What could have been an innovative racer years ago, falls now behind its competitors.
Reading time: 4 minutes
Nothing new in the world of racing, nor mobile games
FORZA Street is embedded in a quite simple story about some kids who found a legal underground racing league in the heat of Miami. You step in as a newbie and make your way to the top, always accompanied by your loyal mechanic-/dealer-friend. The typical kind of night racing story. The game comes free-to-play on mobile devices and let’s you unlock your cars with ingame currency or real money. You only purchase the right to spin a wheel of fortune which determines wich car you are going to get.
If you are looking for a specific car, you might have to play a lot or spend a lot of money. A guaranteed average car costs about 2,19€ at least. Also you can attend periodic special events which give you another chance to unlock parts or new cars. The game does everything to keep you coming back. Just like we know it from other free-to-play mobile games. Nothing new so far. But it doesn’t ever force you to spend money if you want to proceed.
Spend all on graphics, save on the rest
When you start the game, two things become clear right away:
First of all, the graphics are impressive (given a quite powerful phone). The lighting and reflections make the cars look great and the camera always does its job of showing them from the sweetest spot. Even though the presentation is overall great, the game still suffers jaggies and the textures of the city are nearly not existent. Anyway, something is shining at all times. The menues as well as the comic cinematics keep the pace high.
Second, the gameplay is VERY reduced. There are only two buttons to use: the gas pedal and a nitro ignition. Your car drives and steers automatically. The only thing to do is to push and release the pedal with the right timing. Let go of the pedal to brake. Push it with the right timing again to accelerate properly and get extra fuel for the nitro gauge. On longer straights you push the nitro button for extra boost. That’s about it.
Too easy and unfair at the same time
It really is as simple as it sounds. The races are all about timing. Once you get a feeling for it, the game becomes quite easy. If you search for a bigger challenge you can choose two higher difficulties in each race. This is the point when you will need to tune your cars with ingame or real currency or get a better one. Otherwise you might lose some of the races, even if your timing was perfect. That is a little unfair if you have the bad luck to only get weak cars.
Tuning is very generic in FORZA Street. You can choose different colors for your car or upgrade specific parts and stats. As the steering is done by the game anyway, we never got in a situation where we felt the need to tune something different then top speed or acceleration, though.
If you reach the finish the last
It should have become clear by now: FORZA Street is a very simple game. It is designed for quick and uncomplicated sessions and you can’t say that it is not fun. But the missing variety and challenge will soon bore you, if you look for a serious racing game to really master. The neckbraker for FORZA is, that other games have done the same thing already better. The most prominent example is Asphalt 9 Legends. It nearly works the same way, but gives you more action, opportunities and control during the races. FORZA Street might have been an innovative game three years ago. Now its competitors have already made it to the podium, while FORZA is just entering the finish line.
Source: FORZA Street
