Soapbox: Forza Horizon 5 Will Be Great, But I Hope It Does More With Its Radio Stations

There aren't too many holes to pick in the brilliant Forza Horizon 4, which I've been playing and enjoying for many years now, but if there's one complaint I do have, it relates to the music selection and radio stations in general. Compared to something like Grand Theft Auto V, I feel like there's a lot of untapped potential.

It doesn't help that I'm not really the biggest fan of the songs in Horizon 4. There's a rock station but it's not really my type of rock, and there are multiple dance stations but it's not really my type of dance, so I usually just end up throwing Spotify over the top of it. There's a lot more variety in GTA V, so there's always something to suit my mood.

And the radio announcers in general are typically pretty boring to listen to. It's all bland chatter about how the Forza Horizon festival is progressing, the odd comment about how bad the weather is in the UK, and so forth. You're not going to get the same kind of absurd commentary as you do in a game like GTA V, but a little more depth would be welcome.

Forza Horizon 3 Radio Stations Groove Music
Image: Forza Horizon 3, Groove Music

The biggest issue I've had for a long time now, and it relates to a wide variety of games beyond Forza Horizon, is that custom music is no longer an option. The Xbox One era seemed to do away with the ability to incorporate custom music in most games, but Forza Horizon 3 temporarily got around this by introducing a Groove Music feature. You could upload your own music to OneDrive, and this acted as a custom station in the game.

Sadly, Groove Music is no more, and Playground Games shows no signs of bringing back custom music for the upcoming Forza Horizon 5. Yes, you can always just whack on Spotify and listen to your favourite tunes while driving around, but the ability to actually incorporate those tunes into the in-game experience would add an extra level of immersion.

I'm not expecting the return of custom music for Forza Horizon 5, but I still think Playground Games could do more in terms of providing greater variety with the tracklist, giving the announcers on each station a bigger role and more personality, and finding a way to sync up the radio stations with friends online, as I've lost count of the amount of times we've simultaneously broken into a horrible rendition of the Backstreet Boys when playing GTA V together in the past.

Forza Horizon 5 will be great regardless, I'm sure, but these little details would make a big difference for me personally.

What are your thoughts on the music selection and radio stations in Forza Horizon? Tell us below.