say. 90%+ of the Matrixes I see are base models but that hardly makes my XRS unobtainable or crazy impressive. It is practical and still fun to drive though.

Checking out the official forums, it looks like there's a semi-official list of tracks up that I hadn't seen before:

Reaper 392 wrote:

We now have 134 tracks confirmed, in 24 different environments

Officially confirmed tracks list

we now have a list from x360racer (link below) which shows all the tracks. unfortunatly it was in french, so excuse the poor translation from google.

- Costa Di Amalfi (2 tracks): Full and reverse
- Camino Viejo (8 tracks): Full, Short, Mini, Extreme and their reverse
- Iberian International (6 tracks): Full, Short, Mini and reverse
- Ladera test track (6 tracks): Full, Short, Mini and reverse
- Circuit de Catalunya (3 tracks): GP, National, School
- Le Mans (3 tracks): with and without chicanes on mulsanne straight and Bugatti
- Maple Valley (4 tracks): Full, Short and reverse
- Laguna Seca (1 track)
- Mugello (2 tracks): Full and Short
- New York (4 tracks): FM2 version, version with chicanes on the straight and reverse
- Nurb (5 tracks): Full and 4 point to point
- Rally di Positor (10 tracks): Full, reverse and 8 point to point
- Road America (1 track)
- Road Atlanta (2 tracks): Full and Short
- Sebring (3 tracks): same as FM2
- Sedona (10 tracks): Full, shorts and their reverse, oval (+ reverse) and the Drag strips
- Silverstone (3 tracks): same as FM2
- Sunset Peninsula (6 tracks): Full, Short, Oval and reverse
- Suzuka (3 tracks): same as FM2
- Tsukuba (2 tracks): Full and Short
- Motegi (4 tracks): same as FM2
- Fujimi Kaido (14 tracks): full circuit, FM1 layout, 4 P2P's of kaido circuit, hillclimb, and all their reverses.

Two other settings are grayed out in the selection screen (probably those requiring the installation of the second disc):
- Benchmark high speed ring (14 tracks)
- Sidewinder proving grounds (18 tracks)

Camino Viejo reverse confirmed, woot. Return of the NY track, boo.

I really can't express how happy I am about the return of point-to-point.

LiquidMantis wrote:

That's what I was about to say. 90%+ of the Matrixes I see are base models but that hardly makes my XRS unobtainable or crazy impressive. It is practical and still fun to drive though.

Yup, the XRS is remarkably similar to the SVT in a lot of ways, particularly in the powertrain department. High revving motor paired with tall gearing and a fun suspension. Not really fast, but definitely fun to throw around. Toyota really did it's homework with the that 1.8 Liter engine. It's such a nifty little motor Lotus used it in the Elise

My first car was an '89 Honda Accord. It had 98 horsepower and I loved it. In game land, I'd rather drive that thing down the Amalfi coast than the Ferrari California. I'd get a kick out of seeing if I could tweak it to beat the lap times of a much more expensive car.

Now, I drive a 330 coupe and a C5 'vette. Both are good cars. Both are obtainable cars. Both are enthusiast cars. I think the C5 is something of a marvel. I know it doesn't compare to a Z06 or even a base model C6. I'm much too old and encumbered to push my cars to the limit, but Forza would be of much more value to me if I could play with my cars in its lovely virtual environment.

I've got relatives and coworkers with AMGs, M3s, and Z06s. They're good cars, but I'm not really interested in them. I've seen the compromises involved in buying and keeping them up.

Maybe it's just a matter of taste, but I'd be much more interested in wringing the performance out of a late model Buick Roadmaster with it's LT1 Corvette V8 than an racing spec 911 GT3. I'm never going to see one of those GT3s. I walk by the Roadmaster nearly every day. The GT3 is an awesome car. Tuning and driving the Roadmaster to its limits would be an awesome challenge.

I disagree that there are no base models. Yes, there are higher end vehicles in there, but plenty of lower end stuff as well; here's some that I picked out:

2009 BMW 135i
2006 Ford Focus ST < Essentially a step down from the SVT; still very affordable. I know an E-4 who drives one.
2009 Honda Fit Sport < See above.
1991 Honda CR-X SiR < Yea, it's the Si. You can still get them dirt cheap now a days.
2009 Mazdaspeed 3
1994 Mazda Miata
1997 Mazda RX-7
2003 Mini Cooper S < You can get one of these w/ 40-50k miles for ~15k
2009 Nissan Versa SL < Top end model, but base price is still $16
1989 Porsche 944 Turbo < These run 6-8 grand
2006 VW Golf GTi
1984 VW Rabbit GTi > Both the VWs are fairly inexpensive.

That's just from Disc 1. Disc 2 has a handful of others, maybe 3-4 more on top of that. But overall, that's a fairly decent representation of cars that are easily obtainable, which a fairly large group of people stand a VERY good chance of owning.

Sure, the other 380 some cars are crazy expensive and WAY out of reach. But I think that's more than enough for me to get a good feel for driving a car *I* own. Or will own, as in the case of the Mini.

polq37 wrote:

Arrgh.

So, they just posted a list of all 400 cars in the game. And I'm profoundly disappointed.

There are virtually no ordinary cars on there.

You can race any model BMW M car you want, but I don't see a single 325i. Lots of Z06s, but no ordinary base model Corvettes.

The only remotely ordinary looking cars on the list are a New Beetle and a couple of Scions.

There's nothing there for the kid with the beater Civic or the hand-me-down Altima who wants to find out what new tires, a lowered suspension, and a couple of other cheap mods might do for his ride.

Supercars are nice and all, but I don't really care about them. I expect them to perform well. I'm much more interested in ordinary cars. The kind of cars people actually own lots of examples of. I'd like to be able to tweak those cars to see what kind of results you can get out of an accessible, every day kind of vehicle.

I know what you mean, I have so much fun racing/upgrading the lower-tier cars.

Two cars that I was hoping would be in the game:

-Honda Accord Euro aka Acura TSX
-Nissan Skyline Sedan 350GT aka Infiniti G35 Sedan (it was in Gran Turismo 5 Prologue, and is my car in real-life).

And the fact that they included SUV's in the game kind of rubs me the wrong way.

Well, here's to hoping they'll release free promotional DLC, like the Nissan Tournament Pack (2007 Sentra SE-R, Altima, and 350Z Touring) in Forza 2.

I can't help but assume that my talking to one of the producers at E3 scored us the Fox body Mustang. That's as ordinary as ordinary gets.

LiquidMantis wrote:
Thin_J wrote:

Not a single one of those cars is a tuned racer or racing spec. They're all tiny cars with lawnmower engines in them. All that GT/SVT/Si/VTi/SiR crap means is they probably suck down premium fuel.

In the case of the focus you got a really nice suspension and about 20 horsepower, putting you at a whopping 135-140 at the front wheels. Newsflash: you get that from a Corolla. The '99 Civic Si netted you a motor with potential if you wanted to dump money into it and upgrade everything but it was just an everyday 4banger with a slightly higher redline on the tach when it was stock.

Similar things can be said about every car I listed.

That's what I was about to say. 90%+ of the Matrixes I see are base models but that hardly makes my XRS unobtainable or crazy impressive. It is practical and still fun to drive though.

Yeah that's pretty much the case, I would love a Matrix XRS in any racing game.

I still kick myself because I should have bought the XRS model instead of my XR.

Some cars are listed as Disc 1 and some are Disc 2. I wonder how that's gonna work. If I rip Disc 2 to my hard drive, can I access all of the cars with no Disc swapping?

skeletonframes wrote:

Some cars are listed as Disc 1 and some are Disc 2. I wonder how that's gonna work. If I rip Disc 2 to my hard drive, can I access all of the cars with no Disc swapping?

I'm pretty sure that's the idea, yep. Ah, here we go:

http://au.xbox360.ign.com/articles/1...

IGN wrote:

When you first insert disc 1, it will ask if you want to install the second disc. The install eats up 1.9 GB of space. Yowa! But you can instead choose pieces of disc 2 to install if you have limited space or a memory card.

Disc 2 is broken up into four packs that act like downloadable content. If it's installed on your hard drive, then the game reads it and adds in the content seamlessly.

I'm very happy with both that car list and that track list. Awesome stuff! Of course there are cars (I too want some more D and C class loving, but there are a lot of those that I want already in the game) and tracks (let's see some more Grand Prix circuit tracks please!) missing that I wish were on there, but this more than warrants jumping from Forza 2 to Forza 3, not that I doubted it would be the case.

Day one, here I come!

Forza Motorsport VIP Membership Car pack:
2008 Aston Martin DBS

...sigh, only for VIP.

- edit -

TeamXbox Review - 9.5 (Link)

Nei wrote:
Forza Motorsport VIP Membership Car pack:
2008 Aston Martin DBS

...sigh, only for VIP.

- edit -

TeamXbox Review - 9.5 (Link)

How does one become VIP?

Reviews are popping up. Nei posted the Team Xbox one above.

IGN - 9.4 (With an average fan rating of 5 - Apparently the fanboys are out in full force today)

Videogamer - 10

Gamespy - 4.5 / 5 stars

Looking really solid so far.

skeletonframes wrote:

How does one become VIP?

One way is to buy LE edition... there are other ways which I don't recall.

-edit-

...actually, now that I think about it, I'm not sure if buying LE Ed. gets you into VIP. Research time.

-edit 2-

The Forza 3 GameStop Exclusive Limited Edition comes with:

* Forza Motorsport 2GB USB Storage and keychain: Show off your Forza pride with these specially branded items.
* Forza Motorsport VIP Membership and Exclusive Car Pack*: Want to be a top painter, tuner, driver or just more active in the community? VIP membership is the way to get yourself noticed. Includes special treatment within the online Auction House, Community Storefront and on the Forzamotorsport.net forums. Also includes 5 of the hottest cars from the roster of Forza Motorsport 3, available only through your VIP membership.
* Exclusive Collector’s Edition Car Pack*: This one is for the fans. This pack includes 5 cars that have been hand tuned and hand painted by the developers at Turn 10 to fly the Forza Motorsport colors.
* Exclusive Forza Motorsport 3 Theme:* Customize your Dashboard experience with this limited availability Xbox 360 theme.

skeletonframes wrote:

How does one become VIP?

Buy the collector's edition.

zeroKFE wrote:
skeletonframes wrote:

How does one become VIP?

Buy the collector's edition.

After the game's out, I bet there will be other ways as well but that's the easiest way it seems.

Lothar wrote:

After the game's out, I bet there will be other ways as well but that's the easiest way it seems.

From what I hear, VIP and LE car pack can not be sold through Forza's Storefront... so, unless they will have them as DLC packs, look like I'm out of luck regarding DBS.

LupusUmbrus wrote:

GameTrailer Review - 9.2

Nifty.

I do hate myself a little for drifting down and reading comments on the video review. Jesus that's depressing. It might as well be Youtube.

IGN Review:

... There are numerous assists to alter how your car performs, but there are just three AI difficulty options: Easy, medium, and hard. Even for average drivers, medium will quickly prove too easy. But, for me, hard can be really hard at times. It leads to too many races that are either far too easy to win or seem almost impossible to compete in. If Forza 3 had one more setting between medium and hard, it would be perfect. But it doesn't and, for me, it hurts the balance over the course of the career mode.

That describes exactly why I never finished the campaign in Forza 2. On "medium" I kept winning every race without any real challenge, especially on the longer races. On hard I never really stand a chance. Too bad they didn't address this, but perhaps only a few people were bothered by this. I played the demo and wasn't overly impressed, played the same basically as Forza 2, with better graphics. I won't be picking up Forza 3...

Thin_J wrote:
LupusUmbrus wrote:

GameTrailer Review - 9.2

Nifty.

I do hate myself a little for drifting down and reading comments on the video review. Jesus that's depressing. It might as well be Youtube.

Yeah, they need to be disabled by default. Its hard not to read them when they are right on the bottom of the screen.

LupusUmbrus wrote:

GameTrailer Review - 9.2

Is the rewind feature that much of a problem for everyone? This is not specifically referring to GT's review, but there seems to be a lot of comment on the web that seems to cry foul on it. Some how, I feel like I missed the Memo!