This month’s Forza Horizon 5 update brings a new event type: Race Off

Cometh the new month, cometh the massive content drop for Forza Horizon 5. The April monthly update adds - spoilers - some new cars and other rewards, but the headline news is the Race Off event.

Race Off is a community event that works a bit like last year’s Secret Santa - the whole community’s working to fill up a progress bar so that everyone unlocks a shiny new 2024 Ford Mustang GT and a Ford F-150 Raptor R, a pickup that literally eats dirt for breakfast. We’ve seen it happen. Also: never interrupt its breakfast time. It gets angry. 

Race Off is split into two separate progress bars for road and off-road racing. Any participation in road, drag, street racing, midnight battles, along with speed racing in the Hot Wheels DLC and ‘apex predators’ races in Rally Adventure, count towards the community goal in road racing. 

Meanwhile, all dirt and cross-country events, along with hazard races from the Hot Wheels DLC and both ‘grit reapers’ and ‘horizon raptor’ events in Rally Adventure count towards off-road completion. 

The following event types don’t count, though: Rivals, Monthly Rivals, Forza EV, Showcases, Horizon Stories, Expeditions, and EventLab events .

If that sounds a bit complicated, well - it is a bit, isn’t it? But that’s modern live service gaming for you. Just close your eyes, floor it, and think about those nice new Fords you’ll have in your collection. 

A quartet of new cars are available in a £3.99 DLC pack, meanwhile. That outlay gets you a 2021 McLaren Sabre, 2019 Ginetta G10 RM, 2022 Ford Supervan 4, and a 1967 Shelby GT500.

Outside that DLC pack, these new reward cars will be added throughout the month:

28 March - 4 April: 2023 McLaren Artura

4 - 11 April: 2020 Audi TT RS Coupe

11 - 18 April: 2003 Ford Mustang SVT Cobra

18 - 25 April: 2020 Jaguar F-Type SVR

That should keep us busy for a while. Still waiting for that BMW 850CSI to turn up in one of our wheelspins though.