Files for Forza Horizon 6 – the highly anticipated racing release by Playground Games and Microsoft – have been accidentally released, in full, on Steam ahead of its proper release on the 19th May.
Spotted by keen-eyed users (and still visible on SteamDB) the unencrypted files seemingly were uploaded onto the game’s Steam page. An early upload of game files prior to launch is typical for many game releases, but without proper encryption, they can be accessed earlier than intended allowing for access to the game, which has happened here.
While this error was fixed quickly by Playground Games, this brief window did allow a few people to download the files, resulting in cracked versions appearing online. As such, pirates have been able to access Forza Horizon 6 in full.
Now before some of you get too excited, accessing and playing the game early can come with serious risks. One screenshot circulating online shows one such case, which involves content creator DVS Squad. He uploaded a video of himself playing the leaked version of Horza Horizon 6, without blurring out his account name.
The screenshot shows him receiving in-game mail from the Forza Community team, informing them they’ve been banned for 69,895,509 hours, or until the 31st December, 9999. Eurogamer has checked this creator’s Discord server, and have verified the screenshot’s legitimacy.
Microsoft itself has a rich history of dishing out bans to those who pirate games. You can look all the way back to 2009 where it initiated a sweeping wave of bans for console modifications, which allowed people to access games without buying them. More recently, it permanently banned Gears of War Remake leakers from Xbox One online services. The company has a history of not messing around with this stuff.
Playground Games recently released a massive breakdown of Forza Horizon 6, going into the scale of the map, the types of vehicles available, and the approach to setting a racing game in Japan.
