Occasional Tales

The treasure hunt seems to have been rather contrary from what I’ve been hearing. I headed to the jumping-off point for Eventlab Island before going down to the beach and driving north to Playa Azul. At some random point, the task was done. For the weekly challenge we had to drive the BMW X5M. What did we have to race it in? A Street Scene race. Well done, PGG, another car that encourages impressionable young players to drive the wrong sort of vehicle in the wrong sort of event. Or does it? I suppose that since SUVs are mostly urban vehicles driven by gangsters, gangsters’ wives(/yummy mummies), gangsters’ molls, and gangsters’ henchmen (or for “gangsters” read “shifty builders” and “shady plumbers”; “people from Cheshire[/Alderley Edge/Chelsea]”), this is an ideal vehicle to drive in a Street Scene race. I managed to one-shot all the PR stunts in the Taycan CT. I half expected the danger sign to go wrong, but managed to land the car without it flipping or slamming into a tree. One-thi

The weekly posed no real problems. I managed to one-shot the PR stunts in the 2018 Ford Mustang GT. Northern Passage , which I’d been practising was a skin-of-the-teeth job. Didn’t we do Ring Road as the speed zone last week? Or very recently? I had one SWS that was one-third good and the rest were rubbish. The picture of the new Ford Focus got me a pair of boots. Mmmm, high fashion. I ended up in my Hummer EV for Horizon Tour. One 1st place and two 2nds. I managed a last minute 2nd place round Herencia from being able to take corners properly. Only one Eventlab this week, Hill Valley Run , which is why it seemed that it took no time to get through the Festival playlist. Good use of props on a course that I thought was a rally stage only for it to turn out to be a long, narrow circuit that resembled a rally stage. At least it wasn’t some piece of insane spaghetti. The rewards was another bloody 2010 VW Golf. I smashed the collectibles. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, I counted. 1, 2, 3, 4, the gam

Oh, and some collab with some shoe manufacturer. PGG gave it away in a video. I watched Ericship111’s video about the video (how meta-video can you get?) which hinted strongly at a hide-and-seek game mode, and then watched JakeXVX’s video last night after the full details were revealed. I guessed that the new game mode would be multiplayer of some sort. On paper, hide-and-seek is not a bad idea, but it’s not for me. If I avoid Playground Games events, I’m not going to be doing this. Dude, where’s my racing game? Like the Eliminator, I wonder whether this will become an event that appears on the Festival playlist once or twice a series (#ForcedEngagement). Like the Eliminator, I can see the OCD boys finding ways of exploiting this whether they’re the hunters or the hunted. I can also see the entire thing being massively frustrating if the hunted gets pinned and can’t use the ghosting power-up. As a keyboard player, I’d be all right as a hunter, but if the hunted is meant to blend in as

Treasure hunt. Has to be done in the Polestar. Trailblazer off the motorway. Job done. I used the weekly challenge in the 2010 Audi TT RS to do the Switchbacks PR stunt (terrible SWS). My first attempt to do the danger sign got ruined by a front flip. Terrible SWS. I one-shotted the speed trap and got another terrible SWS. Rivals. (1) Bola Ocho , Fiesta ST. Rain and understeer, the winning combination. (2) Gran Pantano . Toyota Camry. This thing will be better with upgrades. (3) El Pípila . The Durango. Overpowered, fast and wobbly. (4) Dunas Blancas . Lucid Air. What?! Again?! Overpowered, fat barge. I think I did take the car out for a spin the last time it was in the game, and even on gentle corners it wanted to go sideways. Eventlab (1). Yes, the tiles were actually working this week. Black Sands Truck Ranch . Terrible “track”. The first hairpin need a mid-corner checkpoint or something. Prop placement ahead of the final corner was terrible. The reward was another MB A45. Third? Pr

I happened to be on YouTube mere minutes after JakeXVX uploaded a video on the Series 37 reveal. I assume that Ford are on a marketing spree with the 2022 Ford Focus and the 2023 Ford Fiesta. I hope the Focus will be a good addition to the models that are already in the game. I’ve always felt that the with the Focus in the game, the Fiesta is a bit of an also-ran. (As an aside, I was racing in the Fiesta today; decent PWR in both A and B class, but not my first choice.) I must admit that apart from the name, the (2023) Toyota Camry doesn’t mean a lot to me. It might turn out to be a decent super saloon. As for the last of the new cars, the 2021 Dodge Durango, I can’t see how that fits in with the theme; or why we’d need a second Durango. Prediction: they’ll have the same perks, same stats, and same performance. The series rewards are fine, although the older BMW M2 is the better car, and I don’t think I’ve ever driven the Lucid Air. I can see no compelling reason to do so. I had hopes

Treasure hunt. Deberti Mustang + speed zone = job done. The wheel spin afterwards threw an International Scout at me, which was ironic because it’s also a reward for a seasonal for those players who are too indigent to buy it from the AH or the Autoshow. The weekly in the 190E posed no problems. I need to rebuild the car, though. Took a photo. Got some clothing. I’m surprised MS hasn’t forced PGG to market real-life Forza-branded clothing. “Milk the franchise, Luke.” I one-shotted all the PR stunts, but had practised them beforehand, finding that the International Scout needed an engine swap to be able to hit the targets. SWSs, one-third good, one-third excellent, one-third very excellent. My testing for Going International was a prize pain. The category for it was D500 cult classics. I started with the Fiat-Abarth Esseesse, which – if I remember rightly – had been a sound performer in a previous seasonal. No, underpowered. The Gremlin was a possibility (just) and the Datsun 510 (just

 I happened to remark to Fitztalbot (I was at the club) that there was no treasure hunt in FH5 this week. “None?!” he spluttered. “Disgraceful!” I know he enjoys the treasure hunt, but I can’t understand his enthusiasm for it. And so I started this week’s Festival playlist with the weekly challenge in the 2010 Nissan 370Z. I more than passed the drift target in two runs along one of the more benign drift zones. I resorted to another Street Scene event to deal with Rivals. I had 4½ hours to complete Cañón Run . Seriously, the worst time was 4½ hours, and it was flagged. Does the game not time players out? I one-shotted the speed trap for a two-thirds good SWS. The speed zone took a couple of goes and requires finesse in a car which it wasn’t possible to build properly. (I get a bit annoyed with stock+ cars for PR stunts and seasonals.) Rubbish SWS. The drift zone also took a couple of attempts. I almost got it the first time, knew the target was 75,000pts, thought I had it, and missed b