F1 Manager 2022 v1.8 Fixes A.I., Tire And Fuel Management

Frontier Developments have today released their 1.8 patch for F1 Manager 2022 on PC, Xbox, and PlayStation. It appears to fix every complaint I have had or seen, including the lack of superwide support that I brought up as just a small annoyance in my review.

What’s interesting are the initial complaints I am seeing about the patch from people who seem utterly confused that a management title is now expecting them to be able to manage their races. There is absolute bewilderment that they cannot simply set a driver to full push (basically asking a driver to do repeated qualifying laps) for the entire race without facing increased tire wear. I’m not sure what planet these people are from, perhaps they trickled over from Frontier’s Elite: Dangerous space game, but I’m genuinely curious if they’ve actually ever seen Formula One before. People still talk about that time that Michael Schumacher did a series of qualifying-esque laps in a row to make a race strategy work as if it was the stuff of legend because it is. It’s not normal to push 100% ALL RACE, every race, because it’s about getting the full race distance done in the shortest time and most often not having to sit in the pit lane more than a couple of times is how that’s done.

Changelog:

Gameplay

Adjusted tyre performance deltas, degradation rates, and performance during degradation for all compounds, across all weather types
Updated behaviour of backmarkers and slower-moving cars, so they move aside more effectively when required
Further adjustments to car part development focus and attribute trade-offs to help balance player progress vs. other teams
Updated fuel delta display to improve readability and stability. Fuel delta is now measured in kilograms (KG) and is relative to the expected fuel load at the current point in the race
Improvements to car behaviour when racing side-by-side, reducing instances of unnecessary slowing and ‘concertina effect’
Improvements to AI strategic behaviour during wet weather conditions
Fixed an issue where the Safety Car would pull aside to let cars pass by if the race leader entered the pits
Fixed an issue where saving on a specific screen would cause all 20 cars to appear during Q2
Added super-wide monitor support, including fix for gameplay UI appearing in the centre of the display
Minor adjustments to starting car performance, starting Facility levels, and board performance expectations for a small number of teams to align with their real-world performance (will only take effect in new saves created after this update is installed)

General Stability

Fixed multiple crashes caused by various events, including invalid qualification grids and tyre types
Fixed instance of hard-lock when changing stint compound type to a compound the player has run out of in Strategy View
Fixed multiple reported soft-locks and progress blockers in the tutorial sequence

Drivers & Staff

Multiple corrections made to staff information, including age and accompanying photos
Fixed an issue where drivers would remain in a bookmarked slot after retiring

Achievements & Trophies

Fixes for multiple instances of Achievements/Trophies not triggering correctly, including ‘Constructors’ Champion’ and ‘First of Many’. Achievements/Trophies that players have earned, but not triggered, should unlock after the player finishes their next race, after installing Update 1.8

Cars

Fixed a small hole in the car model for several cars

Cinematics

Fixed an issue where tyres would sometimes appear duplicated in cutscenes
Stopped instances of rain passing through the ceilings of pit buildings
Fixed a soft-lock when opening the Options menu during some cutscenes
Reduced instances of major garage reactions to minor race incidents, such as a car running wide

Circuits

Updated Miami International Autodrome track map in the ‘Circuits’ menu to add tags for corners 17,18, and 19

Facilities

Controller: Fixed bindings for right shoulder buttons not working in ‘Overview’ and ‘Usage’ tabs 

Pit Stops

Resolved an issue where unattached tyres would appear in pit lane
Fixed trackside camera focus for second car when ‘double stacking’ cars for pit stops

Steam

Added on-screen keyboard support for Steam Deck and Steam Big Picture Mode
Resolved issue causing the game to launch Steam VR when a VR headset is connected