Achievement Hunter: Working Your Way Through Forza Horizon

If you haven’t had a chance to check out Microsoft’s Forza Horizon for Xbox 360, you really should.  The game manages to capture the open world challenges of previous Forza titles, while presenting a more casual approach to the racing itself.  It’s like the best of both worlds, especially if you’re looking for people to race against, especially friends.

The game has 1000 Achievements to score through the main game, as well as an additional 250 points through today’s released DLC Rally Expansion Pack, which is available for 1600 Microsoft points ($20) in the Xbox Live Marketplace.  For this week’s Achievement Hunter, we’re breaking down some of the easiest – and toughest – that you’ll be able to earn throughout the game.  We hope you’ve brought your racing skills.

Easy Street

Some of Forza Horizon’s earliest rewards come from simply showing up to race.  “Welcome To Horizon” earns you 10 points merely by getting to the Festival to show your stuff, while “Take Her For a Spin!” nabs you an additional 15 just for buying a car from the Autoshow.  

Others come from completing first events, including winning your first race at the event (…and across the line!, 10 points, with a First! award for an additional 20).  Playing through the Rally stages offers some simple ones as well, including Now That’s a Special Stage (worth 20 points) and Covered In Mud and Glory (also 20 points).  

Just for getting your feet wet in this racing world, you’ve automatically racked up nearly 100 points.

Progress Makes Perfect

With Forza Horizon, the more progress you make, the more you’ll unlock.  Sometimes completing a certain number of events help you earn them, while others require you to reach a particular point in wristband status before you get there.

Let’s start with the numbers game.  Winning 10 street races will give you a Warning!!  Danger To Manifold Achievement worth 15 points; beating ten festival races earns you the Charlie Sheen-inspired #winning! for an extra 15; and challenging and beating 10 specific festival competitors will unlock Close Encounters, good for 20 points.

In some cases, you can also unlock Achievements merely by exploring.  For instance, if you manage to find and speed past five speed traps and through five speed zones (recording your time on the leaderboards), you’ll earn 10 points on your GamerScore.  Making your way around the entire Horizon Festival Loop (it’ll take some time, but well worth it) will nab you another 10 points.  And if you find a barn (they’re around somewhere), you’ll be Barn This Way for a small but helpful 5 Achievement points.

Get Popular

Next, you’ll want to rank up your popularity.  You do this by winning races throughout the circuit, and answering certain challenges.  However, you can also boost points by performing stunts on the open road without wrecking.  You’ll level up quite effectively, starting by getting to be the 200th most popular driver (One To Watch, 10 points) and eventually moving through 100th (The Next Big Thing, 15 points), 50th (Almost Famous, 20 points), 10th (Killer Skills, 25) and, finally, first place (Notorious, 30 points).

As you progress through your racing career, you’ll earn different wristbands, which will unlock new areas to access.  You’ll start with the Yellow Wristband (A Wristed Development, 20 points) and eventually move through Green (Going Green, 25 points), Blue (Out of the Blue, 30 points), Pink (Racing For Pinks, 35 points), Orange (Freshly Squeezed, 40 points) Purple (Purple Reign, 45 points), and finally, Golden (Golden Boy, 50 points), adding 245 overall to your GamerScore.  It really pays to excel through events.

Completionists Beware

Completion plays a huge part in unlocking points, as you’ll earn rewards beating all the Horizon Stars (Domination!, 10 points), winning every single race in the game (All Your Race Are Belong To Us, 30 points), completing every Horizon Outpost PR Stunt (Stuntman, 25 points), completing five Sponsorship challenges (Kudos To You, 10 points), beat every Festival Event (Gettin’ It Done, 30 points), won every street race (30 points), finished all the Showcase Events (Exhibitionist, 20 points), and, last but definitely not last, taking out Forza Horizon champ Darius Flynt and overtaking the Festival as your own (Darius Who?, 100 points – the highest Achievement in the game).

Owning most of those Achievements will net you 1000 points with ease, but the new Expansion Pack has 250 more to earn.  Some are basic, like winning your first Horizon Rally stage (Now That’s a Special Stage, 20 points) and obtaining your first car (Take Her For a Power Slide, 20 points), while others require a lot of work, including becoming the champion of the Rally circuit (Horizon Rally Champion, 75 points) and completing certain objectives during a race, like getting over 1609 meters of air (Mile High Club, 10 points) and winning without crashing or using rewind (15 points).  Beating rivals, playing multiplayer matches and buying all the rival cars will net you some sweet points as well.

Forza Horizon is one of those games that’s continuously fun to come back to, even if you think you’ve mastered every corner of the road that the developers have offered within the game.  Hey, if you don’t have all 1250 points, you’ve got some work to do, right?

Forza Horizon is available now for Xbox 360.