Australia, May 4, 2007 - We had originally planned to do a Forza 2 head to head between the US and Australia today, but Hilary realised how poor it would look if an Australian thrashed him, and made up some excuse about having to see Spider-Man 3 instead. His time will come. In the meantime, we're going to focus our initial impressions on the three things that have really grabbed our attention in the day that we've had the game; the Graphics, Handling and Sound Effects.
我們今天將會按照原訂的計畫，辦一場美國跟澳大利亞的極限競速二競賽，但是Hilary 很明白如果澳大利亞的隊伍把他打的很慘的話，會有多難看，所以他就想了個藉口，如果輸的話就假裝今天是要去看蜘蛛人三的遊戲。很快的，輪到他該上場了。在比賽過程中，我們會將焦點放在三項重點上：畫面，操控性，以及音效。
Graphics
We've seen just as many screens and videos of the game in action as you guys, but they didn't prepare us for the way Forza 2 looks when hitting three hundred kilometres an hour through New York's Times Square. The most in-your-face, retina-stretching effect is the game's frame rate. Locked at a super smooth 60fps, it's made the IGN AU editors firm believers in the importance of 60 over 30. We'd always thought 30fps was fine… until we played Forza 2 and were kicked into the back of our chairs by its sensation of speed. Strangely enough, it's also less straining on the eyeballs.
There's been a trade-off to reach this smoother than thou framerate though - the environments in the game aren't quite as jaw dropping as we'd hoped. Functional is probably a better way to describe them. We've sampled about 8 tracks, and while some of them have a few pretty sections, we haven't seen anything that inspired us to whip out the virtual camera. It's not such a big deal though. Due to the intense handling and fast frame rate, we were usually so focused on the pavement that we didn't have time to take in the scenery.
Unlike the roadside, the inhabitants of the road are a sight to behold. We've spent far too much time pausing our replays to rotate the camera and peek up the skirts of these saucy, turbo-charged ladies. They're smooth in all the right places, with nary a polygonal seam or harsh angle to be seen. They're lit quite nicely too, with an HDR-like glow when in direct sunlight, but they seem a little dark in the shadows. And the reflections in the bodywork just pour over the car's metal curves. It's disturbingly sensual.
A big deal has been made about the game's damage modelling. Ramming into concrete barriers and other cars at high speed will result in cracked glass, scratched panels and even pieces detaching from the car. One thing that's missing is real car deformation, ala DiRT, where hitting a wall at 200km/h results in the car looking like a squashed aluminium can. Still, high speed impacts are suitably wince-inducing.
One very strange omission is a rear view mirror when in the car's bonnet mode. It's there when you switch to bumper mode, but if you want to see the cars behind you, you'll have to drive from invisible car mode. Hopefully it's just a preview quirk.
Overall, we're very happy with the way the game looks. The choice to implement a faster frame rate over courses filled with waterfalls and unicorns has worked to the advantage of what the game is all about - the sensation of speed while driving a car only Jay Kay could afford.
總之，我們對這款遊戲的畫面非常滿意。此款遊戲選擇了高畫面數是對的，這點讓此款遊戲非常成功。
Handling
We'll admit that we've only played this game with a control pad (we're saving the joys of using the wheel until our review). Even with this control method, the handling of the cars is where Forza 2 shows why it could be first to pass the chequered flag in the next-gen car race.
操控性
我們必須坦承，我們只有用搖桿玩此遊戲而已(我們將會在review的時候使用方向盤)。不過即使是手把，這也算是次世代賽車遊戲中，最好控制的了。
There's more technobabble associated with this game's physics engine than most rocket scientists are comfortable with. For instance, did you know that the physics engine runs separately to the graphics engine, at 360 frames per second? More time was spent working on the tire modelling than it takes to develop many budget games. We wouldn't be surprised to learn that the game forces your 360 to connect to a massive supercomputer in Dubai to calculate fuel usage. All of this has resulted in car handling that can only be described as… glorious. Dare we say perfect? Of course not, because then Forza 3 would have no room for improvement. But it's damn close.
We're big fans of the way the first Forza handled, and the sequel has raised the bar so far above the first game that it's quite scary. It's really quite hard to describe why - but when you play the game you'll notice it too.
It's got something to do with the fine balance necessary when pouring the gas on through a corner, feeling the tires starting to lose their bite on the bitumen. It's about realising that if you turn off stability control, the Porsche Boxster likes to flick its back end around like a dog on heat. It's feeling the subtle stickiness in the curves that your new racing slicks have given your overpowered VW Golf GTI.
We've done a little bit of hooning about race tracks in our time, pushing cars past the point where they go where we wanted them to, and the game's physics capture that almost-out-of-control feeling perfectly. And that's exactly where the best drivers reside, on the red line between a personal best lap time and a flaming wreck on the Bergwerk corner of Nurburgring.