The original Forza Horizon reaches the end of the road

The original Forza Horizon will reach its "end of life" status on Oct. 20, Forza Motorsport's official blog announced on Friday.

This means that the game, which launched four years ago on Xbox 360, and its associated downloadable content will no longer be available for purchase on the Xbox Store. However, anyone who has bought the game or has acquired its DLC prior to then will still be able to download and play the game as normal. Forza Horizon was offered in the first half of this month in the Games With Gold program for Xbox Live Gold subscribers.

Forza Horizon kicked off a successful departure for Microsoft's racing franchise from the exacting driving simulation for which Forza Motorsport is known, into the car-culture "action racer" format that distinguishes Horizon.

Forza Horizon 3, launching on Tuesday, takes the virtual car festival to Australia. For much more, see Polygon's review. We call it "a joyful carnival of squealing tyres and bumping fenders, of wheeling vistas and shuddering prangs."