F1 23 hands-on preview: Fantastic Formula 1 action
Between welcome refinements and subtle new additions, F1 23 is shaping up to be an excellent evolution for the racing game series
After F1 22 introduced supercars to the racing game series, Codemasters set themselves the hard task with F1 23 of building a game that somehow feels new again. We spent a few hours with a preview build of the upcoming Formula 1 game to see how that was playing out, and while F1 23 might feel like a safe evolution for the franchise, it’s still shaping up to be an excellent one.
There’s a lot we didn’t get to play just yet, such as F1 World, new tracks, and Breaking Point 2, which we’ll be focusing on over the coming weeks, but we already have quite a clear idea about how the game is shaping up.
The first thing we noticed is how much more grounded your car feels. That’s thanks in part to new sound effects. Wheels dig into the ground and throw grit around your ears. You feel every shifting gear, and the engines are now deliberately less graceful.
That sense of groundedness doesn’t extend to how cars control, though. In our experience during the first few hours, vehicles feel more slippery, and it’s easier to lose the rear end. It’s tough to get used to, but it could be a result of counter-steering becoming more common in Formula 1.
While the emphasis is squarely on F1 as a spectacle, it also accentuates a long-standing issue with the series. Curbs seem suspiciously safe to straddle, rather than having you spin-out the moment you touch them, and there are still issues in the middle of corners.
Speaking of curbs, Codemasters evidently took feedback from the real sport since shipping F1 22. Ground effect returning meant that managing curbs became even more complex. If you just touch them with the bottom of the car, you lose control for an instant. That’s a side effect of the new aerodynamics introduced in 2022.
Since the initial build, driver and team performances have been updated to reflect their progress in the 2023 season. Fernando Alonso is now going for the pole in his Aston Martin, while Ferrari is considered the third or fourth team on the grid.
We played as Max Verstappen and enjoyed a Bahrain GP in the lead from the first to the last lap. Red Bull remains a powerhouse even in the video game. The Asturian Fernando Alonso was our best choice in an intense Grand Prix of Emilia Romagna. Imola GP was canceled due to the disastrous floods earlier in May 2023, but we still managed to have some fun there, keeping the reigning world champion behind.
The preview build let us test the 35 percent race length, a much-needed race length setting, and a vibrant new color encoding system – a welcome set of improvements over F1 22’s visuals.
It’s not all new features. F1 23 is also refining plenty of established systems. The grid is more active than ever, in line with improvements made in F1 22, and you can see safety cars and overtakes changing during a race. We haven’t seen red flags, but we’re assuming those will show up in the final build – and even more so in the multiplayer component.
You don’t find yourself in P20 anytime you get in the pit lane from P1 anymore – which might seem like a given, but it wasn’t really obvious in the last few F1 games.
Tire management is still a very strong asset, both in wear, which still influences how performance changes during a race, and in compound. It makes a substantial difference between how you start a race and how you finish it, and it affects human and AI players alike.
From the first hours spent with general gameplay, F1 23 looks like a solid update – even if it is a safe one. Between welcome refinements and new nuances to check out, we’re looking forward to getting our hands on the final product when it launches on June 16, 2023, for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X|S.
Written by Paolo Sirio on behalf of GLHF