major issues for me: too easy to set competitive times out the box. yes, i am a seasoned online racer, but i start a season in Lotus (backmarker at best) and managed to set 12th in qualifying with every difficulty setting set to maximum, all driving assists turned off and tyre and brake temp simulation turned on full. FAIL. I agree that it ashould be possible for counter-strikers to play this and enjoy it, but there should be a "realistic" option, that sets the difficulty up to a realistic level. I don't believe for a second that Heikki Kovalleinen can take turns 20 and 21 at Bahrain at the same speed as the McLaren's or Red Bulls. maybe i'm just too good (lol) but i very much doubt it. For those wanting accurate and realistic challenges for driving F1 cars, i would go back to the MMG Mod for rFactor or Race07, or try the Ferrari Virtual Academy. As for online "play", it is very much an evolution of GRID, which i personally think although flawed as a simulating driving game, has a very solid online platform. F1 2010 takes that to the next level, with some minor bugs... you go to custom GP, then find sessions. It gives you a list of sessions in play, but when you join them it says no. It's because you can only join sessions which are currently in the lobby, but shows you all the sessions in the list regardless of whether they are in game or not. A bit pants. to get around this, instead of joining the session and waiting for the time out, view the host's gamer card in GFWL, and it shows you what session they're in, you can them choose to join if in lobby, or ignore if not. improvements needed: >more session info, to get around problem explained above. >ability to join sessions whilst in pratice/qualy sessions. This would enable sessions to fill up a bit better, currently because of problems explained above, you only get 4-5 drivers on average per race, when there really should be more. >a higher difficulty setting, with grip levels reduced to about 90% of what they are in game. I belive that this would drop laptimes frm an experienced driver like myself, to more realistic levels, and make it more difficult to stay in a straight line. I dont believe for a second that you can floor the throttle in 1st gear with a touch of steering lock and NOT spin. In real life, you'd be in the barriers. just my 2c
but SOOOO much time has gone into making it as realistic as possible in every other way... why not an UBER difficulty setting.. i don't think the game needs to be re-coded, but the grip levels on expert are just too easy. It's actually easier to spin out in a Dodge Viper in GRID than it is in an F1 car in F1 2010.. both games based on the same game engine.. that doesn't fit in my book.
I'm a n00b racer and i really enjoy it but i agree with djDEATH that it shouldn't be difficult to include a 'realism' difficulty setting.
Good idea, except that Codemasters have clearly gone for making a significant durability difference between the prime and option tyres that's not always seen at the real races this year. We've seen drivers go for 70%+ distance on the soft options - something that the game won't let you do. So starting on the option tyres means you can struggle to get more than 8 laps life in Brazil and be forced to pit with other drivers. It's essential it's sorted out in a patch. More importantly for me, not so much a bug but certainly a major gripe is the timing displayed in the actual races. You only get the sector splits and the +- differences between lap times for other drivers. Not only is that a rare sight on the TV captions but you don't get the far more useful gaps between drivers/how far back drivers are behind the leader as is standard when watching on the TV for pretty much every lap.
agreed. simply a gap to car in front, gap to car behind would suffice, just like other racing games/sims. i think this is a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation, because unlike real simulations, this game has a much broader appeal, like trying to make something that caters for everyone, there were always going to be omissions. I have to say that i had not noticed the times being generated artificially, i did notice that i was able to keep pace with a Mclaren whilst driving the Lotus, what i didn't realise is that the lap i supposedly followed him, he set a time about 2.5 seconds faster than me, yet was never more than five or six car lengths in front of me. if you keep it simple though, and race online against other people, i do think that it works very well, tyres do run out, you do need to pit, and there is a very clear difference in driving style from out the box, to warm tyres to ruined tyres. my personal preference in the 20% or above races, is to start on the prime, that way, you keep pace with people on the option tyres, stay out when their tyres degrade, then pit at 70% distance to finish on low fuel and good tyres, that way your laptimes improve througyhout the race, and you avoid the everyone pitting together scenario. I know in real life the statisticians stick with the option then prime, but in this game, the best strategy is prime then option. Remember, there isn't the difficulty in overtaking you see in real life, and online players make many mistakes. the slower harder tyres make less of a difference than just being a decent driver. as a result, i have a 90% win ratio on my online profile, that is i have played 10 races, and won 9 of them.
