Turn 10 Studios the nostalgia bomb with a lot of force on the Forza Motorsport community, and the players could not help but show their feelings. The game’s official Twitter account posted about the Sunset Peninsula Raceway and described it as “a piece of racing history” and accompanied it with a call for the players to share their fastest laps, wildest moments, and favorite cars for this Florida track that is a classic. The response was, to put it lightly, a chaotic mix of love, memories, and a bet on the future of the game to be bright.
But what makes this track such a deal? For the game developers, Sunset Peninsula Raceway does not exist as a real location, but for the players who have been loyal to Forza Motorsport since day one, it might just be a real one. The circuit is said to be a classic and a very popular one in the game series. This is a fictional circuit in Florida, where mainly digital rubber is laid compared to a few of the real-world tracks. Although the original post was meant to engage the community, the responses soon turned to something completely different—a very heated, occasionally sulky, and very passionate debate regarding the condition of Forza Motorsport.
From the start, players began to show their emotional connections to the track. One user Ryan Dj Rs1n Wason said, “I have seen this track in real life. 👍” which contradicts since it is a fictional track; however, maybe it just seems that realistic. ColbySteffens, aka ‘The Real Optimus Prime,’ simply stated, “One of my favorite tracks!” A statement, for sure, that shares a common feeling. David Gaming even uploaded a winning clip of a NASCAR race on this track proving the versatility of the circuit.
On the other hand, are the stories that getting crazier and crazier. KatashiKujikawa went through the gaming history and posted a very funny gaming moment: “One time I flipped the car after I won.” A moment that we have all probably experienced at least once—the one where the post-victory celebration goes terribly, gloriously wrong. Then Johngofett 1-1 told about how he was drifting with an RX-7 on the street layout which was quite a sublime experience.
Nostalgia was in the air everywhere. Haydan James was like, “Forza… 1, maybe? Driving a Bentley road car around there and my tyres were dying. How I learnt that Bentley road cars are 2.5 tonnes. 👀” Well, good for you, as this is a hardcore memory-learning vehicle physics-the-hard-way. Darth Mario pointed out that back in FM4 the community had used it as a pseudo-Daytona for the old TORA NASCAR series, thus showing how inventive players can be with fictional tracks.
Nevertheless, the comments section did turn out that way, and quite fast too, into a suggestion box—or perhaps a complaint department. A huge number of the reactions were not about Sunset Peninsula but were direct requests to the developers. DimaGaydar was the most active and proposing user and responded several times with different formulations of “Bring back the true Forza Motorsport 1 2 3 and 4” and even constructing what seems like an open letter: “Dear Forza developers, please bring back to Forza Motorsport 9 everything that was exactly like in parts1,2,3, and 4 of Motorsport, those first parts, bring back the amazing career modes like in parts 2, 3, 4, and 1, and the damage and tuning system. Bring back the true motorsport.”
The sentiment was basically the same among all the players. User Soft_Forza was imploring, “Guys, don’t let the Forza motorsport die! Please 🙏🏻 I really love this franchise. 💔” And MrShumacher was articulating very deep frustration: “im starting to loose faith and hope😔. At first, I thought everyone was prematurely, foolish for believing rumors. I called everyone a clown for believing rumors. maybe I’m the foolish clown. Not communicating with fans at all is disheartening.”
Poor communication with the community is apparently one of the major problems. Tevinandheaven was very direct with his response: “Drop some content at least an update.” On the other hand, Dack asked about the return of other real-life tracks: “Is there a chance for us getting back Long Beach and COTA?” and gblandro was yelling “WHERE’S INTERLAGOS? it won your forum survey,” while another user, Haydan James, was pondering whether there was an “Issue with licensing? PMR were/ are calling it ‘Sao Paulo’.”
There were negative comments too that came through the gamers’ feedback. The user 5ithGen just stated his opinion saying, “It’s fake and awful,” which is, to say the least, a sentiment shared by some PlayStation and Xbox players as well.
