REVIEW: Forza Horizon 6

Playground Games has finally taken the Horizon Festival to Japan, and it turns out it was worth the wait. Forza Horizon 6 is a big, confident open-world racer that leans hard into what this series has always done well: giving you a vast playground, a couple of hundred hours of things to do in it, and enough cars to keep any petrolhead occupied for a long time.

With a Metascore sitting at 92 at the time of writing, critics are broadly in agreement that this is the strongest entry in the franchise to date. Whether you agree with that depends a lot on how much you already like Forza Horizon, but for fans of the series, me included, it is hard to argue with what Playground has put together here.

Story

Calling it a story is probably a stretch, and Playground Games would be the first to admit it. You arrive in Japan as a tourist with no real credentials, and over the course of the game you work your way up to becoming a Horizon legend.

The cast of characters around you is likeable enough, and the cutscenes between major events keep things moving, but the narrative is functional rather than memorable. What the game does better than any previous entry is frame its two parallel progression paths as a genuinely interesting reason to keep playing.

The Horizon Festival side of things is built around earning Wristbands, seven in total, which unlock higher-tier events and faster car classes as you progress. The Discover Japan path runs alongside it, tasking you with filling out a stamp book through exploration, photography, food delivery runs, and side activities tied to the country’s culture.

Together they give the game a sense of direction that Forza Horizon 5 arguably lacked, where you were handed superstar status almost immediately. Here, the sense of working your way up feels more earned, even if the game still throws cars at you pretty generously from the off.

Gameplay

At its core, Forza Horizon 6 is the same game it has always been, and that is not a complaint. The accessible arcade handling model returns, sitting comfortably in the space between full simulation and pure arcade. It rewards clean driving without punishing the occasional kerb-clip, and the range of assists means the game scales well.

The new event types are worth highlighting. Touge races on twisting Japanese mountain roads are an obvious fit for the setting, and Time Attack circuits that appear organically on the map are a nice addition. The Showcase events, which cap off each Wristband tier, are as over-the-top as ever, ranging from races against stunt planes to a pursuit involving what can only be described as a giant mech.

They are heavily scripted and you are unlikely to lose them, but they serve their purpose as a reward for the work put in. The car roster launches with over 550 vehicles, with Japanese legends like the Nissan GT-R, Mazda MX-5, Subaru WRX and Toyota Supra sharing space with European hypercars and American muscle.

The cover car, a 2025 Toyota GR GT Prototype, is a strong choice. Audio has also received attention, with a new acoustic modelling system giving each car a more distinct and convincing engine note than in previous entries.

Visuals

Japan is a genuinely excellent setting for a Forza Horizon game, and the team has made the most of it. The map is divided into ten regions, each with its own character: a dense recreation of Tokyo, mountain roads around a version of Mount Fuji, bamboo forests, coastal highways, snowy ski resorts, and more besides.

The result is the most visually varied map the series has produced, and it means you are rarely looking at the same type of scenery for long. The game runs well on Xbox Series X and on an Xbox Ally X, it’s very well optimised, holding a stable frame rate across most conditions with only very minor stutters in busier areas, especially around Tokyo city.

Load times have also been addressed, with Playground and Microsoft citing a significant reduction thanks to new shader delivery technology. Whether or not you notice the technical specifics, the practical experience is that the game rarely asks you to wait around, which is appreciated.

On the audio side, the soundtrack covers an eclectic mix of genres spread across multiple radio stations. It does its job, though music tastes being what they are, your mileage may vary on the individual selections.

Multiplayer

Forza Horizon 6 handles multiplayer in much the same way the series has for several entries. A shared open world means you will regularly encounter other players going about their business, and you can form convoys to tackle events together, including the main campaign races and Discover Japan activities.

The new CoLab feature lets players build and share custom races within the open world, which adds a creative layer for those who want to do more than just race preset circuits. Online progression has its own dedicated path called Horizon Play, which feeds back into the main campaign up to a point, meaning you are not locked out of single-player rewards simply because you prefer to race other people.

Competitive racing modes are present and functional, and the matchmaking covers enough race types to keep things from feeling repetitive. It is a solid, if not dramatically different, multiplayer offering compared to Forza Horizon 5.

Conclusion

Forza Horizon 6 does not reinvent anything. If you have played Forza Horizon 4 or 5 and came away feeling like you had seen everything the series had to offer, this entry will not change your mind. But for those who still find the formula enjoyable, which based on player numbers and review scores is a large group, this is the series working at a high level.

Japan is a setting that suits the game well, the dual progression system gives the campaign more structure than it has had in years, and the sheer volume of content on offer means it will occupy a slot in most players’ rotation for quite some time. It is a well-made, enjoyable open-world racing game that knows exactly what it is trying to be.

Forza Horizon 6 Pricing & Availability

Forza Horizon 6 is available now, starting at €59.99 from Smyths, or €69.99 on Steam and Xbox Series X|S. It is also available as a Day One title on Xbox Game Pass, included with a Game Pass Ultimate subscription at no additional cost.