F1 2k is a rushed product. But, :) here is why.
They had the license for the year 2000. EA has only once delayed a product
that is tied to a calendar year, that was Madden 96 or 97. Absolutely awful
and it damn near killed the Madden series. EA puts out sports titles when
the seasons begin. You'll see the new Madden title this fall, the NBA a few
weeks later, and Hockey also. They tie the product release to the season
schedule.
So obviously they wanted F12k out when the season began, and they hit that
mark. They were able to acheive this by buying up ISI and using an exisitng
software engine(scgt) rather than start from scratch. Many of F12k's
limitations are a direct result of the close kinship to scgt. If EA had
built a whole complete title from the ground up, they KNEW they would miss
the 2000 season and their license would be worthless.
However, even though GP3 was originally scheduled to ship in the early
spring, I think EA could feel pretty confident that the title would slip. I
am frankly suprised that GP3 has gone gold. Based on the difficulties
getting GP2 out the door, I didn't think even this fall was realistic. I
have to give credit to Crammond and his team for that.
So EA knew they had a window, and they slipped in, sold what they could.
I'm sure Hasbro would have loved to go head to head with EA but it just
didn't happen. Now next year....we will see probably a radical upgrade for
EA's series, and an evolutionary upgrade for GP3 and those titles should
really make for an interesting comparison.
dave henrie
> Not many went near it even though Gp3 is not out. F1-2000 is a bad
product and
> should have never been released. Check out Grand Prix World by Eidos it
is a
> much better racing sim then F1-2000.
> > Do you people think the reason EA distributed F1 2000 in this state
(i.e.
> > unfinished) was that they figured it was the only chance they had to
make
> > any money out of it? In other words, that once GP3 came out, nobody
would go
> > near F1 2000?
