The Forza 2 Marketplace Demo is Coming!
And thanks to a full-page ad in a recent issue of Official Xbox Magazine, you already knew that. Although the real question keeping a lot of you up late nights is when when when, and in that respect, I regretfully do not know. We're currently cranking to finish both the final game and the demo (well, the two are somewhat related, no?) simultaneously, which means both versions are being tested and bug fixed with the same Turn 10 fervor. So the good news is that the demo is basically finished when the game is finished. Of course, this trial version will also need to be submitted for certification; but being a downloadable demo on Xbox Live Marketplace means there's no huge delay in waiting for the game to get pressed, packaged, and shipped onto shelves.
But equal amounts of you have also been asking for details on what exactly the demo will feature -- which car(s), which class(es), which track(s), multiplayer? To answer some of those questions, I will reveal to you what I can about the FM2 demo that you're all going to be downloading and playing until the game comes out. So here we go. The Forza 2 demo will indeed feature a handful of our favorite cars in the game, separated into three different classes (C, A and R2) to give you a taste of the automotive flavors across the spectrum of the roster. Although I'm not going to reveal the R2 cars right now (remember, we conclude our car list next week with the full list of our Race class cars), here are all the cars you can play around with in the other two classes:
1997 BMW Motorsport M3 E36
2006 Chevrolet Corvette Z06
2003 Dodge Viper SRT10
2003 Dodge SRT4
2004 Ferrari F430
2005 Ford Ford GT
2005 Ford Mustang GT
2002 Honda Integra Type-R
2005 Lamborghini Gallardo
2006 Lexus IS350
2004 Mazda RX-8 Mazdaspeed
2005 Mercedes SLR
2003 Nissan Fairlady Z
2007 Porsche 911 Turbo (997)
2005 Subaru Legacy B4 2.0 GT
2005 TVR Sagaris
These 16 cars A and C class cars will be completed by 8 more Race class beasts for a full list of 24 demo vehicles. Although you'll be able to cycle between the different manufacturer colors for these cars (obviously, not the R2 cars), we're holding back on all of the sweet customization stuff for the final game. Besides, there's no point in decking out your ride and then not being able to save the design or upgrades after you exit the demo. The races themselves will be exhibition style (i.e., against 7 other A.I. driven cars) on one of our new tracks. What about the other functions of the game?
Although there was discussion about including our innovative Xbox Live features in the demo, we wanted this playtest to focus on core gameplay elements -- like how it feels to drive our wide selection of cars at 60fps, the visuals on a new tracks, the damage, wheel-to-wheel racing, stuff like that. Most importantly, it gives you a very good idea about how the game feels -- something that will certainly be amplified by the demo's support of the 360 force feedback wheel. Again, the when question is still an unknown, but the good news is that it won't be much longer now!