Many were surprised when Forza Horizon 5 was announced, as it represented a departure from the principle of alternating games, which Microsoft had previously followed with Forza Motorsport and Forza Horizon. The former has had increasing difficulty maintaining its sales position, while the latter has only grown in popularity - and after the layoffs at Motorsport studio Turn 10 earlier this year, many feared that they would now be decimated to help with the Horizon series going forward, with Motorsport being dead and buried.
But... that's not the case. And the source of that claim is Microsoft's own gaming boss, Phil Spencer. In an interview with Famitsu (thanks Windows Central), he had this to say about Motorsport:
"As for Forza Motorsport, we sometimes have to shift our focus to games that will be released earlier. And I also understand that many people reacted when the scale of Turn 10 Studios was reduced. As far as we are concerned, there are many games that we would like to support carefully, and sometimes we give the development team a little more time so that they do not continue to be in a state of tension."
In short, the series is simply on hold for the time being, and the development team will be given the time they need. Hopefully, this means a bigger comeback for the next generation of consoles, but whatever the case may be, we'll probably have to wait a long time to find out.