for F1 fans only
As far as console F1 games, you won't get any better than this. That isn't saying a whole lot but I will say it's a very good racing game. I like all the things that try to make it an F1 experience like setting up your car with your engineer, weather forecasts, live sector timing, car development, pit lane speed limiters etc etc.
The real meat of the game, the racing is very good and what you can expect racing an F1 car. The car takes high speed corners with such tenacity that it's no wonder F1 drivers must be fully fit because the G forces must be incredible. But the low speed stuff, particularly exiting corners, is where the real challenge is because you can spin out very easily if you don't have full traction control on. You must squeeze the throttle ever so softly and if you don't, you won't have time to counter steer and correct your mistake like you can with sports car sims like Forza. F1 cars are the fastest so require a masterful touch.
other notes:
-The sound of 19,000 rpm Formula 1 motors is absolutely exact. When you're accelerating over the kerbs and the tires are looking for grip so the engine is sort of struggling or bouncing on the rev limiter...wow it's exactly like watching a real F1 race on television.
-the difficulty is a challenge. I mean: There are 4 overall settings which can be further adjusted within with things like traction control, ABS, line suggestion etc. BUT the thing is that 3 of those overall settings make the AI cars so slow that I was able to put my Force India into pole position by a very wide margin with no assists at all on Hard. Expert would be great but on some tracks it seems impossible to keep up(Australia) and if you push too hard and make a mistake, there's no Rewind feature(on expert)! Even on Hard you're only given 2 Rewinds which is definitely not enough, in my opinion. Why Codemasters didn't let the player choose how many rewinds they'd like is frustrating.
-oh yes, you have to have the tracks memorized even if you have the suggested line on at all times. I've played F1 games before so I know most of them but your first race is in Bahrain, a relatively new track so before I went to do the race, I probably did 70 laps in the practice sessions, qualifying etc to get the handle on things.
something odd today: At the Chinese GP(4th race of the season) I was happily cruising on the last lap to secure 3rd place when right after I crossed the finish line the post race screen pops up and tells me that I finished 16th wtf! I did spin a couple times causing yellow flags and a small collision so maybe I got a time penalty or something that they can add after the post race results . I wish it would've told me.
If you're not into Formula 1, I'd take a large bet that you won't like this game. But if you are, hang your hat here.
