First point is obvious. It's the only official game available.NathanOlder wrote: ↑22 Nov 2019, 09:57Well its used as an official game for the eSports championship, so it can't be too bad. It's definitely the best F1 game to date.
I find with all racing games I've ever played, that people will complain that they are not accurate sims and cars don't drive like that ect ect are normally the guys that struggle for pace. Its an easy excuse.
And what makes me laugh is (as an example) playing F1 2019 in a Ferrari, "The car is crap, it handles all wrong ect ect" . Yeah you know that becasue you've driven a formula one car recently ?!
I find with F1 games, the biggest problem for me is the track limits. Some places you get away with murder, others you can get penalties for 2 wheels off the track on the outside of a corner.
2nd point is a bit odd. Why would Sim racers with hours and hours of experience on r factor assetto corsa and iracing struggle at a game you can even play with a keyboard? I used to play f1 2013 with a keyboard and top online leader boards.
Penultimate point is somewhat naive. Of course no general person knows how a specific f1 car feels in real life. But you have a general idea that (for example) running the lowest down force settings at Monaco isn't the fastest setup. But in code masters f1 games, it is the fastest setup. Add to that the fact that the force feedback in steering wheels often doesn't convey too well the information a driver needs to know if the car is about to snap, is understeering etc. Also to drive at the limit, you often need to do unconventional things in these f1 games, like go full throttle mid corner in a corner that no f1 driver would even dream of putting full throttle even for a short blip. Add to that visual glitches. The tyres don't actually roll on the ground. It's easy to see at the Monaco hairpin. When you go full lock, the front tyres "skate" along the track surface. The pivot point of the car doesn't seem to be at the front wheels like it should. Also have you seen that joke of a pitstop animation? Drivers inputs and angle of the tyres don't even match the direction of the car moving! You'd have thought they'd have fixed this by now!
Those are just a few points. But the biggest one for me is how the cars behave on the track. How the suspension reacts to kerbs and bumps, how the steering wheel movements match up (or don't match) what the car is doing on track.
In a Sim like ac, you instantly feel a difference. The fastest way to drive in ac is the same as real life, and that's by experience. At one time, I was struggling to get some decent laptimes out of the corvette c7.r and so I watched a pov video of one being driven at daytona. That thought me to trail brake into long corners and use more steering lock, since that car has a less sensitive rack compared to (for example) a 911 rsr 2017 gte. Also you can feel every setup change. No cheaty setups will work. Also there is not just one fastest setup like there tends to be with f1 games. You set the car up to suit your driving style, like in real life. Also you can feel when the car is about to snap, when you're getting understeer, when the tyres bite. You can feel all that. And when you overdo it and crash, you're just in awe that the car behaved as you expected. Cars have a weight to them. They don't feel floaty. You can really throw some cars around and get the expected results. For example, in a Sim like AC you can force and inherently understeery car into oversteer by chucking it around, like in real life. A good example of this is the audio qiattro group b car. It will understeer for days but give it a scandi flick or two and it'll happily hold a slide. The original car was notirious for the same thing. This fact was well publicised. Now do i really know if that handling matched the real car one to one? No. And most likely it doesn't. But it certainly handles like a real car, and it's very plausible.
So, are the f1 games a simulator? Yes. They use a physics engine which simulates cars driving on a track, tyre temperatures, fuel levels, engine mixtures (as opposed to an animation based games). (Except for the odd precoded spin and side pod glitches of old. Those weren't physics based)
Are they realistic and accurate? No simulator is truly realistic and accurate. But the f1 games have some way to go to be at the level of r factor, AC and I racing. Grand prix 2, 3, and 4 had more accurate physics than the current f1 games. Also had a proper dynamic wet to dry track cycle where the dry line appeared first. Always a fun challenge to drive that dry line on slicks or inters. This is why the f1 games are often called sincade. Some elements of a simulator and some elements of arcade games
Disclaimer: this post is referring purely to driving dynamics and car handling.
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