F1 2013 Please Help A Noob

[AfxTwn]

Hi everyone, I am new to F1 2013 and have it on my PC on Steam. I am playing with a brand new Xbox 360 controller (my old controller's throttle seemed to be a bit too powerful and the controller itself was rather dusty and so I got a new one).

Anyway, as I am a complete newbie to this game and generally quite rubbish at racing games I am playing on the lowest difficulty setting with all assists on/set to their highest setting and brake control set to full.

I am on day 2 of the young driver test and I'm really, really struggling to pass the evaluation test where you have to complete two laps of the Abu Dhabi track in under 3:50. This seems nigh-on impossible for me and I'm always over by a few seconds, even when sticking to the suggested racing line.

Now I know most people here will suggest turning off some of the assists or using an actual wheel (which I don't have), such as the auto-brake function (or whatever it's called) but I wanted to see if you can complete this test using all the assists.

The car I am using I think is a Red Bull car (the blue one with the Infiniti logo?), so I don't know if this a bad car to use for this test or not.

Am I so bad at this game that I can't finish this one evaluation test or is it always going to be impossible using all the assists etc?

I know it might be a case of practicing but I've tried this damn test about 20 times and I just can't get anywhere near the required time. Please somebody help me!!

 

[ParkYongLee]

Are you using KERS and DRS when available?

 

[AfxTwn]

Yes, I use KERS coming out of hairpins or very slow corners (once I'm on the straight) and DRS whenever I go into one of the zones.

 

[Jonathan Rowland]

The red bull is a good car, so that won't be the issue. The auto braking assist slows you down massively i find. If you are using all assists you should have the racing line on. Follow that, and brake when it turns red. I'm sure once you get the hang of that you'll be able to pass the test.

 

[AfxTwn]

I turned the braking assist down from highest to high and after a few attempts and some slight corner cutting (without the game actually catching me), I was finally able to complete this test in 3:48.

The braking assist does massively slow you down and I had read elsewhere on this forum to try and brake on the straights (particularly the fast ones before a tight corner) at around the 100 yard sign. This helped me a lot as I was going into the corners slower but not too slow.

I think I will turn the braking assist down to medium and see how I get on in career mode with it and just get used to braking better on the straights. I have found that my new xbox controller is better than my old one too. On the default settings in the game, the throttle doesn't seem as aggressive as it did on my old one. On the old controller, I was constantly spinning out of corners because as soon as I applied throttle on the exit (even just a small amount), the car would lose grip and lurch left or right.

I think this game rather than making things easier with the braking assist, makes it worse and that seems silly to me. Surely the whole point in using this is for people who haven't yet learned how to brake correctly and the game seems to make things more difficult when you use it. You should still be able to use all assists and be competitive in races/qualifying and certainly be able to complete all the young driver tests with no problem. Sure it may be too easy but that would encourage you to turn them off. In fact, I'd say it's pretty much impossible to complete the evaluation test when braking assist is at it's highest, it just slows you down far too early and far too much through corners.

Anyway, now that I'm finally over the young driver tests I can get to actually playing the game properly. Thanks for the help.

 

[ParkYongLee]

Turn the braking assist off, believe me you'll very fast learn when to brake. And soon you'll be able to turn the racing line off. Korea is the only track I can never remember and always brake wrong, most other have easy to remember braking spots (like signs showing the meters).
And soon you'll also be able to reduce the TC (I have it on medium, I tend to press forcefully on my triggers, haha)