Forza Horizon 5 tips | Forza Horizon 5 best cars | Forza Horizon 5 car list | Forza Horizon 5 Barn Finds | Forza Horizon 5 Drift Zones | Forza Horizon 5 Car Mastery | Forza Horizon 5 solar panels 

Forza Horizon 5 New Year Accolades

You can now find three special Accolades in Forza Horizon 5 themed around the Lunar New Year under the ‘Evolving World’ Accolades category. Each Accolade that you complete awards varying amounts of Accolade points and sometimes exclusive awards that we’ve listed below. You’ll notice that these Accolades are also grouped with some Christmas-themed ones, although these can’t be completed any more as Series 2 has expired – although it’s likely that they’ll be available around the Holidays later this year. Any that mention ‘the New Year’ can only be completed in Series 3, which ends on February 3, 2022.

Happy New Year! Accolade

Rewards: 50 Accolade points

For this easy Series 3 Accolade, you need to drive into Guanajuato during the Happy New Year series to find some nice, red Chinese lanterns. That’s it. You’ll find lots of these lanterns hanging around the central areas of Guanajuato, particularly near the cathedral.

Another One Lights the Dust Smash Lanterns Accolade

Rewards: 50 Accolade points, Camo Utility Epic Trousers

For the “Another Lights the Dust!” Holiday Accolade, you must destroy 25 Lanterns while driving the 2014 Toyota AT38 or the 2016 Toyota AT37. You can get the AT37 in Autumn and the AT38 in Winter during Series 3 only. Both cars are the 45-point rewards for their respective seasons, however, which means they’re not particularly easy to get and you’ll have to complete a lot of seasonal challenges to get the necessary points.

Series 3 Collector Accolade

Rewards: 1,000 Accolade points

To complete this New Year Accolade, you need to own all the exclusive reward cars from the seasons and challenges of Series 3. All the cars in this series are unlocked by earning enough points in each season or the entire series, so you’ll need to play a lot of the Forza Horizon 5 seasonal activities to unlock them all. If you miss any, you’ll have to buy one through the Auction House from a fellow player. Here are the cars you need to own and how to get them:

• 2016 Zenvo TS1 – Series 3 reward for earning 120 points
• 2015 Jaguar XKR-S – Spring reward for earning 25 points
• 1971 Ford Mustang Mach 1 – Series 3 reward for earning 120 points
• 1989 Lotus Carlton – Spring reward for earning 45 points
• 2016 Toyota Land Cruiser Arctic Trucks AT37 – Autumn reward for earning 45 points
• 2014 Toyota Hilux Arctic Trucks AT38 – Winter reward for earning 45 points
• 2003 Toyota Celica SS-I – Summer reward for earning 45 points
• 2013 D8 Donkervoort GTO – Autumn reward for earning 25 points

The post How to complete all Forza Horizon 5 New Year Accolades appeared first on Game News.

Forza Horizon 5 tips | Forza Horizon 5 car list | Forza Horizon 5 Barn Finds | Forza Horizon 5 Drift Zones | Forza Horizon 5 Car Mastery

Where to find Forza Horizon 5 solar panels

There is a solar panel facility which can be found just south of the main highway that runs almost the length of the map. The solar panels are southeast of the main Horizon Festival Site and northeast of the town of Mulege. They are visible on the map as a little cluster of light dots arranged in a rectangle.

How to complete the Forza Horizon 5 Lights Out Series 3 Summer Seasonal Challenge

You might be on the lookout for solar panels if you need to complete a challenge or the Total Eclipse Accolade. To complete the new Lights Out challenge, which is found under the Summer tab of Series 3 within the Festival Playlist menu, you need to drive to the solar panel facility and just drive into 25 solar panels. While this challenge is easy, it’s only around until January 13 when the season changes to Autumn.

We recommend choosing a large, off-road car that will allow you to build up decent speed on the dirt track so that you can plough through the solar panels. Something like the Ford Bronco or Warthog – which we reckon is one of the Forza Horizon 5 best cars, especially for free roam activities. There are so many solar panels in this area that you’ll get this challenge done in no time. It’s a good idea to drive in a straight line through as many panels as you can and then turn around for another strafing run through more panels.

If you still need to do the Total Eclipse Accolade, you should head to the same place. For the Accolade, you need to destroy 100 solar panels while driving the 1995 Mitsubishi Eclipse GSX although. Like the Lights Out challenge there is no time limit, so you can destroy the required solar panels whenever. You can find this Accolade under the ‘Discovery’ tab within the ‘Discovery & Collections’ page of Accolades.

The post Where to find Forza Horizon 5 solar panels and smash them appeared first on Game News.

Hallowe’en is a special time of year. So special, in fact, that we couldn’t let our celebratory Halloweek go by without making a very special effort to do a very special thing indeed. To that end, we’ve resurrected the ghost of H.P. Lovecraft, master of fevered horror and creator of Cthulhu, to write a few game reviews for us. It wasn’t easy. We had to enlist the eldritch help of Aleister Crowley to even get the ritual started–fortunately he haunts the right-hand toilet cubicle on the first floor–and he’s a notoriously cranky old bastard.

But succeed we did. So here’s old Howard Phillips, to take over the article and furnish you with his finest, most considered responses to this year’s biggest games. See you at the end. If you’re still alive, and sane, and not the prostrate thrall of an elder god… Good luck on all that.

Super Smash Bros.

Every bone of my wretched skeleton froze to fragile ice, liable to shatter with the steadily creeping weight of the endless moment. I stared into his eyes, seeing not life, nor light, nor comprehension. Only madness. And worse, it was not the disarrayed, fragmented, scattershot madness of the fractured-but-harmless lunatic, but one focused and aware, if it were aware of anything at all, of rapturous delight in its own insanity.

He looked back in silent, intent vigil. At me, through me, within or without me, I could not fathom which, and nor did I wish to try, for to follow his gaze back along the deep, fissured path to its source would surely have seen me lost forever. Perhaps it was days. Perhaps only a handful of eternally contorting seconds. But when my lucidity returned, to snatch at my hand and turn me shrieking away, I could not help but feel that our exchange was not yet over, nor would it ever truly be so. His empty glare lingers over my shoulder to this day.

Score: Despair / 5

WWE 2K15

The sights that I witnessed surely cannot have been real, but rather the twisted dream of an insane god. One by one, two by two, three by three the brawny beasts left the portal, emerging from the stygian blackness beyond to lurch, pound and creep toward the chamber. Upon that profane altar they assembled, these unholy constructs, these perverse amalgamations of man, rock and beast. Over and over again they threw themselves against each other, breaking and crashing their gnarled forms into the most terrible, impossible shapes.

Oh, the depraved lies that my deceitful eyes wrought during that unhallowed spectacle! Please, in the name of all that is reasonable, they must have been lies! For the creatures appeared, for the longest time, to stretch and contort their bodies into the most sacrilegious configurations, creating such heaving knots of ligament and flesh that the very stinking air around them must have defied and defiled all hope of logic, science or intellect. And worse! So much worst an abomination! Upon finally falling, rendered and broken, these hulking molestations of the rational inflicted further contempt upon my sanity, reviving, reforming and recommencing their assault as if nary the slightest of affronts had ever been committed.

Score: Devastation / 5

Tomodachi Life

There is a man in the room above mine own. I cannot see his face. In my dreams, he comes to me and tells me that he is unhappy, and that he requires seven things. Seven things, are what he requires. A simple fountain pen, a handful of purple bread, the shoulder of a cloven beast, the sap from a tree, a red cloak, and the soul of a banshee. Only then will he show me his face.

I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I cannot see his face. I see his face. Darkness.

Score: Decay / 5

Forza Horizon 2

The world of my senses dissolved into a garish blur. Illuminated only by the weighty mystery of the waning gibbous moon, my uncontrolled acceleration from the civilised plane was an irresistible trajectory into the void. Far from the lights, far from the path, further and further into the murk I went, my journey into blackness punctuated by intermittent flashes of blinding light upon unrecognisable scenery, bursts of sickening colour shaking incoherently at my core.

Above me, the pale, shadow-draped satellite watched in silence. If the gloom from which it half-protruded held any answers, then those answers were not forthcoming. Only the cold, faceless glare of that cryptic moon, half-shrouded in the same darkness to which I was committed. And on, on I plunged! Further, faster into the unformed night! The ground beneath me–if it were still the ground at all–rattled and contorted with a searing rage. Explosions and unseen shatterings shook the very air around me, as unseen objects tore past my face. And everywhere, in the periphery, I knew they lurked. Out in the night, watching for me and waiting for me. The pig people (opens in new tab). Always watching, and always waiting.

Score: Devilry / 5

FIFA 15

The drone of a thousand thousand human voices is echoing around my ears, threatening to lull me into a sleep that I fear I may never awake from. I desperately glance into the virtual eyes of a man known only as ‘Messi’, who answers my stare with a hollow gaze of his own that–such is its artifice–sends a dread chill through the core of my very being. I am helpless now. As a shrill whistle punctuates the infinity of our exchange, I realise that this game–this spectacle of fools–is already over.

The men are moving now. They chase a round object that objectively matters nothing to their existence, yet they pursue it as if a very legion of slave masters compelled them. They matter not. The object becomes entangled in a white web, which wraps around it like a cloak, presumably choking the life from its spherical victim. The men cheer, but I know that they are already dead. They always were.

Score: Dread / 5

Mario Kart 8

Around I went again. Around and around and around, never to slow, never to rest, never to look back at the blissful innocence left behind. How many times now had this dread circumvolution claimed another haunted hour of my experience with its obstreperous drone? How long had this sleepless sun driven my fevered senses from rest? How many hours, months, or years had it scorched my skin and flooded my senses with the foul stench of flame, of oil, of burning steel?

The dread beast was upon me now. I had, in my nave inattentiveness, been unaware of its presence at first, its ponderous, sluggish lurching registering barely a shadow upon my perception. But now it was here, a thundering blight of teeth, scales and talons. Beyond that, I will not describe it. Beyond that, I cannot describe it. Even if my mind were able to fully comprehend is fearful countenance without breaking entirely, I fear that the bumbling foibles of human language would be as naught in the face of its horror. But it matters not. Soon it would strike. Soon, and so close, so painfully close to sanctuary, that deathly azure inevitability would drag me down once more. My only solace would be a swift descent into oblivions sweet respite. Until the next time. And the next. And the next

Score: Desperation / 5

Watch Dogs

What is this place? This prison? And who am I? I stare longingly into the Pandora’s Box nestled in the palm of my hand, hoping it will somehow allow me regain my humanity, and escape this dreadful virtual zoo. As I run my rough hand over its smooth surface, I feel the world shifting around me. What devilry is this? I shall surely die here.

A fellow entity suddenly draws beside me in his motorised carriage. Wordlessly I slide into the seat beside him, and he duly mirrors my movement. I am now alone. I spur on my magical vessel and drive forever, spurning the temptations of some foul demi-god, who urges me towards a constant stream of empty activities. In his language, the beast calls them ‘Fixer missions’, but I know them to be evil traps that will forever enslave my consciousness. I must be wary.

Score: Darkness / 5

Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn

Sorry, got caught up in the moment there. Ahem. Where were we? Oh yes, that bit at the end of the article where we ramble on a bit in a desperate attempt to fill a final paragraph, before passing you on to some links to other stuff. H.P. would be brilliant at this. He’s great at rambling on a bit. But alas, we have already laid him back to rest, with the promise not to bother him again until at least this time next year. All part of the deal to get him to write this for us, I’m afraid. He’s a bit antisocial like that. But anyway, links!

How does an editorial on Why most scary games fail as real horror, and why they always have (opens in new tab) sound? And then maybe a Photoshop gallery of your favourite video game characters zombified (opens in new tab)? Yeah? Awesome. Enjoy.

The post The biggest games of 2014, reviewed by H.P. Lovecraft appeared first on Game News.

The Horizon Festival is a massive, summer-long music and automobile festival, and it’s back again–this time it’s hitting the French and Italian coasts before spilling into the sun-baked countryside. Thousands of hipsters with fancy cars and far too much disposable income have gathered here for a summer of concerts and racing competition; think Coachella meets Le Mans, and you’re halfway there. It’s a completely ludicrous set up that makes no sense under any form of scrutiny. Seriously, who would give these people free reign to terrorize not one, but two European countries with high-powered sports cars? I can’t tell you how many private vineyards I must have demolished on my race to be Horizon champion, and it kills me a little inside every single time. Still, it at least gives you some context as to why you’re driving around the Mediterranean coast like a bat out of hell.

As contrived as the whole premise is, Forza Horizon 2’s, well, horizons are gorgeous. Whether you’re racing down the winding streets of Nice or zipping through the bounding hills of Montellino, each location in Forza Horizon is both distinct and breathtaking. While there aren’t as many cars here as there are in a typical Forza game, each one is painstakingly detailed, right down to the individual gauges and windshield wipers. The dynamic weather system ensures those wipers get fair use, too. One minute it’s nice and sunny; the next, it’s raining like the end of days, and how you tackle each course changes dramatically. It also looks fantastic, too, as rain bubbles and pools on the surfaces of roads and cars. Other than a few frame hiccups and some minor bouts of shadow pop-in, Forza Horizon 2’s vistas are a joy to drive through, whether you’re doing it in a classic Ferrari GTO or a not-so-classic 1981 Volkswagen Scirocco.

You won’t need to know a lot about about cars (other than that they look cool and go fast) to enjoy Forza Horizon 2, as it trades realism for pure, high-speed thrills. Cars may dent and windshields may shatter, but they ride just as well as if they were just driven off the lot, and each one is miraculously restored after each race. Driving on dirt or grassy fields will cause your vehicle to slide around more than it would on the road, but honestly, that just makes things even more fun, as you drift wide through someone’s delicately pruned shrubberies. Heck, when the festival gives you your first ride, it doesn’t show you each car’s individual stats–rather, it’s as if the game simply asks: “Which one looks the most badass to you?” Even the series’ signature Rewind feature feels more at home here than it ever did in Motorsport, as it keeps you from having to repeat races due to a single botched turn. Forza Horizon 2 wants you in a car and doing awesome stuff as quickly and as often as possible, without having to worry about differentials and gear ratios.

That is, unless you want to worry about that stuff, in which case Forza Horizon 2 has you covered there as well. You can poke around under the hood and change pretty much anything, from tuning different parts of your car to changing individual difficulty settings. That has long been a hallmark of the Motorsport games, but it’s new here in the more arcadey Horizon series. The cosmetic damage I mentioned earlier? You can switch over to realistic damage, meaning your car will stop dead in its tracks if it gets banged up too much–completely changing how you approach driving in the game. By taking advantage of these options, you can transform Horizon 2 from a simple arcade racer to a much more in depth simulation. It never feels truly necessary, though, and a vast majority of my time was spent without even touching any of these settings. Still, it’s there if you want it, and it disappears almost completely if you don’t care about anything other than going fast.

Race against the world

In addition to the massive solo mode, Forza Horizon 2 includes an impressive online component. Compete in Road Trips or free roam across the entire map with several friends, picking and choosing races as you go. In addition to the typical races, you can also compete in Playground events, like Infected (ram into other cars as fast as you can to “infect” and turn them to your other side). While I wish the lines between online and off were a bit more blurred than they are here, if you’re looking to test your driving mettle against the world’s best racers, you won’t be disappointed.

Actually racing on each of Forza Horizon 2’s many courses is a varied and exciting experience. Drivatars–the AI system introduced in Motorsport 5 that takes other players’ racing data and puts it in your game–are back, and they seem to fit even better here than they did in the game that created them. Drivatars in Motorsport 5 are overly aggressive, to the point of constantly trying to ram into you, and it feels out of place in that game’s overly sterile environment. Not so here, as races in Horizon 2 are far more cutthroat and unpredictable, going from pavement, to off-road, and back again, with racers often leaving behind a wake of wooden fences and traffic cones. Earning skill points takes the insanity to a whole new level, as you’re rewarded based on how well you drift around corners or how close you get to other drivers without crashing. Racing in Horizon 2 is a contact sport, and it’s the most thrilling it’s ever been in the series.

In between championships, you can explore the massive open world of Southern Europe and take on a plethora of additional side content. It’s makes for nice diversions, but much of it feels like just that–a diversion. Sure, you can seek out and destroy all 150 XP boards on the map, but there’s really no incentive to do so, other than to say you did. Still, having this huge map to explore lets you be as focused or as distracted as you want to be, while always keeping you engaged in the act of driving.

Image 1 of 7

(opens in new tab)Image 1 of 7

Things to do when you’re not racing

Southern Europe is a big place to roam, filled with massive straightaways, tight switchbacks, and countless nooks and crannies. And while the main attraction of Forza Horizon 2 is the championship itself, there are tons of things to see and do if you’re looking for a break from the competition. Stuff like…

(opens in new tab)Image 1 of 7

XP and Fast Travel Boards

These delicate hunks of painted plywood are waiting to be run over with reckless abandon. Some feature the face of Horizon’s smarmy host and an experience point award, while others will give you a small discount on fast travel costs. There are 150 of them, and many of them are well hidden–best get searchin’.

(opens in new tab)Image 1 of 7

Speed Traps

There are speed cameras located all over France and Italy, and when you see one, you’ll want to make your car go as fast as it possibly can–you know, the exact <em>opposite</em> of what you’d normally do&hellip; Right?

(opens in new tab)Image 1 of 7

Bucket List

Want to drive across France as fast as possible in a McLaren P1? Check out the Bucket List–a list of challenges that give you a specific car, a specific goal, and certain amount of time in which to complete it.

(opens in new tab)Image 1 of 7

Barn Finds

Several abandoned barns are hidden across the French and Italian countryside, and inside each one is a rare, antique car. Sure, the cars are a bit beat up, but after a little TLC they’ll be up and running in no time. And it’s not stealing if their previous owners haven’t touched them in decades, right?

(opens in new tab)Image 1 of 7

Challenge a Drivatar to a one-on-one race for cash

Every single racer with a name over it can be challenged to a one-on-one race at any time in between events. Each one varies in difficulty, with the most notorious racers paying out the most money for a win.

(opens in new tab)Image 1 of 7

Car Meets

Entering one of these locations will group you up with other online racers, let you look at their cars, challenge them to a race, or merely hang out for a chit chat. It’s a great way to get to know the people you’re going to destroy on the asphalt.

After a while, though, Forza Horizon 2 starts running out of new tricks. Each championship in the game works like this: First, you go on a Road Trip to your destination–a timed jaunt that’s less about racing and more about learning the lay of the land. Once there, you partake in four different races tied to your chosen championship. Once you finish those, you go on another road trip and do it all over again. For a while, you’re constantly unlocking new features in between races, but once you start focusing in on knocking off wins to make it to the Horizon Finale, it starts to feel a bit repetitive. Still, it takes around 10 hours to get to a point where you’re even starting to repeat races, and with 180 different championships, there’s a ton to do. And when the core racing is this good, you won’t mind a little repetition.

Despite minor faults, it’s easy to love Forza Horizon 2. With many of the optional features the more serious Motorsport games are known for, along with Horizon’s high-octane thrills and massive open landscapes to explore, Forza Horizon 2 is a culmination of the best parts of both games, all in one package.

This game was reviewed on Xbox One.

The post Forza Horizon 2 review appeared first on Game News.