The F1 series has been a pillar of Codemasters’ racing game business since their first home console game in 2010, and it will continue to be one for the foreseeable future as they announce a long-term extension to their Formula One license.
Having previously held the rights to the FIA Formula One World Championship until 2021, they’ve signed a new contract to extend that to 2025 with a further option for the 2026 and 2027 seasons. Lewis Hamilton could potentially be a 14 time F1 World Champion by that point!
“Since 2008, Codemasters has been an invaluable partner to the franchise, consistently creating games of the highest quality and enabling fans to get even closer to the world of F1,” said Frank Arthofer, Director of Digital and Licensing at Formula 1. While another Frank – Frank Sagnier, Chief Executive Officer at Codemasters – said, “We are delighted to be extending our long-term partnership with the pinnacle of motorsport. Both the sport and game franchise are going from strength to strength and the arrival of new platforms, business models and territories, combined with the rapid growth of the F1 Esports Series, give us a springboard to even greater success.”
The series has been on an upward curve over the last few years, after struggling to make the transition to the current generation. The game quality and variety has increased dramatically, fleshing out the career modes with more narrative elements and more to do besides simply racing, venturing into esports for the last two years, and expanding the game to include Formula Two for the first time in F1 2019.
In our F1 2019 review, Tom wrote, “While F1 2019 adds features from the all-time bucket list of many an F1 fan, these new additions aren’t quite fully formed yet. This still managed to be the best Formula 1 game by Codemasters to date – the handling of the F2 cars and new online modes are genre defining – but there is always scope for further improvements and some areas are now beginning to feel a little stale. Video gamers can be so demanding sometimes.”
Hopefully Codies can keep that trajectory going, bringing new features and more easily handling the jump from PlayStation 4 and Xbox One to PlayStation 5 and Project Scarlett, both due out by Christmas 2020.
Source: press release
camdaz
That’s great news, I’ve been a fan of their racing games since the first TOCA game on pc (around 1996/7) but especially when they released Colin McRae Rally on the PlayStation a year or two later.
My biggest wish is for Codies to include support for the PSVR(2) in all their racing games.
jeanhenry
That’s what I’m holding out on VR for. Surely with the PS5, this along with GT can go fully VR.