In an exclusive preview, we were able to take a look at the features, atmosphere and production of the new Formula 1 simulation and are extremely taken with it.
Now I’m going to pull out all the stops: Alpine is simply making too little progress for a factory team. And Ferrari rarely manages to develop efficiently in the second half of the season. Red Bull? Oh, I’d change a lot of things there, but nobody asks me. And don’t even get me started on Aston Martin! Bad decisions as far as the eye can see! And anyway and anyway!
Then why don’t you do it better instead of complaining so cheekily! you’re probably thinking to yourselves now. Oh, how good it is that F1 Manager 2022 will soon be released. Then passionate fans like me can roll up their sleeves and finally show the F1 team bosses in the paddock how it’s done properly!
Table of Contents
A full licence package
F1 Manager 2022 comes with an official licence from the rights holders. You can look forward to all the teams from A for Aston Martin and M for McLaren to W for Williams – including the familiar faces of the drivers from TV. The trailer gives you a first taste of this.
However, you cannot create your own team, which is a pity. So you have to choose one of the ten racing teams instead of being able to lead your own to success.
Even the graphics, the font used for texts and the TV inserts make those familiar with the subject matter feel at home immediately, as the entire presentation corresponds to the real-life model. This credibility benefits the races in particular!
During the course of the season, you will travel to all 22 official tracks of the 2022 Formula 1 World Championship. We also asked the developers how they will deal with possible cancellations due to the pandemic, for example if Canada is kicked out and Turkey jumps back in.
Will the race then be added for buyers of the game? A concrete answer to this question was not yet available. In this case, they would work closely with the responsible parties and look for a solution.
Girl for everything
In the highly competitive environment of Formula 1, your daily routine as a manager naturally revolves around one thing above all: success. You don’t just want to race, you don’t just want to win, you want to dominate the entire field at will.
Only when both World Championship trophies greet the visitors in the foyer of your team seat can you pat yourself on the back with satisfaction and start planning for the next season.
Unlike in F1 2021, however, you won’t be sitting in the car yourself, but as the team manager you’ll be responsible for everything from finances and research to strategy during the races.
Because the competition never sleeps: If you want to compete and win in the top class of motorsport, you have to expect tough competition. Here, it’s not only a matter of having the fastest drivers on the track, but also of forming the most efficient team behind the scenes.
What will your daily routine look like in F1 Manager 2022? Instead of telling you with a list, we asked Bodo Barsch, passionate fishing pro and new manager of Red Bull Racing, for an exclusive diary in which he gives you a first-hand account of the game. He now describes the gameplay features that await you, unvarnished and up close. Mr. Barsch, get started!
A week in the life of an F1 manager
Monday – 6 days to go until the race in Melbourne
As the alarm clock rings on my bedside table, I’m already sitting in my office. I don’t have time to sleep. The race weekend in Melbourne is just around the corner and I still have many important things to take care of.
First, I get an overview on the home screen. Where is my team in the constructors’ standings? What events are coming up? What parts are coming to the car soon? Three unread emails are waiting to be read in my inbox.
The very first news brings a rare grin to my face. Theo Pourchaire has won the Formula 2 race in Jeddah. That boy is going places! It’s a good thing that I took him into our youth development programme.
If the young man changes to Formula 1 one day, he will drive with us and then we will reap the fruits of our development work! That’s why it’s nice that this part is also part of my responsibilities in the game. Besides Formula 2, Formula 3 is even open to me for talent scouting.
The second e-mail, however, makes my grin disappear right away. A sponsor is not happy with our performance in Saudi Arabia and is threatening to move to a rival team. So the pressure is growing, because the new cost limit since the 2022 season is also in play. We have to deliver in Australia or it will tear a hole in our team coffers!
And that would entail a rat’s tail of problems. Finances are also in my care and affect every part of the team. If my wallet is low, I can’t pay Verstappen anymore, and he’s not exactly cheap, as much Red Bull as he drinks. I might have to replace Perez with a cheaper No. 2 driver next season. The best thing for me to do is to start contract talks with other drivers early.
When I read the third email, I almost fall off my chair. The new front wing is not coming until Imola. Yes, reigning times, zefix nochamoal! That can’t be true. I’m busy for the rest of the day making phone calls and tracking down someone to blame.
Tuesday – 5 days to go until the race
I pay a visit to the factory in person and have them show me what’s wrong with the front wing. Apparently, the carbon structure is not strong enough and tends to break under high stress. In the end, it’s supposed to be my fault again, because I really wanted to have the update one race weekend earlier and accepted a loss of quality for it.
Have you got any words?! What am I paying all these expensive staff for? All the mechanics, engineers and analysts should be able to foresee something like this. Now the front wing is going into production again and it’s not only taking longer, but it’s also getting more expensive.
Thursday – 3 days to go until the race
On Wednesday I had a dentist appointment and was out of action all day. I’ll spare you the details at this point. But on Thursday I was back in the office with a sore cheek, working on the race strategy for the upcoming race weekend.
First of all, I always get an overview. After all, you never stop learning. In addition to historical data on the race, I am particularly interested in the weather forecast and the asphalt conditions. Both have a big impact on the performance of the cars and therefore I have to take them into account in all my planning for the event.
Then it’s down to the nitty gritty. I need to know the track at Albert Park as well as I know my own backyard to guide the guys and gals in the garage to success. How many corners are there? What tyre compounds are available? Which sections suit our car, which ones not so much?
Because a Formula 1 car is always about compromise: Quick as an arrow on the straights or a force in the corners? If you concentrate on a set-up early on, you can also focus all your development work on it in the long term and benefit from it in the future.
In the short term, I’ve decided to concentrate on setting up the car for sectors 1 and 2, i.e. the high-speed sections in Melbourne. We still lack some downforce compared to the competition in the midfield, so maybe we can pass them on the straights thanks to the overtaking aid DRS.
Sunday – The race has come
For all racing events, be it Friday practice, Saturday qualifying or Sunday’s race, I as a manager have the choice of watching the action in real time without interruption or fast-forwarding or even pausing the time in several speed steps. This is comfortable and lets me adjust the pace of the game to my preferences.
Friday’s practice seemed to confirm our focus on high top speed, but on Saturday we were suddenly mercilessly bumped in qualifying. Apparently the colder weather had caused the tarmac temperatures to drop and we lost grip. I should have been more careful!
In the end, our boys finished 13th and 17th, an embarrassment, I can tell you! I couldn’t look Toto Wolff in the eye when we ran into each other later in the paddock.
But what came next, I’ll gladly tell you in detail! You should have seen this race! Right at the start Verstappen grabbed Vettel and Ricciardo, straight into turn one, bang, just like you know him.
Perez had a bit of a hard time in traffic, which is why I adjusted the stint length during the race and changed the tyre compound for the pit stop. I put him on the hard tyres so that he could drive longer and maybe make up positions at the back.
Suddenly Albon and Schumacher hit each other. It’s not my fender bender, but it’s all over the place now because the safety car is coming onto the track. All the cars come into the pits, we bring Verstappen in and put fresh soft tyres on him. We leave Perez outside, who of course has no reason to change because he stopped on hard tyres, and he manages much better with them.
At the end of the safety car period, our guys are in 5th and 6th place, right behind each other, but Verstappen is behind Perez due to the stop. Stupid situation, because actually we’d rather have Max up front. So I clear my throat, grab the microphone and radio from the pits: Swap positions!
No sooner said than done, there’s no discussion at all. If you don’t function as a team player, you have to go. I could also have told them to save fuel or to step on the gas as I see fit. Such team instructions are unpleasant, but they have to be taken now and then.
Verstappen got the better of Sainz in a thrilling finish, but Hamilton, Russell and Leclerc were already gone. A fourth place should at least satisfy our sponsor. We’ll be even better in Imola in a fortnight’ time – I’ll make sure of it, you can count on it!
Race action and scope surprise positively
Thank you very much, Mr. Barsch, for your descriptions! So, hopefully now you have a good picture of what to expect as a manager in the context of your job. The developer Frontier showed us F1 Manager 2022 in detail, but unfortunately we weren’t allowed to play it ourselves yet.
Nevertheless, we can already say that we were very pleasantly surprised by the many small details and, of all things, the racing action in this simulation game. This starts with the meticulously implemented regulations, such as the cost limit or regulated hourly quotas in the wind tunnel, and extends to the extensive promotion of young talent and the staging of the races.
Our highlight and a good example of this: Instead of simply hiring a random voice actor for the role of the race engineer, the developer Frontier has dragged the real employees in front of the microphone for each racing team. At Ferrari, Riccardo Adami will radio into your ear, at Mercedes the usual calm Peter Bonnington and so on. For fans, this is a big plus in terms of atmosphere!
The races seem very realistic thanks to a 1:1 conversion of the real TV camera settings. In addition, there is a subtle but extremely effective blur effect in the dynamic camera movements. All in all, F1 Manager 2022 does not even have to hide from F1 2021 at first glance.
On closer inspection, however, you quickly realise that the same graphic quality has not been achieved. For example, the cars themselves still look like they are running on rails, and in the background they are actually only being calculated on the basis of our decisions. The clumsy car animations in particular should change before the release.
When we asked about the difficulty level, the developers let us know that you can even be kicked out of your team if you do a bad job. Then, of course, it’s not game over, but you first have to restore your tarnished reputation with a backbencher. But hey, Formula 1 has always been a tough challenge!
Editor’s Verdict
I’m not usually a big fan of manager games. That’s probably mainly because I’m afraid of cluttered user interfaces and I’m also not very good at football (sacrilege!). However, I have had petrol in my blood from an early age and the fight for the last tenth of a second brings more beads of sweat to my forehead than a penalty kick in the 93rd minute ever could.
That’s why, after my first impressions of F1 Manager 2022, I’m both relieved and surprised. Nothing about this game looks like a playable Excel spreadsheet. The interface with the individual tabs at the bottom of the screen looks well thought out at first glance and the management of the racing team really extends into the smallest areas, which I would not have expected at all when it was announced.
Especially the scouting of young drivers and the staging of the surprisingly action-packed races made me want more. This game could cost me many weeks of my life! Now I really want to get into the paddock myself and find out whether F1 Manager is as much fun to play in a long-term test as it seems to be so far.
Because the game not only has the potential to be a very good management game. It even has what it takes to be the most comprehensive Formula 1 experience on the PC for many years, because unlike the Codemasters racing games, it not only simulates racing, but also the whole shebang. And in hardly any other sport is this “trappings” as decisive as in Formula 1.
