New Feel, New Cars, New Tracks, VR: F1 22’s Big Shake-up
It’s no secret that Formula 1 is surging in popularity right now – largely because they’ll tell you, any chance they get. In fairness, that’s what quality promoters do – and it’s precisely this sort of promotion that’s seen F1 gather such an impressive amount of momentum over the past few years.
On the back of explosive online growth, the success of Netflix’s surprise hit Drive to Survive, and some long-awaited rising interest in the US, F1 is in a very healthy spot. The fastest growing sports league on the planet in terms of online follower growth in 2021? F1. The highest-attended live sporting event in the world last year? The US F1 Grand Prix. In fact, the Abu Dhabi season finale had a higher TV audience than Superbowl LVI – almost 30% higher than the same race in 2020. It may have been marred by controversy but the historical showdown between Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton attracted remarkable interest.
“It’s a really exciting time for us to be making a Formula 1 game,” says long-time F1 series senior creative director Lee Mather. “It’s really growing across the globe and those figures are increasing on a race-by-race basis, so that sets us up really strongly for where we’re going to take things in F1 22.”
As the sport itself enters a new era, Codemasters appears to be following suit.
“So the rule changes have been the biggest changes we’ve seen in the sport in four decades, and certainly the biggest change since we’ve had the license,” says Mather. “Things have changed massively in the sport this year; we’ve got new rules, we’ve got new drivers, we’ve got a new circuit in Miami. Things are really changing.”
“The order of the cars in the series is changing massively. The way that the cars look, the way that the cars
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