The Crew: Motorfest
Ivory Tower · Racing, Action, Adventure
Overview
The Crew Motorfest is an open-world racing game set on scaled-down versions of the Hawaiian islands of Oahu and Maui. The third entry in The Crew series, it is structured around a festival theme with "Playlists" consisting of staged races, side activities, and challenges built around topics like specific car brands or motorsport disciplines. Players can control cars, boats, and planes across the open world, and multiplayer modes include the Grand Race and Demolition Royale. The game originally started development as DLC for The Crew 2 before becoming a standalone title, and draws comparisons to the Forza Horizon series for its festival-based structure.
THE GAMEQ VERDICT9,983 reviews analyzed
What players are actually saying
1. Summary
Most reviewers recommend The Crew Motorfest. They praise its Hawaii, with sunsets, storms and jungle and volcano roads; a garage that runs from hypercars to dirt bikes, boats and planes; and themed playlists that mix races with car history. 28% of longer reviews measure it against Forza Horizon, and those who prefer Motorfest point to the vehicle variety, the more colourful map and the free updates. 12% mention buying it on sale, and some advise waiting for a discount instead of paying full price.
Technical trouble is the most frequent complaint. 19% of longer reviews, and 30% of negative reviews, describe disconnects, crashes, launch failures or Ubisoft account problems, and because the game is always online, some players lose a finished race or a Grand Race run when the connection drops. The 60 FPS cap and missing PC graphics options come next. Design complaints follow: playlists that put you in loaner cars instead of your own, hosts who talk through every race, and menus that make it hard to find a specific event. Players disagree about the handling, though more longer reviews praise the driving than condemn it. Reviewers also differ on how much the PC problems should count against a game most of them recommend.
2. What keeps coming up
What players praise
Hawaii is a pleasure to drive aroundHigh
36% of longer reviews talk about how the game looks or about its map. Reviewers single out sunsets, rain at night, lightning storms, the jungle and volcano roads of O'ahu and Maui, and the way each playlist restyles the island. "The open world is stunning, the playlists are super fun," one player writes, and several say they spend hours just driving with no goal. Criticism within this theme is narrower. A few find the colour grading oversaturated, the TAA makes the image blurry for others (see the PC options theme), and a minority call the streets empty of traffic and pedestrians or the map small next to The Crew 2's United States.
Playlists that teach car cultureHigh
Playlists, the themed event chains that replace a traditional career, come up in 18% of longer reviews. Fans like that each one changes the HUD, music and decorations, and that they mix racing with brand history and short documentaries. "The playlists provide history of each automobile company and also is quite rewarding," one player writes. Made in Japan, Ferrari and BMW come up as favourites; some influencer-led playlists divide people. The main objection to the system is how it handles cars, covered under loaner cars below.
Cars, bikes, boats and planes in one gameMedium
12% of longer reviews bring up the mix of vehicle types, and several give it as the reason to pick this game over Forza Horizon. One short review covers the whole pitch: "Like forza with nos with planes, boats and bikes, beefy vehicle sound, fine map, good graphics". Reviewers point out that Forza has no motorcycles, and a few recommend Motorfest to bike fans in particular; RC cars, monster trucks, F1-style cars and NASCAR add to the list. A few reviewers call the planes and boats an afterthought or hard to control on keyboard, one long-time player warns that bikes can't keep up in races, and some complain that the car list is padded with several variants of the same model.
A lot of game for a sale priceMedium
Buying on sale or at a discount comes up in 12% of longer reviews, some at 80% or 90% off, and some of those reviewers say the sale price is what makes the game worth it. "Absolute bargain for a discounted price," writes one. 4% say outright that it is not worth full price or call it overpriced. The free demo and the friend pass, which lets a friend join your crew without buying, also earn thanks from players who used them.
Visual customizationMedium
9% of longer reviews discuss customization. Visual tuning (body kits, wheels, stance, liveries, interior colours, vanities) gets real praise, and a few players call it deeper than Forza's, though one finds it worse. Complaints focus on performance upgrades handed out as random loot parts, cosmetics locked behind real money or past events, missing license plate editing, and no way to sell unwanted cars.
Engine soundsMedium
Sound design, especially engine and exhaust notes, gets praise in 6% of longer reviews, and a few players call it the best vehicle sound they have heard in a game. A few dissenters find the turbo and shift sounds samey across cars.
Steady free content updatesLow
4% of longer reviews praise the live-service support: new islands, free playlists, NASCAR, the Track Forge creator, and weekly Summit events. "I saw how much content was being pushed on a routine basis into the game," writes one player who arrived late. This praise comes mostly from players with long play histories.
Your Crew 2 garage comes alongLow
Importing cars from The Crew 2 (or carrying progress over from console) comes up in 4% of longer reviews. For returning players it removes much of the early grind. A handful report imports that failed or arrived without their liveries.
Cockpit view and wheel playLow
3% of longer reviews praise the first-person view, the animated hands and the full steering wheel rotation, and wheel owners say it feels good on a G29 or Thrustmaster. DualSense haptics also get compliments. Wheel support has its own complaints: a few players report that wheel or controller mappings reset every launch, and that some wheel brands are not supported.
Where players are split
How it stacks up against Forza HorizonHigh
28% of longer reviews mention Forza or Horizon. 5% say outright that Motorfest is better ("Better than Forza Horizon 6 in every way."), while 3% call it a lesser copy ("Its just Forza from Temu, dont waste your money on this"). The Motorfest side points to more vehicle types, a more colourful map, more free content and progression where new cars feel earned rather than showered on you. Forza fans cite its physics, graphics polish, uncapped frame rate, offline play and the freedom to race your own cars. Others land in between and recommend Motorfest as something to play alongside Forza, or to hold them over until the next one.
The handling modelHigh
Handling, physics, steering or drifting come up in 22% of longer reviews, and those reviews disagree sharply. 11% describe the driving in clearly positive terms, often as weighty and much improved over The Crew 2 ("Took them only 3 tries, but the handling is finally good."). 5% condemn it: sudden snap oversteer, cars that start drifting on their own, floaty off-road surfaces, steering input lag on controller and a drift system that kills speed. "The handling feels so horrendous that it completely kills the fun," writes one player who gave up on the game. A few players say turning off assists, especially the steering filter, fixes most of it.
A step on from The Crew 2, or a step backMedium
14% of longer reviews compare it with The Crew 2. Those who see an upgrade mention handling, graphics, sounds and the garage import. Those who see a downgrade miss the full United States map, picking any race type freely, the old menus and the sense of a larger game; some call Motorfest a paid expansion for The Crew 2. "Crew 2 was better in all aspects," one writes, while others call this the best entry in the series.
The grind for carsMedium
7% of longer reviews talk about grinding or the economy. Some like that cars cost real effort, compared with Forza's constant wheelspins. Others find payouts too small once the playlists are done, car prices steep, and the loot-based parts system tedious, which pushes them toward the shop.
Grand Race and online racingMedium
Online play comes up in 6% of longer reviews, mainly Grand Race, the 28-player race across the island. For some it is the reason they still play: "I really like the 28 person multiplayer races." Others describe the same mode as a demolition derby: "Grand races are 100% filled with rammers." Long-time players add complaints about ranked matchmaking, leaderboards topped by impossible times, only a couple of online modes, and Summit weeks built around stunt or RC events they did not want.
The NASCAR updateLow
2% of longer reviews mention NASCAR, mostly in reviews written in early 2026, when players describe it as the new update. Pit stops and longer races won fans; collision physics, bumper-car AI and AI opponents that skip their own pit stops drew angry reviews from established players.
What frustrates players
Crashes, disconnects and launch or account failuresHigh
19% of longer reviews, and 30% of negative reviews, describe technical or account problems. One review consists of nothing but the error itself, "An error has occurred. Returning you to the login menu.", and another says constant disconnects make the game "a login simulator". Others describe crashes mid-race or at startup, "GPU lost" errors, BattlEye stuck on updating, a black screen with only menu music, or a game that runs at single-digit frame rates until they alt-tab. Ubisoft Connect causes problems of its own: new accounts suspended on first login, Steam purchases asking for an activation key, purchases still treated as the demo, an overlay that froze on screen (concentrated in reviews written between late 2024 and spring 2025), and a handful of "problem authenticating the ownership" errors in early June 2025. Because the game is always online, a drop mid-race throws away the result; one player lost "an entire day's grand race grind" to repeated disconnects. Some positive reviews list the same problems and recommend the game anyway.
The 60 FPS cap and missing PC optionsMedium
11% of longer reviews complain about the locked 60 FPS limit or related settings, and 12% of negative reviews name the cap itself: "60fps cap for a game released in 2023 is stupid, thumbs down for that alone." Some players say they saw the cap at first launch and refunded the game straight away. The same reviews list forced TAA that blurs the image, no DLSS or FSR, no exclusive fullscreen or resolution choice, and no field-of-view slider. Some players report workarounds with Lossless Scaling or Nvidia Smooth Motion; others call the cap tolerable once they get used to it.
Stutter and uneven performanceMedium
8% of longer reviews discuss performance. Complaints include regular stutter every few seconds on high-end machines, the game picking the integrated GPU on laptops, VRAM crashes and long launch times through the launcher. Plenty of other players report smooth play on modest or older hardware, so experiences vary widely by machine.
Hosts and Cara who never stop talkingMedium
Dialogue draws complaints in 7% of longer reviews: Cara the in-car assistant, playlist hosts and influencer commentary during races. One player suggests renaming it The Crew Yappingfest. Some players say they muted the voices or set the dialogue volume to zero, and one says they started enjoying races once the assistant, the dialogue and the radio were off. A minority enjoy the narration as part of the car-culture lessons.
Menus and UIMedium
6% of longer reviews criticise the interface: streaming-service-style menus, notifications and pop-ups everywhere, and no clear way to start a specific race. One player says once you try to do anything beyond the playlists, "the UI becomes the final boss". Some also want to shrink or hide the HUD.
Racing in loaner cars instead of your ownMedium
5% of longer reviews object that playlist events hand you a loaner car the first time through, so the cars you buy and tune feel useless for progress; some playlists even require buying a car you then do not drive. "Wish I could use my own vehicles in races," writes one player who recommends the game. A few players like the loaners as a way to try many cars, but 6% of negative reviews name the loaner system as a reason for the thumbs-down. Fast travel, which only unlocks after ten completed playlists, gets a smaller round of complaints in the same breath.
Always-online playLow
5% of longer reviews take issue with the always-online requirement itself: no play during maintenance, no play on unstable or mobile connections, and being kicked to the menu after resuming from sleep. Several mention the promised offline mode and say they will believe it when they see it.
Crossplay and playing with friendsLow
4% of longer reviews describe trouble playing with friends. Crossplay covers only matchmade modes such as Grand Race, not free roam or crews, which a few buyers call misleading: "Advertised as crossplay but this is false." Crew members also vanish from each other's maps or get the message "Failed to join Event, you will play alone".
Microtransactions, passes and confusing editionsLow
4% of longer reviews complain about the shop, year passes and paid cars in a full-price game. Some buyers of Ultimate or Deluxe editions say the bundle left out DLC, or that purchased DLC never activated through Ubisoft Connect.
Rubber-band AILow
3% of longer reviews complain about AI opponents that catch up out of nowhere at high difficulty, ram the player, or ignore rules the player must follow, such as disabled nitro or mandatory pit stops. One negative review sums it up as "Primitive rubberbanding simulator."
Steam Deck and LinuxLow
3% of longer reviews discuss Steam Deck or Linux. Deck owners report connection errors every few minutes and low frame rates despite the Verified badge ("lmao that green steam deck tick is a lie I guess"), and some Linux players say the anti-cheat blocks them; others report it now runs well on both.
3. The player conversation
Negative reviews aim at Ubisoft's launcher, the servers and the frame cap more often than at any single design choice. Praise and complaint often share a review: a player will rave about the island and the bikes, then list the 60 FPS cap and the disconnects.
Who raises what differs by how far players got. In reviews from players with under two hours played, 28% describe technical or account failures and 17% the frame cap; the game not launching and disconnects during the tutorial are typical. Among players with fifty hours or more those problems come up far less (11%), and the talk turns to Grand Race rammers and ranking, Summit event design, the money grind, leaderboard cheaters and what each update changed, for better or worse.
Topics also follow the game's calendar. Reviews written from late 2024 to spring 2025 keep returning to the frozen Ubisoft overlay, early June 2025 brought the ownership errors, and reviews from early 2026 mix newcomers who bought in a sale and hit launch problems with established players angry at the NASCAR update.
4. What the developers could do
- Fix the disconnect, crash and launch failures first. 30% of negative reviews describe them, more than any other complaint, from login-menu kicks to GPU-lost crashes and BattlEye hangs.
- Keep race results through short connection drops. Some players describe finishing long races or Grand Race grinds only to lose the result to a disconnect in an always-online game.
- Unlock the frame rate and add modern PC options. The 60 FPS cap, forced TAA, missing DLSS or FSR, no fullscreen resolution and no FOV slider come up in 11% of longer reviews, and some players refund over the cap alone.
- Let players use their own class-appropriate cars in playlists. Reviewers say the loaner system makes buying and tuning cars feel pointless, and 6% of negative reviews cite it.
- Repair the Ubisoft Connect path for Steam buyers. Suspended new accounts, activation-key prompts, games stuck in demo mode and DLC that never activates stop people before they reach the game.
- Make crews and crossplay work as advertised. Crew invites fail, friends disappear from the map, and some buyers expected cross-platform free roam that the game does not offer.
- Give the chatter separate volume controls and an off switch. Players mute all voices just to silence Cara and the hosts, losing narration they might otherwise keep.
- Curb ramming and rubber-banding. Grand Race regulars ask for ghosting or penalties for rammers, and solo players want AI that follows the same rules they do.
