SAFETY CONFIRMED IN F1 2011 CODEMASTERS

I am also enjoying the game to a surprising degree.

Got it with no high expectations this year and just treated it as an arcade racer, and I agree the problems only really rear their head if you go looking for them.

Although the length of the instant replay is farcical doesn't catch the action at all lol.

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Is anyone else using a wheel and finding you are having to turn it way to much?

I have tried all different settings and no matter what I do I just cannot get it right

It seemed OK. I like very sensitive steering in most sims, but in this (OK, very much not a sim) I found it OK. I remember finding early on that it needed quite a bit of angle compared to what I'm used too (and especially for F1 I guess), but it was still OK to use.

The force feedback is atrocious though. Absolutely atrocious.

Maybe I will just have to get used to turning the wheel too much then

Okay... Started playing the game...

Championship Season.... Chose Force India .. (obvious choice)...

10% Race Distance...

1. Australia - Qualified 18th... Finished 4th (12 pts) (Winner - Hamilton)

Got a great start.. Over took 10 drivers.. Picked off 7 other by lap 5.. Massa over took me and kept chasing him till the end....

2. Malaysia - Qualified 1st... Finished 1st (25 pts)

Again... Great start... Was untouchable till ran wide at 13.. Had to overtake button on the back straight on lap 5 and the last lap..

Season so far... (1. L.Hamilton: 40 pts; 2. Myself: 37 pts; 3. J.Alguersauri 22 pts)

Not too bad.. Still waiting for something special to arrive... When it does.. This game is toast!!

I have had the game on rental since last Friday and all I can say for my briefly worded - yet accurate - review is: this game is infuriating and frustrating, not fun.

What' I'm finding surprising is that some of us are expressing that it's much better than last year and others are saying it's much worse.

As sim racers I expected us all to have a similar viewpoint. Personally I'm finding it much more drivable than the previous game, you have more control and can attack the circuits much better than in the previous game.

Where the game falls apart is where you race other AI cars. They swerve all over the place, crash into the back of you, wobble about, are inconsistent and have too much grip. There is very, very limited collision detection on the wheels and the physics are crap because of this.

The online experience is much better, particularly is you know the people you're racing against and turn those damn penalties off.

lol guy i 've won 5 world championhip against legend ai, 10% of race simulation fuel and tyre on .
this game is too easy ...but i like it

try 50% race distance.

Backmarkers and cars on outlaps seriously annoy me though, especially in singapore, there seems to be a hrt parked on the apex of everycorner doing about 10mph after 8 laps. So many front wings destroyed because of them!

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Overall it's a decent game, better handling and AI and less gamebreakers than F1 2010 but there's still plenty of bugs, as illustrated below by this comic I just made.

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Circuit Thermalito

Liverpool Waterfront Circuit (WIP)

Nice meme work :P.

I returned the F1 game on Friday, I have to say that the sense of relief I felt when I put it away was just proof of how terrible my experience was. I didn't look forward to playing it much, it was mostly dreadful but I just couldn't go without attempting it.

Is the AI sorted? ie, is it real this time?

Are the car's performance corrected? So a Lotus will corner slower than RBR or is it all based on engine power still?

Is there that awful replay system where it records to the HDD still?

If so then I wont bother, if not I might look into getting it...

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"Trulli was slowing down like he wanted to have a picnic" LOL

I've got it on PS3 so am probably getting the worst deal out of all the platforms but here's what I've noticed. I've yet to play it online, waiting for the 11/11 bug to get fixed first.

Good
- The AI is real. Qualifying times are real. It's actually a really good experience and all the cars are balanced the way they should be. Stick it on Legend and get in a new team and you'll struggle to get higher than 19th. I'm up to Spa in my first season (Virgin, 100% distance, Legend, no assists or TC) and I've consistently been finishing 19th. Managed to hold off both Williams in Spain for 17th (felt so good!) and my only points came at Monaco where I finished 5th due to a rather nice pistop under the safety car.
- DRS and KERS are really well implemented. Along with fuel consumption (instead of cruise, normal and fast you now alter your fuel mix to lean, normal and rich) and tyre degradation you're constantly thinking. 100% races are nothing short of intense and awesome.
- The sound is excellent, really immersive. Not something I can put into words really but you really do get the full effect of the car screaming along. The engineer is much less annoying and surprisingly useful this year too.
- The handling is a massive advancement on last year. It's not quite upto the level of rFactor and iRacing etc but once you've done a few laps you'll hardly notice. The rear end slides (and it's not scripted or fixed with a dab of brakes), the kerbs are useable, the gravel isn't made of glue and wet weather is appropriately treacherous. It's no longer a case of slamming on the brakes and then the accelerator because you'll lock up and then spin the car round.


Meh
- Menus are pretty much the same as last year. There's a new email system which manages your contract offers, season news (weather reports and standings etc) but it effectively does the same job.
- They're nowhere near as harsh/instant as last year but penalties can sometimes be a bit surprising. Illegal overtakes, corner cutting, causing a collision. Quite often they don't make sense.
- The safety car is a good addition but it could have been implemented so better. You can still steer your car and brake/accelerate but if you get too close to a car infront it'll automatically limit your speed. Also if you go off track then it'll put you back in the queue, often in the wrong position. If that happens to be higher than before then bad luck, you just got a drive through for an illegal overtake.
- The tracks are ok, nothing spectacular but they're far better than some efforts that have been seen out there.

Bad
- There are no AI retirements. No mechanical failures and hardly any errors. If there's going to be a monumental crash then one of the cars will probably end up ghosting too. This has two knock on effects, there's hardly any safety cars unless you cause them and also race targets are normally impossible in the lower teams (i.e. finish 18th when no one retires, you're 1-2 seconds off the next car and you're in 19th).
- Lapped cars in a race and outlap cars in qualifying are nothing short of moronic. Yes they'll slow down to let you past but most of the time they'll do it right on the apex of a corner so you've got no option but to go off the racing line and lose loads of time.
- There's an R&D bug which causes the objectives to fail if you restart any session, skip any session or return to paddock before the race. This means you've got to do P1, 2, 3 and Q1, 2 and 3 in one sitting without restarting any session or returning to the menu.
- The AI are very hesitant to overtake you. Even if they're alongside going into a corner they'll probably back out and give you the place. If you make a good start and get high up the field then it's quite easy to hold everyone behind until your first pitstop.
- The graphics and framerates are terrible. Don't quite know what Codemasters have done here but the PS3 version is atrocious. Low texture quality, shadow quality, horrendous antialiasing etc. Even with all these optimisations you're still likely to get stutters and a less than fluid picture.
- Replay system is awful. You maybe get 10 seconds if you're lucky but it's normally around 5. I don't use flashbacks but if I did, they'd be totally useless.
- Wet weather AI seem to be in a different world. There's no longer the problem where if they kept the dry tyre on they'd still do try times (thankfully) but now it seems as soon as there's some rain they can push a lot harder (normally about 2-3 seconds per lap). If I try and push any harder I'll either understeer, lock the wheels or just spin off so it's hard to see how I could drive any harder.


Yes I know, there are a lot more negatives than positives, so why do I still play? To be honest I'm not really sure, I still enjoy it somehow.

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Circuit Thermalito

Liverpool Waterfront Circuit (WIP)

Everyone seems to be focusing on the AI, but I've always found that online is the best part of this game, and as long as you find a good online league (or two), this makes the good good value for money - for a console game at least.

Having said that, I have persevered with my first season of Career, and actually won a 20% race at Singapore, on Legend (the highest) difficulty in a Virgin.... I qualified 10th on prime tyres, but got up to 2nd by the end of Lap 1, as the AI are always slow in the first few corners. I was able to hold with Vettel on options throughout the first stint until he pitted, and then led. I probably stayed out one lap too long, as my tyres were worn and I half-spun and lost some time. So I came out a few seconds behind Vettel, but with fresh options, I could easily catch him, and overtook him with DRS with two laps left. It was nice to win, but it makes me very apprehensive about driving for better teams in the future, and I don't know if I'll actually get further into Career mode than I ever did in F1 2010 (Australia Season 2).

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X (@ed24f1)

2 bits you forgot Finamus Fin Fin, 1 is the rear slides too much without TC, far more than in real life. Soooo many corners in real life that are taken full throttle have to be managed carefully in the game. 2 the AI zig zags around the track when you need to overtake them - your hotlap on their outlap or lapping a backmarker - and they also have varying speeds at which they can take corners, as in, some corners they're unreasonably slow and in some they are much faster than it's possible to be in our own car.

I do agree about KERS, DRS and sounds though. The whole fuel mixture thing could be better, my engineer would never tell me to switch to a lean mixture and I found myself crawling around the track in the last lap, a few of those times with my great P1 destroyed by the backmarker AI and some other times the engine would just stutter too much as it drank every last drop of fuel.

Fuel mixtures is a nice idea, but I think it would be improved if you could decide to underfuel or overfuel your car at the start of the race.

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X (@ed24f1)

Can you get above 3 laps worth of fuel extra? I was running for ages in the rain with the lean mixture but never seemed to get above +3 laps :S

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I have just bought this game and I am having fun with it. Even though I like the 'sims' f1 2011 is not too bad for an Arcady game it has some excellent features as mentioned above like Drs Kers and the atmosphere. But as said it is way too easy, I’m with lotus and I make a great getaway and find myself easily in the top 6 after starting around 16th or so every time. The other car passes you but as soon as a heavy break zone comes I just go on the outside and cruise round them back into my position before the straight. In my first race I did experience fuel starvation but did manage to finish but as said yes it would be great if I was notified to switch to a leaner mixture. Yes the game could have been better but just remember this is only their second time and lets just remember that most of the features we take for granted in this game are not implemented in another game properly, or if they are via a third party download by a modder or along those lines. I like 'sims' such as iracing and certain rfactor mods and richard burns rally but i like a game where the physics are more life like but you don't need a physics degree or a be a fully racing driver to find a good setup. That's probably why i dont think this is that bad but i do know its an arcady game not a sim. That said i will probably play it for a couple of months until the novelty wears off and go back to the other games. there will always be faults and gremlins in a game but I do not think this is that bad especially for a wider audience than us here at this forum, I don’t think I wasted my money at least it is better than the ea @#$%& they kept feeding us for about 10 years or so.


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I can't get my car to work at all in the rain. I was on inters and I was +10 secs slower than the others, who were on slicks. It was totally raining too. Hm.

Hi guys
played the game today on lan with my friend, but I couldn't find the co-championship thingy
do I have to unlock or something?

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