F1 2020 Review
Racing In its Finest Form
Enjoyability
It is a dream of mine to race a Formula 1 car, but for many reasons I will likely never drive one in real life. I have played the F1 series installments of 17-19, and these games were solid racing games. However, it was not until I played F1 2020 that I felt as close to my dream of driving a F1 car. From the roaring of the engines, cockpit cameras, burning rubber, bumps, scrapes, upshifts, downshifts, presentation, and realistic graphics, I felt as if I was dreaming. I was not dreaming, but rather encapsulated in the wonderful world of F1 2020.
The main ingredient of this game is of course racing, and the racing is superb. Racing occurs on some of the most iconic tracks in F1 with incredible attention to detail. Including tracks such as Monaco, Silverstone, Hungaroring, Red Bull Ring, and many others. The quality of sounds, graphics, views, presentation, controls, strategies, and significantly improved AI racers make racing enjoyable throughout.
The core gameplay is so enjoyable I find myself spending the full time in practice sessions/qualifying sessions and racing longer races. The AI drivers race more aggressively than in previous games and make more realistic overtake attempts and defending moves. This game captures the true-to-life realism of the motor sport with the accessibility to new players. The game offers a wide array of difficulty sliders to help racers of all skill levels enjoy all the game has to offer. F1 2020 also has all the game modes from the last few iterations, with the addition of an in-depth my-team mode that is a terrific gaming experience.
If you are like me and have always dreamed of starting your own motor sports team with full control, my-team is the mode for you. You start as a new aspiring F1 team owner driver and get to fully set-up the new team name, logo, colors, engine, sponsors, and a second driver. These customization options personalize the career mode resulting in a more enjoyable experience. Throughout the my-team mode, you are faced with the challenge of balancing finances between advancing facilities or saving up for your dream high dollar teammate. Gamers will also have to focus on improving there F1 car performance through the in-depth R&D tree. This should be overwhelming to new players, but it is not. The in-game tutorials will help guide you through the in-depth R&D process. If you enjoy modes with this type of management system, you will really enjoy the my-team mode.
In other iterations of the F1 series, I often simulated some of the races. In F1 2020, I find myself enjoying the racing mechanics and true-to-life quality so much I do not need to simulate races in my-team/my-career. I can personally say, this is my favorite my-team/franchise mode of any sports game I have played. Even when compared to the modes in NBA 2k, NHL, and FIFA. Even with all these pros, I could not ignore some of the cons. I would like to be able to play more than 10 seasons and adding a feature like full pit crew personnel management would take this game mode to another level.
Additionally, while the game is great, there are some bugs and problems that keep it from being perfect. These include crashes when moving between qualifying sessions (happened twice), virtual safety cars that do not leave the track (happened once), and one crazy moment at Monaco with almost all AI drivers receiving DNF standing due to a non-contact pile-up. The game also needs to implement a dynamic difficulty setting. I found myself always having to adjust the difficulty for each track to match my second drivers’ times for more realism. However, the small number of bugs and problems I faced after hundreds of races did not affect my high enjoyability of the game and did not deter me from continuing to play.
Enjoyability Score: 9.5/10
Replayability
As I dive into the replayability of F1 2020, my goal is to determine if the enjoyability of the game remains after many hours. I understand that I am writing this as a racing fan and that the replay value may depend on whether you like racing games. Personally, I can see myself coming back to F1 2020 every day and not getting bored of the game. There has never been a moment in my playthrough that has felt tedious. I get the same high enjoyability level with each race as I did with my very first race on the game.
A huge aspect of replay value is the core gameplay and number of modes. In F1 2020, the core gameplay is a blast, and when coupled with in-depth career mode, a full F1 my-team iteration, online custom seasons, and online racing, this game has everything a game needs for replayability. The game also offers a podium pass which has a free tier and premium tier where gamers can earn in game currency and cosmetics items only (no pay to win aspect in this game). I have really enjoyed this addition. The podium pass keeps me motivated to play to unlock all the cool liveries and customization items. I wish more sports games would offer a free sports pass for customization items.
F1 2020 is a game I plan to play the full year until the next installment is released. I am hopeful and excited for what Codemasters has in store for us next summer with F1 2021. Until then, I will be very content getting my racing fix on with F1 2020, with my dream of being the top team every week.
Replayability score: 9/10
Watchability
I am going to provide two separate perspectives on watchability. The first one is going to come from me as a racing fan and a long-time lover of racing games. The second perspective is for gamers who love watching video games but not necessarily racing games. Gamers that like racing games will enjoy watching this game due to the realism and excitement the F1 game creates. Hearing the sound of engines roar, skidding tires, upshifts, and downshifts while watching skilled content creators race is exhilarating. It is as close as we can get to watching a real F1 race, and racing gamers can do this whenever and wherever via livestreams and YouTube Videos. On the other hand, gamers who love watching video games but not necessarily racing games may still get some enjoyment from watching a few YouTube videos or live streams of F1 2020, but would probably not have high enjoyment when watching the content.
For those of you with interest in watching gameplay, check out these content creators: Aarava, Tiametmarduk, and TRL Limitless. As of, 08/13/2020, on sullygnome.com, F1 2020 is ranked number 50 in average viewers over the last 30 days out of 25,390 total twitch entries. The game has accumulated 3,309,058 hours of watch time and tallied a peak viewer count of 43,464 over the past 30 days. To put this in perspective, the top game on twitch over the past 30 days in regard to average viewers is League of Legends with 185,455 viewers. However, when just ranking top sports games by average viewers over the last 30 days, F1 2020 is ranked number 5 behind Fifa 20, NBA 2k20, Rocket League, and Trackmania.
The numbers show that in that past 30 days, F1 2020 is in the top 1% of viewed content on twitch when ranked by average viewers, so many gamers share my opinion of this game’s watchability. However, twitch data is only one aspect of my watchability score. Some of the other parts include enjoyability of watching, how often I find myself searching and watching videos for the game, and how long a live stream can hold my interest.
Watchability score: 8/10
