FH5, Series 33, Week 1

I thought I was going to have problems with the treasure hunt because I’ve probably done S1-class rivals in every road race on the main map and didn’t fancy trying to get the Lotus 2-Eleven to do the job until I realised that I’ve never done rivals in Street Scene. As practice for the seasonal, I did Ruta Norte in a clean time and got a decent reward. I also got a crap wheel spin as well.

I mustn’t have driven my McLaren P1 in ages because the tuning was decidedly antiquated, but I managed to get through all the tasks in this week’s weekly without any bother.

I also did the HA along with some other people who actually contributed to it.

Eventlab (1) was Italia 458 Race Track. Mostly decent track but completely flat. Not helped by the race being set at night, which meant that the tyre bundles tended to vanish into the gloom, making some of the corners tricky to negotiate. The SWS was rubbish.

Eventlab (2). Green River GP. I raced in the Porsche Carrera GT for this one. A decent circuit (well, apart from one or two overly tight corners), but the kerbs were a bit much and the boost pad was unnecessary and unexpected. Another Lotus 3-Eleven. My third? I keep finding three of this and four of that in my garage. I really need to do some spring cleaning.

Eventlab (3). Jungle Race Circuit. I used the Lotus Exige for this. Not a bad course following some familiar tracks. I got another Warthog.

Took a photo, got clothing. I need a bigger wardrobe; and a larger mirror to admire how gorgeous I look.

Did the Eliminator. My usual strategy worked. Yes, I have a strategy.

Whole bunch of rivals this week. The Lancer Evo TA was bloody brilliant round Los Jardines as was the Hyundai Elantra round Bola Ocho. The events in the Corvette C8.R and the M8 GTE were two other rivals events and not advertising for the Allstars Car Pack. Probably.

I used the BMW M3 GTR for the PR stunts and got some very good SWSs for once. One-shotted the speed trap and the Festival speed zone, but it took me a couple attempts to get Mountain Pass.

I surveyed my Super Hot Hatches, and chose the 2010 Megane RS for Burning Up. Good choice, solid wins, and no issues.

I went with the AMG GT3 for Live Long & Próspera, which is low S2 class. I struggled round Tierra Próspera itself. I loathe Llanuras because it’s likely to be a drivatar cheat zone. I won, but badly and stupidly. Copper Canyon was a lot better.

I one-shotted the HW PR stunt in the International Scout and got an utter rubbish SWS.

I stuck with the car for Pick Up the Pace. I think I must’ve done an engine swap on the Scout because it was making sports car noises. The races were mostly good with the Scout dominating the drivatars. The dark spot was Canyon Drop. The section that runs through the canyon itself is a major pain because the drivatars plough through the water as if it isn’t there. (Do their squitty little drivatar brains even register the presence of water?)

The RA PR stunt was the most enormous pain. I hate PR stunts where the requirement is, say, “A800 Alfa Romeo”. It should be that every A800 Alfa Romeo can hit the target, and I was getting more and more irritated until I decided that the answer had to be the worst handling car coupled with the most engine. The TZ2 has the lowest handling of the Alfa Romeos in the Autoshow. I then realised that you were supposed to do an engine swap. I also switched to AWD, but the handling was terrible even if the speed was more than enough. And what did I get? Another crappy SWS.

I went with the 33 Stradale for O Romeo, Romeo. Gods, we would have to do that dreadful canyon course and the reverse variant to win a horn.

And finally it was onto the Trial. I thought about the Mini, but although I like the car, it’s always been a bit of a disappointment in FH5 where in FH4 it was a brilliant little car. So I opted for the 1965 Mustang and risked keeping it RWD (mainly because it was already B700). I came 4th round the Horizon Festival Circuit to a, er, team loss. I’d been keeping an eye on the scores, and for the most part, we were ahead by a greater or lesser extent. I don’t know what happened behind me, but the scales tipped in the favour of the drivatars. However, a small milestone in that I hit level 500 in prestige 6 for which I was rewarded with the most insultingly pathetic wheel spin. Mulegé was almost a last-to-first race for me because I was second-to-last on the grid at the start of the race. Yes, 1st with good support from the rest of the team. I also came 1st round Bahía de Plano with solid support from the rest of my random team. Job done.

That, of course, unlocked the ugly and ridiculous Pro Stock Camaro (Stock Pro? Oh, I can’t bloody remember). I was expecting it to be an uncontrollable mess, but it was quite drivable so long as you didn’t want to turn a corner. Cockpit view is awful.

The 2016 Ford GT No. 66 GTLM has 9/9 for tuning (yes, this one even has tunable brakes) and all the same car masteries as the cars in the Allstars Pack. I tuned before trying it in Copper Canyon because the overall range of the gears was too short. I managed a 02:36.669 in the race, which makes the 2016 Ford GT the fastest of the new cars so far.

The Apex Allstars Car Pack has definitely had me wanting to go back to the game and drive them some more. I think AR12 Nick was onto something when he suggested in a recent video that there should be a separate GT3 class in the game. Certainly, it doesn’t make much sense when your race includes a Bugatti Divo or older track cars such as the Moslers or the Lamborghini Diablo GTR. I’d also like to see some actual GT4 cars in the game as well.

There are some dissenting voices, but if you want to drive your mum or dad’s anodyne car, it’s probably already in the game along with your nan’s and your granddad’s old bangers, and those tinny rust-buckets that your aunts and uncles drove. The sort of thing that Jeremy Clarkson thinks is still cool. FH5 is a game that’s centred on racing cars, and thus finally, we have a series dedicated to cars that actually belong to this genre.