Forza Horizon 5: four tips for getting started!

Forza Horizon 5 is here! Welcome to Mexico.

Before the festival really gets started, there are some things you'll want to do to make sure you get the best out of the game.

Here are our tips!

Choose your graphics settings

PC players will be used to tailoring the graphics settings to their systems, but in the case of Forza Horizon there's a choice to be made on the Xbox also. You'll need to decide between Quality and Performance modes.

Quality mode sets the game at 30 frames per second but adds some fancier water and foliage effects. Performance mode means that water splashes lose their transparency and there's less in the way of greenery as you barrel across the landscape. You then get 60 frames per second though, so it might well be worth the trade-off for you!

Personally I've played the game on the Xbox Series X in each mode and I'm finding that I switch between modes depending on what I'm doing. 60 frames per second does help with racing, but that Quality mode does look glorious in freeroam and on expeditions. I'd also stick with Quality for the showcases, which are quite straightforward competitions but look fantastic.

Get familiar with Drone Mode

Drone Mode is so useful in Forza Horizon 5. You'll be able to record amazing footage, explore locations more fully to make sure you have all the bonus boards, and also spot those tricky barn finds!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4BhWhL1Dtg

You can find Drone Mode in the Creative Hub section of the menu. It's nice that we don't need to unlock it this time!

Configure your controller

If you're a wheel player, you already know how important it is to get the settings just right before you start racing. But this time around, controller players need to make some tweaks too.

On the Xbox, Forza Horizon 5 comes with a slightly odd controller setup. There's no gear down button configured, so if you're a serious racer you'll want to fix that immediately. There's also large deadzones for both brake and accelerator. If you're disabling the driver aids, you'll want a bigger range of input for each. Find these settings under "Advanced Controls" in the menu.

Unlock fast travel

This is something you'll want to do as early as you can in the game. The Mexico map is very large and it can take a lot of your time getting from event to event. Story chapters can often be located in opposite corners of the map and so you'll be driving miles and miles just to take part in the next stage.

There's a house you'll need to purchase to enable you to fast travel, so make sure you read our guide to that.