Motorsport Manager Mobile 3 review
:: SPEEDY SEQUELPrice: $3.99
Version: 1.0.1
App Reviewed on: iPad Air 2
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The Motorsport Manager series is very near and dear to my heart, but that’s mostly because they are simply some of the best management games on mobile. The first game was a fantastic debut that made simple management mechanics fun and easy to engage with on a small screen and Motorsport Manager Mobile 2 upped its game by making a more fully featured experience more suited to larger screens.
Just one year later, Playsport Games announced and released their third installment in the series, Motorsport Manager Mobile 3, which largely feels like an extension of the game that came a year prior. It’s bigger and better, but also feels a bit like more of the same you’ve come to know and love.
Backseat driving
For those that have played a Motorsport Manager game, you already know that you don’t actually do any driving yourself. Instead, you are responsible for running all aspects of a racing team. You pick your drivers, hire mechanics, invest in new parts, make sponsorship deals, and generally try to make sure you run a profitable organization.
All of this management comes to a head on race day though, where all of your preparation is put to the test. On races, you are also in control of your drivers, though only in a limited sense. Your drivers circle a track automatically, but you tell them whether to push hard to try and make up lost time, make pit stops, etc. You know, the stuff you might expect to do when you’re a manager as opposed to a driver.
More to manage
As a sequel, Motorsport Manager Mobile 3 doesn’t shake things up quite as much as its predecessor did. Instead, it takes the core concepts of Motorsport Manager Mobile 2 and adds a bit more dimension, detail, and polish to the whole thing.
Some of the new things in Motorsport Manager Mobile 3 include: six new championships (including different kinds of cars), new race types, a supplier network management layer, an influence system (which allows you bend rules or manipulate drivers), and even votes on rule changes to racing series. Along with all of this new stuff is also a lot of refinement to existing systems, to the point that the more puzzling and random-feeling aspects of previous games (read: qualifying and driver stats) feel way more understandable.
If it ain’t broke
The changes and additions to the series make Motorsport Manager Mobile 3 feel like the most complete version of the formula yet, but it’s hard not to feel a little disappointed by this release. Motorsport Manager Mobile 2 was such a huge (and amazing) shift for the series, but Motorsport Manager Mobile 3—for all the new stuff jammed into it—feels a lot like more of the same.
In fact, in my time with Motorsport Manager Mobile 3 I found myself using the same strategies I used in Motorsport Manager Mobile 2 to win, and they are just as effective here, if not more so. The clarity that this new entry brings to some of its systems actually makes it easier to avoid pitfalls and create a racing dynasty almost immediately. If things feel too easy though, there are also difficulty options you can tweak to make things harder on you, which is a new and welcome addition to the series.
The bottom line
Where Motorsport Manager Mobile 2 felt like a reinvention of the series, Motorsport Manager Mobile 3 just seems like a continuation of pre-existing ideas. There’s more things to do and a greater variety of ways to do them, which is great, but it’s also a bunch of stuff that feels pretty familiar. This familiarity makes Motorsport Manager Mobile 3 feel a bit unsurprising, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t still fantastic.