The Day-0 Patch

Gamers who get Forza 5 home from the game store and slot it in their Xbox One are in for a startling shock... As soon as the game loads they are informed that a patch is necessary before they can play the game - and this is not just any old patch either - it is a 6GB update!

You read that right - Six Gigabytes! Woot!

Right well that may seem to be a tad on the excessive side, but really it is not... You see what it is to put a fine point upon it is all of the updates, corrections, and perhaps more important the additions that have been put into the game between when it was carved onto the disc and when the disc actually made it to the stores.

Officially the update fixes things that needed fixing and as we mention above, adds some things to the game. Well, that is the official story anyway -- and we believe it! But our best pal Eddie the Conspiracy Theorist has a different take on the matter...

According to Eddie the game disc you get in the retail box does not actually have the game on it - it has a bunch of artwork for the game like the splash screen and a video, but really the game was never on the disc at all -- according to Eddie that big Zero Day Patch you download? Yeah, he says THAT is the game.

Now we should know better than to buy into any of his theories - his claims that all of the space shuttle launches were CGIs and his theory about the whole CIA-Kennedy hit are entertaining, sure, but...

So we checked the game disc, and it turns out the game is actually on it. Seriously. Want to hear the really twisted bit? The 6GB Day Zero patch? Yeah, that is the game too. Man, we hate it when Eddie is right -- even when he is only half right. So now he has me wondering if that whole weather baloon thing really was just weather balloons!

The in-game Message Center is for claiming winnings, cars, and getting news

All Humor Aside

While nobody can say with any certainty what the future of games and console gaming is, one thing that we can say is that the future of gaming includes massive and complex game Titles that will require lots of storage and memory and regular updates.

The eighth generation of game consoles operate in a fast-and-loose manner that was previously unthinkable on the past because it presumes that the home Internet connection is an ubiquitous resource that is present universally in all homes -- and today it is.

When you bring home Forza 5 -- or any other title for an eighth generation console -- within seconds of slotting it the game checks to see what if anything exists on the hard drive of your console that relates to it, and then its loading program assesses the console to see what common resources are available before it begins the installation process.

Once the loader determines that there is sufficient free storage space the first thing that it does is copy over all of the bootstrapping code for the game from the installation media, then it reaches out via the Internet and downloads the most recent and up-to-date list of installation instructions for Forza 5 and, once you indicate it is OK to do so, it begins downloading and installing them to the hard drive on your console.

The new eighth gen installation scheme has been optimized to permit the player to begin playing a game as soon as a sufficient amount of the game is present on the console - you may have noticed that from the install process of other games. Once FM5 has the game engine, the first race, and the first few Tracks and the Cars that you can actually afford to buy (a small list unless you have an account with the Forza Rewards program), after less than 15 minutes you should be able to play.

While you are playing those first few races the game is busy downloading and installing the rest of the game, and all is right and well with the world, right? Well, sure!

On the plus side, once you have applied the zero-day patch you do not have to connect to the Internet to play the game, however connecting or not connecting to the Internet is not really an issue because you will want to connect to the 'net - so you can play with others, enjoy the benefits of online gaming, and of course download and upload car designs and tunes.