I'm a newbie to modern racing games, the last racing game I played was nfs most wanted.. I wanted to get back into racing after watching an amazing video on youtube so went and bought myself the Forza motorsport 4 for xbox.
While racing, I noticed that even though I had the acceleration button pressed, the car slowed down during turns etc.. (noticeable by the sound) and after tampering with the settings I found out that changing difficulty level to Hard (or pro) from medium seemed to eliminate that.. however, I had a new problem to deal with.. my car was completely out of control.
I noticed that in hard mode, the auto stabilizer is turned off, breaking is not assisted and steering is ABS (whatever that means).. Now my cars have much wider turning curve and it is impossible to make a turn without spinning, coming to a halt or a straight on colliding with the sides of the track.
I've tried not accelerating, braking, reversing during turns – all have the same effect – collision or spinning.
Why is this all so difficult? what happened to "floor the gas and go" idea, like the one they had on nfs, it was still a lot of fun to play without actually getting into the "realism" – if that is what it is..
My real question is – How do I work, rather, how do I make my turns in the "hard" mode in Forza motorsport 4? Is there some trick I need to follow?
ps: I noticed the same is true for Gran Turismo 5 on ps3, though I haven't played it much.
Best Answer
I totally agree with Dave McClelland, but want to add a few points from my own experience.
You don't have to have all of the driver assists turned on for the game to be enjoyable as a newbie, but some are definitely helpful.
I have turned automatic braking completely off, but left ABS turned on. In Forza 4, automatic braking will apply the brakes when it thinks you're going too fast for the part of the track that you're on. ABS ensures that you don't lock the brakes under heavy braking. It's standard equipment on pretty much every car produced today IRL. The reason I turned off automatic braking is that I find that it brakes too early, too hard, or unnecessarily, increasing lap times. For the gas peddle always down crowd, it's useful, but for anyone who has actually driven a car and knows that you have to slow down for corners, it's usually more of a hindrance than a helper.
Next is the racing line. I've set it to show braking only. This is because I know the general rules for getting fast lap times: slow in, fast out, hit the apex of the turn, etc. I pretty much know what the racing line is, and usually have a good idea of where to turn in, but don't really know where to start braking on most tracks. If you don't know what the racing line is, then you may want to set it to show the full racing line.
For the rest of the driver assists, I have them set to a mix of on, off, or intermediate. For me personally, I've struck a nice balance between controlling the car and getting good lap times. Note that good players can get better lap times with these driver assists turned off than they would if they were on.
But even if you had all the driver assists turned on, you still wouldn't be able to play Forza like an arcade racer. Too much gas too early in a turn, even with the automatic braking, and you'll be drifting at best, but more likely spinning out and crashing into the exit guard rail. For the gas peddle always down crowd, there are some corners that the automatic braking will get them through, but most will end like I just described. Proper throttle control is key to successfully negotiating corners in Forza. Luckily you don't have to worry about braking control as much with ABS turned on, as long as you don't try cornering too hard with the brakes on.
You're going to have to find the perfect balance between how much you control the car, and how much control you hand over to the "onboard computer" (i.e. the game). In the end though, you simply can't treat Forza 4 like an arcade racer. You can find a load of racing techniques that will help you when playing racing sims, as well as arcade racers. Start with some of the theory, and you'll start seeing your lap times improve.