Review: Rally Adventure in Forza Horizon 5 bids farewell to Mexico.

The second addition to Forza Horizon 5 is fundamentally different from the first. If in last year’s Hot Wheels we rode on perfectly flat plastic tracks, then in Rally Adventure we go to conquer much bumpier roads. Like the previous supplement, it does not fully meet expectations, but is a quality supplement that you can enjoy spending a couple of evenings in.

⇡#New sandbox…

This time we are heading to the Sierra Nueva region, a place off the main map where rally fans have gathered. As usual, the opening race shows off all the beauty of the new terrain, from jumping off a cliff in an electric truck to jumping over a plane in a 2011 Ford Focus RS, the same Colin McRae car. In the background you can see the most beautiful mountains, the trees in the rain forests collapse funny when driving through them, and it is very difficult to tear yourself away from drawing footprints in the sand.

Sierra Nueva can hardly be called a large region, but in the process of exploring its scale, one begins to like it. It’s all about how compactly different areas are located here: here you have a small desert, and a secluded crater, and a couple of bridges across the river. As you travel from one end of the map to the other, many unique scenery quickly replace each other.

The same can be said about the races – although there are only three dozen of them, they are all unique. Either a track with several chicanes in a row, or long winding sections that test your ability to “string” a series of turns, then jumps or just rough roads on which the car constantly bounces. The surface is also constantly changing – you will have to ride on the asphalt, and on the ground, and along the dunes, and you will need to cross reservoirs.

Chickens run across the roads here quite often.

Since the theme of the add-on is rallying, the driving rules have changed accordingly. Now, when you start the next race, you are offered a choice: drive in rally mode or in normal race mode. The second option is no different from the usual competition with other participants, but the first turns the race into a time trial, where only the player remains on the track. You still need to move from one control point to another, and sometimes these points turn out to be dividing gates – when you pass through them, the leaderboard is updated and you can find out how many seconds you are behind or catching up with the record holders.

The rally mode is also interesting in that a helicopter constantly flies in front of the player, in which the navigator sits and warns of obstacles and bumps on the road. To make the gameplay more realistic, it is recommended to turn off the trajectory of movement (arrows behind the ground) and follow the instructions of the assistant, as well as the icons that appear on the screen. The idea is good, and the flying helicopter looks especially cool during night races, where there are not so many light sources. However, you almost never use these hints – maybe with the interface turned off and with a view from the cockpit, the effect is cooler, but under normal conditions, the same navigator’s remarks that sound every second soon begin to annoy.

You can’t get rid of the helicopter in rally mode, but you can turn off the navigator’s remarks

⇡#…with new toys

In the first DLC, the developers introduced an unusual progression system – you could only use the issued cars, and in order to open new ones, you had to move to other divisions. In Rally Adventure, this was abandoned – you can drive whatever you want, including cars unlocked in the main game. But it was not without new cars either – it is difficult to single out the best among ten fresh copies. There is a funny buggy Polaris RZR Pro XP, and the legendary Volkswagen Beetle Baja Bug of 1973, and the main “star” of the DLC is a fresh F-150 Lightning Platinum pickup.

These cars are unlocked by the reputation you earn with the three teams racing in the Sierra Nueva. Raptors are classic rally racers who prefer dirt tracks. “Super Predators” rally races on asphalt, and “Sand Reapers” drive only at night. With each level of reputation, one track opens and several bonus entertainments, depending on the team you are “pumping”. These attractions are familiar to fans of the original: “Danger” signs, breakable boards, speed sections and drift zones. Unfortunately, nothing new – they decided not to supplement the formula that has been tested for years.

One of the prizes for passing tests

To increase your reputation, it is not enough just to complete the races and win them – you also need to pass the tests. A lot of them are done automatically, like a few jumps during a race or earning stars in fast sections. But there are also “challenges” for which you specially go to the indicated places. For example, you are asked to drive from one point to another in three minutes, or to visit two locations with a “Danger” sign in the same three minutes. Among the awards are not only “numbers” and new cars, but also items of clothing for the driver. The prizes are not very necessary, but you still want to pass the tests – in addition, as in the usual Forza Horizon 5, it’s terribly pleasant to spend time.

This feature of Forza Horizon 5 has not disappeared in the second expansion – even just fooling around on the roads, ignoring races and other entertainment, is fun here. Take your favorite car, jump from trampolines, knock down trees and earn points to buy passive upgrades and lottery tickets – that in the original game, that you want to do this all the time here. Now it will be doubly exciting for fans of punk music – in addition, the Epitaph Records Radio radio station (familiar from Forza Horizon 3) has returned, where you can hear a dozen songs.

The new radio also has special songs that give more points for technique

***

Neither the first nor the second addition to Forza Horizon 5 became something out out of the ordinary. However, these DLCs cannot be called passable either. Both offered something that the original didn’t have and added tons of bonus entertainment to the game. In my opinion, Rally Adventure wins against the backdrop of Hot Wheels – and the location is more interesting to explore here, and the list of cars will appeal more to fans of “standard” cars, rather than toy ones. The novelty is unlikely to be included in the lists of the best DLC series, but the supplement does an excellent job of giving a reason to return to the “force” and have some fun in the new “sandbox”.

Advantages:

• an excellent map with compact biomes and beautiful scenery;
• each race can be played both in rally mode with no visible opponents, or under normal conditions;
• ten new cars that look more solid than in the last addition;
• simple, but fun challenges that you mostly pass for fun, not prizes.

Flaws:

• navigator’s hints in rally mode don’t help much and tire with monotony;
• the entertainment in the open world is exactly the same as in the main game.

Rating: 8,0/10

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