Forza Horizon 3 review – the fast, fun and beautiful driving sim returns

The third title in Microsoft's flashy yet smart driving series offers a new landscape and a host of fresh features - and does it all with a smile

Driving games used to matter. Like, really matter. When the original PlayStation was launched against Sega's Saturn almost 22 years ago, the two consoles were judged on their respective racing sims: Ridge Racer and Daytona USA. Before fighting games took over, these were the standard bearers of polygonal visuals that introduced players to the concept of real-time graphics rendered in three dimensions.

Since then, at the accessible end of the driving sim genre, we've had the brilliant Burnout, the endlessly reconfigured Need for Speed, the innovative Test Drive Unlimited and the gorgeous Project Gotham Racing - all venerated in their time. But over the last few years, interest in the arcade racer has waned, a state of affairs symbolised by the sad closure of Bizarre Creations in 2011, a British studio that truly understood how to make flashy, beautiful driving games for the mainstream market.