The Grand Tour season is in full effect and on the back of the recent Giro comes the biggest bike race in the world – the Tour de France. But it’s not just the real world cyclists who are looking to grab their lycra, for yet again Nacon and Cyanide Studios are bringing Le Tour into the virtual world with release of Tour de France 2022, and Pro Cycling Manager 2022 alongside it.
Available to purchase and download today on Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, PS5 and PC is Tour de France 2022. There are both Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S versions – priced at £41.74. Complementing it and available for PC players only, is also Pro Cycling Manager 2022. If you want to know more about the games, perhaps understanding the difference between the two, check out our full exclusive interview with Cyanide Studios – we got time to chat to them ahead of launch.
Following on in the yearly tradition of Tour de France games, TDF 2022 sees Nacon and Cyanide delivering no less than 14,000 km of competitive bike racing, as players get the opportunity to take in four game modes – including the new Race of the Moment – with the usual licensing of rider and team names in place.
You’ll find that TDF 2022 is being seen as the best Tour de France game yet, covering the new 2022 course and all 21 of the official stages that the likes of Wout van Aert, Roglic, Pogacar and co will be traversing. The new teams will be in place too, ensuring that any bike fanatic is well catered for.
There’s more than before in TDF 2022 though – the much requested Race Incidents are now included which should mean that riders can actually fall off their bike for the first time ever, causing crashes (we hope). A new AI system is in the peloton too, and this should mean that breakaways have more than a little hope of holding off the chasing pack. When you throw in the cobbled sections of a variety of Classics – yep, this ain’t just about Le Tour – then hopes that this could finally deliver what the cyclists want is high.
The key features in all include:
- New game mode: Tour de France 2022 introduces the all-new Race of the Moment mode, in which players can compare their results online with others in ranked weekly challenges.
- The new official course of the 2022 Tour de France: like previous years, players can race around France, this year starting from Denmark. All 21 official new stages are in the game, including the time trial in Copenhagen to start, then Lille Métropole – Arenberg Porte du Hainaut and its cobbled sections, the iconic Hautacam climb in the 18th stage, and the final flat stage on the famous Avenue des Champs-Elysées in Paris.
- More varied racing situations: the game’s artificial intelligence now offers a wider range of behaviours, which are better tailored to races and events. Players will experience early breakaways more often and enjoy better collaboration in breakaways.
- New classic inspired by a famous Italian race: the Primavera Classic.
- New playable teams: Eolo-Kometa Cycling Team, Caja Rural-Seguros RGA and Uno-X Pro Cycling Team join the game for the first time.
- Race incidents: players now have the option to enable or disable falls and illnesses as well as set the frequency when enabled. The consequences vary depending on the severity of the incident.
- Race preparation: this new system randomly selects five cyclists to be well prepared and five others who could potentially underperform. This encourages players to keep a close eye on their competitors as well as their own team.
- More immersive cobbled sections: when racing on these difficult sections, the user interface shudders, just like cyclists experience in real life. Players have never experienced the Arenberg trench like this before.
You’ll find Tour de France 2022 on the usual stores for Xbox One, Xbox Series X|S, PS4, PS5 and PC. The Xbox Store being our favourite.
But there’s more, particularly if you’re a PC player, with the joint arrival of Pro Cycling Manager 2022. This moves more into the stats, letting you combine management with real-time racing. It’s got upwards of 260 races to partake in, 680 stages and all the depth you could ever want.
We’d still prefer if Nacon and Cyanide started integrating the two games into one big console and PC bundle, but if you’re one for the numbers and have PC access, it’s probably worth checking out Pro Cycling Manager 2022 too.
Stay tuned for some full review thoughts of how Tour de France 2022 plays on Xbox Series X|S in the coming days. We’re hoping it builds on all those Tour de France games from the years gone by.
Game Description:
Become a legend In Tour de France 2022, you can create your own cyclist in Pro Leader mode. Choose your profile (climber, sprinter, puncher or versatile) and become a future winner of the Grande Boucle or a specialist of the great classics! Take control of a team in Pro Team mode! You start at the lowest levels and must prove yourself to receive invitations from organizers to high-profile races. Create your own tour with My Tour mode and the 92 stages available. Choose teams, rest days and stages to build your own unique tour.
