To be perfectly honest, I do not know that much about the sport of cycling. All of my knowledge comes from watching ESPN when Lance Armstrong was the king of the cycling world. So when Pro Cycling Manager 2013 landed on my desk, I felt way out of my element. That feeling subsided a little bit during my time with the game, but this game is not for the faint of heart.
I spent all of my playtime in Pro Cycling Manager in the career mode. This is what the game is about: managing a cycling team. You will handle all of the tasks that come with being the manager, including signing new riders, interacting with sponsors, register the team for different events, and other managerial duties. It can be pretty overwhelming if you do not know what is going on, but fans of professional cycling will feel at home.
In the career mode you have three leagues to choose from: Cya World Tour, Continental Pro, and Continental. For those wanting to participate in the most iconic races, including the Tour de France, then the Cya World Tour is the league for you. I learned that in cycling, like football leagues around the world, teams can be relegated and promoted between the three leagues. So if you’re participating in the Cya World Tour, finishing the season as one of the bottom two teams will send you to Continental Pro for the next season. If your team is not performing well, you can also lose sponsors, limiting the events you can register for.
The game does feature real cycling teams, like Radio Shack, Sky, and Garmin. I went with the Garmin team, as I had no idea what was going on. Populating the rosters are the real riders, with their real likeness. Of course I have no idea who these riders are, but I’m sure fans of cycling will appreciate seeing their real faces. As the manager you can try and bring other cyclists to improve your team. While the interface for this mechanic was not the best, it is enough to get the job done.
Leading up to races you’ll want to train your riders, and can even send them to camps to increase their stats. Now that your team is all ready to go, it is time for your first race. There are a lot of races to register for, and once again you get a very overwhelming feeling. Luckily you have a handy calendar to keep all of the events you’ve registered for in a convenient location.
Before starting a race, you can select which equipment you want your riders to use. As expected, you start out with lower level equipment and can purchase upgrades as you make more money. To be honest I was not expecting this amount of customization with your riders, so it was a pleasant surprise.
You have two options when it comes to racing: running a quick simulation or watching the race in full 3D. When you watch the race in 3D, you can give commands to your riders, so for those players who want complete control, that would be the best option. One downside of the 3D races is they can take a long time to complete. For those casual fans of cycling, watching the 3D races could be quite boring. If you are noticing the theme yet, this is a game for hardcore fans of the sport.
For the races you must use your riders in the positions that they are best in, and you’ll have to use tactics to get your riders to the front of the pack. There will be times where you need to counter-attack, or just attack and get ahead of the other cyclists. Seasoned fans of the sport will know when to apply these tactics, but newcomers could be a little lost. Unfortunately the only tutorial is a website that is set up like a blog, explaining the mechanics of the game. There is no in-game tutorial, which could have been pretty helpful.
A majority of the time will be spent looking at menus in the game, which have a clean white and yellow look to them. The 3D races look good, with accurate locales, and spectators cheering for you on the side of the road. It is pretty cool to look at 50 or more riders on screen, all bunched up in a pack trying to fight for that top position. With the limited knowledge I have of cycling, it does a good job of representing the look of the sport.
Coming into this review I knew that I would be in over my head. I tried to step into the shoes of a die-hard cycling fan, and view the game that way. Unfortunately it is kind of hard to do so when you know very little about a sport. The lack of an in-game tutorial was a problem to me, and the game can feel incredibly overwhelming at times. Pro Cycling Manager 2013 was made for die-hard fans of cycling, and I believe there is enough content here to please that crowd.
Score: 8/10
Pro Cycling Manager 2013 was developed by Cyanide and published by Focus Home Interactive for the PC on June 20th. A copy of the game was provided to us by Focus Home Interactive for reviewing purposes.
