F-1 World Grand Prix

1998 · Racing · Nintendo 64

About F-1 World Grand Prix

F-1 World Grand Prix (1998) is Paradigm Entertainment's Formula One simulation of the 1997 season, praised by N64 Magazine as the finest driving simulation ever made.

F-1 World Grand Prix in Depth

The Nintendo 64 version is based on the 1997 Formula One season, with all 17 circuits and all 22 drivers plus two unlockable bonus racers, except Jacques Villeneuve, who is replaced for licensing reasons by a silhouetted "Driver Williams" with a fictional helmet but his correct career statistics; the player can rename him, which also unlocks extras. The MasterCard Lola team is absent because it never took part in a race that season. Five modes are offered: Grand Prix, racing the 1997 season course by course; Exhibition, a single race; Time Trial; Challenge, recreating real scenarios such as trying to win the 1997 Hungarian Grand Prix as Damon Hill or beating Jean Alesi as David Coulthard at Monza; and two-player split-screen racing.

Before each race players can tune their car's tyres, fuel load and wing angle, and weather and its effects are simulated. N64 Magazine's James Ashton called it "the finest driving simulation the world has ever seen", Hyper gave it 86 per cent as "a great addition to any racing fan's game library", and Edge eight out of ten, while GamePro warned that only players wanting an extremely challenging F1 sim, or with enormous patience, would love it. Later versions moved to the 1998 season on Dreamcast and Game Boy Color, and to 1999 on PlayStation and Windows.

Making F-1 World Grand Prix

Paradigm Entertainment developed it as a Nintendo 64 exclusive, and it was released in 1998 before versions followed for Dreamcast, Windows, PlayStation and Game Boy Color. The N64 and Dreamcast versions received favourable reviews; Famitsu gave them 29 and 30 out of 40. It was a success in Europe, and its sequel, F-1 World Grand Prix II, was published by Video System for the N64 in 1999. Eidos Interactive's later PlayStation and Windows versions received mixed reviews, though AllGame praised extras such as a fully customisable instant replay.

F-1 World Grand Prix Trivia

It used speech compression technology from Factor 5 to fit voice clips on the cartridge.
It was first developed as a Nintendo 64 exclusive.
It won a Gold award at the 1999 Milia festival for earning over €20 million in the EU.
It was nominated for Best Racing Game at The Electric Playground's 1998 Blister Awards.
F-1 World Grand Prix II followed in 1999.