Playground Games details the next-gen tech behind Forza Horizon 5

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Forza Horizon 5 took the racing world by storm when it hit the market back in late 2021. From then until now, it has become the fastest-selling entry in the Forza franchise, along with becoming one of the biggest launches ever for an Xbox first-party title. The icing on this success cake is none other than the immense amount of praise the game received from critics and fans alike, leading to several high review scores and awards.

It’s easy to see why Forza Horizon 5 gets all the fanfare. Due to an abnormal three-year development cycle, the longest in the Forza Horizon series, the team over at Playground Games was able to use the extra time to produce a more refined, expansive, and technically impressive experience. The result is Playground’s largest title to date, and one of the most comprehensive racing games ever.

The tech gurus over at Digital Foundry sat down with members from Playground to go in-depth into all of the tech that powers Forza Horizon 5, showing us what’s really under its proverbial hood.

“Forza” is actually Italian for “power.” It’s quite fitting that Playground tapped into newfound elements of power thanks to the arrival of the Xbox Series family of systems. The next-gen consoles allowed the team to properly optimize Forza Horizon 5 to take advantage of new graphical processing techniques.

The Forza Horizon series has always been a technical showcase just like its track-based sibling, Forza Motorsport. After all, many of the high-fidelity car models are shared between games. However, due to Forza Horizon’s open-world design, Playground also seeks to capture the essence of the landscape in addition to the vehicles.

In Digital Foundry’s deep-dive, the developers explain how, just as with past Forza