I was a little disappointed with some of the cars which seem slower than the cars in the demo however the LX4, and LX6 (Caterham wannabes:P) were the cream of the crop, having been in one of these cars before it handled with a realism seen only in a few sims, this leads me onto the physics side.

One of the most important parts of a sim are the physics, as aforementioned the physics of the LX�s seemed incredibly realistic, I cant really say much more on the matter, the other cars also have physics which would be a race instructors dream, with an accurate tyre and realistic handling you will have to learn how to drive properly, hitting kerbs and going onto gravel traps highlights the physics engine.

The tracks within S1 are Blackwood, South City , Fern Bay and Autocross�.each track has several different variations from long over 3minute laps to rally cross , each has challenging corners. My favourite so far is Fern Bay which reminds me a little of Zandvoort with some long sweeping corners that will test your driving skills to the max. The city course is another I really enjoy, the tram tracks in the road are something you don�t notice until you go over them of course! The tracks can also be raced with different lighting conditions from dusk to a nice sunny day, the track graphics are very good as well adding to the realism. Hopefully in the next releases there will be actual weather affects such as rain.

I found the sound in S1 a little disappointing, though the turbo sound is quite good, the general engine tones seem banal edging toward the Spectrum 48k area, the music reminded me a little of Miami Vice! Pity there isn�t a white Ferrari included
One sound did grab me though, after turning off the helps and driving with the clutch I soon noticed a popping sound, aha so there is engine damage, soon my engine was sounding like a bowl of rice krispies. Unfortunately that�s where the damage ends, it�s a pity tyre wear wasn�t included for this release, hopefully it will for the next version.

Moving on to the online aspect, I have never seen a racing sim that does this so well, even if you are on 56k modem you can have good clean racing(depending on the other drivers that is) by clicking on the multiplayer button you are presented with a list of servers which often have drivers in them. Double clicking on one will take you to the race where you immediately view the action that is going on, you can click on the join button and if the race has already started you can drive out of the pits and join the race, a great idea which means no hanging around. The other options are extensive such as voting to restart and sending setups directly to another driver, these ideas are truly groundbreaking and hopefully more sims will incorporate them.

Another groundbreaking part of S1 is the website, I know this isn�t driving, but it truly is a great piece of dynamic programming, much like nGstats for Unreal Tournament you can see what laps you have done online your positions and plenty of other features, the site also included a hotlap section which ties in with the hotlapping option on the menu screen. The laps are automatically checked for verification, so no cutting or wall riding!

In all this first release is a huge achievement by the three developers, I like the way they also interact with the community to make S1 better and better, if only other developers did this. For the next release I would like to see a number of additions, such as damage modelling, tyre wear and weather affects, having pit stop as well would increase the playability. I would also like to see more powerful cars, something like the DTM series would be an awesome experience with LFS. Ultimately I don�t have a lot of bad words for S1, it seems that the fan base is growing and growing, let�s hopes the developers� bank balance is too, we all want to see the next versions!