Have F1 Manager games been a hit or miss for you?

"Team Principal: A Grand Prix Manager" is a great in depth F1 management game that was released a year ago.
The developer is constantly updating the game, intently listening to user feedback

Motorsport Manager on PC will always to me, be the best racing manager experience. Even though its not official F1 licensed, It's the best example out there

Personally I started with Grand Prix Manager back in the day, so many hours spent in that.  My career brought me back to that world working on the Motorsport Manager games for PC & mobile for the last decade.

You’re right in many of your assumptions about the restrictions placed on the game by the license holders.  For them the game is a piece of their larger marketing strategy, so as part of the agreement Frontier had to spent time & money making photorealistic tracks and cars, and accurately recreating the TV presentation - only for all of us to play most of it at speeds that just show the circuit map.

The other side of it is there are real people in the game, and really limits what you can do with them.  With Motorsport Manager we’ve always embraced the sillier side of the sport away from the racing - the personalities, the memes, tabloid stories, etc.  We have the freedom to do that because we’re not using real people.

Similarly we can lean into the side most F1 games avoid with illegal parts, bending the rules for a bit of an advantage.  Officially licensed games avoid this (with a couple of exceptions) as I think it would be seen as brining the sport into disrepute, even though it’s always been part of it.  Teams of engineers looking for every advantage, every creative interpretation of the rules to gain a fraction of a second.  It’s one of the things that makes the sport so fascinating.

With no license we have the freedom to hold up a mirror to these aspects of the sport in a way a licensed game doesn’t.

We’re working on Motorsport Manager 2 for the PC currently, we’re excited to be showing more soon, and we’ll continue to support that aspect of things.  And with mod support people will be able to bring the championships & eras of motorsport to life that they want to see.

Watching this video while playing F1 manager 24 with 2026  mods. The community is still alive with constant updates for the mods

I have a genuine soft spot for the crammond gp manager games because the ui was easy to use (drop-down menus) and there wasn't any wasted time hunting through screens.

They were also pretty feature rich so you could build a dream championship season playing as minardi by managing to grab a couple of top tier sponsors from competitors, a driver with lots of championship potential, and a decent engine/car package.

I actually did that playing as Lotus in Grand Prix Manager.

It was quite the feat to take a team that was all but dead in the beginning of '94, build it up through that season, sign a huge tobacco company as lead sponsor, lure jean alesi away from ferrari, get a factory partnership with renault and then make a come from behind title challenge that was successful in 1995.

Team Principal A Racing Manager. This game will be the base for all motorsport managerial games.

I really liked GP Manager 2, even using it with DOSBox recently (say, during the pandemic). Something that wouldn't work at all right now is the idea of having "your" team poach sponsors from anywhere else: I once played with Simtek and managed to hold Mild Seven for two years. Also, the other thing is you could have different engine suppliers, banned tech coming back and even pay drivers, ending with very weird stuff like having Ferrari sign a deal with Nissan while McLaren had... Ferrari engines. So, it was really fun in a way you mentioned it won't ever happen again.

10:41 exept that the zyn logos are removed from the official F1 games. Witch i think is a pretty good thing. I dont think zyn is anywhere on the Ferrari merch either.

A historic Manager, beginning with 1950s-something would be a must-buy for me.

Ive alway loved the F1 manager games they've been a hit for me wish they bring it back the different storylines in seasons ill have was fun

There is some indy games on steam, delta manager ,team principal, golden lap,the undercut all with real mods avaliable all give gpm2,gpw vibes

The fact that I've gotten more enjoyment out of learning spreadsheets, learning how to sim F1 races, and finding a community of people to simulate F1 online through sheets/excel than any F1 management game speaks tenfold to how much the genre is lacking and how much of an itch there is to be scratched for, surely, a pretty decent amount of people.

I suggest playing Motorsport Manager 2016 PC Game. Its the best F1 Manager game PERIOD

F1 manager professional was my go-to game in the genre. Simulating 1996/97 seasons it was indeed one of the best ever however on-track management side was actually lacking. From the more recent ones Motorsport Manager is clearly ahead of the curve. Although non-licensed and sometimes a bit shallow, reminding a tabletop game with cards and bonuses, it is very slick in the delivery, features and possibilities. Also on-track management hits the right balance in my opinion

I had and played Grand-Prix manager 2, I didn't really understand the game and it drove me nuts....
I played and enjoyed the E.A game, we all most won the title with David Coulthard and Jarno Trulli as our drivers.  For me my favorite one has been Motorsport Manager, I am still playing it!! 10 years after release..... I like to win about 4-5 titles and then I start a new save.  I can't wait for Motorsport Manager 2 though as I hope that'll be really good, I'm hoping a certain youtuber does a series on it too.

My roommate plays the 2024 F1 manager game frequently. He seems to really like it. It's not perfect, but it seems to simulate an F1 season reasonably accurate. Too bad it was cancelled.

Well with motorsport manager 2 coming next year we might have a good hope of a nice future ahead.

Ascaron's "Team F1" was a really good product, especially considering that it is a 1995 game

Blink and you miss it. Some foreshadowing from the 1999 game at 7:02