Forza Horizon 5 is Biggest-Ever Xbox Game Studios Release

Well, it’s official: The universally praised Forza Horizon 5 is now the biggest-ever Xbox Game Studios release. Not bad for an arcade racer.

“We’ve invested for years in Xbox so more people can play,” Microsoft head of Xbox Phil Spencer tweeted. “With 4.5+ million players so far across PC, cloud, and console, Forza Horizon 5 shows that promise coming to life. Largest launch day for [an Xbox Game Studio] game, peak concurrent [users are three times higher than Forza Horizon 4, its predecessor]. Thank you, players, and congrats to [Playground Games, the studio that made the game].”

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Forza Horizon 5 launched yesterday with a lot of fanfare. But the big news to me is the many ways in which gamers can choose to play the title. In addition to their being three editions for purchase across Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, and PC, including on Steam, the Standard version of the title is also available to Xbox Game Pass subscribers on console and PC, and it can be streamed to devices of all kinds via Xbox Cloud Gaming, a feature of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate.

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Conversation 5 comments

  • saqrkh

    10 November, 2021 - 9:46 am

    <p>I think Xbox does simulators and simulation-based games really well — e.g., Flight Sim, Forza Motorsport, Forza Horizon, etc. I hope they build on it with more games. They don’t have to be pure simulators, but I think an Ace Combat-type fighter-arcade game and a mech game would be really cool. </p>

  • spacein_vader

    Premium Member
    10 November, 2021 - 12:21 pm

    <p>Horizons is more arcade handling vs motorsports light sim handling to me. Neither are hardcore aims like flight sim but Horizons struggles with force feedback wheels which are a given in sim racing. </p>

  • LT1 Z51

    Premium Member
    10 November, 2021 - 3:10 pm

    <p>Horizon is weirdly in a partial sim spot, in that physics seems to work at various times but at other times its clearly been being ignored. Which can be annoying, I don’t care if a game follows physics or not, strictly, just be consistent. And sometimes the consistency is maddening.</p>

  • Calibr21

    10 November, 2021 - 3:17 pm

    <p>I believe this tops all of Sony’s first party games for biggest launch. Last of Us 2 was Sony’s previous biggest launch with 4 million players. So Microsoft is able to hit a larger launch than Sony without launching on Playstation or Switch. Reinforces that their strategy of keeping future Bethesda games off Playstation is sound. </p><p><br></p><p><br></p>

  • vladimir

    Premium Member
    11 November, 2021 - 5:36 am

    <p>The game seems amazing but it crashes on my PC after a few minutes of use. I tried three times and cannot get past the introductory parts. I hope they release a patch soon</p>

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