F1 Games

Motorsport Manager

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  • #254884
    SirCoolbeans
    Participant

    Hi everyone,

    I’ve been working on Motorsport Manager for a while now and this weekend I was at Eurogamer’s Rezzed event at the NEC in Birmingham where I showed a playable demo of the project. I thought it was time I introduced the F1 Fanatic community to the game. (I’ve been around on the site for a good 4 years now – had a comment of the day – and contribute as a paying member).

    I’ve been a video game developer for nearly a decade (I’ve worked on BAFTA nominated games like Geometry Wars Galaxies) and a motor racing fan for over 20 years. Motorsport Manager is a blend of my two biggest passions and the result of years of dedication.

    You’ll set up your own motor racing team and enter it into one of the lower tiered racing categories. Starting in the national racing series you’ll work your way through international categories in North American, Europe, and Asia to eventually reach the pinnacle of motorsport.

    Along the way you will hire drivers, invest in engineers and technology, and make the big decisions that will affect the outcome of the entire championship.

    I’ve wanted to develop Motorsport Manager for years. I obviously don’t have the official licences of any of the real racing series’, but that has it’s benefits. I’ve created an array of new series’ each with their own history and rules. You won’t find any Hewis Lamiltons, DRS or double points for the last race here. Enter the American Racing League and race on oval circuits in the deep south. Start in Formula Italia and race through the rain in the forests of northern Italy.

    Every moment of a Grand Prix weekend is simulated in detail: watch the race in real-time or jump into the strategy screens to take control of the action.

    Images



    Website
    http://www.motorsportmanager.net

    Vine

    The game will be out at the end of May on iOS and Android.

    If you’d like to know more I’m happy to answer any questions here. You can also follow me on Twitter http://www.twitter.com/sircoolbeans.

    #254885
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Love the tilt-shift graphics. Great minimalist style but works really well. I shall be investigating come May!

    #254888
    SirCoolbeans
    Participant

    Thanks @ajokay.

    I’m a huge motorsport fan and I think I have a design here that people will genuinely enjoy.

    There’s a core feature that sits through the entire game that I’ve not spoken about yet that will make this stand out from other management games in the genre. It should push things forward when it’s released and away from features like purchasing car parts like: front-wing level 3 and front-wing level 4, and then level 5. There is none of that. Of course you’ll be developing your car though, just not as you’d imagine.

    #254889
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    I’m a big fan of Grand Prix Manager 2, and still think that was the last F1 manager game that was worth any kind of salt. Kairosoft’s Grand Prix Story was a great little time sink but didn’t have a lot of depth. There have been various unlicenced F1 manager releases on PC which seem to have a lot of depth but are difficult to use, shoddily put together or just plain aren’t much fun, so it’s definitely time for something serious that works.

    I like that it’s ‘Motorsport’ Manager rather than Formula manager. It sounds like it’s not just limited to one series or one type of car. Will there be an option in there for tin tops/GT/prototypes at all?

    And yes, those 3d track models. Very much like the diagrams you see TV companies put on at the start of the broadcasts. Any motorsport fan will feel at home with those.

    #254890
    SirCoolbeans
    Participant

    Absolutely. Usability and depth are the key areas for me. I’ve found a solution in design that allows those two to exist without being in conflict with one another.

    At the moment the series in the game are all single-seater. I do have plans for additional forms of racing over the coming months after release. For now I’m focusing on getting the core experience right and the quality as high as I can with single-seater cars before adding bonus content post release. Regardless there will be a lot to play with in the nine categories you’ll find in the game on launch day, and each have their own distinctive feel.

    #254892

    This looks absolutely fantastic! Love the fact it’s coming to android as well :P

    #254894
    SirCoolbeans
    Participant

    Thanks. :-)

    You’ll find some of the racing series’ logos that I’ve created on the website: http://www.motorsportmanager.net

    #254896

    I love the concept and how it looks – I’ve been playing a lot of Grand Prix World recently and just wish someone could could make a modern racing management sim – but I have to be honest with you, the fact that it’s an iOS and Android game kills my interest in it as I don’t one of those devices and don’t see myself getting one any time soon.

    Good luck with the project, though. I hope it’s successful!

    #254904
    Bradley Downton
    Participant

    Like @magnificent-geoffrey I was hoping this game would be console based rather than mobile/tablet, but nonetheless it sounds fantastic and I can’t wait for it’s release. I think @juan-pablo-heidfeld-1 will agree with me that it seems like the Virtual Grand Pix Championship on your phone, and that is incredible!

    Two things I’ve been wondering while reading this:
    1. How much do we get to customise the team, ie: Name, engine, sponsors, livery, drivers (from a list I suppose and based on how well you do as to who will want to drive for you?), is money involved?
    2. Is it a free game or will there be a price, if so, how much?

    #254920

    Can’t get enough management sims! @bradley13


    @magnificent-Geoffrey
    Would it be worth buying grand Prix world? Interested in that sort of game, but its quote old

    #254930
    SirCoolbeans
    Participant

    You get to customise your team’s name, logo, drivers, race engineers, technical director, sponsors etc. You can choose a team colour, but not design the livery. It has very little hands on car creation and there’s a reason for that. You’re the team principal and the decisions you make are higher level than that. The focus of the game is not on being an engineer or a car designer but the owner of a team. I don’t want to give too much away just yet, and what I’ve said may disappoint some, but when you play this you’ll realise why it’s different and why it brings this genre forward.

    As for cost. It’ll be a paid app with no in app purchases. Free apps aren’t free really, they are barely even games. I’m not interested in making something that hassles you to keep spending 69p or wait a day to get upgrades. I want to make games that focus on giving people a fun experience that is balanced and designed to be enjoyed and mastered through skill.

    #254933
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    Console? Pfft… this is the kind of game that should be on PC. Phone/tablet is plenty good though.

    #254952
    BenH
    Participant

    This really does look very interesting and will definitely keep an eye out for this one come May time. Have subscribed to the thread to make sure I remember ;)

    #254970

    @juan-pablo-heidfeld-1 Absolutely, if you can find it. I bought it fo’ cheap about ten years ago but it may be hard to find these days.

    It’s just a next-generation sequel to Grand Prix Manager. The menus are all really slick and everything is designed really well game play wise. It’s been designed to work as a game, rather than a fully realistic simulation – like you can only change car setup by doing special ‘setup testing’ before a race, which earns you setup upgrade points to spend on both your cars for that race – but it all works really well.

    I like that you have to spend time negotiating with suppliers for next year’s car. If you want to just sign up some engines right away, you’ll do so on a customer basis, but if you try and sweeten them for a few races by giving them some race hospitality, you can convince them to give you a partner or a works deal, which means you’ll get their products for free and get to do some R&D work with them to upgrade them as the season goes on.

    The actual racing itself is really fun too. The cars are 3D rendered and are superimposed onto real life photographs of tracks, which looks really cool. You have four different screens which you can select what information you want on, so it’s really like being on a prat perch. It’s so much more fun to watch the races unfold in real time (you can also accelerate the race to 150% speed) and it’s so satisfying when you use pit strategy to get one of your guys ahead of a rival.

    The only issue with it is that you might need to do a bit of messing around to get it to work properly on a modern operating system like Windows 7, but it’s easy enough to find some files to make it work and I found it works best if you run it under Windows 98 compatability mode.

    If you don’t mind jumping into a game based around the 1998 season, it’s a really fun and deep management game that’s easily my favourite racing management sim ever.

    #254988
    Anonymous
    Inactive

    This looks brilliant, can’t wait to try it out. I agree with what you say about “free games” on smartphones, I’d happily pay for a well-made and enjoyable app.

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