Motorsport Manager

[FaultyMario]

http://www.motorsportmanager.com/

Business simulator / RTS / fast cars. Sounds like a killer combination.



Anybody getting it?

[21Kid]

Cool. For people like me who aren't good at racing games, but still like racing games.

[novicius]

My people!

[Kchrpm]

Is it F1 only? I can't watch the trailer, but that's what it looks like on the website.

[FaultyMario]

Looks like generic "open wheel gp racer" that's closely based on current F1. From factory management to team orders and everything in between.

[Reynard]

I'm close to getting this, $35 on Steam now. Anyone here get it, been playing at all, have any opinions?

[Reynard]

Ok so I've put in over 20 hours into this title now so I feel I can give a decent opinion. First it's pretty damn addictive for a racing junky such as I and I've been playing it voraciously since getting it but I'm going to be very objective in my opinion here. It's not too complicated and if anything, possibly a bit too simplified ultimately for my tastes but seeing as the original version was made for iOS, I can understand why. That said it still has a little bit of depth for the strategy layer if you will... where your monies are going to go and what return on investment will come there of.

If you haven't read any about it already, the game is based around 3 different fictional open-wheel racing series, which you can easily imagine to be F3, GP2 & F1, hey they didn't pay for any official licence. Along the way, away from the actual race events, you will be tasked with contracting your team (3 drivers, 2 mechanics, 1 chief designer) and scouting for other possible hires, selecting different sponsor contracts, voting on rule changes for the series you're running in, upgrading your team's headquarters and designing/building new parts for your race car. Then there are the actual races which is pretty much just like running in B-Spec mode in a GT game. You can adjust in real time how hard your driver's are pushing their tires or how rich they're running their fuel mix, when to make a pit stop (and what to do during said stop, fuel, tires, repairs... how fast). There will also be a practice session before hand and maybe qualifying if it's part of that season's rules package. You can set up your race cars with very basic performance sliders for front & rear wing angles, suspension stiffness, gear ratio, camber angle & tire pressure and of course tire compound. All on track sessions can be paused at anytime or fast forwarded up to 3 x speed.

I started a career mode game with a low/mid-pack F3 team and was able to win the driver & team championship in my 3rd season. Defended title in season 4 with utter domination, moved up to GP2 and struggled in season one but won championship in second season with out too much difficulty. This is both with mid-grade drivers, so I'm already wondering about how many different strategies for success there really is. I should point out that there are no difficulty levels to choose from in the game. I tend to foresee that after a couple months the game will turn into the same stuff over and over and lose it's appeal.

The mechanics of the gameplay are good, the menu's and look/graphics of the game are really nice but variety is lacking. For instance every person in game is depicted by a standard little "playing card" if you will with a picture of them front and center. However there is only one male & one female character in the entire game and thus the only individualism as far as their appearance goes are things such as glasses, facial hair & the colors on their cap. None of this is editable by the player btw. Your car's livery is however but again it's vary shallow with about a dozen predefined graphics to choose from and a tiny color palette to apply to them. Not terrible mind you as the cars are pretty tiny when racing so you never see the full liveries on track. Another thing I feel lacking are the "random" events that happen off track such as a driver taking up flying lessons or one of your cars' cooling system developing a leak. The reason I put the random in quotes is because after my short time playing is obvious these are just all going to happen no matter what and it's just when the RNG hits on them. It's less a matter of if then when. Speaking of RNGs, it can be frustrating at times too. I once had both drivers crash out of a race within 20 seconds of each other... while parading around behind a safety car no less (double Will Power @ St. Pete is not very likely at all ). I didn't mention weather yet but it rains a lot in the game. Far too much to be realistic IMO but of course that adds another dimension and a bit more tactical options during a race/qualifying. Qualifying itself isn't handled as well as I'd like either. It's like a very difficult mini-game where you have to try and balance in real time the car's tire and brake temps during it's out lap with a slider controlled by your mouse pointer. Try doing this for both cars at once and you'll soon see that's nigh impossible. So really you only get to run one car at a time and with the time constraints that usually ends up meaning 1 attempt per car and the latter car will have a big advantage because of more rubber on track (assuming no rain). That said it's fun and very satisfying when you manage to get the car on track at the latest possible chance to get a lap in with a clear track AND get your temps in their sweet spot. It's just a rare thing and I feel the whole process could've been designed better.

I've never played any other sports managerial games so have nothing to compare it to in that regard but in terms of what I know about racing I think it does a fair job if a bit overly simplistic, especially in regards to the technical side. It does provide some cool racing moments and some races can be very exciting coming down to the wire, it's just that as is, I don't think there is enough substance to keep playing it for months on end. But there maybe something to change that opinion and of course that is the fact that the game is mod friendly. Playsport the developer has said there will be Steam workshop support rolling out in the first half of 2017 and there is already a few little mods out in the wild including what looks to be a full 2016 F1 conversion that's in the works. So I'm hopeful that the game might actually get better in the future. Until then, my enthusiasm for the game is still high and I'll keep on playing until I get through a F1 season no doubt but fear the boredom might start settling in by then. We'll see.

[dodint]

PC only? Bummer. This is one of the few types of games where I think I'd rather have it on a tablet. I don't have a single game on my tablet or phone, but this would've been cool. I know it came from a mobile title but is that earlier title still supported? I wonder.

[Kchrpm]

There's an Android version, I've been playing it for a couple weeks. It's cool, but you can burn through (in-game) money very quickly so you have to not get ahead of yourself. I jumped championships too early at one point and just went ahead and put $5 in the game because I enjoyed playing and the work that went into it, but was going to go under.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...orsportmanager

[drew]

One question, can you bribe or cause controversy like blow a load on Bernie's girlfriend's face (or Bernie, for that matter)?