Need For Speed: Reborn
EA drive Need For Speed series in new direction with 3 new games in 2009.Published 30/01/2009 at 11:42 by cc_star
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Portal 2 On The Way (update) [46]
EA announce expansion of the Need for Speed franchise as the series ups its game for 2009.
EA have today announced new NFS games for 2009, and in doing so a new direction for the franchise with a triple pronged attack on the charts. Yep that’s right, 3 NFS games for 2009 focusing in turn on the core, casual and free online play markets.
Need For Speed: Shift will be appearing on the PS3, 360, PC & PSP in the autumn. It’s being developed by Slightly Mad Studios with the help of Michael Mann (producer at Black Box), and drops the underground urban race culture in favour of a more realistic simulation approach appealing to the ‘core’ market.
Some buzzwords flying around from EA’s marketing bod are ‘driver experience’ ‘wickedly-intense race’ and apparently there’s even “a flashy 3D HUD that mimics driver head movement, inertia and G-force will help achieve this. There’s a cockpit view that lets players freely look around using the right-stick.”
Personally I’m hoping for a return to form for the series because, like Carbon & ProStreet before it, Undercover was a bit disappointing to say the least.
The two other games out this year are Need For Speed: Nitro which will be appearing on the Wii & DS and is naturally designed to appeal to the casual market, and Need For Speed: World Online coming under EA’s ‘Play 4 Free’ umbrella seen most recently with Battlefield Heroes, where you can… errr play for free.
Comments
Please note that all comments are the opinion of the individual author and not TheSixthAxis.
GamerRiley | 30/01/2009 12:03
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That looks nice. A great in car shot, I hope they do a decent job this time, I’ve been disapointed of late with NFS.
andytorr | 30/01/2009 12:09
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If its released anywhere near a Gran Turismo release, it won’t be getting my cash. Thats for sure.
cc_star | 30/01/2009 12:10
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You think GT5 will be out this year?
GamerRiley | 30/01/2009 12:41
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Good point!
proog | 30/01/2009 12:23
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I generally dislike NFS games, primarily because of the “underground urban race culture”, and Undercover certainly didn’t help. I’m looking forward to the Play4Free NFS though.
Severn2j | 30/01/2009 12:31
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With GT5 and GRID, its got some stiff competition, and imo, there hasnt been a good NFS game since Hot Pursuit.
Maybe I’ll be pleasantly surprised, but I wont be holding my breath.
Ninja | 30/01/2009 15:45
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“there hasn’t been a good NFS game since Hot Pursuit”.
Beg to differ. There hasn’t been a good NFS game since that one on the 3DO.
mcphatty | 30/01/2009 12:35
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260 TSA Points | Member since: Sep 2008
The shot looks a bit like Grid, thats a good sign! I don’t know though, if its going to be anything like Pro Street then it’ll be a pile of pants. Roll on Burnout Panama City!! (I made that up sorry if anyone gets excited!)
nofi | 30/01/2009 12:49
Wants a custom tag.
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Shift is going to be like GRID, then? Fair enough.
LiquescentShadow | 30/01/2009 12:52
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I’ll definately be giving this one a go.
Pixl1983 | 30/01/2009 13:01
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As for NFS, I’ve never been a fan. It always smelt like it was cut from the same ‘EA Yearly Update’ cloth. EA have been getting their act together somewhat in that respect but I can’t help but think that releasing 3 games under the same umbrella in one year, one of which would appeal to us, is flooding the market somewhat.
Personally I’m more interested in Fuel.
Edge’s preview’s got me all shook up….
http://www.edge-online.com/magazine/ahead-pack-fuel
LiquescentShadow | 30/01/2009 13:04
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“It always smelt like it was cut from the same ‘EA Yearly Update’ cloth.”
That’s because it was. Big time.
hannes_truce | 30/01/2009 13:14
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I may give this ago, maybe a rent-er and then buy if it’s compelling and good. unlike the last few NFS games
xvLIAMvx | 30/01/2009 13:46
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481 TSA Points | Member since: Dec 2008
Every thing sounds great – except the Need for Speed part. It will take alot to recover. Personally, I’d ditch need for speed and work on a new racing title, or buy codemasters. Need for speed has become a title that only Kappa thread, Elizabeth Duke bling, cap on its side wearing chavs play. Tho I will praise EA for FIFA 09, that’s how to make a franchise reborn.
Pixl1983 | 30/01/2009 15:18
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Totally agree. 5 Stars to you good sir.
Jas-n | 30/01/2009 16:01
Folding With TSA Co-ordinator.
1215 TSA Points | Member since: Aug 2008
I’ve always tried NFS games, and was quite dissapointed especially graphics wise, showing hte teaser/trailers they did didnt do it justice. Although i think it was slightly better than ProStreet, Although now i think about it, it would be the other way round.
By the looks of this game though, it’s been in development for quite soome time, more than the difference between undercover and Autumn, this could of been in development since ProStreet, and it shows, thankfully..
theshockwave | 30/01/2009 16:24
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Never bought Undercover due to bad reviews I truly hope this is a step in the right direction.
CrazyKrissZ | 30/01/2009 17:22
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552 TSA Points | Member since: Oct 2008
If EA wants to reach me with a NFS, they should do a NSF: Crap cars, where I could race my rusty Ford Focus agaist my friends noisy 1993 Honda Civic in a parking lot. That would reach me and maybe I’ll think about buying a NSF game.
For now, back to Burnout and Nidnight Club.
Jas-n | 30/01/2009 17:38
Folding With TSA Co-ordinator.
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I just thought, will the dammage be implimented? I just want a game with the quality of GT5/the look of this game, with the chrash efects of buurnut
cc_star | 30/01/2009 19:02
Team TSA: Writer
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If you can make it, you’ll be a multi-millionaire
Jas-n | 31/01/2009 02:00
Folding With TSA Co-ordinator.
1215 TSA Points | Member since: Aug 2008
Oh if only, also, my keyboard typing is crap…
“chrash efects of buurnut” lol
LiquescentShadow | 30/01/2009 19:31
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I have to say that I didn’t hate ProStreet or Undercover. The only major downside of Undercover was the framerate (which affected handling at times) and ProStreet didn’t really have anything majorly wrong with it. I really like racing games so I tend to just persevere with NFS games and they can be enjoyable. Having said that, I really do hope that this game is what they say it is.
I probably wouldn’t have bought this year’s NFS update, because despite me persevering with Undercover (it was a present) I wasn’t prepared to do the same if they churned out another below average game this year as well. Seems that i’ll probably be buying Shift.
And also I don’t really want GT5. If it doesn’t have damage, then polyphony can keep it. Prologue was rubbish.