No Porsches In Forza 4, Due To EA Licensing Difficulties

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Those planning to drive Porsches in the upcoming Forza Motorsports 4 will be severely disappointed, this according to news from developer Turn 10. The company has announced that they won’t be able to secure the rights for Porsches in the new game. EA holds the exclusive rights to the Porsche brand, and while Turn 10 has been able to work out a deal with EA to get Porsches in previous Forza games, it’s no dice for the upcoming fourth installment.

No word on how EA ended up with the exclusive rights for the Porsche brand for video games, but about 11 years ago, the company did publish Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed for the PC and PlayStation. Despite that, EA has been willing to license the rights to Porsches to quite a few driving games, even if they’re published by somebody else. But, that’s stopping with Forza 4 for some reason, according to Turn 10 Creative Director Dan Greenwalt. In a note posted on the Forza site, Greenwalt wrote:

As many of you know, since the beginning of the Forza franchise, the Porsche license has been available only through a sub-licensing deal with EA. In Forza 3, we were able to feature more than 35 different Porsche models by offering to collaborate with EA. For Forza 4, we were looking forward to adding even more Porsche cars, and we were especially looking forward to featuring multiple Porsche experiences in our new Autovista mode. In the end, however, EA couldn’t see their way towards collaborating again. We’ve asked our contacts at EA to reconsider their position frequently and regularly over the last 18 months. We also reached out to various influential people in gaming to lobby on our behalf, and on your behalf, but that was to no avail.

Greenwalt goes on to explain that considering Forza’s popularity, the folks at Turn 10 know a few powerful people in the automotive industry, some of them connected to Porsche, and even asking them to influence EA garnered no results, as EA just isn’t licensing out the Porsche cars to Forza, it seems. A bit weird, considering that EA doesn’t really have an uber-realistic driving game like Forza or Gran Turismo. They have the Need for Speed series, and Need for Speed: The Run is coming out this year, but this must be a high-level decision made by EA to hold onto their Porsche license. A shame for all involved.