F1 Manager 2022 – Review

From the moment I heard about F1 Manager 2022, I have been eagerly awaiting each new announcement and gameplay trailer.

It isn’t just that I’m Laptop Mag’s resident racing nut and have reviewed F1 22 and Gran Turismo 7 with the Thrustmaster T248 (and probably boring all the team with my rants about Ferrari strategy). But also because I’ve been craving a serious racing management simulation ever since 2016’s Motorsport Manager.

On the surface, this appears to be the complete package; it features authentic-feeling production values, a wealth of options and data, and strategic race day action. Let’s put that theory to the test.

Across the board, F1 Manager 2022 performed superbly. My Asus TUF Gaming F15, equipped with a 12th Gen Intel Core i7 and an RTX 3060, was able to run the game at a smooth 60 frames per second at Ultra.

A 60 fps frame rate on high was achieved with some minor stuttering on my old Asus ROG Zephyrus G15 equipped with a GTX 1650 and 3rd Generation AMD Ryzen 5.

We still need clarification on how it operates on Steam Deck. That’s why the correct response is “pretty good!” I’ve spent a lot of time immersed in this on the many train rides across the country, where the frame rate stays steady at 50-60FPS on medium settings.

Nonetheless, this has highlighted a problem that Steam Deck and console users can’t get around: manager games on consoles are awkward to operate. Games that rely heavily on menus and statistics are best played with a keyboard and mouse. Even with the most streamlined user interface and button shortcuts, navigating with a pad can be a cumbersome experience.

You boot it up and put yourself in charge of a team as the leader. The genuineness of the setting and atmosphere is immediately striking. You’ll be impressed by the care taken with the visuals and soundtrack.

It looks and sounds fantastic for a management game, with voiceovers from the drivers and team members (plus some commentary from Crofty) helping to immerse you in the action.

Special kudos go to the animations of the characters, which drive home the feeling of joy or horror experienced by the crew depending on whether or not your plans succeed.

The game’s menus and options are also well designed, so you can easily access all the features you have access to (which are many more than the trailer makes it seem). The user interface is simple to navigate, with all options and information readily available.

The impressive level of depth and stakes to each decision you make demonstrates that this is a labour of love for the Frontier team.

The goal is straightforward: increase the size of your team, compete successfully, and satisfy the board of directors. The methods for doing so are delightfully data-driven, keeping any management sim fan happily hooked on squeezing every last drop of potential out of your team by monitoring everything from vehicle performance to facility upgrades to employee morale.

Playing strategically with long-term objectives in mind is rewarded. In the short term, monitoring time splits and communicating with drivers to conserve ERS energy in preparation for a perfectly timed overtake are crucial.

Even more important are the medium and long term goals, which include working on the current car’s improvements as well as planning and doing research for the car of next year. There’s a tonne of information about things like downforce, grip, speed, temperature, and durability included with the presentation.

It’s hard to find a gaming genre that can compare to the overwhelming sense of accomplishment you get when you finally get a handle on everything you need to do and see all your plans come together in a competitive car that starts to rise up the ranks.

To begin, the learning curve is extremely steep, despite the existence of a fairly good tutorial covering the fundamentals. Don’t get me wrong; I value the meticulousness with which you plan, and the fact that you must divide your attention between short-, medium-, and long-term goals gives you a great sense of satisfaction when your efforts bear fruit. However, I can see how newcomers to the genre and even seasoned players unfamiliar with the sport might feel lost.

First, let’s look at the logic of artificially intelligent races. Some drivers act in a peculiar manner, especially when they are in a safety car. During my weekend in Monaco, I was told there had been a multi-car accident, but it turned out to be just Sergio Perez’s Red Bull stopping in the middle of the track for no apparent reason.

As a result, it influences the tactics employed by the AI squad as well. F1 races are exciting not just because of what happens on the track, but also because of what happens between the pits, as teams change strategies on the fly in order to undercut one another by, for example, pitting their drivers for fresh soft tyres under the safety car. With the exception of extreme weather, this rarely occurs because all competing teams essentially employ the same basic strategies. I wish there was more responsive AI, which would force you to deviate from your initial race plan.

There was a regress in driving ability at the end. Legends, too, tend to decline with age, but judging by the current crop of drivers, including Alonso and Ricciardo, this trend does not appear to be present. Even though their abilities should be diminishing with age, older drivers can be particularly powerful due to the statistical boost that comes from their accumulated years of experience.

Frontier did address this in a recent Reddit post by rebalancing retirement ages, but this may compound the problem somewhat, as the time drivers call it a day will now be based solely on age rather than ability.

FIFA has already addressed this issue by implementing a gradual decline in player performance after the peak age, but without a limit on driver ratings based on age, the game remains unbalanced and some features, such as scouting for new talent, may become unnecessary until retirement is announced.

The fact that this is Frontier’s first attempt at an F1 Manager game explains a lot of the issues. The development team did a great job of taking into account the many suggestions and comments made by players, but there is still far too much work to be done before a racing management simulation can be considered complete.

At the outset of this review, I mentioned how badly I wanted a realistic racing management simulation. After being scratched by F1 Manager 22, it’s completely bare (gross analogy I know, but you get the point).

There are issues, some of which are inevitable given the game’s status as an extremely detailed management simulator, such as a steep learning curve. Some of the AI’s strange behaviour on the track and a lack of intuitiveness for making strategic decisions during the race are not so positive.

However, if you want the best of Football Manager and the thrill of Formula 1, F1 Manager 22 is a terrifyingly addictive simulation that sets a high bar for the sequel.