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I’m
happy to believe that the concept of all that is F1 was first
started by two very rich men having an argument over the
theoretically perfect way to race. Of course, the only way to test
this would be to build a car with virtually no ground clearance,
very little or preferably no air resistance, one massive, but
perfect engine and get one idiot to sit in the front and drive it.
Once you get to this stage of a stream lined
rocket on four wheels, the only thing left to perfect is driving the
thing - and this is where F1 2005 really starts to show its
complex construct. F1 2005 has honed the formula of all
racing games gone before it; not because of the game design or even
playability, but because this is the most sophisticated F1 game
available and F1 cars, by design, are at the pinnacle of everything
that is racing.
I’ve
never driven a F1 car and I can assume that 99% of the people that
will play this game haven’t either, so the fact that this game is
made by the same people that brought us the most realistic driving
simulator ever means we may need a little bit of help getting
started. There is plenty of help for us ailing beginners in the form
of “Driving Aids”; these are just simple little enhancements
which if put on any other driving game would seem demeaning a
pointless, but if you feel even slightly daunted by the prospect of
taking full control of what might as well be a complete,
functioning, scaled representation of a F1 car, they are a necessary
if not essential. When I first started this game I noticed these
“aids” and decided as I have played many a racing game they were
pretty much beneath me; about halfway into my first race and I
decided that not only was I a danger to all those racing me, but
also if I want to beat them I’d need every little bit of
assistance this game could possibly give me.
Sure
enough once I’d turned on the “Breaking Assistance”, the
“Steering Assistance”, the “Spin Recovery”, the “Anti-lock
Breaks”, the “Traction Control”, ”Damage Protection” and
the “Virtual Racing Line”, I was able to get all around the
track without crashing or being lapped once, something I felt good
reason to be very chuffed about. The emphasis being this game is
hard, well not so much hard - more a complex construct. As I started
winning races with these aids on and started finding it relatively
easy, I took off the steering aid and went straight back to square
one, I was still able to keep up with the  pack
but just didn’t have the skill to work my way through it, slowly
though I was able to fine tune my driving ability to win like this
and even went on to take off the many other varied aids to reach a
degree a competence.
That
is a great thing about this game; the learning curve is only there
to the degree that people need it. It is actually designed to bring
you up to the level of the game, as opposed to the way many games of
this generation seem to have been forcibly designed - to slowly work
the game up to your level of competence.
Once
you have mastered the whole driving side of this game, or while
you’re mastering it, there are lots of different modes to try out,
the aids will work with every single one of them even the time trial
so there’s no need to worry on that score. There’s the old quick
race for those that just want a quickie, you and a full grid of
others in a quick race to the finish. Then there’s the one player
this allows you to choose to do one Race, a Weekend Race, or a
Championship. There’s a more thorough option with the Career Mode.
This mode starts you right from the beginning of a F1 career; you
design yourself giving you the usual options of Name, Nationality,
and Appearance with a completely new optio n
for long time fans of the F1 franchise, an Eye-Toy
Cameo. Using your Eye-Toy to make a mask of your face you may
continue to then place it onto your chosen driver, for that extra
edge of customisability. You then go to your Managerial Screen,
which gives you access to the real-time centre of your operations.
Through this screen you can get to your e-mail inbox, your only way
of contact with the outside world, the Recruitment centre - where
you will need to start to even think about driving a F1 car, and an
Information centre - telling you everything you might think you need
to know whilst in this mode. There’s also an Advance Time option
for when you’ve done all you need to and are just waiting for the
next race to start. This mode is huge; there are three jobs to apply
for at the beginning and depending on how well you do in the races
you get promoted, demoted and get other job opportunities. With the
option of scaling the race lengths from 10% to real-time and
therefore the tyre wear and fuel consumption, you can really control
how long this process takes. As you go through the Career Mode you
will obtain Career Points, which will unlock various Cars, Tracks
and Helmets, these add to the already large range available. The
other modes can unlock objects in this menu too.
One
of the other huge modes in this game is the Online Mode. Now that
Slimline PlayStation2 has an
Ethernet
Port
built-in many hundreds more people are taking their systems online,
why not join them and show off the driving skills you have. There is
the ability to allow or disallow the many “Driving Aids”, and
alternate the scaling of the race lengths so you can set up an
Internet Tournament for which ever skill level you choose, the other
variable options like the weather and even how people line up for
the grid really enhances the intricacy of the game. Of course
there’s always the two-player option for those who just want a
rumble with a mate - still many variable options to choose from, but
great fun for a quick run about.
Graphically
this game is smooth and slick. There is a small amount of fogging
when you pull into a long stretch, but with the sheer amount of
detail in the foreground at the speed at which the game plays you
barely notice it. The sound has had a lot put into it as well, when
you’re really focusing on the game as you take corners at 90 miles
an hour the sound actually gets you believing you could be sitting
in that driving seat.
This
game is a complete and finalized piece of art; everything has been
worked on and worked over again and again to bring out the perfect
homage to what F1 is. If you have ever sat and watched an F1 race
and thought that being part of that would be cool, you will
experience it in this game. Although I really haven’t summed up
everything that makes this game so good, this is, as I have said,
what I consider to be the pinnacle of F1 games and therefore at the
very peak of the entire real-racing genre.
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