I don't see how the time gated events will ever change unless Turn10 find another way to get people logging on. I think they are **** scared that what
@Morbid65 says is true, that people will just switch off for good without the FOMO. And with the current status of the game and the lack of tangible major improvements, I agree with this.
But the counter argument remains, in my opinion, make a game enjoyable and you don't need FOMO.
...
Forza Horizon 5 has its own issues (the weekly car FOMO is awful in my opinion) but still, series 37 has FOUR new-to-Forza cars (compared with TWO for FM23 series 11), and update 38 has a new game mode!
So far, after 11 months, the number of new game modes in FM23 is... zero, nada, nothing.
It's so easy to think of improvements, which makes it very frustrating to me. If Turn10 can't think of something original to add, then steal from elsewhere. Grid Legends has Time Attack, Eliminator and Drift modes, and that's just one game, for an example.
I agree a good game shouldn't need FOMO stuff to encourage play, but sadly the FOMO thing has also sorta become a competition between games at this point. Even if your game is fun and you don't have a Battle Pass or whatever, players will still go "oh well I can play your good game any time, I have to get the FOMO stuff now in this other game."
As I've posted before, despite being frustrated/disappointed with T10's decision making and quality control, I'm enjoying the game and having fun races with friends on a regular basis, and it is undoubtedly a much more fun, deep racing experience than FM7 even if it has been frustratingly inconsistent/unstable at times and is missing features we previously had and has/had bugs that make things more difficult than they should be.
For others that don't have weekly league races though, I don't see a lot of reason to keep returning to this game frequently. The career is abysmal (although it should be noted I'm jaded and haven't enjoyed a career mode/single player experience in a loooooong time), the public multiplayer certainly can be fun and I've had some good races, but is also executed poorly with the ratings not meaning enough/working well so the driving standards outside the top 4 or 5 drivers in each lobby are bad, and the choices/formats generally being pretty unoriginal/uninspired mean it's not consistently enjoyable.
As you point out, FH5, which is old at this point and in a better state than FM8 and therefore doesn't need to be as desperate for some hype, is consistently getting better/more content and more buzz, which is pretty off-putting for those of us who prefer the circuit racing side of things. Maybe if we didn't have FH5 to compare it to it wouldn't be so disappointing... but we do.
Update 11's cars themselves are cool but I don't think they are enough to create any real kind of "hype" or whatever you want to call it amongst the sorta "normal" playerbase. Some will love the Nissan for nostalgia and the GT hardcore guys will be excited about the Aston I guess, but they require like 3 hours of slogging through generic "races" to get them, and I dunno how many people really bother. It's also not a very varied selection, as all 3 are RWD R-class GT race cars so no street cars, no slower cars, no variety of cars for different divisions.
The new cars being locked away or held back for drip feed mean the only new thing to play with is the track, but not every month has a track. When the only new content is locked behind a grind, it doesn't really make the game feel fresh when you turn it on after an update.
I personally don't think the solution is necessarily new game modes though. I get that some people miss drifting, and I get that some people miss drag mode (although I don't get why, it was always barebones and the game really isn't set up for drag racing well), and both are still fairly small niches of the larger Forza community. One of the most frequent criticisms of the franchise has been lack of focus, and adding either wouldn't help that. If we are down to getting 3 cars a month, then imagine how much more disappointing it will be for a big chunk of the playerbase when 1 of the 3 is a drift car or a drag car that only smaller percentage of the playerbase will use and will be useless for the game's core circuit racing.
It's still a tough spot for them though as each sorta subcommunity is pulling in their own way. Single player people go "the game NEEDS X" and multiplayer people go "we HAVE to get Y!" It seems like it would make it hard for T10 to focus on improving anything specific and it means the most logical things to work on are things directly related to the racing, as single player and multiplayer both have racing in common... But even then "I don't want to have to make a pit stop!" and "the races are too short!" and "no they are too long!" and "all we drive is road cars!" and "but race cars have no upgrades and that's boring!" and so on.
I do think just content can be enough, but it has to be focused and cohesive, and it needs to be utilized well. Just 2 cars buried behind some boring single player championships that feel like they were constructed using RNG where you have to use cars that have already been in the game for ages isn't enough for most people I think.
wall of text apologies etc
...yeah I might have to do that now lol. But to be fair I do like some of the details she gives about the tracks.
