F1 2019 Game Review

While I’m not exactly a game reviewer, I am a big gamer, with a particular fondness of racing games, so why not write a review for F1 2019?

One of the first things you’ll probably notice when starting up F1 2019 is the inclusion of F2, something I’ve wanted in F1 games for years, so in the career mode you start off in F2 and then move up to F1. The F2 part of the career mode isn’t a full campaign, it’s three fairly short scenarios; some laps at Catalunya with a failed turbo, some laps of Austria after an accident, with fresh tyres, chasing down your rival, and finally a race in Abu Dhabi for the championship. There are cutscenes between each of these scenarios and how they play out depends on what happens within the race scenarios.

I would have liked to play a little more F2, it’s a fun little campaign to get started before F1, more of a story mode than a career but it’s a good way to get into the game and keeps it fun. The F2 campaign also features two fictional F2 rivals, who will also progress into F1 as you do, the first time proper driver changes have happened in the Codemasters F1 games.

I play the game on a fairly good spec gaming PC, with a Logitech G29 steering wheel, so the game is about as good as it can look, and it looks fantastic. The rain effects are incredible, but also very, very difficult to see where you’re going when following other cars, realistic at least, but also very hard to not crash.

The cars feel good to drive, the F2 cars are surprisingly difficult and in fact harder to drive than the F1 cars are, it’s good. I recorded a bit of footage from the game as well, I’m not great but I’m better than average. I did a few time trial laps of Silverstone in the F2 car to start off, takes a bit of getting used to, harder to drive than the F1 car and tends to understeer, which is my excuse for the many wide lines and missed apexes…

I also tried driving Monaco, at midnight, in heavy rain, and I am absolutely horrific in rain. I cannot drive in rain at all, no matter what I do I just slide around everywhere, and as you can see, I often can’t even see much. I’ve never been great in the rain, and it’s very obvious in the video, but it was still rather fun, even if horrifically slow…

Finally, I tried a quick race around Austria in the Brawn BGP001, with the entire field being the same car, and it was a very fun race. The AI were lots of fun, not easy to overtake, a bit bumpy but most of that was my fault, and a good bit of side by side driving. There was a weird little bug at the end where the steering wheel shook (mine didn’t, just the one in the game), but nothing that really matters. Easily my favourite quick race so far, though I am yet to get properly into the career mode.

In short, F1 2019 is fun, F2 is fun, career is fun, the game looks great, lots of minor improvements over F1 2018, buy it if you want it, don’t buy it if you don’t want it.