F1 2009 Wii Hands on impressions + Video

We took an F1 car around Albert Park while in Melbourne, it wasnt the real one but it was still pretty good

While Wii content was pretty thin on the ground at eGames—apart from Ubisoft’s offerings—Namco Bandai was there along with F1 2009 on the Wii, bonus F1 Steering Wheel and all. The steering wheel, which is shaped like a real F1 wheel (except the whole ’it’s white’ thing), works really well with the F1 brand of racing as unlike racing games like Excitebots and Mario Kart, which require sharp turns, F1 racing on Wii requires subtle left and right adjustments to steer similar to a real F1 car. Playing with all the assists on makes the game insanely easy and probably good for your really younger brother or perhaps your dad. Unless of course your Dad is a F1 or racing nut, then you can turn all assists off and go for the authentic experience.

The game’s graphics aren’t anything to be sneezed at with the tracks looking alive and the cars looking well modeled, too. We were only playing a early development version as they were using the ’green’ debug Wii, so things may get better before release or we may have been playing an older version—no one from Namco Bandai was watching the booth it seems, or the life size F1 car. The game also runs at an impressive 60fps but we did notice some slow down when lighting effects were in playing.

The Wii version of F1 2009 is seemingly shaping up well, but for now here is a minute of it in action. F1 2009 is out in Australia on November 19th.