F1 25 - Review

It has been a few years since I last put into a F1 game, simply because like every other sports game there is never enough of a change to warrant playing each one. So going into F1 25, I knew that Braking Point would be a big deal for me, but I was keen to see how the rest of the game would shake out. Was the end result a pole finish, or is it nothing but the pits?

There are really four main modes on offer here, three of them are really connected to racing and one is more about the management side of things. Starting off with Braking Point 3, this was going to be the most intriguing part for me, as I have been playing F1 games since 1992’s Nigel Mansell's World Championship Racing on the Super Nintendo, so a story mode was new. As I had not played the first or second entries in this story, I was worried that I was going to miss out on context and I was right. The game did attempt to mitigate this by offering up a recap, but adequate would-be kind. It really didn’t explain who the characters were, nor what was going on, it was just there. Now if you have played the previous entries, then I am sure it would help refresh your memory, but for me, it was not helpful. So, with that played, it was time to jump in and it was ok. The racing you get to do is fine, though I hate with a passion, forced issues that make you lose or have issues. You don’t really get the full racing experience for each course, but rather are dropped in towards the end and then given a goal to meet.

The most frustrating part of Braking Point 3 for me was the cutscenes, as almost all of the characters are stereotypes. There is the guy with money who acts like a guy with money, the young racer who just wants to race, and so on. Some of them do grow by the end of the story, but there are times when listening to a young person tell someone who has been doing this longer than they have been alive, it just feels like a soap opera. What is even weirder is the quality difference throughout it, normally we do visuals later in the review, but it is important here. The game has one-on-one interviews and they look fantastic, it also has cutscenes with characters walking and talking and they look good. But there are also scripted animations that play out and they are stiff, with faces that will haunt your dreams at times. Having three very different quality levels in one mode is bizarre, but the team are car people, so I can understand a little.

Speaking of cars, the other modes are basically racing and managing. Driver Career is just that, a career as a racer and players can opt to start at F2 and work their way up or just jump right in at the top. Much like other sports-based career games, you will play through the season, earning points and trying to prove you’re the best. You play as your own character and then can either jump into an existing team, or bring one of the two made up teams into the series, one is from Braking Point and the other, the upcoming F1 movie. You will deal with all the things real racers do between races and then on the weekends where you get to drive, you will set laps, earn a starting position and then race for the flag. The nice thing is that you can change the settings before you begin, allowing you to enjoy a short version of the season or even the full thing, just know that last one will take time.

The management side of things is interesting, if only because I couldn’t help but compare it to F1 Manager from Frontier. In this mode you are not the driver but are the manager and everything has to be decided by you, that includes which driver get the lead spot in a race. It also includes budgets, R&D, sponsorship deals and personal management. Spending to much time focused on one area can impact how much you are aware of others, so it is a fine balancing act. With the two modes and then Braking Point on top of that, there are many ways to play the game, which brings me to the actual racing part, it is ok. Now I am not a F1 driver, I am not a race car driver of any means, but I was able to get around the tracks here without too much hassle. The game offers a few presets, casual will literally turn on everything to support you, so the only thing you need to do is press down the accelerator and steer, no braking need. The normal turns off some of those and increases the AI levels and of course you can bump it up more or just tweak settings to find your perfect balance.

Once you hit the track and race, things become standard fare. You just race around the circuits, trying to get the best times you can and then move on, its fairly standard stuff. What would have been amazing is if the game explained half the things that happen. In almost every race DRS would show up on screen, but the game never explains what that is. I am sure F1 folks know it, but that is not me and it was not the only thing that was not explained. There were a few times in the early races of my career where I would be penalised for hitting another car, when they hit me and it made no sense to me. That to me is the Leg-before-wicket rule in cricket, likely meant something decades ago, but is utter trash now. Thankfully, if you can ignore all the rules of the sport, then you will have a good time, learning the courses and finding the lines, it is good and if you mess up rewind is there to help you out.

I said before that the faces in Braking Point are weird, but the rest of the game is mostly free from issues, which I like. Now this is no surprise, but the team making the games have been doing so for 16 years now, so they know a thing or two about them. What this means is that the cars look great, no matter the shot, they look good. There were even times, especially in the drive out from the pits in the TV presentation, where I wasn’t sure if it was game or footage from an actual race. The tracks themselves look good, though there are a number of that had flickering barries and trees along their sides, which were quite distracting. The team have made a big deal about LIDAR being used on some tracks, which would likely mean something to anyone who played last years game, but I couldn’t tell the difference visually between what track was scanned through LIDAR and what was not.

Sounds are good, the cars sound great, especially again in TV viewing mode where you get to hear them coming towards and then race past camera. When you are racing, either behind the car or from within, there is a lot of variety to the engine noise, which I like. Perhaps the most annoying thing about the audio is that the guy who tells you about timings, placements and other race updates is fairly bland. They also have this really weird habit of saying things like “I have an update for you” and then just never speaking again. There are some audio cut out issues, usually around when lead times are presented, but they are not super common and if you have subtitles on, you will still get the information. The Braking Point cast does a decent job of making me care about their characters, thanks to the vocal performances, the story still is weird at times.

F1 25 was a fun game to play, as I said it had been years since I last played one and this was a good reintroduction to the series. The Braking Point 3 story was fine, but unless you know exactly what happened in the previous ones, you are likely to be left confused for most of it. The actual racing in any mode is fun, though I question how much of it has changed since F1 2020. My Team is a great addition and while not as in-depth as F1 Manager, it does a solid job of keeping you busy across the season. Fans of past games will likely spot the improvements the team have made, that is not me, so it was all new as far as I was concerned. For those casual players, there are enough assists to ensure you can still land pole position and for those who want the challenge, that is there as well. F1 25 is not reinventing the wheel, but it is polishing it up and for now that is enough.

The Score

8.0

Review code provided by Electronic Arts

The Pros

Racing is still good fun, being able to tweak the assists to your desired choices is a nice touch

Braking Point 3 tells an ok story and fans will likely be happy with the end result…

The Cons

… but it doesn’t really explain what came in the past ones in a way that really matters

There are a number of visual and audio issues that mar the experience