EA has officially unveiled the next installment in its long-running official FIA Formula One World Championship game, EA SPORTS F1 23, and announced it will be released on June 16.
Developed from F1 22, F1 23 will be available on PC — via Epic, Steam, and the EA App — as well as PlayStation 4/5 and Xbox One/Series consoles. However EA has been working to refine several aspects of last season’s title, as well as bringing in new and returning features.
Headlining that will be the return of F1 2021’s Braking Point story mode, which we had been expecting after comments from EA around its absence from F1 22 that this was on a “two-year cadence”.
The story will see the return of the hero and villain of the last entry — Aiden Jackson and Devon Butler respectively — as they now drive together for a new team on the grid: Konnersport Racing.
A new introduction for F1 23 is “F1 World”, which appears to replace “F1 Life”. According to EA this combines several different game modes — including time trial and grand prix — and takes cues from the real Formula One calendar to create a new experience that helps introduce players to the sport.
F1 World will also have a new progression system which will see players unlock cosmetic items and vehicle upgrades, while a new safety system will see players evaluated in both online and offline modes. This will also function as a matchmaking criterion, to “pair like-minded drivers more efficiently”.
While the real-world cars remain largely the same as the previous year’s, EA has been working on upgrading the rather numb vehicle handling of F1 22. There’s promised changes across the board in terms of car physics, based on feedback from the real-world F1 teams, to deliver more “predictable” handling and more authentic throttle control.
Controller users are set to see a change too, with a new “Precision Drive” system to improve the experience on game pads.
Naturally F1 23 will include the entire 2023 season grid and race calendar at launch, which brings Qatar’s Lusail circuit and the new-for-2023 Las Vegas Strip Circuit that will host its debut race this November.
In addition there’s three “legacy” circuits available, with Autodromo Internacional do Algarve (Portimao) in Portugal, Circuit Paul Ricard in France, and the Shanghai International Circuit in China all included despite not hosting races this year. However there’s no word on “classic “legacy” F1 cars at present.
The races will have an additional new dimension with the debut of red flags. These session-neutralising signals, shown whenever it’s no longer safe for cars to circulate even behind the safety car, will add a tactical element as the confusion reigns — even in Race Control — before a restart.
Players will also be able to take part in new, 35% race distance events which bridge the gap between the shortest and longer race options — and are pretty close to the real-world Sprint Race distance.
F1 23 will launch in two versions. A Standard Edition will be available either digitally or as a physical game, alongside a digital only F1 23 Champions Edition with the EA Sports-sponsored defending champion Max Verstappen on the cover.
The Champions Edition includes dual entitlement for console players, a Max Verstappen race wear pack, special Braking Point 2 and My Team icons, an XP boost, an “F1 World Bumper Pack” (the contents of which are unclear at the moment), 18,000 PitCoin, and three days’ early access. Players who pre-order this version before May 31 will also receive special “Las Vegas content”, with Standard Edition pre-orders gaining 5,000 PitCoin and an “F1 World Starter Pack”.
