F1 Manager 24 is coming to Nintendo Switch with complete feature-parity
Frontier has announced that its upcoming F1 Manager 24 is coming to Nintendo Switch for the first time in the series, and will have complete feature parity with the Xbox and PlayStation versions.
Until now, the F1 Manager series was only released on Xbox, PlayStation and PC platforms. While this previously made sense given much of the gameplay involves navigating UI menus and reading relatively small text. It seems that Frontier has worked its magic to get the title running optimally on portable hardware, despite the small-screen limitations.
Team orders on the go
Click to enlargeThe news was dropped at the Frontier Unlocked event on June 26, which detailed plenty of other advancements players can look forward to in the strategy sim. For those who haven’t played before, F1 Manager puts you in the shoes of a team principal, rather than a driver. You’ll spend your time allocating team resources, developing your cars, nurturing drivers and co-ordinating race day strategy - all to take home the Constructor and Drivers Championships.
Much like Codemaster’s F1 racing series, F1 Manager is officially licensed by Formula 1. As such, it has an authentic feel, with the UI elements designed to look much like the official broadcast. Sky Sports commentators David Croft and Karun Chandhok make their return, providing bits of commentary to punctuate the race weekends.
New advancements in this year’s title include a brand-new livery designer for both your drivers and cars, which I had a great deal of fun experimenting with in our preview earlier this year. There’s also a new Mentality system to experiment with, which will take into account the personality of your drivers and staff members. Favouring one driver over another could lead to conflict within the ranks, so you’ll need to consider your actions more carefully on race weekends as the championships roll by.
We've reached out to Frontier for further comment on any adjustments that have been made to the game to get it running well on Nintendo's ageing hardware. We're not sure what the target frame rate is, although given you're mostly clicking through menus, a high FPS isn't exactly required. We're also keen to learn about how the UI has been scaled to work on a small screen.
As someone who’s played a fair amount of the previous F1 Manager games on the Steam Deck, it’s a game that’s suited extremely well to a portable form factor. Being able to take your championship efforts on the go ultimately means more time invested into honing your team’s capabilities, so it’s fantastic that Nintendo Switch players are now also afforded that opportunity.
Now all we need is a Mac port so I can procrastinate in my day job all on one screen…
F1 Manager 24 is set to launch on PC, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 5 and Nintendo Switch on July 23, 2024 for £29.99/$34.99.
