Codemasters have already created the driving games of Dirt 2 and Grid with their Ego engine. They've even created an FPS called Operation Flashpoint with it too. Now they have the licence to make F1 games, and presumably the licence to print money because of it as well. I really hoped that they'd done Formula One justice, since I am a big fan of the motorsport and I do like my driving games - especially Forza 2 and Gran Turismo 3. The game itself seemed quite exciting at the start, but some rather nasty issues tend to spoil any fun for me.
First impressions of the game were generally good, if mildly concerning in places. The control scheme was fully customisable - I could even configure the right joystick to flick the gears up and down. The graphics looked nothing special but faithfully re-created all the tracks on the formula 1 grid calendar. There was a smeary and slightly bland look to the track-side background, although the cars themselves looked detailed. One thing about the graphics that did distract me was the blocky textures used for reflections of the circuit and sky on the bonnet of the car (from the in cock-pit view). The overall frame-rate is said to be 30fps locked and seemed quite fluid in-car. Except it really chugged in the replays, when displaying race grid starts and packed fields. All the extra cars on-screen made the replay frame-rate dip to single figures and look like more of a slide show.
The handling was also ok - not quite Forza handling though - more "arcade" - less "sim" and with the feeling of turning about a central pivot than of genuine over or under-steer. There was a slight delay in response and not much feeling from the car, especially under braking. The relationship between braking and steering seemed weird to me. The sense of bumpiness, craziness, wailing engine sound and sense of speed the game gives is thrilling and quite intoxicating (a bit like GRID). It does manage to paper over some of this games deeper flaws for a while. This is true especially in the rain, where the water effects both on the track in on the visor go to make the game look good while being played. Although the weather effects, rain splatter and wet track does look excellent, oddly it makes little difference to the handling or top speed of the cars.
I'd say the difficulty as fairly hard, except for true fans of the sport. The slightest mistake on track is enough to punish a racer severely. Hitting, or even tapping another car is usually punishable by grid drops or by time penalties during a race. The Grid and Dirt system of a limited numbers of race "rewinds" is included, depending on the difficulty setting chosen, but these rewind moments don't rewind back that far, so I quite often forgot to rewind until my car-crash had come to a halt, then could only rewind up to the point I went flying off the track. On the easiest setting you only get to share 4 rewinds in total between 3 practices, the qualifying sessions and the main race itself (minimally 10 laps or 20% race distance). I can't help but think that the game could have been more forgiving of beginners to racing. There are driver aids and realism settings, but some of them didn't seem to work too well.
The career mode is set up from a pre-season interview, but the main game interface is the inside a trailer, just like in Dirt 2. You can set yourself up as one of four classes of driver, from beginner to expert, then get to choose a selection of teams appropriate to that skill by answering a short series of questions. So if you want an easy start, you'll be sat in a Virgin, Hispania, or a Lotus and racing while at the back of the pack and not in a Ferrari. Interviews also crop up during the season, where the interviewer (an officially scary representation of Holly Samos) asks bland questions and you get the choice of either modest, enthusiastic, or self-righteous answers. It is important to attend all the practice sessions, where there are usually "technical research" goals that help improve the team's cars during the career path.
The thing that really disappoints about this game is the racing on track does not match the times posted in the menu screens. Apparently due to limitations of the Ego engine; cars racing in front and behind don't match times presented on the time screen. This can lead to bizarre qualifying times, where you think you are racing Vettel in a timed lap for pole, and can plainly see his car right in front of you, but then find out he's much faster after the qualifying time expires. This is borne out by impossible results and replays not being viewable from any other cars except the player's.
But the game is so chock-full other of other bugs that it really spoiled my enjoyment and made a satisfying game career nearly impossible for me ( I am still trying though!). For example; some other ai drivers don't pit for tyres, fuel levels don't affect ai drivers, too frequent punctures (especially when compared to ai), ai swerving erratically, ai spoiled flying laps, knackered or non-existent, lap, sector timing and post race results screens, over courteous pit crew (letting everyone else out first), over-harsh unilateral penalties for venturing off track, holding up others (even after a spin), etc, etc... (I'm not making this up - these are all officially recognised on the Codemasters forum.)
Multiplayer is variable too. It does have a level progression system to tempt back the unwary. The over-strict rules can also be turned off for multiplayer. If they're not, then most public on-line races I joined resulted in people getting penalised or disqualified, then quitting the race. If the rules are switched off, it turns into bumper-cars. There are many other areas where the game is broken in both sp and mp, including typos, crashes, interface oddities, corrupt saves and joining races in progress. But my main issue with this game has got to be the timing ai issues, which should be demonstrated out on track, rather than faked in the results screen. This fakery implies ai rubber-banding, scripted events, lies and falsehoods instead of wheel to wheel duelling. I do appreciate that computing the actions of 24 or so cars on screen at once is a tough job to do, but Jeff Crammond managed it in his Grand Prix 3 and Grand Prix 4 games years ago - replays and all.
The sense of excitement and speed F1 2010 gives is great - especially in the wet, but the graphics have been squeezed a bit to get the high in-engine frame rates F1 2010 delivers. It seems the same sense of speed was taken in getting the game onto consoles too. Some bad bugs and ai design choices really spoil this game for me. The relentless and unforgiving difficulty could also be a spoiler for some too. I do hope Codies try and patch some of these things, but I think the fake times not matching those of the cars on track representing them will stay with this game, unfortunately. Codies haven't exactly been great at patching up their last opus (Op Flash) either. They are probably already focused on their next iteration "F1 2011" now instead.
I will aim (although can't guarantee) to update this review with any news of patches and fixes. 26-09-2010
29/10/10 EDIT CRASH FIXING BUG SOLVED - Not by a fix, but because they found out the specific set of common circumstances that cause it.
First impressions of the game were generally good, if mildly concerning in places. The control scheme was fully customisable - I could even configure the right joystick to flick the gears up and down. The graphics looked nothing special but faithfully re-created all the tracks on the formula 1 grid calendar. There was a smeary and slightly bland look to the track-side background, although the cars themselves looked detailed. One thing about the graphics that did distract me was the blocky textures used for reflections of the circuit and sky on the bonnet of the car (from the in cock-pit view). The overall frame-rate is said to be 30fps locked and seemed quite fluid in-car. Except it really chugged in the replays, when displaying race grid starts and packed fields. All the extra cars on-screen made the replay frame-rate dip to single figures and look like more of a slide show.
The handling was also ok - not quite Forza handling though - more "arcade" - less "sim" and with the feeling of turning about a central pivot than of genuine over or under-steer. There was a slight delay in response and not much feeling from the car, especially under braking. The relationship between braking and steering seemed weird to me. The sense of bumpiness, craziness, wailing engine sound and sense of speed the game gives is thrilling and quite intoxicating (a bit like GRID). It does manage to paper over some of this games deeper flaws for a while. This is true especially in the rain, where the water effects both on the track in on the visor go to make the game look good while being played. Although the weather effects, rain splatter and wet track does look excellent, oddly it makes little difference to the handling or top speed of the cars.
I'd say the difficulty as fairly hard, except for true fans of the sport. The slightest mistake on track is enough to punish a racer severely. Hitting, or even tapping another car is usually punishable by grid drops or by time penalties during a race. The Grid and Dirt system of a limited numbers of race "rewinds" is included, depending on the difficulty setting chosen, but these rewind moments don't rewind back that far, so I quite often forgot to rewind until my car-crash had come to a halt, then could only rewind up to the point I went flying off the track. On the easiest setting you only get to share 4 rewinds in total between 3 practices, the qualifying sessions and the main race itself (minimally 10 laps or 20% race distance). I can't help but think that the game could have been more forgiving of beginners to racing. There are driver aids and realism settings, but some of them didn't seem to work too well.
The career mode is set up from a pre-season interview, but the main game interface is the inside a trailer, just like in Dirt 2. You can set yourself up as one of four classes of driver, from beginner to expert, then get to choose a selection of teams appropriate to that skill by answering a short series of questions. So if you want an easy start, you'll be sat in a Virgin, Hispania, or a Lotus and racing while at the back of the pack and not in a Ferrari. Interviews also crop up during the season, where the interviewer (an officially scary representation of Holly Samos) asks bland questions and you get the choice of either modest, enthusiastic, or self-righteous answers. It is important to attend all the practice sessions, where there are usually "technical research" goals that help improve the team's cars during the career path.
The thing that really disappoints about this game is the racing on track does not match the times posted in the menu screens. Apparently due to limitations of the Ego engine; cars racing in front and behind don't match times presented on the time screen. This can lead to bizarre qualifying times, where you think you are racing Vettel in a timed lap for pole, and can plainly see his car right in front of you, but then find out he's much faster after the qualifying time expires. This is borne out by impossible results and replays not being viewable from any other cars except the player's.
But the game is so chock-full other of other bugs that it really spoiled my enjoyment and made a satisfying game career nearly impossible for me ( I am still trying though!). For example; some other ai drivers don't pit for tyres, fuel levels don't affect ai drivers, too frequent punctures (especially when compared to ai), ai swerving erratically, ai spoiled flying laps, knackered or non-existent, lap, sector timing and post race results screens, over courteous pit crew (letting everyone else out first), over-harsh unilateral penalties for venturing off track, holding up others (even after a spin), etc, etc... (I'm not making this up - these are all officially recognised on the Codemasters forum.)
Multiplayer is variable too. It does have a level progression system to tempt back the unwary. The over-strict rules can also be turned off for multiplayer. If they're not, then most public on-line races I joined resulted in people getting penalised or disqualified, then quitting the race. If the rules are switched off, it turns into bumper-cars. There are many other areas where the game is broken in both sp and mp, including typos, crashes, interface oddities, corrupt saves and joining races in progress. But my main issue with this game has got to be the timing ai issues, which should be demonstrated out on track, rather than faked in the results screen. This fakery implies ai rubber-banding, scripted events, lies and falsehoods instead of wheel to wheel duelling. I do appreciate that computing the actions of 24 or so cars on screen at once is a tough job to do, but Jeff Crammond managed it in his Grand Prix 3 and Grand Prix 4 games years ago - replays and all.
The sense of excitement and speed F1 2010 gives is great - especially in the wet, but the graphics have been squeezed a bit to get the high in-engine frame rates F1 2010 delivers. It seems the same sense of speed was taken in getting the game onto consoles too. Some bad bugs and ai design choices really spoil this game for me. The relentless and unforgiving difficulty could also be a spoiler for some too. I do hope Codies try and patch some of these things, but I think the fake times not matching those of the cars on track representing them will stay with this game, unfortunately. Codies haven't exactly been great at patching up their last opus (Op Flash) either. They are probably already focused on their next iteration "F1 2011" now instead.
I will aim (although can't guarantee) to update this review with any news of patches and fixes. 26-09-2010
29/10/10 EDIT CRASH FIXING BUG SOLVED - Not by a fix, but because they found out the specific set of common circumstances that cause it.