Why race the cars when you can manage them? That’s been the premise of Frontier Developments’ F1 Manager series over the course of the last couple of years. And it’ll be the case again as F1 races back to the fore with F1 Manager 2024.
Following on from the creations of F1 Manager 2022 and F1 Manager 2023 comes F1 Manager 24. The officially licensed Formula 1 management game from Frontier Developments will soon take to Xbox, PlayStation and PC, with a July 23rd 2024 release date now known.
Due to be playable across Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5 and PC, F1 Manager 2024 will see Frontier build on what has come before it, as players return to the role of Team Principle, creating their own team and taking to the grid, all in hope of becoming F1 World Champions.
An annual improvement?
As you may expect to hear from an annual drop, the basics will be in place with F1 Manager 2024, but tweaks and new features will also pop up. For the first time, fans can live out their ultimate fantasy by bringing their own team to life, with customisable livery and logo creation tools giving them control of their team’s unique branding. Team Origins provide total customisation of their team’s starting conditions, whether they choose to enter as a total newcomer, or to target an immediate spot amongst the title contenders with major investment and an all-star line-up.
And further to that, Team Principals must also directly manage their stable of sponsors to deliver both engagement opportunities and results to bolster marketability and attract future support.
This should be seen as the pinnacle of motorsport, as F1 Team Principals become responsible for ensuring every individual is motivated and believes in their ability to achieve their goals amidst fierce competition. With the introduction of a new Mentality System, players will have greater understanding than ever before, adding in personal ambitions and characters of their team.
F1 Manager 2024 is all about managing people and personalities. What that means is Team Principals will see the impact of their decisions directly influence drivers and staff mentality; prioritising one car’s performance risks building an inter-team rivalry. Failure to keep stars happy will present rivals with opportunities to poach talent – Hamilton to Ferrari? – disrupting the team’s trajectory towards the top.
Create a legacy
Building their legacy across multiple generations, Team Principals can secure rising stars by recruiting them to the new Affiliates system, allowing young drivers to continue their careers in F2 and F3 whilst receiving training and development from the main F1 team. Fans can experience this evolution of the sport across multiple seasons and plot their own route to the top with the option to simulate entire races, build their credentials in the paddock by making the leap to a competitor, or adjust their challenge with difficulty settings.
And as you’d expect to hear, as the officially licensed F1 management game of the 2024 season, you’ll find visually enhanced circuits taken straight from the official 2024 race calendar. With these you’ll get to execute the perfect strategy; instructing drivers to extract every millisecond of performance. And a tyre wear and temperatures increase, so too does the risk of an incident. Much like their real-world counterparts, players will need to think tactically as they strive to mitigate and capitalise on the ever-evolving challenges and opportunities mechanical failures bring.
You’ll get to take all this in, watching the action unfold from a range of immersive camera angles; feeling the rush of acceleration with Visor-cam, directing the race from trackside and onboard cameras or even taking to the skies with the debut of the strategic Heli-cam view as the simulation brings the racing action to life with greater realism.
Get playing in July
If you have played the previous F1 Manager games, we’d suspect you’ll be there for the launch of F1 Manager 2024 come July 23rd. It’ll be playable on Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4 and PC.
You can get pre-ordering today – either the Standard Edition (£29.99) or the Deluxe Edition (£34.99 with additional Scenarios, Livery Patterns and more) are both on the Xbox Store. Which will you be grabbing?
