Submitted article: Review of Psygnosis' "Formula 1"

eytl · Post by **eytl** » 07 Jun 2014, 01:49

Hi everyone,

The new content keeps on coming!

Forum member "TomPryce" has written a review of the classic 1996 console game by Psygnosis and Bizarre Creations (based on the 1995 season), "Formula 1" - the game which begun a series which has continued to this day (albeit produced by different companies). Complete with Murray Walker's commentary and the ability to drive Fortis, Simteks and Pacifics and compete against legends like Deletraz, Lavaggi, Montermini and Inoue, this game was full of reject goodness!

http://www.f1rejects.com/centrale/submitted/psygnosisf1/index.html

(Whilst this game is clearly terrific, having never owned a game console until we got a Wii last year, I must admit I was always a devotee of PC games instead, especially the awesome "Grand Prix 2" and its sequels. And before that, anyone around here old enough to remember "Accolade F1"?)

Cheers,
Enoch

P.S. Enjoy the content overload while it lasts. I suspect it may dry up over the next month due to the round-ball kick-about in Brazil.

UncreativeUsername37 · Post by **UncreativeUsername37** » 07 Jun 2014, 01:56

eytl wrote:(Whilst this game is clearly terrific, having never owned a game console until we got a Wii last year, I must admit I was always a devotee of PC games instead, especially the awesome "Grand Prix 2" and its sequels. And before that, anyone around here old enough to remember "Accolade F1"?)

You mean Grand Prix Circuit?

Shizuka · Post by **Shizuka** » 07 Jun 2014, 06:07

Nice article. The devs went on to create one of my favourite racing games of all time... Metropolis Street Racer on the Dreamcast!

eytl · Post by **eytl** » 07 Jun 2014, 06:23

UgncreativeUsergname wrote:
eytl wrote:(Whilst this game is clearly terrific, having never owned a game console until we got a Wii last year, I must admit I was always a devotee of PC games instead, especially the awesome "Grand Prix 2" and its sequels. And before that, anyone around here old enough to remember "Accolade F1"?)

You mean Grand Prix Circuit?

Yeah that's the one!

Post by **Miguel98** » 07 Jun 2014, 08:51

That was an interesting read.

I've actually never played the original Formula 1 game. The first F1 game I played was F1 2000, and after that, only about 10 years later would I actually get back into F1, games wise at least.

Julien · Post by **Julien** » 07 Jun 2014, 20:05

A quick note: Grand Prix 2 had the official Formula 1 license, and it was 3D as well. It also predates this one IIRC.

TomPryce · Post by **TomPryce** » 07 Jun 2014, 20:53

Julien wrote:A quick note: Grand Prix 2 had the official Formula 1 license, and it was 3D as well. It also predates this one IIRC.

Holy crap, I owned that game. I had totally forgotten, but it was on an old PC my family bought second hand. I feel a fool. Sorry :oops:

dr-baker · Post by **dr-baker** » 07 Jun 2014, 21:12

Definitely agree in the article that the 1995 Ferrari is a thing of beauty.

MrMG · Post by **MrMG** » 07 Jun 2014, 21:38

Great article

Loved that game.

Something to mention is whilst the default qualifying times are the real 1995 ones, if you let Qualiying run for a while, eventually the AI start setting faster times. If you quit Qualifying, the times remain static. This means if Inoue or Deletraz go fastest, you can just go straight to the race and they'll be on pole! I don't know if they fixed this oversight in any revisions.

For fans of the sequel, this link may be of interest to anyone interested in a certain Reject Team

midgrid · Post by **midgrid** » 07 Jun 2014, 22:04

Great to see this game get some appreciation almost 20 years after its initial release! I do have a slight quibble, however, with this paragraph:

The biggest problem and one that, to be fair, many racing games still suffer from is the lack of adequate balancing. One can absolutely destroy the competition with any car, regardless of the car’s true performance. Any fan of Delatraz, Andrea Montermini, Pedro Diniz or Jean-Christophe Boullion can see your fantasy come to life as they take the championship without breaking a sweat.

After racing with every car on the hardest difficulty settings, I can safely say that a Williams or Benetton is significantly faster to drive than a Simtek, Pacific or Forti, both in terms of downforce and straightline speed. You can even hear the engines reaching higher revs when you drive the fastest cars!

MrMG · Post by **MrMG** » 07 Jun 2014, 22:20

Yeah I remember the performance getting more realistic on the higher difficulties. it's really noticable if you drive the McLaren. It suddenly becomes a brick on low-speed corners.

AdrianSutil · Post by **AdrianSutil** » 08 Jun 2014, 10:08

Brilliant article. Loved this game as a kid.

Another thing to point out, was if you set the fuel load to 'realistic' or 'on' or whatever he seething was called and put it to 100%, you'd be really slow at the start of the race but be one of the quickest towards the end. This was a great challenge as you'd be lapping similar times to the likes of Forti and Simtek early on but be setting fastest laps at the end. So I'd choose someone like Katayama and you'd end up somewhere between 4th-10th each race. Great fun.

LellaLombardi · Post by **LellaLombardi** » 08 Jun 2014, 20:32

I had Grand Prix Manager about 1996ish. It was a brilliant concept for a game and one that I wish they'd do again. The big downside of it was a series of bugs which would really scupper your chances, the main one being that it would refuse to let you sign a new driver for the following season because your existing one was under contract, only for them to abscond at the end of the year and you'd end up with Taki Inoue.

MrMG · Post by **MrMG** » 08 Jun 2014, 20:46

I remember my brother playing GPM and signing Barrichello and Coulthard for a year at Williams. Barrichello dominated the first half of the championship then had a crash a Silverstone which put him out for 2 years!

He was forced to sign Inoue as his replacement, Williams went bankrupt shortly after.

DOSBoot · Post by **DOSBoot** » 09 Jun 2014, 05:04

Good game for it's time. Have both it, and the 1997 version for the PS1. Though I didn't really get into Psygnosis' works until I was a little older. But I was always impressed with what they could come up with. This may inspire me to submit something to Enoch in the near future about a classic F1 game I have that nobody seems to talk about. (If I get the time to do it.)

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 09 Jun 2014, 05:52

I had this game and played it to death. I think its still the only F1 game to include all the drivers that drove in that particular season unlike modern games that aim to be on sale as the season starts thus ruining any opportunites to change drivers mid-season. Boo! It is relatively simple compared to the modern games but I find that thats its charm. And, as mentioned in the article, its a honeypot of classic Rejects.

I would turn the music off though, screeching racket that it was :lol:

P.S I won a championship as Verstappen in the Simtek and I never assaulted anyone in doing so :lol:

sswishbone · Post by **sswishbone** » 09 Jun 2014, 09:37

There is a rare version of this where Mansell is actually in the Mclaren! But better was F1'97 the original version of that had mastercard Lola playable, but it got recalled and they were removed from the code. If you are good with an action replay or gameshark cartridge you might be able to find the code and reinstate them!

*edit I won the title as Deletraz as a joke, a mate said I couldn't and it was too bloody easy

Ferrim · Post by **Ferrim** » 09 Jun 2014, 09:50

CoopsII wrote:I had this game and played it to death. I think its still the only F1 game to include all the drivers that drove in that particular season unlike modern games that aim to be on sale as the season starts thus ruining any opportunites to change drivers mid-season. Boo! It is relatively simple compared to the modern games but I find that thats its charm. And, as mentioned in the article, its a honeypot of classic Rejects.

It also seems that today's games are limited by licensing issues to use a concrete set of drivers and teams, instead of what happened in the past.

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 09 Jun 2014, 09:56

Ferrim wrote:It also seems that today's games are limited by licensing issues to use a concrete set of drivers and teams, instead of what happened in the past.

True, which led to the spooky shadowy Canadian Williams Number One driver rather than an actual Jacques Villeneuve due to JV refusing to allow it for the 1997 season featuring sequel :lol:

Also, yesterdays race reminded me of the chicane that was included in the original game which had adamantium-like bollards which would stop my Pacific dead despite visually looking like they were made of plastic

elRicharD · Post by **elRicharD** » 09 Jun 2014, 17:57

Great game, the review is somewhat lacking.

I love this game, which you guys can play for the sake of nostalgia in your emulator of choice.

The selection of rejects is great. I play mostly with Roberto Moreno, but I remember that some helmets are messed up...

There is a great Duel Mode called Ladder, in which you pit your driver of choice against a series of drivers, from the lower ones to the big names, in 12 random races around the globe. You have to be in front of that driver, starting last on each race. At first it is easy, but later on you have to overtake practically the entire field, and it gets hard... and you only have 3 retries!

Some additional remarks about the game itself:

The difficulty of the game in the higher levels is terribly hard. The only way to play the game and win is enabling a "Boost Mode" that lies in the Options section.

Cars seem to be really slow. In Monza they don't do more than 320 km/h...

Murray Walker rocks it all the way!

The tracks removed from 1995 to 1997 were included on F1 97 game for PS as well via cheat codes.

MrMG · Post by **MrMG** » 09 Jun 2014, 17:59

sswishbone wrote:There is a rare version of this where Mansell is actually in the Mclaren! But better was F1'97 the original version of that had mastercard Lola playable, but it got recalled and they were removed from the code. If you are good with an action replay or gameshark cartridge you might be able to find the code and reinstate them!

*edit I won the title as Deletraz as a joke, a mate said I couldn't and it was too bloody easy

I had a day 1 copy of F1 '97 and Lola were nowhere to be seen, although they did get a mention in the instruction manual along with Villeneuve!

Mansell's in all versions of the game, you just have to scroll off the McLaren driver page

Magnussen is also there.

Just realised the review states that Mansell replaces Hakkinen in Adelaide - Hakkinen does race in Adelaide but his default stating position is 26th.

And for an even EARLIER look at F1 '97. Click here

Just look at those placeholders! And it seemed they were initially gonna replace Villeneuve with Boullion

(Look closely at the TV graphics)

elRicharD · Post by **elRicharD** » 09 Jun 2014, 18:54

There is an amazing 1997 F1 game for Nintendo 64 (which can be played via emulator as well) in which there are Missions, like "Take Damon Hill to the end of the Hungarian GP and win it"... great game, lots of fun and pretty similar in looks to the PS games.

And you can be Verstappen, too!

TomPryce · Post by **TomPryce** » 09 Jun 2014, 19:59

Hi guys, thanks for all the feedback. I hope to write more for the website in the future, so any feedback here is great.

1) One thing I must say is that I never really played on higher difficulties. I always thought it was the case across the board, and I honestly haven't played the game for years so I couldn't remember. Sorry.

2)

elRicharD wrote:
There is a great Duel Mode called Ladder, in which you pit your driver of choice against a series of drivers, from the lower ones to the big names, in 12 random races around the globe. You have to be in front of that driver, starting last on each race. At first it is easy, but later on you have to overtake practically the entire field, and it gets hard... and you only have 3 retries!

Some additional remarks about the game itself:

I mention the Ladder mode, so I'm not sure why you commented on my exclusion of that.

midgrid · Post by **midgrid** » 09 Jun 2014, 21:51

elRicharD wrote:The difficulty of the game in the higher levels is terribly hard. The only way to play the game and win is enabling a "Boost Mode" that lies in the Options section.

I've won all the races of a championship season in Schumacher's Benetton on the hardest difficulty settings (albeit with automatic gears, as the game physics aren't realistic enough for me to have an intuitive feel for a manual box), but it does get impossible with the slower cars. I've never actually used the boost mode - what exactly does it do? I've noticed that the AI cars do tend to slow down significantly at some circuits (e.g. Monaco) during a full-length race, and selected AI cars will drop down the field at others.

I also race full-distance without fuel usage or tyre wear, as there is a bug that results in the AI drivers repeatedly coming into the pits after their first stop. (That's another way to win all the races!)

Cars seem to be really slow. In Monza they don't do more than 320 km/h...

Yes, the acceleration and top speed are not comparable with real life. On the other hand, this results in faster cornering speeds - it's also possible to go insanely fast through some of the chicanes, even without cutting them - which can produce faster lap-times overall. In a slower car, I've also noticed that your straight-line speed is faster than your AI team-mate's, but this diminishes the further up the grid you go.

Murray Walker rocks it all the way!

My disc is so worn out that the prescribed commentary frequently cuts out - only to be followed some minutes later by every single stock phrase on the disc in succession. And then the same thing in the foreign languages.

One thing I can't believe is that no-one's mentioned the amazing bonus track so far!

I spent far too much time playing this game when I was younger (along with the awesome arcade racer, [youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDZBL1dj9rg]Total Drivin[/youtube]), and it remains my favourite of all the console F1 games I've played (although I haven't played the newest generation of games from F1 2010 onwards), even more so than the similar F1 1997. I think the two main reasons it appeals to me are (1) the handling, whilst not realistic at all, makes it extremely challenging to lap at a consistent pace, and thus completing a full race distance is extremely rewarding; and (2) the enormous field spread (I think the top AI cars lap the slowest ones about ten times or so in their fastest setting) means that you can race extremely hard over a full distance, and depending on your car and/or skill level, spend the entire race near the back, in the thick of the midfield, or near the front, battling closely with other cars (which is difficult to do consistently due to the aforementioned handling). In most other racing games, I've usually found that I'm either too slow or too fast to compete with the AI cars at any given difficulty setting.

FullMetalJack · Post by **FullMetalJack** » 09 Jun 2014, 23:13

CoopsII wrote:I think its still the only F1 game to include all the drivers that drove in that particular season

I remember F1 99 doing so too.

MrMG · Post by **MrMG** » 10 Jun 2014, 00:46

Yep F1 99 did it too. You could race as Sarazzin in the Minardi, and Mika Salo fans could have him race for either BAR or Ferrari! (He also replaces Schumacher for the rest of the season after Silverstone, since the game was released before Malaysia)

I remember F1 WGP on N64 (and its sequel) had real incidents happen during the races if an option was enabled. So both McLarens retire early at Nurburgring 97 with engine failures, Panis crashes in Canada etc.

I vaguely recall one of the N64 games (think it was the first one) having an easter egg where if you set a record in Time Attack mode at Imola, a superfast ghost car spawns for you to beat. The car? A red and white McLaren driven by someone with a yellow helmet...

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 10 Jun 2014, 06:52

FullMetalJack wrote:
CoopsII wrote:I think its still the only F1 game to include all the drivers that drove in that particular season

I remember F1 99 doing so too.

Really? So you can race as Salo in two different teams? Funky

AdrianSutil · Post by **AdrianSutil** » 10 Jun 2014, 18:48

CoopsII wrote:
FullMetalJack wrote:
CoopsII wrote:I think its still the only F1 game to include all the drivers that drove in that particular season

I remember F1 99 doing so too.

Really? So you can race as Salo in two different teams? Funky

F1 99 was another quality game. Plus it had the SC!!

Normal32 · Post by **Normal32** » 10 Jun 2014, 23:30

And i think that F1 97 was also pretty good (altough i don't play that in a while)

MorbidelliObese · Post by **MorbidelliObese** » 11 Jun 2014, 12:54

Julien wrote:A quick note: Grand Prix 2 had the official Formula 1 license, and it was 3D as well. It also predates this one IIRC.

It did, although (and my mind/age may be playing tricks on me) I vaguely remember it being pulled from shelves (here in the UK anyway) due to some sort of dispute over licencing. Was involved quite heavily in modding and running my own offline GP2 league (well they were all offline back then I guess!) back in the late 90s and I remember crapping myself when I lost my CD, needed to reinstall and then found it wasn't on sale anywhere! Luckily a local second-hand shop saved me on that one.

It still bugs me to this day that Googling "GP2" gets you reams of stuff on that F3000-replacement real life series in place of the original GP2

Bleu · Post by **Bleu** » 11 Jun 2014, 19:27

I remember from this game that it was possible to arrange road block in the middle of the track. Therefore, even if you played for a team like Williams, it was possible to see Forti, Pacific, Simtek or Taki Inoue winning the race.

MrMG · Post by **MrMG** » 11 Jun 2014, 20:30

MorbidelliObese wrote:
Julien wrote:A quick note: Grand Prix 2 had the official Formula 1 license, and it was 3D as well. It also predates this one IIRC.

It did, although (and my mind/age may be playing tricks on me) I vaguely remember it being pulled from shelves (here in the UK anyway) due to some sort of dispute over licencing.

It was F1 97 that got pulled. They FIA objected to the use of their logo on the packaging as it was licenced through FOCA and Fuji TV and not them. It got resolved pretty quickly though.

MorbidelliObese · Post by **MorbidelliObese** » 11 Jun 2014, 22:39

MadGaz85 wrote:
MorbidelliObese wrote:
Julien wrote:A quick note: Grand Prix 2 had the official Formula 1 license, and it was 3D as well. It also predates this one IIRC.

It did, although (and my mind/age may be playing tricks on me) I vaguely remember it being pulled from shelves (here in the UK anyway) due to some sort of dispute over licencing.

It was F1 97 that got pulled. They FIA objected to the use of their logo on the packaging as it was licenced through FOCA and Fuji TV and not them. It got resolved pretty quickly though.

Ah maybe that's it - my overriding of F1 97 is being unable to play it due to my computer lacking a 3D card which I think were pretty new back then (GP2's software didn't require one) - in fact it was my childish disappointment at that that made me decide to Goog..I mean Yahoo some modding software so I could edit GP2's '94 cars to '97 paintjobs :lol:

UncreativeUsername37 · Post by **UncreativeUsername37** » 12 Jun 2014, 01:01

MorbidelliObese wrote:Ah maybe that's it - my overriding of F1 97 is being unable to play it due to my computer lacking a 3D card which I think were pretty new back then (GP2's software didn't require one) - in fact it was my childish disappointment at that that made me decide to Goog..I mean Yahoo some modding software so I could edit GP2's '94 cars to '97 paintjobs

You're not the first one to get so disappointed at a game not working that you try to mod another game to basically be it... or maybe you were the first!

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 12 Jun 2014, 09:47

I dont remember the original game having any cheats, although I do remember the bonus track. The 1997 game went OTT on cheats (I think) with the option to make the cars Wipeout cars (complete with blue lazer emerging from the back), a black and white 60's version, Murray and Martin appearing as bizarre puppets and racing with frogs raining down. There may have been others. Sometimes I forget how mental the 90s were....

MrMG · Post by **MrMG** » 12 Jun 2014, 13:01

There were cheats in the original F1, off the top of my head:

Bonus Track unlocked
Track replaced by lava
Bike mode (Cars replaced by 2 wheels and a bit of suspension)
Big Wheel mode
Gibberish mode (My personal favourite: Murray's commentary became completely random. Loved hitting random cars to hear him announce: "Welcome to Monte Carlo" and "It's a win for Giovanni Lavaggi!" etc)

There was also "cheats" to switch the commentary language without restarting the game.

Post by **Nuppiz** » 12 Jun 2014, 14:30

CoopsII wrote:I dont remember the original game having any cheats, although I do remember the bonus track. The 1997 game went OTT on cheats (I think) with the option to make the cars Wipeout cars (complete with blue lazer emerging from the back), a black and white 60's version, Murray and Martin appearing as bizarre puppets and racing with frogs raining down. There may have been others. Sometimes I forget how mental the 90s were....

One more cheat I can remember was where you could have monster truck wheels on the car. Made driving around Monaco much more fun! There were also multiple cheats based on Jean Alesi's name that gave you various situations in Championship mode with the last three races left to run.

CoopsII · Post by **CoopsII** » 12 Jun 2014, 16:31

There was a Virtua Racing cheat aswell I think. If I even get any spare time I'll have to dig this game out and revisit it, and the 1995 one. I'd forgotten how much daft fun they were.

MrMG · Post by **MrMG** » 12 Jun 2014, 22:26

Here's something that many people overlooked in F1 97:

Pressing select on the second controller during a race allowed you to switch to trackside view, or view any other car.

(This was also in the original F1, but you just did it with the controller you were using)

tristan1117 · Post by **tristan1117** » 15 Jun 2014, 03:28

As this game was released when I was less than a year old, I never had the chance to play it. I did, however, find a hilariously bad review of the game on Youtube a few years ago. It must be seen to be believed.