Forza Motorsport Gains Next Level Physics With Game-Changing AI

After a long period of short teases and some quick glimpses at gameplay, Turn 10 Studios invited us to watch a private demo of the new Forza Motorsport during the Xbox Showcase event in Los Angeles. Unfortunately, the Chevrolet Corvette E-Ray that graces the cover of the game didn’t make an appearance at the the event. It’s co-cover car the Cadillac V-Series.R racecar was busy in Le Mans that weekend so it couldn’t make it either. During the demo we learned more about what Forza Motorsport will bring to the table from Creative Director Chris Esaki and Forza General Director, Dan Greenawalt. This is everything we learned.

One of the most important aspects of any good racing sim is its physics model. It’s the result of complicated math programmed by incredibly smart people to make sure that the simulated vehicles in the game feel and react as close to the real thing as possible. There are various ways to approach this and depending on the developer in question, they may have a completely different method than the others. Turn 10 Studios focused on the tires. With all the elements that determine the way a car handles it may seem weird to focus on the tires but it actually makes a lot of sense.

The tires are the only point of contact a vehicle makes with the road surface. Everything a car is and everything a driver does is ultimately translated through the tires. The previous Forza tire model used a single point of contact per tire to calculate its physics response. Esaki said that model is completely rebuilt for Forza Motorsport and now samples from eight points of contact per tire which adds up to a 48x increase in fidelity. They’re also pulling the data six times faster per tire. Esaki also said that the suspension, aerodynamics, and weight models have all also been completely rebuilt but did not specify the increase in performance over previous Forza games. However, he is confident in its capabilities. “I would put this [Forza’s] simulation up against the hardest core sims that are out there,” said Esaki.

It can be argued AI driver capability is the next most important feature of a serious racing game next to its physics model. Esaki explained Forza Motorsport’s AI model has been “completely rewritten,” and is machine-learning based. He stressed that the new AI drivers are “as fast as our fastest real world drivers,” without the need for cheats, hacks, or “rubberbanding.” If you’re unfamiliar, rubberbanding is a developer trick in which a racing game’s code would give AI drivers or human players an artificial boost of speed to keep the racing close depending on difficulty. Many seasoned players find this practice annoying because they find themselves in situations where they should be pulling away from slower cars but can never build enough of a gap no matter how good they are.

So, how does the AI in the new Forza Motorsport achieve expert-level driving without having to resort to such tactics? According to Greenawalt it’s about changing what the AI is learning from. In previous Forza games the AI was learning from the optimal driving lines for each track and that learning was cloud-based. In this new game, the machine learning is targeted at the “controller” for the AI driver. So instead of just the driving lines, the game is also pulling data from the car, and track configuration to train the controller.

In other words, instead of the AI learning the track, its learning the car. Which means it learns how to drive at the limit using the same physics that human players deal with within the parameters of the car’s attributes, upgrades, etc. Esaki explained that because of the AI’s more authentic driving nature, if you find yourself being beaten into or out of a corner its because you’re being genuinely out-driven and not because the difficulty curve is giving the AI drivers a fake performance boost. If the Turn 10 developers pulled this off as well as say they have, this could make for some incredible driving scenarios.

Traditionally in Forza games, it was all about going from one race to the next. The new Forza Motorsport is going to change that up in career mode with a three stage race weekend structure. Things will start with open practice which allows the player to get use to their car and the particular track they’re running. This is also an opportunity for players to “level up” their cars in the style of a “RPG” game like Final Fantasy. During practice players will be given required and optional objectives. For example one required objective might be to complete a certain number of laps during open practice, while an optional objective would be to hit a lap time under a designated target. These objectives, combined with how well corners are tackled, and pulling off faster sector times will earn car experience points—or “CXP.” All of those elements make up Forza‘s new “car mastery system.” Esaki quipped that this element makes Forza Motorsport a “CarPG,” which is also one of the greatest dad jokes we’ve ever heard.

Each time a player gets to a corner or enters a track sector the car mastery system will judge them against their previous performance in that sector and corner. It will also measure them against the fastest theoretical way to go through those corners and sectors based on how the player’s car is built. This function almost “coaches” the player in that they can see how close to the limit they are based on the AI’s estimations so they know how much room they have to improve.

The next stage of a race is called “Challenge the grid.” This is where the players can set the parameters of a race before it starts to tailor their experience. Forza players will finally be able to choose what position they start on the grid. Additionally players can fine tune the difficulty by adjusting AI driver skill are and by choosing different racing rule sets along with race parameters. For example the “Club” difficulty will limit damage to cosmetic only, keep the ability to “rewind” on, and race penalties will be “lenient.” If players move up to the higher “Sport” difficulty, they’ll have to worry about fuel and tire management, and harsher penalty enforcement.

As with previous games all of these adjustable parameters will have an impact at the overall race payout. In a nutshell, higher difficulties equal higher payout bonuses.

A staple of big racing sims like Forza and Gran Turismo have been modifying and building cars. Games provide the ultimate opportunity to create that dream build you’ve had in your head without actually spending your real life money. Generally speaking this means earning in-game credits and using those credits to buy parts. Some games let you sell those parts back but you typically get less than what you paid.

This new Forza Motorsport game is turning that all on its head. “Cars in the new Forza are built and not bought,” said Eskai. Rather than buying parts with earned in-game credits. Upgrades are unlocked as your car levels up and you spend “car points” on parts rather than credits. However there is no diminishing value with car points. For example, if a larger turbocharger costs 100 car points and you later decide you want to go back to a naturally aspirated set up, you can uninstall the turbo and get all 100 car points back to use on other upgrades. Nothing is lost.

We’ve been waiting quite a while for this new Forza Motorsport and to learn more about it. With Turn 10 taking a completely different approach to development we’re not really sure what to expect. This demo showed us some promising things to look forward to but it’s all about the execution. So we’re not against saying we are very impressed with what we saw, but we have to temper expectations and see what the final product will actually deliver. Hopefully we’ll get a chance to go hands-on with new Forza Motorsport and come back to you with our experiences before it drops on October 10th, 2023. Stay tuned!