Forza Horizon 5: A Must-Play on PlayStation

Put simply, there’s no racing experience on PlayStation 5 quite like Forza Horizon 5.

The Crew Motorfest comes close. By embracing the festival-centric formula, it feels more like a Forza Horizon title than its predecessors ever did. But it doesn’t quite capture the same magic.

Test Drive Unlimited Solar Crown? Unfortunately, no. While the original Test Drive Unlimited helped pave the way for open-world racers, Solar Crown’s always-online requirement and lack of a dedicated solo mode fall short. Forza Horizon, in contrast, has offered seamless offline and online integration since Forza Horizon 2 in 2014.

Need for Speed Unbound brings deep car customization that even surpasses Horizon in some areas, but its arcade-style police chases make it a different beast altogether—more adrenaline rush than open-world exploration.

No, the undisputed leader in modern open-world racing remains Forza Horizon 5—and now, for the first time, it’s available on PlayStation 5.

With its vast and vibrant depiction of Mexico, drift-optimized physics, and a garage of nearly 900 vehicles—including cult classics found nowhere else—Forza Horizon 5 delivers a complete package. PlayStation players are now experiencing it all, many for the very first time.

And the reaction has been electric.

This wave of new players is exactly what the team at Playground Games hoped for.

“Yeah, I’m super excited,” says art director Don Arceta. “Brand new players—many of whom are experiencing a Forza Horizon game for the first time. It’s thrilling to think about what their first impressions will be, just like ours were when we first played.”

Arceta is especially eager to see what PlayStation users will create with the game’s powerful Event Lab—a suite of over 800 customization tools and props.

“We’ve seen the community do incredible things with Event Lab,” he says. “The creativity is mind-blowing. Now, with PlayStation 5 players joining in, I can’t wait to see what they build.”

“You’ll actually get some pretty good Halo content too on the PlayStation, with the event lab props!”

The port itself stands tall alongside its Xbox and PC counterparts—technically flawless despite the game’s massive scale and the fact that its engine has never before run on PlayStation hardware.

“Bringing the game to PS5 was no small task,” Arceta explains. “The series has always been built around Xbox architecture, so there was a lot of engineering work involved.”

“The PlayStation 5 version was developed by Panic Button in collaboration with Turn 10 and ourselves—and they did an amazing job. The quality you expect from Xbox and PC? You get it on PlayStation. It’s truly impressive work.”

For many fans, the Forza series has long been the ultimate playground for car lovers—packed with dream machines, hidden gems, and vehicles you didn’t even know existed. The idea of a whole new audience discovering their favorite cars in Forza Horizon 5 is incredibly exciting.

Lead game designer David Orton believes it’s the game’s sheer variety that will leave the biggest impression.

“The breadth of Horizon is staggering,” Orton says. “Players go in and find what they love—but because there’s so much freedom, that ‘thing’ can be anything.”

“We pride ourselves on giving players the freedom to play how they want, and the game rewards them accordingly. Whether you’re into road racing, Rivals, track events, photography, or creating content in Event Lab—there’s something for everyone. Horizon is a place where everyone belongs.”

“For me, the victory is hearing someone say, ‘I can’t believe I’ve never played this before,’” Arceta adds. “That sense of surprise—that’s the win. Because once they’re surprised, they’re hooked.”

Orton agrees.

“It’s about players—whether platform-bound or just short on time—finally stepping into this world and realizing how warm, welcoming, and full of fun it really is. Discovering that Horizon isn’t just a racing game, but a place they can call home.”

“That moment when they say, ‘How have I never played this? This is incredible’—that’s the win. We’re reaching a whole new group of players, and that’s incredibly exciting.”

Car culture may be passionate, but gaming platform loyalty can be even more so. Now, one major barrier has fallen.

Let’s hope it’s the first of many.