After the disappointment of "F1 22," "F1 23" shines purple on the timesheets, one for the Netflix generation, one for the hardcore, and one for the booty addicts. Yes, seriously; add in the eSports shenanigans, and one might wonder if Codemasters is spreading itself too thin. Surely, not everything can meet the standards of that impeccable career mode. ......" Incredibly, it is very, very close.

The best example of this is the return of the fictional story "Breaking Point," located at the top of the main menu. This is because there is only so much you can do with an F1 storyline script, which is basically a clash of teammates, an old veteran training up a new driver, or a cocky antagonist making jokes, only to get his revenge in the final act. Yes, this is the synopsis of the original F1 21 production of Braking Point. But strikingly, there is originality here. It's also properly charming. You won't find any spoilers in this review, but the cast of characters is deeper and more compelling, eliciting far greater emotional responses than before. The improved facial expressions help that, but still, any one of them could easily be elected mayor of the uncanny valley.

Also, the ability to directly control several key characters in various situations has changed our perception of them. Suddenly empathizing with the plight of an obviously antagonistic character gives "putting yourself in their shoes" a whole new meaning. The script is powerful, and the game successfully translates these relationships into simple, multi-layered racing objectives, seamlessly incorporating this fictional soap opera into a fully licensed F1 world and an ultra-smooth game engine.

It is also impressive that your actions and interview answers are faithfully reflected in the game's social feeds and news videos. At nearly 10 hours long, "Braking Point 2" is so much more than worth the purchase of the game on its own, but it is still just one pillar of the experience.

So let's move on to the second pillar, the career mode. Career comes to life in earnest around "F1 2018," and at this point it is perfect. Aside from a new scene by Nathalie Pinkham, Career Mode remains largely unchanged from last year's excellent game, but after the second year, three bonus tracks can now be added: Shanghai, Paul Ricard, and Algarve.

Now, what is the third "game", which is basically (take a deep breath) "Fortnite"-ized F1. This will no doubt raise eyebrows, but it offers a "Podium Pass," loot of varying rarity, and a variety of challenges that sometimes tie in with the real-world calendar. This mode is called "F1 World," and participating in the Grand Prix will read "F1 World Grand Prix," so old-school N64 fans will unwittingly recreate DiCaprio's finger-pointing gif. This mode makes much more sense than last year's weird living room version, which allows you to customize not only your avatar's outfit and crib, but also your unique F1 car, and raise your tech rating from 100 to 1,000.

Here's where things get complicated.

The cars in F1 World are basically blank canvases that can be upgraded with parts and perks. As you play, you earn upgrades and team member contracts, which can be traded, boosted, or destroyed to earn stickers. Stickers are actual photo fragments that can be seen on the compendium screen, where you can learn trivia about cars, drivers, and circuits, and collect entire photos to earn even more loot. Each upgrade and team member has a numerical value, and the average of these values determines the car's skill level. If you enter a 90-rated series with a 295-rated car, you will win every race by 20 seconds or more, as Max Verstappen did this year.

While this works almost exactly as it should, events tend to have at least a few drivers who are overpowered relative to their event's rating. On the other hand, "vendor goals" allow you to set yourself a bonus task, such as driving 50 miles on a European course. You can complete it and collect the loot. You don't have to pay for the podium pass itself, but you can pay extra to speed up the process or get additional items. You don't have to, but the option is there. Also, "F1 WORLD" requires an Internet connection, so if the servers are down, progress will be impossible.

Into all of this is woven a sportsmanship-oriented driving style: start with a C rating and work your way up to (hopefully) a B or A as you race without being penalized for hitting other drivers, going off the track limits, and so on. B, A, and so on. Some events are locked by the license rating, and restarting the race does not remove the damage to the rating, so you cannot repeat restarts as a towed car until you have a clean run.

Interestingly, the lower the license rank, the lower the difficulty setting, so C-license drivers are automatically reset to the track with their crashed car at almost full racing speed. In the online race, the first lap is completely collision-free, and contact detection is only turned on for one level after the second lap.

While F1 World offers the most genuinely new gameplay in years, it seems to have yet to redefine the in-game experience. One event is labeled "Arcade," but there is clearly nothing arcade-y about it; it is just like any other race. In fact, "F1 World" will never fully convince hardcore fans, or those already invested in the loot-box shenanigans of, say, "Disney SpeedStorm," despite its outwardly similar DNA; F 1is too serious. Thankfully, all of the loot-centric elements are contained within the "F1 World" mode, so if the mere mention of the word "loot" makes you nauseous, you can largely avoid it. Nevertheless, if you want to play some online modes or start a driver-only Grand Prix season, those elements are unlocked by playing the first few hours of F1 World.

On the track, "F1 23" is a fast, accurate, and technical racer with tactical depth; the AI drivers' behavior has improved over last year, with occasional silly lunges like real drivers, but they rarely change lanes when overtaking anymore, and parallel They are now more willing to give the car the width it deserves at times. As a result, racing has become much closer.

Every few hours you might see an AI car skipping a chicane, but for the most part, you can carefully drive a beautifully realistic real-world course, manage the "overtake button" and its boost gauge, extend your stint on medium tires by two laps and spend time worrying about whether or not to run the last six laps on soft tires at full throttle. They will be immersed in each track, learning how to handle a car with oversteer and how to maintain good adherence with the track surface on smooth corner exits. This is a very convincing recreation of the actual sport, with all the positives and negatives that that entails. Booty-phobia aside, the only criticism that can be leveled at this phenomenally well-made game is that, like real F1, it's all a bit straightforward.

That said, the new Las Vegas course is big in its own right, and a few tweaks have made existing courses better, like the removal of the final chicane in Barcelona, the new super-fast middle section in Melbourne, and even a slightly different version for the umpteenth time in Singapore No doubt about it.

The game looks great as always, even on high settings on a 1080p laptop with an NVIDIA RTX 2070. It is playable at Ultra with ray tracing enabled, but you'll need a more robust hardware to run it at 60fps or better, which is the standard for racers. Steam Deck play was not supported in the build I tested, but the first day's patch claims to have fixed this issue.

F1 23 has been criticized for being expensive, but no one would realistically argue that it is not cost-effective. The best-in-class career mode is complemented by the best story, along with a completely different progression-based economy in the F1 world. Add online ranked play, an eSports championship, and last year's F2 cars, and you have a truly phenomenal package. Sure, it's a little too paw-faced in some places, but it's still phenomenal.