Forza Horizon 6 hands-on: your new favourite racing game is almost here

Yes, we've played it and we can exclusively report that it feels like... well, it feels like a Forza Horizon game. Playground Games has taken the phrase 'if it ain't broke, don't start hitting it with a hammer' to heart and applied its enormously successful core Horizon formula to Japan. Yes, there are tweaks to the gameplay here and there, but they are icing on an already delicious cake. A cake that tastes of petrol and scorched rubber. The metaphor falls over a bit at this point.

Like all recent Horizon games, Horizon 6's story kicks off with a veritable TikTok feed of bitesized experiences, whether that's burying the throttle into the footwell in the new Toyota GR GT, blowing through cherry blossoms in a wide-body 911 GT or careening down a ski slope in a trophy truck. The alleged difference this time is that once you've finished this highlight reel, you start not as part of the festival crowd but just as an enthusiast following the travelling circus, in a more modest ride than you had access to at the start of Horizon 5. Materially, it doesn't seem to make a lot of difference to what you're actually doing, though; you're still participating in races and time attacks rather than, say, spending hours cleaning a fast food restaurant bathroom to earn enough for a wristband.

What does make a difference is the map itself and, in particular, Tokyo. Japan's capital is a literal game changer, in that it's the biggest urban area in a Horizon game to date. The series has primarily been about gobbling up miles on the open road with occasional detours into a highly compressed version of a local city; now one of the most densely-packed metropolises on the planet is given the space it justly deserves, and the change is profound.

That's not to say you'll spend all your time dodging commuter traffic on the elevated expressways and haring around 90-degree corners, the more rural areas of Japan are well represented too, right the way up to the snowy alps in the north. The Touge routes up and down the legendary Mount Haruna have long been a dream for Horizon players and they are a predictably perfect fit for a game that has prioritised driving sideways since the very beginning. Add in dense forests, idyllic beaches and traditional rice fields, all of which will benefit from Japan's very distinct seasons, and you have a map that, from our time spent with it, feels significantly more varied than Horizon 5's Mexico.

Exploring the world is going to bring additional rewards this time around too. The series' traditional barn finds are joined by 'aftermarket cars', which you'll discover parked up out in the world. If you've got enough credits jingling in your pocket to meet a generously discounted price, you can buy them there and then. The objective is apparently to tempt you away from your favourite brands and models and get you behind the wheel of something a little different.

This demo version only featured the tantalising first hour or so of structured content in the game, but we've enjoyed unfettered access to the entirety of the open-world map, which by our estimation is the real star of Forza Horizon 6 anyway. We know the release is only a few short weeks away, but guaranteed it's going to drag like a childhood December…