GTA 6: 5 Major Car Details That Make It Better Than Forza Horizon 6

GTA 6 doesn’t launch until November 19, but comparisons to Forza Horizon 6, which is Playground Games’ Japan-set racer that arrived back in May, keep surfacing wherever car culture comes up. Rockstar’s trailers and screenshots point to five different areas where Vice City’s vehicles could end up feeling more convincing than anything in Horizon’s Japan.

5 Better NPC Detailing and Surroundings

GTA 6 has a more detailed world | Credit: Rockstar Games

Forza Horizon 6 is a dedicated racing game, meaning it isn’t required to pay much attention to the world apart from the cars and the streets themselves. It populates its festival crowds mainly for atmosphere, and NPCs mainly just wave and cheer, but rarely react to a specific car.

GTA 6′s trailers suggest something closer to a lived-in city, true to the franchise’s core mechanics. The models in Rockstar’s upcoming game are detailed, inside and out, and clips also show informal car meets and street races happening in the background rather than as scripted set pieces, which helps make Vice City’s traffic feel real, and not just as a decoration.

4 A Bigger, More Interactive Map

GTA 6 has a bigger map | Credit: Rockstar Games

Scale isn’t the real differentiator. After all, Forza Horizon 6’s Japan is reportedly 1.5x times larger than Forza Horizon 5′s city center. What separates the two is how much of that world a car eventually interacts with, and while Horizon’s map exists mainly for races, GTA 6’s Vice City, in comparison, ties cars into systems beyond driving.

This includes garages to store and maintain them, and even an economy around buying and reselling them. In simple words, Horizon’s map is built for routes, but Vice City is built so a car has somewhere to belong.

3 Obsessive Attention to Detail in GTA 6

There is an obsessive attention to detail in the game | Credit: Rockstar Games

When it comes to little things such as off-road wear, it’s where the gap looks the clearest. Combing through the trailers, fans can see mud building up on bikes and trucks thanks to off-roading, alongside reflections and sun glare that shift realistically across a hood.

Forza Horizon 6 also simulates surface grime during races and normal touring, but it’s mostly uniform across every car and the amount of time spent in the dirt, making it clear that Rockstar’s version is more detailed, and it shows that a car drove through a swamp recently, and it was not just because a race called for it.

2 In-Game Lighting That Flatters Every Car

Realistic lighting thanks to custom engine | Credit: Rockstar Games

Rockstar’s RAGE engine has always leaned on dramatic lighting, and GTA 6’s footage carries that forward with golden-hour glare bouncing off chrome and headlights cutting real shadows at night.

The killshot? Wet asphalt reflecting neon signs and brake lights. Admittedly, Forza Horizon 6’s lighting is strong too, with the dynamic weather and a full day-night cycle across the Japan-inspired map looking sharp in motion, but it’s tuned more for visibility during a race, and not to make a single vehicle look flashy. GTA 6 isn’t limited by that same constraint, so a sunset can sit on a hood for a bit longer, and that patience is what makes the game’s cars look like the centerpiece.

1 Extensive Customisation Thanks to Unlicensed Cars

You can customise cars to a great extent | Credit: Rockstar Games

The biggest structural advantage GTA 6 has is one Horizon can’t fully match: none of its cars are real. Every vehicle in Rockstar Games is an original design, a silhouette clearly inspired by a real manufacturer’s car but legally distant from it, so no licensing deal dictates what can or can’t change about its shape.

Rockstar has already confirmed dedicated customization hubs for GTA 6, plus classic car restoration as its own activity and off-roading modding culture that GTA Online has built up over a decade. With no manufacturer’s sign-off required, body kits, widebody kits, and liveries can go further than a licensed racer would ever be cleared to allow.

What is the one distinction that makes GTA 6 stand out for you in comparison to Forza Horizon 6? Make sure to let us know in the comments below!