Recent reviews by Justin Toothpaste

Best career mode of any F1 game, much more replayable than the newer renditions. Bit buggy now but to be expected from a game that hasn't seen a patch in 5+ years, GOAT F1 game possibly (imo). 10/10

Pretty buggy and unpolished atm (v1.05) however the gameplay definitely makes up for it and they're not game-breaking bugs, maybe not worth £50 at the moment but after a couple of well-needed patches it could be the best F1 game yet imo.

i'm gonna give this a bean/10 this game gave me my first born son

Pros:
1. Best AI I've come across in any driving/racing game, they're not scared to race you at all and having a good race is so rewarding.
2. The My Team game mode basically makes the other career mode obsolete as it's so much better, definitely makes the game a lot more replayable and adds a grind-y aspect whilst still being fun and not a chore. Also I feel like this mode has gotten harder i.e. engine components wear very quickly, actually takes a season or two to be competitive, actually have to invest in the facilities to progress. In my eyes, this is a very good thing.
3. Handling model rewards being brave, definitely less downforce than last year's game but just from being smooth can find you a lot of lap time.
4. Graphics have come a long way in recent installments and this year's game looks absolutely stunning, especially the cars themselves and the weather effects.
5. Multiplayer has a whole multitude of modes to choose from such as ranked, unranked, leagues, custom lobbies, esports qualifying/events and the servers have also improved exponentially in the last few games which was a huge issue a couple of years ago.
6. Very good menu soundtrack, adds to the ambience of the game and is actually quite nice to sit back and listen to if you wanted.
7. New damage model is intricate and very unforgiving even for the AI aswell, makes for very topsy-turvy races and introduces a different aspect of race management i.e. stay off the kerbs.
8. Talking about kerbs, the fact that you can't absolutely abuse the kerbs on this game is a nice feature as it did feel like a bit of an exploit in previous games. The auto-spin kerbs are a bit too RNG for my liking but that is probably just due to my driving.
9. The safety car actually exists in this game and comes out quite regularly which is lovely.

Cons:
1. The car performance is nowhere near aligned with real life i.e. McLaren are massively overpowered, Williams are underpowered as are Red Bull, Alfa Romeo and Alpine to a point. However this can obviously be sorted out with a patch but still it's quite annoying when the real season's been running for 4 months before launch.
2. The difficulty of the AI is so inconsistent for instance I have to run the difficulty at 96 on Canada and then 87/88 at Hungary or Spain just to be as competitive as I am in the field, could be down to myself but I have noticed that the AI are overpowered in high-speed corners especially. Just bad coding to be honest.
3. Game came out without the full calendar and in general just felt incomplete at launch (no F2 2021 either), I know the new tracks are rumoured to be released in September but the gaming industry/community seems to be complicit with games coming out unfinished these days which is quite sad *cough* Call of Duty *cough*. I hope this air of laziness in the industry gets ironed out as it just looks bad on the devs and infuriates the players.
4. Numerous stupid bugs and glitches such as cars getting stuck in the pits or drivers starting the race a lap down for no particular reason, again this can fixed with a patch but still does affect the gameplay.
5. The removal of classic cars is just baffling to me, absolutely no reason to get rid of them unless it was to make way for Braking Point (which is fairly mediocre to me). I do hope they make a return at some point but I suppose you could just get Assetto Corsa and drive a realistic version of them on a proper simulation game if you really wanted to.
6. Podium Pass, it's just not very good is it. It is subjective though at the end of the day but I think a lot of people are unimpressed by the first season, hopefully they improve throughout the year.
7. The ability to mod, not just this game but previous versions since 2016-ish, has been restricted massively which in my eyes is not the best idea. Could be due to licensing, but it would increase the game's replayability tenfold.
8. The deluxe version of the game is not worth the extra tenner.

Summary: To be honest, I'm not sure if this game is worth the retail price at the moment and does need improving. However, in a few updates time and when the new tracks are out, I don't know if I can recommend it anymore to anyone. This has the potential to easily be the best F1 game and possibly the best sim-cade racing game of all time aswell, it does have it's issues at this moment in time though. Codemasters have come a long way with this franchise and I'm so excited to see what they bring to the community next year with the new car regulations. Plus having EA alongside them, this can only be seen as a good thing for the series.

Reviewed on patch 1.06