Forza Horizon 6 Takes the Festival to Japan

The Horizon Festival has visited Britain, Australia, Mexico, and the American Southwest. Now it is finally heading somewhere fans have been requesting for years: Japan. Forza Horizon 6 launched on May 19, 2026, bringing the full open-world racing experience to Tokyo's neon-lit streets, mountain touge passes, and coastal highways.

The Setting Is the Star

Playground Games picked Japan for a reason. The country is automotive legend — home to the touge culture that inspired Initial D, the factories behind some of the world's most iconic sports cars, and city streets that look like a driving game even in real life.

In Forza Horizon 6, you get all of it. Tokyo's expressways and narrow backstreets are rendered in meticulous detail. Mountain passes outside the city bring tight, technical racing that rewards precision over raw speed. Coastal routes open up for high-speed runs with ocean views. The biome variety might be the best of any Horizon entry yet.

550+ Cars — Including Long-Awaited Additions

The car list at launch clears 550 vehicles, and Playground went deep into Japanese automotive history. Expect a comprehensive lineup of Nissan Skylines, Toyota Supras across multiple generations, Honda NSXs, Mazda RX-7s, and Subaru WRXs alongside the usual mix of European exotics and American muscle.

Every car is as detailed as ever — Forza's model fidelity remains the benchmark for the genre. The Japan setting also means new weather systems, including dense mountain fog and heavy rain that transforms how the game plays and looks.

What Is New in Horizon 6?

Beyond the setting, Playground introduced a few meaningful additions:

Touge Mode — a dedicated drift-focused event type with its own leaderboards and progression
Expanded Horizon Arcade — the open-world co-op events are bigger and more frequent
Improved Photo Mode — new depth-of-field and lighting controls
Dynamic Traffic AI — cars on the road react to your driving more realistically

Performance and Platform

Forza Horizon 6 is available on Xbox Series X/S and PC via Game Pass, plus standalone purchase. On Series X it runs at a locked 60fps in Performance mode with ray-traced reflections in Quality mode. PC players get the usual customization suite, and early reports suggest a solid port out of the box.

Is It Worth Playing?

If you liked any previous Horizon game, the answer is yes. The Japan setting injects fresh energy into a formula that has never stopped being fun. The car list is enormous, the world is gorgeous, and the touge culture gives the game a personality distinct from its predecessors.

For Game Pass subscribers there is no reason not to download it right now. For everyone else, it is the kind of game you fire up to unwind and end up losing three hours to — which is about the highest compliment you can give a Forza Horizon title.