F1 2016 Codemasters F1 2016 Revealed

[Paul Jeffrey]

Following recent leaked shots of the new Formula One racing game, Codemasters have finally made their official reveal of the latest instalment for the popular racing franchise.

Due for release on PlayStation®4, Xbox One and Windows PC (DVD and via Steam) this summer, F1 2016 goes some way to addressing the many issues and missing details reported following the less than popular release of 2015's version of the game. In direct response to the outcry around dropping any kind of career mode within 2015, Codemasters promise the new game will feature "the most immersive career mode we’ve ever featured". Spanning an impressive 10 full seasons, the new career mode will include more focus on car development as players can directly influence the performance enhancing upgrades brought to the team over the course of a season. One assumes the relative performance of each team will rise and fall during the duration of a players career as your virtual world develops season on season.

One particular omission from the last game makes a welcome return to F1 2016 - the Mercedes Safety Car is back! Mirroring real life Formula One the new game will also include the use of a Virtual Safety Car alongside the traditional on track car and further as yet unannounced features to follow. Principal Game Designer Lee Mather said “With the re-introduction of the Safety Car as well as the addition of the Virtual Safety Car for the very first time, we are creating the most complete F1™ experience ever. This, combined with several features that are yet to be announced, should excite fans of the game and FORMULA ONE™.”

Mather continued-

“F1 2016 is a massive step forward for the franchise. The new career mode sits at the heart of the game and allows gamers to create their own legend over a career that can span for up to a massive ten seasons. Beyond improving upon the fastest and most thrilling on-track racing experience in gaming, F1 2016 uniquely offers the drama and vehicle development that goes on behind the scenes. A rich car upgrade system is fully integrated into a new and deep practice development programme which mirrors the tests carried out by the teams in real life.”

F1 2016 will feature all the teams, drivers and circuits of the 2016 Formula One World Championship including the new for 2016 street circuit in Baku, Azerbaijan. A new hospitality area feature in career mode makes its debut in F1 2016, adding further flavour for players wishing to immerse themselves in the world of Formula One. The team over at Codemasters have created a fully captured and voice-acted Research and Development Engineer and Player Agent to act as a central hub, where gamers earn Research and Development credits from the race sessions from to spend on upgrading their team's car.

It looks like Codemasters have made a considerable effort to rectify some of the mistakes and disappointments found in previous versions of the game as they aim to address a perceived decline in quality of recent Formula One titles over the last few years.

Let's hope 2016 lives up to expectations...

Check out our Codemasters F1 Series forum for news and discussion regarding F1 2016 and look back at previous title's from the series with all the best mods and setups.



Do you think F1 2016 will improve on previous versions, or is it more of the same? Looking forward to the release? instabuy? Let us know in the comments section below!

 

[Marcos Santi]

Looks a great game like was F1 2015, but I think that only one season is too little for a F1 game, I would like to see at last 5 seasons, it would be great. A career mode with 10 seasons with always the same cars and drivers looks little immersive.

 

[Bjorn de Haas]

Will ai drivers change teams during the 10 year long careermode??

 

[BoogerMac]

Will ai drivers change teams during the 10 year long careermode??

I seriously doubt FIA would ever let this happen in a game. I hope I'm wrong, but based on their track record, not gonna happen.

If this game is half as good as F1 2012, I'll buy it as soon as possible.

 

[billymitchell]

I'm hopeful because Codies did that survey a few months ago, which at least gave everyone a chance to let their voice be heard. Potentially it can backfire if they just tackle the most common requests, because the 'common Codies racer' may not know what's best for him or herself or can't come up with the ideas they'd most enjoy.

For example, their F1 titles are perhaps the most approachable on PC and let casual drivers use fast cars. Lots of us have race rigs that our friends want to tryout, or even compete in hot seat sessions to see who can drive a Red Bull fastest around Monaco.

Where's a full timing sheet for us to compare our lap times?
If they put in said timing sheet, can I distinguish between setups used and perhaps even the physical driver that did each lap?

With triple-screen setups becoming more common and VR in the horizon, multiple people using the same sim rig in a F1 session will become more common. And F1 is a sport defined by competition, so hey Codies, make it easier for us to compete! Including something like that must be a million times easier than AI algorithms, dynamic time of day, or a helmet editor.

Will it happen? Probably not. And that's the real shame, forgetting the roots of the sport which is who can go around a track the quickest in the fastest race cars.

Enjoy that helmet editor, folks. Maybe Codies will put in a league to let people strive for the best design!

 

[Deleted member 130869]

I wonder how they'll get around sorting T-Cams for 2017 with the new cockpit protection device. It's going to be a tough sell to drive a game like that.

 

[Mantas Jokubauskas]

Quick explanation about 10 season career:
The teams will be the same, but the team performance will change from season to season (also depends on your R&D points). Even after one season ends other teams can improve their cars, so let's say you start career in Manor and after a few seasons they can fight with Mercedes and Ferrari for the title! Or maybe not even Mercedes or Ferrari, maybe even Force India or McLaren, if these teams do R&D good and other does not... You get the idea.

 

[gamer19]

Don't want to repeat what some others said, I, as a true T-cam lover (I have done my onboard cameras mod for F1 2014 and it was by far most downloaded mod in that field, sadly F1 2015 wasn't moddable in that way - only cockpit cam is in game moveable) hope and pray that they allow us to edit T-cam (and all the others perhaps, why not?) or at least... give us real T-cam angles and RIGHT FOV. Not ashamed to say... I love to drive from T-cam. And I'm not the only one. And I believe that T-cam driving will become more popular now, in light of that *hitty solution - halo implementation.
Their F1 2015 have T-cam too little angle toward to the ground and too big FOV.And you could trust my opinion, remember that mod of mine...

The rest is good to read, like Safety car return but let's wait and hope they will indeed implement all this, not give up due... the lack of time or something like this.

 

[Charlie Fishykins]

I played F1 2014 I believe, and I literally wanted to kill Codemasters after playing it. I had a better F1 experience in GRID autosport lmao, and Project Cars F1 cars and Open Wheel cars work a treat. Even so I will still purchase it for the sake of my games collection and atleast give it a shot before hating on it.

 

[gamer19]

Well, you can say anything you want but F1 2015 was quite improvement from F1 2014 to me.
If only those T-cams were editable...
The biggest difference to me was Force Feedback feeling, then graphic aspect of the game, which look much better and much closer to real-life pictures.
Here are two unedited at all random pics from two different track and different time condition, to prove my point. I just hope '16 could continue this... graphical uplift.

Real life pics or not the question is now.

 

[Jonas Bögemann]

Honestly I think that all games excepting F1 2014 were rather robust, although Career mode went down with every new title, until it vanished in F1 2015 xD
The driving in F1 2015 was great, a bit more realism in it than in the previous entries, but there was simply not much content.

The thing with racing games is that the usual player expects instant success, in F1 games were you are supposed to work your way from the bottom to the top, this is rather tricky.

 

[Sele1981]

VR and OSW support and I´ll take a closer look

 

[Boby Kim]

With Dirt Rally CM proved that are able to create good physics but an solid F1 game is another ballgame. To me, the F1 series always felt like pure console clones. I do hope they closed the gap with F1 2016. Im not buying on the fly. First i want to see how the AI works in general during weather conditions, pitstops, yellow and blue flags, gameplay features that are more important to me than beautiful graphics. And for the MP players...will there be dedicated servers?

 

[BBFred]

Won't buy until I can be sure they have TrackIR support back into the engine.
I'm quite excited about the new Free Practice ideas, just hoping we'll get all 3 full FP sessions.

 

[Enagee]

Speaking as an online racer, only thing that would interest me is if they implement serious penalty/rating system. Its the only thing missing in 99% of all racing sims/games, Only iracing has this and you have to pay.

They need to help players grow up and teach racing etiquette...F1 is the worst game to have crashes, slight touch and damage.. turns serious racers to other titles where driving is more matured.

Too many Maldonado's playing F1 kills the game,

Feel the game is more about $£ ....Maldonado is planing a come back

 

[Marcos Santi]

Won't buy until I can be sure they have TrackIR support back into the engine.
I'm quite excited about the new Free Practice ideas, just hoping we'll get all 3 full FP sessions.

You really will be patient to pass 4 hours playing practices before the classification and race? I think that few people will play a full practice honestly, this is not important in my opinion.

 

[BBFred]

You really will be patient to pass 4 hours playing practices before the classification and race? I think that few people will play a full practice honestly, this is not important in my opinion.

Hi Marcos,

I respect your point, but whenever I play a season I want to play it to the full. Having the 3 FPs means to me getting (re)acquainted with the track in FP1 if it were back, and test the hard tyres. Then medium and/or soft tyre tests in FP2, then concentrate on Quali pace in FP3...

I don't mind going round 'n' round the same circuit for days if it actually means something... In F1 2013 I logged 370 hours just for 1 season, and I had to "cheat", going thro time trial on every track to get enough practice, in order to be competitive... Nuts heh, but that's how I get my kick.

Anyway, why can't we have the best of both worlds ? Used to be that way in the 1st instalments of the series.

 

[Jonas Bögemann]

I think a title that calls itself the officially licensed product of the 2016 season needs to have every part of a raceweekend in it. They should also add the official testdays.
But being able to customise the raceweeked is as important.

 

[Jimlaad43]

My feeling for this is the same as 2015. I won't be buying it, but I would not complain if anyone bought it for me.

 

[methtical]

i keep playing f1 2014 just for the seasons mode. i hope the R&D will actually make the car faster and introduce new parts that will actually benefit the car. the r&d tests in 2015 i found were nothing more then mini games in a single race. never actually seen any real improvement. also this is the last year codemasters has a license for the game no? they better be pulling out all the stops.

 

[KevNOVA]

Won't buy until I can be sure they have TrackIR support back into the engine.
I'm quite excited about the new Free Practice ideas, just hoping we'll get all 3 full FP sessions.

Dude we got full 3 FPs in F1 2015 already..