Thanks to Codemasters, the F1 license has had a major presence in the gaming space for quite some time now, and with all the success that the annual racing sim series has enjoyed on both critical and commercial fronts, it’s now branching out into new genres as well. August 30th will see the launch of F1 Manager 2022, a management simulation sim developed by Frontier Developments of Elite Dangerous and Jurassic World Evolution fame, that’ll put a completely different spin on the F1 formula- as the Football Manager to F1’s FIFA, if you will. It’s no surprise that more than a few people are excited to get their hands on the game, and ahead of its imminent launch, here, we’re going to go over some key details that you should know about it.
CAREER MODE
The meat and potatoes of the experience in F1 Manager 2022 is obviously going to be the career mode, and given that this is a sports management simulation game, you should have a decent idea of what to expect. F1 Manager 2022 will feature Formula One, Formula 2, and Formula 3, and will task you with choosing a team and then managing it down to the finest details, charting and deciding its future over the course of season after season. That, as you would imagine, is going to entail quite a lot- so let’s get down to that.
HQ
Your headquarters will, of course, be your base of operations as you manage your team in F1 Manager 2022. In between the actual races, this is where you’ll be doing must of your stuff, which will include things such as scouting, hiring, and poaching staff from other teams, signing drivers, upgrading facilities, managing your finances, and much more.
RACING STRATEGIES
You’ll have similar control over what’s going on during actual races as well- this is an F1 game, after all. While you’re not going to be doing any of the driving yourself, you will be deciding the details of your racing strategy. This will include schedule pit stops, choosing tyres, driver callouts, and much more. Using data gathered by staff and taking feedback from drivers into account will be important as you decide the details of your strategies.
DYNAMIC EVENTS
While deciding strategies will obviously be crucial and will give your drivers prescribed directions for races, being the Team Principal means you’ll also have to react and adapt to situations on the fly. To that end, F1 Manager 2022 will also feature dynamic events in its races, such as weather conditions or changing surface conditions, which will force players to change their strategies and make new decisions. Outside of races, regulation changes can also happen during the season, further forcing you to adapt.
DRIVER AND STAFF DEVELOPMENT
Developing both your drivers and your staff will be key to how your team progresses and whether or not you’re able to hit your short- and long-term goals. As you might expect, the development of staff and drivers will be interdependent in a lot of ways. The better you perform in races, for instance, the more your staff will develop, which, in turn, will enable better performances. Upgrading Facilities will also allow for development in various ways- like your race simulator, which can be upgraded to increase the experience your drivers gain. Players will also be able to train the pit staff and set their strategies, while free practice sessions during weekends can be used to boost the development of younger drivers.
ATTRIBUTES
Both drivers and staff members will have different attributes and ratings, as you might image. Cornering, breaking, overtaking, control, and other performance-related attributes will obviously be the focal point for drivers, while staff members’ attributes will vary based on what their roles are, from technical chief to race engineer, with attributes such as communication and pit crew feedback. The better you perform, the more experience points your staff and drivers gain, which can be used to improve their attributes even further. With drivers determining results on the track and your staff laying down the foundations behind-the-scenes, keeping an eye on and managing their attributes will be a crucial component of the game’s progression systems.
RECRUITMENT
Recruitment is going to be another key area that players will have to focus on in F1 Manager 2022. We’ve already mentioned that signing drivers and scouting and poaching staff will be important elements, but building for the future of your team will be just as important. Established stars with higher ratings in your team will be crucial in several ways, of course, but younger up-and-coming drivers with growth potential could be trained and developed into future stars as well. As you’d expect from a management simulation sim of this king, F1 Manager 2022 is promising to give players the opportunity to foster a long line of stars and racing legends.
FACTORY
Managing and upgrading your facilities, staff, and drivers will be among the core pillars of F1 Manager 2022’s overarching structure- but of course, there’s going to be plenty of work to do with the cars themselves. Improving your cars will be a crucial part your of your short- and long-term plans as well, and the Factory will be your hub for all of that. From developing new parts to your car to swapping out and assigning new ones to prepare for upcoming races, it looks like F1 Manager 2022 will give players plenty of control on this front as well.
BROADCAST PRESENTATION
Production values aren’t really supposed to be the point in management sims, and while that is definitely the case here as well, F1 Manager 2022 does seem to be doing quite a bit in this area, almost surprisingly so. You shoudn’t expect top-notch and ultra-detailed visuals, but during races, the game is promising realistic broadcast quality with onboard cameras, camera angles based on those used in real races, as well as commentary from professional commentators Martin Brundle, Karun Chandhok and David Croft. The game also features real life team radio from real Formula One drivers and staff.
PRICE AND PRE-ORDERS
When F1 Manager 2022 launches on August 30 for PlayStation, Xbox, and PC, it’ll be sold at a price of $59.99. That said, those who pre-order the game digitally will get a 10% discount (for which PlayStation players will require a PlayStation Plus subscription). Meanwhile, pre-ordering the game will give you early access to the game five days ahead of its global launch, on August 25.
PC REQUIREMENTS
F1 Manager 2022 is going to be available on consoles as well, but if you’re planning on playing it on PC (which would make sense, especially for a management sim), you’re not going to have to meet incredibly high requirements. On minimum settings, the game will require either an Intel Core i5-4590 or an AMD FX-8370, along with either a GeForce GTX 960 or an R9 280x with 3 GB VRAM, and 8 GB RAM. Meanwhile, on recommended settings, you’ll need either an Intel Core i7-7700 or an AMD Ryzen 7 2700, along with either a GeForce GTX 1080 or a Radeon RX 580 with 4 GB VRAM, and 16 GB RAM.