Stop Playing and Take Control With Motorsport Manager
Show of hands out there: who sucks at playing driving games like I do? See, I'm not the only one. Sure, I'll jump behind the wheel of an actual car any day to go racing on a track, but put a controller in my hands and suddenly I'm the most uncoordinated person on the face of this Earth. Not that I wasn't ever a gamer, but since quitting during the Street Fighter 2 days, I haven't touched any consoles with the exception of a Wii, and even that took a long time for me to master the tennis game.
One game is going to change all of that for me: enter SEGA's Motorsport Manager. Rather than driving, you become the manager of a motorsport team in an open wheel series that's similar to F1 but not (simply due to licensing) but you can see the real life/world similarities. Call it a role playing game of sorts if you'd like; it has so many intricate features to the game that it can be overwhelming at first to digest but once you're setup, strategy becomes your primary focal point.
You start off by assuming the role of team manager where you're given control to make decisions that'll make or break the team and its overall efforts throughout the season. From overseeing construction of your headquarters to staffing and recruiting drivers, you truly are the boss. You also are responsible for tuning the cars in addition to parts development. Then you put the pieces into play for an event, the only area where you actually see any sort of driving.
But the racing itself is where Motorsport Manager becomes more fun and challenging. Your drivers are personalities themselves, all with varying needs. During the race, they'll provide feedback to you on how a car's responding to their driving based on how you direct them to perform. You'll have the chance to tweak the car's settings throughout the race, based on which parts are showing wear (like suspension or tires), and even weather will play a factor in these areas. Over the course of the season, they will start to react to your decisions, in addition to the rest of your team, which can affect overall company morale. Make the right moves and you'll win a championship; slip up and you'll go down in flames.
That's but a simple breakdown of how Motorsport Manager works as there are so many features it's hard to get into it all. The best way to experience it is to obviously play it yourself like we did with a test demo a few weeks ago. It'll be available for PC, Mac and Linux this coming Fall, and we can't wait to get a final copy of it for ourselves.
(Screenshots: Courtesy of SEGA via The ID Agency)
