Ever since I started my blog, I have written quite a few reviews on a couple of video games. Yakuza, Tomb Raider, Ryu from Streets and lastly, Race Driver GRID. That one in particular is interesting because I talked about that game in great detail about its features, gameplay and overall racing vibe. I really let myself loose on that review because I LOVE racing games. They’ve been a part of me ever since I was a toddler. Now the GRID series existed before Race Driver, but under a different name: TOCA. And when I was around 2 or 3 years old, those games were still around. But it wasn’t them that made me fall in love with racing games. Oh no! It was in fact the OTHER type of racing that made me love the sport. The one where you race in either luxurious cars or your average family sized car, but ramped up 11 with different body and performance parts, all while being chased by the cops for breaking the law. The only way to escape the cops in that situation would be with the help of Speed. THE NEED FOR SPEED!
I love this
franchise to death. Even at its lowest, I still play it. Because there is
always something to find interesting in it to play, customise, chase, escape…
You get the drill. But when it comes to posting my love for these games one a
piece of virtual paper, I’ve been struggling to find a proper way of doing it.
Should I do a review of each game? A review of few NFS games and mention the
others in a single or two sentences? As it is the 30th anniversary
of the series, I thought I’d make a long and somewhat detailed retrospective of
the series, with the inclusion of my own experience with the games. Personal
history with it aside, 30 years of racing and chasing is a huge deal. Going
from exotic cars such as the Ferrari 512TR and the Lamborghini Diablo VT being
chased down American highways, all the way to the present day, where we can
customise and tune any car we want, and the current poster car for the latest
game is an insanely modified Mercedes Benz 190E. This will be a VERY long
writing, that’s for sure. Because I’ll be pouring every bit of me to express
how much I love these games so much so that at the end of this, I’ll perhaps
end up TOTALED and in the desperate Need For Total Repair Marker. And I’ll be
starting off The Run of this piece with the Classic Era of NFS, one of the 3
eras the fans of the games have given to the franchise, which lasted from 1994
to 2002.
Need For Speed is a racing video game franchise developed by different studios over the span of 30 years, and published by the Canadian game publishing company Electronic Arts, or EA for short. The first game in the series, released in 1994 under the name Road & Track Presents: The Need For Speed (TNFS for short) and it was made and published by EA, with the assistance of the magazine Road & Track, which provided the developers with statistics about the cars in the game. The first version of the game was released for the 3DO, a game system from the 90s that was pretty okay overall, but due to poor business management and high price to buy one, doomed it after just a few years. It was then followed up with releases for the PlayStation 1, Sega Saturn and MS-DOS. These four versions of the first game differ greatly from one another. Or rather, the PS1, Saturn and MS-DOS version of the game differ from the 3DO version. That’s because the 3DO version was developed as a driving simulator rather as a racing video game.
The game itself,
even by today’s standards is pretty basic. You get to pick a car, a track, and
race. The 3DO version only had a Head 2 Head mode against a driver called X-Man (played by the late Brenan Baird) and a Time Trial. In both modes, cops would
chase you down and would stop with the pursuit if you either lost sight of them
or crossed the finish line. And the character of X-Man would taunt the player
before the race or after losing it. Same applies if you beat him. There are
total of 8 cars (9 if you count the later versions) with 3 belonging to C class, 3 to B class and 2 to A class. Cars cannot be driven off-road and would
slow down if you do so. The game also offers skill levels and “lives”. The 3
skill levels are “Novice”, “Intermediate” and “Pro”. The “lives” mechanic is
only present in the 3DO version. If you experience one too many crashes, the
race is over. You get an extra “life” if you drive through a segment fast
enough.
The game offers
3 open courses (City, Alpine and Coastal) and 6 closed circuit race tracks. The music was composed by multiple artists: Saki Kaskas, Alistair Hirst, Jeff Dyck,
Angela Somerville & Edwin Dolinski.
The later versions of the game were released a year later and are more arcade in nature, but offer more modes to play: Single Race, Head 2 Head, Time Trial and Tournament. Winning the last mode grants the player a bonus car.
The game upon
release was met with positive remarks. Some praised the graphics, some the
driving, some the updated the versions. And some all three aspects. The game
was released in Japan as Road & Track Presents: OverDrivin' GT-R. It featured
cars only from Nissan.
What seems years
after the release of The Need For Speed, EA would develop and publish its
sequel in 1997, simply titled Need For Speed II. They dropped “Road &
Track” & “The” from the title and simply called it Need For Speed.
Compared to its predecessor, NFS II throws the simulation aspect out of the window and embracesthe arcade nature of racing. For example: no longer did the player have to manually shift to 1st gear when starting a race. They could just hold the gas button and go straight ahead after the green light was lit. On top of that, the game, despite offering 3 ways of handling, still behaved arcade-like. Even the hard-core setting of realism… Didn’t feel like realism. Cars would fly to the sky if driven fast enough, crashes were a lot more common, AI would try to slam the player up against a wall all the time.
Based on this,
the driving should feel enjoyable, right? I’ll explain that in a minute. Gotta
cover the new features the game has.
COLOUR CHANGING
– You can change the colour of your car. You couldn’t do that in the previous
game.
FINE TUNINING –
Tune the performance of your car to either your style of driving or based on
the track you’re racing.
NO COPS – NFS II
just said “F*ck you!” to the cops and deleted them from existence. I consider
this a big downgrade and a mistake at the same time.
VARIOUS
LOCATIONS AND NEW CARS – An actual new feature is the brand new set of cars and
tracks. 15 brand new cars (3 of them being bonus cars) that belong to Class A,
B or C; 9 brand new courses (all circuits and no sprints). With the new tracks,
and in general a new game, a brand new soundtrack was composed for the game.
And it’s awesome! NFS II is also the game that introduced people to the fastest
car in the world (at the time), and my personal favourite car in general, the
McLaren F1.
I played TNFS
and NFS II fairly recently, like 3 or so years ago. And to tell you the truth:
TNFS is WAY BETTER!!! The arcade nature of NFS II didn’t make me dislike the
game, but rather how the overall feel and vibe of the game felt mediocre. TNFS
has some of that early 3D 90s magic in it that makes me go back to it from time
to time. II on the other hand just feels like a chore to play. But if you want
to try these games for yourselves, they’re abandonware (software that is no
longer supported by the creators) and you can get them through this hint: ☠. Before leaving NFS II, I forgot to mention
that the gameplay was almost the same on both PC and Console versions.
The second game was criticised by both critics and fans for being very meh. So EA sat down and worked on its sequel. The result of their hard was shown to the public in 1998 in the form of Need For Speed III: Hot Pursuit. How did fans and critics react to this game? It left a legacy that people look back to and sometimes use it as an example on how to make a racing video game themed around “racers vs. cops”. It also laid the foundation for the current DNA of NFS’ “racer vs. cop” formula with its innovative features.
But that’s not
all there is to it! The game would eventually receive an upgrade in the form of
Need For Speed: High Stakes in 1999. It is essentially the same game, but with
major improvements. For the sake of this work, I’ll combine both NFS III and
NFS IV into one package called Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit – High Stakes. Italic will be about NFS III, and Bold will be about NFS IV.
NFS III was a major success for EA. It fixed many of
the issues people had with NFS II and not only did they improve on them, but
made them fucking AMAZING! Driving was arcadey, but enjoyable. If you were a
newcomer, novice or a beginner in racing games, the game’s assist feature was
available to be used to improve your driving. Fine tuning from the previous
game returned, but revamped and would actually have an effect on your driving.
It didn’t feel clunky at all, and the reward for properly tuning your car was 1st
place in races.
New tracks were introduced, with a special bonus
track unlocked for beating either the Knockout mode or Tournament mode. New
music that goes HARD to this day was composed, and the tracks themselves could
be altered. Mirroring, reverse, weather, option to enable the traffic or not,
lap count…
The vehicle selection, whilst new again, and still
belonging to the “Class” system, were updated and looked fantastic. They were
almost a perfect replica of their real life counter parts (pretend you’re in
1998 and you’re seeing Jaguars, Ferraris, Mercedes, Aston Martins and
Lamborghinis looking real GOOD and almost REAL). Did I mention that NFS III is
the first game in the franchise to feature the first ever Cover Car that
represented the games? The “Giallo” Lamborghini Diablo SV was, and still is to
this day, the best car in the game. I prefer mine in “Blu Le Mans”, but that
“Giallo” is beautiful as well.
AI opponents can be toggled to be passive or
aggressive, full grid or 1v1 another racer, race in only a specific class (you
driving a Class A car vs. Class C cars. Or vice versa for an added challenge),
or just have everyone drive the same car!
But you know what made this game truly epic? THE PUSUIT! Cops return after their absence in NFS II and they can be either your
Rival or your Friend. If you remain a Most Wanted Fugitive, then you’ll be
hunted down by them and you’ll have to fight your way out of a chase. Since
every track is a circuit, you’ll encounter them more than once. Rhinos,
roadblocks and spike strips act as a way of stopping the racer. And if that’s
not the worst, then there’s the cops calling for back up if they have a hard
time arresting their suspect. But should they catch up and force their target
to stop, they’ll hand out a ticket and a warning. First time is a friendly and
casual warning, the second time is a bit serious, and if you get caught the
third time… GET OUT OF THE CAR AND ON THE GROUND, DIRTBAG!!!
If you side with the cops, you’ll be able to chase
down an entire grid and arrest every single outlaw that tries to escape from
your justice. Unlike their AI counterparts, the player controlled cops only
need to stop a racer once before arresting them completely. You cannot call for
backup, but you have an unlimited supply of spike trips at your disposal.
Unlike the racers’ side, the cop side only lets you
drive 2 cars (and a bonus cop, should you arrest every racer on every track.
This same car is also awarded for racers if they finish every single track
without ending up behind an officer’s car).
It’s more of the same with High Stakes. Few new cars are added as both featured within the game and add-on cars through official patches. Graphics are improved (you can see your driver instead of black windows only), 11 new track courses are added, new music created as well. Another thing that differs from NFS III is that the interiors of the cars are no longer images slapped together, but are rendered and 3D.
Cars, for the first time in the series, can get damaged and this would affect the performance. The more damage you have, the
harder your car will control, and the slower it will become. So try to make
less mistakes when racing this time.
The Hot Pursuit game mode returns and on top of the
classic 1v1 duel, you get two new modes to play: Getaway (one racer versus the
cops and the time limit) and Time Trap (1v1 duels under a time limit + cops).
If you again play, as the man of the law for some reason, you can get yourself
a wingman to help out during a pursuit. Or swap to other cars if the suspect
gets away. Helicopters also make their first appearance. They can help out
their vehicular colleagues by simply following racers like an annoying fly.
That is unless there’s a tunnel and the helicopter is forced to stop and lose
sight.
But the biggest innovation this game brings on the
table is the CAREER MODE. You are given a small amount of money to purchase
your car, and work your way through multiple tournaments to win more money, buy
better and faster cars, and unlock more tournaments to get better rewards. The money you earn from races are used for purchasing, repairing damages and buying upgrades .
This is the first NFS game to follow a semi-realistic take on the world of
racing. Cops aren’t present in this mode, but that doesn’t mean things are
easy. Speaking of the upgrades, there are 3 upgrades you can purchase for your
car. Each upgrade costs more than the last, and they affect the car both
performance-wise and visual-wise. New rims are added or decals with each
upgrade, and your avatar changes clothes to that of The Stig from Top Gear.
This mode would single-handedly become responsible for the rest of the series.
NFS III was my
first ever NFS game. I still play it to this day. I played High Stakes a bit
later, but found it as enjoyable as NFS III. Both games hold up well and can be
enjoyed by anyone. Simple to pick up and play, and not even hard to master.
They’re the perfect mix of fun and thrill. Same goes for their console counter
parts. Despite being very different in almost everything, they’re great to play
too!
I have an online
buddy that I’d discuss sometimes with whenever these two games are mentioned.
He loves IV and I love III. His reasoning is because High Stakes is the
complete version of Hot Pursuit, whereas I argue that some things just feel a
lot better in Hot Pursuit rather than High Stakes. But if someone dares to talk
smack about them, we go on a Hot Pursuit.
In the year
2000, EA struck the perfect deal! They agreed with Porsche to have their
license for 15 years. And just to show off their success, they made a Porsche
themed NFS game.
Need For Speed:
Porsche Unleashed is perhaps the best tribute to a car company (or
manufacturer) ever. It features almost every single car made by Porsche from
1948 to 2000. The tracks are all made for these cars, and driving these
magnificent beasts feels surreal. As if you are driving the real thing.
That is because
this game’s driving is rather realistic compared to previous titles, even to
that of The Need For Speed. In that game, it tried to simulate what it’s like
to drive, but in Porsche Unleashed, the driving is pretty real. Or at least the
feeling is. The damage system of the previous game returns, but given with the
added challenge of actually having the skill to do great in races meant that
damage was even more costly than before. Cops return, but people forget they
were even present in the game.
The biggest
selling features of the game are the “Factory Driver” and “Evolution” game modes
and the upgrade system.
The “Factory Driver” mode puts you in the shoes of an official test driver for Porsche,
where you’ll be tasked to drive in specific Porsche cars on specific tracks,
whilst meeting certain goals to complete the task. But before doing all of
that, you are given a trial. Pass, and you get to drive for Porsche. Fail… And
you can try again.
“Evolution” is
similar to High Stakes’ career mode, where players purchase Porsches and race
in tournaments centred on a specific era of the manufacturer, or a mix of eras.
It is here where
the upgrade system differs from its predecessor. Instead of buying complete
upgrade packages for your car, you are given an option to buy INDIVIDUAL parts.
You want to buy brakes only? No problem! Sway bars? Go for it! Each Porsche car
comes with specific parts that can be equipped with, and some parts are
universal for all cars. Buying and installing the parts isn’t the only thing a
player should be focusing on, as adjusting the performance of these parts also matters. Oh and you can buy used cars if you’re low on cash, but need a
specific car for a specific tournament.
This game was
simply aimed at Porsche lovers. If you’re a lover of the Stuttgart based brand,
then this game is for you. Shame they never included their tanks in the game.
In 2001, a strange title that didn’t see much success was released and was free to download, but you had to pay subscription to actually play. Its main focus was multiplayer (it’s a subscription based game, after all), the “Hot Rod” vibe, and the overhauled physics, which were a mix of High Stakes and Porsche Unleashed. Racing against other real life players was the only way currency was earned; parts and cars could be auctioned within the game’s very own auction house, and uh… Yeah this game is a full on simulator.
Don’t let the cover art
and intro full you. This is a hard-core racing game at its core. I have only
experienced this game once. It was a short experience, but it left an
impression on me. I know a couple of guys that hold this game in high regard
due to the in depth performance feature.
In 2003, the
game’s servers would shut down, but a year prior, a yellow Lamborghini
Murcielago and a red Ferrari 360 Spider seen in a tight duel against one
another, whilst being chased by a Lamborghini Diablo VT 6.0 police vehicle. The
cop car was assisted by roadblocks and helicopters.
Need For Speed:
Hot Pursuit 2 is the final game from the Classic Era of NFS games. It released
on the PC, Xbox, Nintendo GameCube and the PS2.
It follows in
the same shoes as the original Hot Pursuit, which focused on arcade style of
driving with the theme of cops vs. racers. Compared to the previous titles,
this game was the first ever BIG upgrade in terms of graphics. No more of those
weird looking 3D models from the 90s, but rather, well scanned and realistic
looking models of actual cars were in the game.
Despite having a
leap in the graphics department, new sets of tracks, and A LICENSED SOUNDTRACK,
the game’s tuning and performance upgrade aspect was taken away. But that
didn’t matter AS THE GAMEPLAY WAS FUCKING SOLID!!! Well, the PS2 version that is. Developed by BlackBox Studios (Later rebranded as EA BlackBox), this is the
only game in the series where the console counterpart of the game was MUCH
better than any other version. On the other platforms, the gameplay, whilst
great, was very floaty and during collisions, cars would actually start flying
like aeroplanes and on rare occasions, would spin around like ballerinas. This
was not present in the PS2 version of the game. Cars were much grounded and you
had more control of your car.
Same could be
said for the game modes. The standard “Championship” and “Hot Pursuit” modes
are present, but they play differently when compared with the other ports. The
PC version has these events laid down as a standard tree (you start from one
event and more become available as you progress), but the PS2 has these events
laid out like a web. Oh and the “Hot Pursuit” mode is replaced with “Ultimate Racer”. It’s the same thing, just with a different name. Oh and the cockpit
camera, which was part of the games since its beginning, is not included.
Currency returns, but it’s only present in the versions outside of PS2. You
earn them by playing and you use them to unlock cars and tracks. PS2 HP2
follows the old school way of unlocking things: by beating events.
Cops take the spotlight this time. As not only can they use the tactics featured from the last time cops were present, but they can now summon the Helicopter to drop explosive barrels on the racers. And the best upgrade of all? NITROUS OXIDE!!! If you find yourself falling behind and your suspect is driving far away into the sunset, just activate the nitrous to quickly catch up to them and make them pay for being too cool for school.
In 1999, there
was a race that occurred in the outskirts of some city, where a metallic silver
Porsche managed to cross the line first, whilst the other cars were caught
during a police ambush. In that race, it was 3 exotics vs. a horrible looking
Civic. Before the race began, the Civic broke down. I’m pretty sure many
laughed at the driver and the car itself. If only they knew how important that
ricer would be in 2003 & 2004.
The game that
changed NFS forever. Underground released to almost critical acclaim, with
critics and players praising EVERYTHING.
It was developed
by EA BlackBox rather than EA themselves, as the company was impressed with
their version of Hot Pursuit 2. Interesting thing to note here is that
Underground is the beginning of the second era of NFS games: BlackBox
Era (2003 – 2011), but the game itself also belongs to the classic era,
due to the similarities it shares with Hot Pursuit 2. An explanation of this
will be presented in a couple of minutes after reading this, but for now, to
quickly summarise why this game was HUGE!
The cars weren’t
anything special. One half were your basic car that you’d be able to afford or
be able to buy it off second hand for dirt cheap. The second half were Japanese
imports that do feel “luxurious” compared to the previous batch of cars. Still
cheap compared to their exotic predecessors however. I’m saying this as if you
were actually buying or comparing the prices of these cars. The dope part of
the game was that you could customise your car to DEATH! 20 cars in total, but
you had no limits in what you were making. Any of those cars could be unique
and special thanks to the customisation options the players had at their
disposal: paint colours, vinyl, underglow neon, custom front, and rear bumpers, custom side skirts, spoilers, custom hoods, exhaust tips, roof scoops, custom tires and stickers, and wide body kits. Performance parts could also be upgraded, AND PAINTED (brakes and engine accents could be painted only).
The graphics,
despite being 21 years old, STILL LOOK GREAT; the soundtrack, which features rap,
hip hop, rock, EDM, and drum and bass from various artists, is still beloved by
not just the NFS fanbase, but people in general, whether they’re fans of racing
games or other genres.
All of these
brand new features and options were accompanied by, perhaps the biggest change
to the series: THE STORY MODE. A story where you try to become the best of the
best in Olympic City. The tracks were no longer set in different parts of the
world, but in a city. In it, players could participate in 5 different race
modes: Circuit & Lap Knockouts, Sprint, Drag (races where manual shifting
is the key to winning. And dodging traffic. And dealing with the AI and its
bullshit. And… Just remember that it’s all about changing speeds to win the
race), Drift (a racing discipline where you control your car while going
sideways) and Time Trials, the last one offering unique parts ranging from
performance to visual upgrades.
But that’s just the tip of the ice berg when it comes to the story of this game. You take the role of a normal dude who wants to become the best racer in town, but since he’s a punk with 0 reputation, you are given a small selection of cars to begin your illegal street racing career.
Winning enough races (and unlocking cool
shit that can be used to upgrade your cars for both the career and quick race
modes) gathers the attention of Eddie, a legendary racer who drives that orange
Skyline on the cover art above, and is the leader of his own crew, The
Eastsiderz. He mocks the player for their ability and tries to downplay them as
the story goes on, but in the end, he gets defeated and you get crowned as the
best racer in town. Oh and you also beat his girlfriend who tries to defeat you
after defeating her man. Was that actually part of the player’s plan to become
the best in the city? Or was it just his fantasy?
The “Fast and
Furious” inspired NFS continued its success in the following year, with the
release of Need For Speed Underground 2. It is essentially Underground, but
with even more features. The car roster saw an increase, and it featured 3 SUV
vehicles for the player to race and customise. The story of the game is also
brand new and a continuation of the previous one. To summarise it without too
many spoilers: A big new open world city where you can freely roam around,
discover shops and challenge racers to outrun races (this is what I was
referring to during my UG segment as to why I see that game belonging to two
different eras), new faces and new enemies to beat. Trick out your car to stand
out from the rest of the crowd and for a chance to make it on the front cover
of a magazine (the game utilises a star rating system. The better the rating,
the more opportunity to be featured on the front cover). Welcome to Bayview City!
Apart from
additional new parts and a fuckton of more options to customise, Underground 2
perhaps has one of the most advanced performance dyno options out of the entire
“NFS Holy Trinity”. It was added at the request of players that found the
feature missing in the previous game. Even the developers admitted in an
interview that the requests were a bit weird, but in the end went on to add it
in. And boy does it work great!
Both games are
great! And somehow both games get to be treated with an equal amount of
respect, whether it’s through community made mods or the cover cars being
featured in later games. And since this is also Underground 2’s 20th
anniversary (holy crap we’re old), a fan made add-on titled underground2.net was
released to commemorate the release of this game. It features parts from the
2000s and it focuses on expanding the presentation of the game rather than
adding needless crap from contemporary car culture. Oh and the star removal mod
and the instant teleportation mod are a blessing too! Driving around Bayview is
good fun, but it can get tiresome in the later stages of the career mode.
With these two
great games, NFS was reaching its peak. The next game… It transformed NFS into
an entity that is beyond our comprehension. You either worship this one, or you
see it as the cataclysmic downfall of the series!
-
I want every single unit, after the guy.
-
Everyone?
Need For Speed
Most Wanted… Do I need to explain why this game is regarded as the greatest
video game ever made?
If I do that,
then this tribute is never going to be done. But fuck it! I’m doing it anyways!
It ditches the
night time racing in favour of the glorious sunrises and the murky and overcast
afternoons. The gameplay and physics of the game are PERFECTION! In Underground
and ESPECIALLY in Underground 2, the cars slide around and not feel that fast, even with
settings enabled to let you feel the need for speed. In Most Wanted’s case, you
get a fantastic grip style of handling that feels amazingly satisfying to use.
And what’s better is the sense of speed: It’s there and beyond, and it makes
you feel like you’re driving fast as hell and the opposition can’t do shit to
reach you! The cops return after a 3 year absence and they’re not fucking
around! Before, cops would usually be a thorn in your sight, but this time…
They want you BUSTED!
It gets better!
You can piss off the cops to the point where they’ll be changing units should
you resist arrest. From those silly looking Police Civic Cruisers, all the way
to the Corvettes, Rockport’s PD never rests when the #1 crime in the city is
illegal street racing. Oh and before I move on with the story, the soundtrack
for this game is THE soundtrack for a racing game!
The story of
NFSMW follows the player (not the one from the Underground games) in his silver
and blue BMW M3 GTR on his quest to… I think become the best racer in Rockport City? Something’s not right with the guy.
Regardless, his
racing and car gets him noticed by two people and two factions: the first batch
being Mia Townsend and Rog, whilst the second batch is The Blacklist, a
notorious group of 15 racers, with Clarence “Razor” Callahan being in charge;
and the Rockport Police Department, led by Sergeant Jonathan Cross. After an
attempt to challenge Razor to become a member of the Blacklist, the BMW breaks
down during the race and it gets taken away by your boy Clarence. To make
matters worse, you are then arrested by Cross, but due to lack of evidence
against you, you’re set free. Out of prison, and determined to get the car
back, Mia and Rog help out the player (with occasional meddling from Razor) on
his quest of completing races, milestones and earning bounty in order to climb
to the top of the Blacklist and become… Most Wanted.
And we must not
forget the yellow filter the game has. In gaming, we call this the “piss”
filter.
Only negative
thing I can say about this game is that the customisation and performance
tuning takes a back seat. It’s not bad, but it lacks compared to Underground 2.
But the story of this great game doesn’t end here. Sure, the game is regarded
as the best, but people to this day demand a sequel of the game…
We do have a
sequel. It’s called Carbon.
Released in
2006, it’s Most Wanted, but better. Better gameplay, a night time setting, good
looking map for the player to roam around, cause havoc or race, cops return and
they’re more of a bastard to deal with than before, customisation that to this
day, the current NFS games trace back to. So many things got improved in this
game, but yet people prefer its prequel.
The story
follows yet again our protagonist from Rockport, who managed to get back his
car from Razor, and escaping the toughest and meanest of the Rockport PD. On
his way back to his home city of Palmont City, he gets shaken by Sergeant
Cross, who now works as a bounty hunter after losing his job from the events of
the previous game. In an attempt to escape the former Sergeant on the windy
Carbon canyon (the canyons in Carbon play a major role in the plot and gameplay
of the game, as those are the locations where drivers prove who is the best of
the best), the player totals his M3 GTR. Before getting arrested by Cross, an
old face familiar to them shows up: Darius, leader of the Stacked Deck crew. He
pays off Cross the much needed bounty to let the player go on his merry way. Or
in this case, ask his girlfriend Nikki to take him to a friend of hers and take
one of the selected cars there as a starter. From there on, the final chapter
of the illegal saga begins.
Carbon offers
players cars from 3 different classes: Muscle, Exotic and Tuner. Muscle cars
have fast acceleration, Exotic have the best top speed and Tuners have the best
cornering abilities. The three types of cars are arranged in tiers as well:
Tier 1 being the slowest cars, Tier 2 being the middle ground of Palmont
racing, whilst Tier 3 are the best of the best. So we have 3 types of cars, 3
tiers… How about 3 types of crewmates? Blocker, Drafter and Scout. Blocker
“kills” any unwanted opponent, Drafter lets the player gain speed and
information about upcoming turns or bumps. Lastly, Scout tells the player the
shortcuts of each track. Veteran racers always go for Scouts because they
always end up in 1st place due to their importance in a race. That’s
because throughout the story, you race as a crew, not as an individual.
Customisation as
mentioned before, got an overhaul of the best kind. The individual
customisation of body parts is back and it can be tweaked to your liking via Autosculpt. And
if you are not sure how you want your car to look like, installing aftermarket
parts is the fastest way to crush your doubts. Performance customisation,
although not as complex as Underground 2, is in fact more simplified but just
as effective. And the vinyl editor… Many spent hours trying to create automotive
art with it. Up to 20 layers of vinyls can be applied on cars and almost all of
them can be painted, rotated, moved, skewed, flipped and mirrored. The
creativity is endless. The music of the game also is another step up from the
previous games. Each car class has its own licensed music track or an original composed score that fits the vibe of it. Muscle cars have rock, Tuners have
Electronica/EDM and Exotics have Hip Hop/Rap.
Thank you for making mine and other's childhoods amazing, Chris Gauthier. You’ll forever be out favourite crewmate...
Another thing
this game does different from the rest is that this is the only NFS game whose
handheld counterpart has a different and original story. It’s dark for a NFS
game, but ultimately a good game for the PSP and the Nintendo DS.
Last, but not
least, this game marks the end of the so called “golden period” of NFS. We went
from customising our cars with unique parts, to free roaming in a big city, to
being chased in another big city, so that in the end, to settling our battles
in the canyons. But where do we go from here? And who do we follow?
WE FOLLOW OUR MAIN MAN, RYAN COOOOOOOOOPERRRR!!!!!
ProStreet
released in 2007 to a mixed reception, mainly because of the fact that this is
the first Need For Speed game to feature legal racing, different driving
physics, and the ability to actually kill your car during a race. The explanation
for the first reason is simple: EA and BlackBox wanted to change things up with
this game, and distanced itself from the illegal street racing (mainly because
even in the real world that was happening as well), and changed gears into the
festival/organised racing events instead.
As for the
second and third reason as to why this game received mixed love back then (but
nowadays is considered one of, if not, the best NFS games ever made). The
driving itself goes back to the days of High Stakes and Porsche Unleashed, with
a precise handling model and emphasis on damage affecting the performance of
your vehicle. The more damage you do to your car, the worse it will perform.
Hitting the wall at 250+ kmh or flipping it on its roof will cause the car to
be TOTALLED! You can fix it with either cash or marker however, but even for
that you need to be careful. The race tracks are that of real locations, rather
than made up American cities. You’ll be travelling to Europe, USA and Japan for
most of the game.
The tiers from
Carbon return, but instead of Muscle, Exotic and Tuner, you get to choose which
car you want to take for which event: Grip, Drift, Speed and Drag. You cannot
take one car for each event. You need to have more for different racing
disciplines. Did I mention that customisation now plays an important role in
winning races? Those bodykits, spoilers and hoods aren’t just for show anymore.
They affect your performance too! Oh and the performance dyno tuining is back.
It’s advanced for a somewhat simcade racer like ProStreet (the gameplay itself
isn’t that realistic, but with the added weight of worrying about how to take
turns more precisely, the damage effects on the car, and the handling being
different than before, makes the game have some sort of “realism” to it).
As for the
story: IT’S PLAIN SIMPLE!
Ryan Cooper is a
former street racer who decides to take his street racing skills to the legal
tracks and become the Street King. He’s never seen without his mask, and has
never uttered a word, but he’s loved by the commentators and the crowd. Even
when he picks up weird cars for different disciplines. On his way to become a
Street King, he first needs to defeat the Legendary 5: The Drift King Aki
Kimura; The Grip King Ray Krigger; The Drag King Karol Monroe; The Speed King
Nate Denver (easiest king to beat lmao) and The Showdown King, Ryo Watanabe,
who shows up from time to time to mock Cooper during some weekends. Ryan Cooper
is Ryan Cooper, however. He easily beats all of them and becomes the Street
King. After all, HE IS RYAN COOOOOOOOOOOPERRRRRR!!!!!!
And then it all went to shit with the following one…
You’re not good and
you’re not bad. You blend and you listen and you trust no one. Once you go
undercover… You’re on your own…
After Carbon
released, BlackBox was separated into two teams: one worked on ProStreet, the
other on Undercover. This game began the downfall of NFS.
Imagine if Most
Wanted had a handling that’s very unenjoyable to deal with, randomised damage
system, and instead of the infamous “piss” filter, you get the “nuclear”
filter.
Story wise and
gameplay wise, it’s a MAJOR downgrade from previous titles. The premise for the
story isn’t bad: an undercover cop working on discovering what the street
racing gangs of Tri-City Bay are fighting for in the underground circuit when
not doing their street racing activities.
As for the
gameplay… Yeah it’s bad in this aspect as well. It’s a far cry from the
“simulation” feel from ProStreet and the “arcade” vibe from the titles before
ProStreet. It tries to make the maximum usage of the new “Heroic Driving”
engine, but it fails hard at making the player feel any joy when driving.
Customisation is lacklustre, but the car list and soundtrack are good. I just
have nothing to say about this but criticism. It’s a bad game through and
through. Praises go to the modders that tried to make this game playable,
though. It doesn’t justify how shit this game was on release, and still to this
day, it’s seen in a negative light. It caused NFS to drift away into an unknown
territory.
NFS Shift &
Shift 2 Unleashed are spin offs that focus on actual sim racing. NFS Nitro is a
Nintendo exclusive game, and NFS World was/is an open world MMO racing game
that started off well, but it then it became a Pay 2 Win shitfest with every
new update. Servers got shutdown in 2015, but the NFS fans revived it shortly
after (with permission from EA to change some aspects so they don’t get in
legal trouble) and also managed to create their very own servers for online
play. No Pay 2 Win crap, no nothing. To experience the joy of playing NFS World
again, I recommend Nightriderz. Their take on the MMO elements is the best out
of the other fan made servers, but feel free to try the others as well. A
simple Google search should do the trick.
After the failure
of Undercover, BlackBox’s writing was on the wall. They were pushed through a
lot from 2008 to 2011, releasing not just racing games, but others for EA too.
The previous games were developed by other studios, with the exception of NFS
World, which BlackBox developed alongside other studios owned by EA. Despite
their time being almost up, the developers had a shot at only a single game to
be made. And they did not disappoint… Too much.
Need For Speed
The Run released in 2011 to a mixed reception from both fans and critics. The
sentiments are shared even to this day. The game can be best
described as: The Need For Speed, but with a heavy emphasis on story.
The players take
the role of Jack Rourke, a cocky character who just so happens to be the best
street racer around. But due to his personality trait, got himself in big
trouble with the mafia and want his head. The only way he can escape his
pursuers is to win “The Run”, a race that covers the entirety of the USA, from
San Francisco to New York City. The reward for winning the race is $25.000.000.
With the help of his friend Sam, he enters the dangerous race in an attempt to
pay off his debt to the mafia and lay low for a while.
Jack is just a
chill guy. He’s the first NFS protagonist to ever speak and is also a
determined character, never backing down even when the odds are against him.
NFS The Run is
not a bad game, and it was a good game to go out with. The car list is huge,
but you cannot use all the cars during the story progression. At best, you
might end up driving around 5 cars in total. Most of the time, you will be
forced to change cars because of the plot demanding, or if you run into a gas
station and change it there. Customisation is somehow present in a game that’s
all about racing for your life. Cars handle pretty exceptional. All cars are
listed in tiers (1-5) and handling difficulty (Easy – Very Difficult). The
locations you visit are breath-taking, 13 years later. Quick Time Events appear
in certain parts of the story, where you have to press or tap the highlighted
button in order to progress with the story, because if you fail, it’s game
over.
So: a good
story, a chill character, great gameplay and physics. Why is the game still
criticised to this day? IT’S SHORT!!! LIKE 3 HOURS SHORT!!! The campaign can be
beaten in one sitting with no breaks at all. If you were a kid in 2011, and you
were given this game as a present, you probably sat down, played it, finished
it within 3 hours or less, was upset about its length, then went on to do your
homework and do something else that’s productive. That’s how short the game is.
But this was it.
This was the end of BlackBox. A rather short, but sweet game that paid tribute
to the origins of the series. From 2003 to 2011, NFS was the king of the hill.
Only few arcade racing games of this period were very close to its popularity,
Race Driver GRID being one of them. But to most people, Underground – ProStreet
is where the series were at their best, with Most Wanted considered the peak of
Need For Speed. BlackBox left a legacy that to this day, people still look
fondly at the games they’ve made, even though there are other games that are on
the same level of greatness and CAN match the “peak” of NFS, but people let
nostalgia control their memories. ‘Tis a
foreshadowing…
But where do we
go from here? Around 2009 or 2010, EA assigned Criterion Games to work on the
next NFS game. The developers are best known for the Burnout games, havoc
causing racing games where the objective is to smash your opponents, cause cool
explosions and… To cause chaos. Criterion played it simple with their task on
making a new NFS game.
Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit (2010, later Remastered in 2020), takes the series back to its
roots of the 90s, with some modern spices thrown into the dish. It’s a simple
pick up and play game, where players take control of either racers or cops.
Cars are classified in 5 groups: Sports (Traffic Police); Performance (Highway
Patrol), Super (Rapid Deployment), Exotic (Speed Enforcement) & Hyper
(Special Response). You earn bounty, which serves as levelling up and unlocking
more cars and equipment. You pick a track you want to race, select your desired
car (maybe change the colour beforehand) and then you race. That’s it! Nothing
too complicated.
The handling is
“brake to drift” style of handling. You tap the bake, the cars tarts drifting,
and now you can do your turning with ease. Weapons for both racers and cops
exist, because it wouldn’t be a modern racing game from the early 2010s without
weapons. EMPs, Spike Strips, Jammers, Helicopters, Roadblocks… You name it,
it’s there. Also here’s the soundtrack for this game. Make sure you’re not
driving when listening to it (this applies for almost every NFS game).
NFS Hot Pursuit
began the Modern Era of NFS, with Criterion’s games being the first half.
The game received critical praise upon release. And for a good reason: it’s a
simple, yet fun & enjoyable racer that anyone can enjoy. So how did
Criterion follow it up?
Listen… If I wanted to play a Burnout game with licensed cars, I’d just go and mod Burnout Paradise and play that instead.
This cataclysmic
error EA and Criterion made with the release of NFS Most Wanted (2012), the
series went completely off the rails. It no longer knew what it was, or how it
was. Or where it was. It was so bad, that Criterion were shafted aside from
making Need For Speed and the mantle was given to Ghost Games, a Swedish game
developer studio. Another change the series experienced was with its
development. Each NFS game would take roughly 2 years to be made, rather than
annually. The latter change took place after the first game made by Ghost,
which was NFS Rivals in 2013.
NFS Rivals is
NFS Hot Pursuit on steroids. Pure and simple. The gorgeous graphics, the attempt at a story, somewhat present customisation, and the return of Ferrari
after God knows how many years (I forgot to mention that after 2002, Ferrari
wasn’t present in NFS for 11 years, not counting that one time they were
present in the first NFS Shift game as a DLC car pack), and new weapons are
what separates this from Hot Pursuit. The Modern Era: Ghost Games Chapter has
begun.
After the
release of Rivals, the plan to make a NFS game every 2 years was put in effect.
This happened largely due to the changing landscape of how video games are
made, and because EA being EA.
The next game in
the series was meant to be a reboot of sorts. To start fresh. But as it turned
out, this was a complete lie. And somehow, this game’s DNA can be traced all
the way to the latest release, meaning I won’t feel the need to yap too much
about how each game feels different from the last.
Need For Speed
(2015)… That’s how we call it. NFS 2015.
It was meant to
be a return to the days of customisation, rice and Underground, and as
mentioned before, a reboot of the games. Set in the fictional Californian city
of Ventura Bay, the players play as… The Newbie. After getting noticed by a
young and upcoming street racer Spike, he’s introduced to Travis and his crew,
consisting of: Amy, Robyn and Manu. This group, under the leadership of Travis,
try to impress racing icons present in the city: Magnus Walker (Speed Icon), Akira Nakai (Build Icon), Shinichi Morohoshi (Outlaw Icon), Risky Devil (Crew Icon) & Ken Block (Style Icon).
The game works
around earning rep in order to become the ultimate icon. Each member of Travis’
crew allows the player to partake in a story based around the styles of driving
(which are represented through the icons present in the game) in order to
become the best of the best. As you level up, more difficult events become
available that grant more money and rep to be earned. The more rep you have,
the better cars and parts can be bought.
The game would
receive great updates, including the Legends Update, which brought back Eddie
and Melissa from the dead, and confirming that every NFS game is connected with
one another in a strange way in the long run. Personal opinion, but this game
captures a mood that I cannot find anywhere else in the current day era of NFS
games. The music, the graphics, the relaxed tone of the game itself. It’s just
perfect for vibing. Ignoring the shitty handling that the game comes with (and is only fixable through mods) and
the fact that this and Rivals cannot be paused during any form of play), the
game is alright. Just alright.
This game didn’t happen… At all!
Finally, the
final game made by Ghost Games, before being merged into EA Gothenburg the
following year. After 3 failed attempts to capture the essence of NFS, they got
it right with Heat. A fantastic game that improves on the 2015 formula with an
improved and better handling system, over 150+ cars to choose from, with
customisation that doesn’t restrict the player from expressing themselves (except
Ferrari, because they’re picky about their cars), a story that is enjoyable
from start to finish, but ends on a cliff-hanger, Legendary Cars (Past &
Present)… The game is not trying to be the greatest NFS ever made. It just took
notes from the games prior and made its own identity. Which is why people still
love it even now.
After Ghost
Games got merged in 2020, NFS went back to the hands of Criterion games, who
made Unbound in 2022. It’s a game, alright…
Jesus Christ…
What a journey. From humble beginnings of just winning races and trying to
outrun the cops with exotics, to rides modified with some crazy parts &
driven by your own custom avatar… Still trying to outrun the cops. I guess no
matter how you look at it, the motto is still the same: purchase your car from
the Underground, then Unleash its potential. Then take that car to the
Professional Streets, or Shift gears onto the public roads, to raise up the
Heat and start a Hot Pursuit with High Stakes. Or go Undercover to stop a
bigger evil. Then, take it up to the Canyons and duel it out against your Rival
to see who the better racer is. And in the end, once all of this is done, the
World will know you as the most notorious racer… as the racer that the law was
never able to stop. You will become… The Most Wanted.
And all of this
began, because you felt the need… THE NEED FOR SPEED!!!
Ѓорѓи „GioGio“ Илиев
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