32 years of brilliant video game box art – #16 (1999) Formula One ’99

Another year, another countdown, another birthday. And I’m boxing it all up, tying a nice little bow around it, and turning the ripe old age of 32 with a celebration of 32 BRILLIANT examples of FANTASTIC video game box art. Join me, won’t you?

Formula One ’99 (1999) – While for at least a couple of decades Formula One games have been one of the highlights of my gaming year, the box art usually is nothing to write home about. But for me rather than examples of great art, they’re time machines, taking me back to great moments in times past. While in my living memory the period spanning from the late 80’s to early 90’s is widely accepted as one of the golden eras of Formula One, I posit that the late 90’s was just as iconic and in many ways paved the way for the sport it has become today. The 1999 season in particular was a fantastic year for the sport, a season thats drivers’ championship wasn’t dominated by one man from Albert Park to Suzuka, and that of the 24 drivers at least half would go on to become household names. Three of those legends of the sport feature on the box art. It’s perhaps an indication of just how big these guys were that it is one of only three officially FIA licensed games since the first Playstation game in 1996 to feature pictures of drivers; with F1 Career Challenge and this year’s F1 2015 being the only other two in modern times. Add to that one of Ferrari’s more iconic cars, the F399 which brought on the era of Ferrari competitiveness, and you’ve got a great piece of both racing and video game history.

(Points for anyone that can name them, and extra points if you can name who won the drivers’ championship that year).

FormulaOne99