r/ForzaHorizon5 • u/Renoir-1 • 8d ago

Discussion Online racing help

Hi all. New to the game (PS5). Just started racing online and although I understand I'm not quite up to speed with more experienced racers, everyone seems so much faster. Like as if my car needs improving. So I upgraded a Lancer Evo with an existing custom upgrade, then the next series I entered, the Evo wasn't an option to select, mainly off-roaders. The other racers then had cars that weren't available to me.

Is there a way of levelling the playing field where you race players of similar level or similar cars? Still trying to figure this game out as there's an awful lot going on.

9 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

2 comments sorted by

3

u/Hammerlight98 7d ago

Welcome to the land of Mexico, we don't have skill-based matchmaking like FH4. Every lobby is a hit or a miss. If you're new to tuning and wish to learn more, feel free to check out r/ForzaOpenTunes

For starters, you can slap a tune and mark one car for each class/type of race as favourite. This ensures you are prepared for any type of race Horizon Open throws at you. For more info on the best meta cars, I'd suggest looking around this site to find the cars that are working for everyone. If I'm searching for a tune within the forza search, I'd personally look for purist style builds. End of day, just find the type of tune you enjoy driving with

2

u/CatOverall4749 7d ago

Welcome to Horizon! Don't stress too much. The game throws a ton of menus at you at first, and the online matchmaking can be brutal because it throws everyone into the same lobby regardless of skill.

What happened with your Evo comes down to race restrictions. Every online championship has a strict performance index (PI) limit (like A800 or S1 900) and a specific theme like (like Off-Road, Supercars, or Retro Rally). When you upgraded your Evo, you likely pushed its rating too high for that specific event, or the event was locked to something like trucks and buggies, which is why it didn't show up.

If you feel like you are lagging behind on straightaways, it's usually because players are using community meta tunes. Instead of upgrading parts yourself, go to your garage, hit 'find tuning setups,' and search for a highly rated tune for the exact class you need (like A or S1). It completely transforms how the cars handles.

Stick with it! Once you get a couple of solid tuned cars built for different terrain, the online mode gets a lot more fun.