So I got to try out Forza 3 yesterday and the game looks absolutely fabulous. The beta build I played only had a few cars and 3 tracks but the level of detail is stunning. Even though we were playing on a projector in a fully lit room you could see how beautifully rendered the cars were. Not to mention the view distance on the mountain track. Breathtaking. There were great little details that I hadn't noticed in videos like the fact when driving in cockpit view the driver's hands stutter back and forth on the steering wheel as he tries to combat the friction of the road and control the car.
The menus are very slick overall I think the presentation is very classy. It was fun flipping through the available cars and then when you picked one you were brought to the screen to pick a colour, all while the camera moves slowly over different parts of the car. It's like car porn. It gets you hyped for the race to start. As did the massive roar of the engine when you pressed the throttle before the race started. The car sounded fierce.
I generally suck at racing games so I played on easy mode with all the assists turned on. I also hate playing with the Microsoft wheel, I find it's far too sensitive especially when you're used to driving a real car. Even a slight turn of the wheel would send me careening into the wall. Despite that the game was a lot of fun. The assists feature is one of the things I'm most excited about actually since I want to play driving games but I usually just get frustrated with them. Even with the assists turned on it was still a challenge to keep the car on the road and so I still has a lot of fun. I REALLY like the rewind feature. It didn't feel like cheating, it felt more like you were trying to make a jump on a platform game, missed and landed at the bottom so you climbed back up to try that jump again until you got it right.
Anyway, I only got to do one lap of the race but my experience definately got more hyped for the game than I already was. Can't wait!
