F-1 Spirit: The Way to Formula-1 is a top down Formula One Racing game, developed and published by Konami, which was released for the MSX in Japan and Europe in 1987.
The game engine is very similar to Konami's Road Fighter. It also features Konami's custom sound chip called Konami SCC (a five-channel chip that compliments the three-channel PSG chip of the MSX computer system, or in other words, a sound custom chip that brings five voices more to the three voices of the PSG sound chip on the system), and great MSX1 graphics to go with it. It was one of the first ROM on MSX with this sound feature. Together with its "3D" spinoff, F-1 Spirit: 3D Special, F-1 Spirit: The Way to Formula-1 was the most extended racing game Konami released for the MSX.
Gameplay[]
This third-person racing game features many different types of cars. Everything starts with stock cars, moving up to rally cars and Formula 3. The main goal is to finish at first place with Formula 1, the king class of racing. There are six types of races: Stock race, Rally, F3 race, F3000 race, Endurance race, and finally F1 races (16 tracks). Initially, the player can only race in the stock, rally and F3 races. As the player win races, he will accumulate points that will allow him to play new races. If the player finish a race at first place he will receive nine points. He gets eight points if he finishes second, etc. If the player finish 10th or later, he will not score any points. There are 16 different tracks for F1 cars. As the player wins races, he will be able to play more tracks in the F1 car category. To complete the game, you have to win all of the 16 F1 tracks. There's a grand total of 21 tracks. The first races are the easiest ones: the cars are slow and the enemies do not drive very well. But as the player classify for new tracks the difficulty will increase: F1 cars are insanely fast and you will need a great agility to win in F1 tracks. Even though they look impossible to control at first, with some practice you can master the Formula 1 cars and win races. And if that's not enough, you can always show off your skills in multi player mode.
The difficulty level can be set, the race track selected and the number of laps is variable. The field includes ready made and custom made cars (the player can select engine, tires, suspension). Avoiding the slower cars the player come up to lap can be crucial. During a race, you can bump into other cars and into the side boards and other obstacles. This will damage your car. In every track, there is a pit lane (labeled with the letters "PIT") where you can fuel up and repair your car. Top speed will decrease if the engine is damaged. This will make you lose time in every lap. When you are in the PIT STOP you can hold down the DOWN key to speed up car repairs. Fuel intake will be slower, though. The fuel consumption is determined by the RPM meter (as in real cars). Your car only consumes fuel when you accelerate. F1 tracks cannot be won at the first race unless you are an ace driver. To win an F1 race, try to memorize each curve and play each race several times to know where to brake and where to accelerate.
An unlicensed Sega Master System port was released by Zemina in the same year, as F1 스피리트.
A similar game, Chequered Flag, was released for the arcades in 1988.