Looks like Forza Horizon 6 just leaked on Steam, letting pirates play it already [Update]

Racing fans have over a week to go before they can jump into Forza Horizon 6, Playground Games' next entry in the popular open-world franchise. However, it seems the game has leaked ahead of even the premium edition owners' launch date, and reports say it's due to the game files being made available on Steam.

Reports of the full game somehow circulating within piracy hubs began appearing just a few hours ago. While there isn't a confirmation from Playground or Microsoft yet, the source of the leak is currently being pointed at by the community as Steam, where an unencrypted version of Forza Horizon 6 was somehow uploaded onto its servers.

Usually, developers let customers download their upcoming game a few days before launch to get the files ready, letting them jump into the action the moment the game releases. However, this is usually an encrypted version that only unlocks when the clock officially passes the release timing.

If the currently circulating theory is correct, it seems a developer had accidentally uploaded the unencrypted version of Forza Horizon 6 Premium Edition (weighing 155GB) to Steam servers, letting people download it and spread the files online. Reports also say that pirates are playing the game already, perhaps using an early crack or some sort of an offline mode. Of course, any files downloaded in this way always carry the risk of them being altered by the party that's sharing it.

Forza Horizon 6 is slated to launch on May 19 for standard edition owners. Purchasing the Premium edition will let fans jump in on May 15 instead. This is the second major game of the year that has had a preload mishap. Death Stranding 2 had almost an identical leak via Steam back in March.

Neowin does not recommend or promote using unofficial and pirated ways of game activation.

UPDATE: Playground Games has put out an official statement about the Forza Horizon 6 leak. The studio has now confirmed that the files being spread are not from a pre-load leak as original reports stated. It has not provided an alternate cause yet.

There are reports of the hardware bans the studio mentioned already rolling out to those who attempted to play the game with the leaked build.