With Need for Speed and Guitar Hero Live, we’re seeing a new wave of experimentation with first person live action. Of course, we may have had this particular dawn of gaming at least once already, but neither EA nor Activision have any qualms about re-inventing the wheel. While I might feel at times like I’m trapped inside a camera or that I’m someone who is decidedly not me, in the case of Need For Speed it at least features a number of personal firsts in gaming. From first person brew drinking to a huge amount of first person fist bumping, my life may never be the same again.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLQGXHy5m6Y
That live action footage will probably make or break Need for Speed for many players and while it is admittedly more of a TV special than a Hollywood blockbuster I found it all pretty enjoyable, despite a few weaker performance. Balancing the experience a touch, you do have Faye Marsay of Game Of Thrones and Doctor Who fame who stands out as your mechanic Amy.
If you’re a fan of street racing, its scene, and particularly the earlier entries in The Fast and the Furious films, then overall it’s an involving way of participating in the story with a number of characters that you’ll genuinely come to like. Adding to the authenticity is the inclusion of various real-world racers, including the iconic Ken Block, who appears in the later stages of each crew member’s event-line.
Your mobile phone is an intrinsic part of the experience, and it’ll be ringing throughout, with calls coming in even as you’re in the middle of the race, while Twitter-like messages popping up at various points with gameplay hints or congratulations on your latest win. Members of your crew will be getting in touch to invite you to various different venues or events, or occasionally just for a chat, and it all feeds in to create a genuine sense of place that surprised me.
Need For Speed’s locations certainly help with that strong sense of place, and while the graphics aren’t at the absolute pinnacle of the genre alongside Forza 6 and Driveclub, it’s still a very attractive game. It also runs very smoothly, with only the tiniest hint of graphical pop-in in the distance. The spirit of Need for Speed: Underground looms heavily throughout, and it’s a welcome return to the dark neon-soaked streets. It’s worth noting that the day-night cycle is in fact only a day-dusk cycle, which seems baked-in rather than dynamic, and the murkiness may start to grate on some after a while.
The handling in any racing game is clearly far more integral than all this graphical frippery though, and thankfully Need for Speed allows you to heavily customise this aspect. For the less serious petrolhead there’s an overarching handling style slider, which ranges from Drift to Grip, while you can dive into front and rear tyre pressures, steering response, range and more if you’re an adept tinkerer.
I found that turning off the Drift Stability Assist was the key to success for me, allowing you to tap the brake to initiate a drift a la Ridge Racer, but the diversity of handling models you can create is impressive, and you can certainly emulate the handling of previous Need for Speed titles if you so desire.
The stock setting is heavy and uninteresting, but it’s more than possible to find a set-up that’s going to suit you if you take your time with it, while you can further enhance the handling by fitting new parts. The key downside is that you have to return to the garage to make any alterations to the handling, meaning that if you’ve set it up incorrectly you’ll be making repeat visits when it would be so much quicker and simpler just to drop into a standard options menu. It may suit the fiction, but not the gameplay.
As expected, you can also improve your ride with plenty of after-market upgrades, turning your entry-level car into a legitimate street racer, and while this isn’t a complicated business it’s still enjoyable to swap out parts in search of a few more horses. You can find some parts dotted around the world which you can ‘acquire’, as well as those that unlock via completing Amy’s Build missions.
Each of the members of your crew will promote different types of event, from Spike and his Speed races through to Manu’s Style challenges, which feel organic enough, and ultimately leaves the final decision up to you, though you’ll have to eventually progress through each of their missions, as well as the Crew and Outlaw ones, to complete the game.
The range of cars is fairly limited, certainly in comparison to other entries in the genre, but those looking for authentic ‘scene’ cars will be well served by the inclusion of rides from Honda, Nissan, Toyota and Mazda, while the top-end features entries from Porsche and Ferrari to lust over. The ability to customise the appearance of your vehicle will be the key to variety, and there’s a pleasing selection of rims, bodykits and spoilers to choose from, as well as plenty of vinyls for those not wanting to put the time into creating their own.
The game’s always-online nature has a number of drawbacks, the first of which is that those wishing to use the suspend function of your PS4 will encounter a network error and return to the title screen when you next want to play. This perhaps wouldn’t be such an issue if the start-up load times weren’t overly long, but they are.
The other problem is that your fellow racers aren’t always in it for the same reasons you are, and I often found them trying to cause a head-on collision rather than anything else. It doesn’t feel like it adds anything to the experience, and in fact would be better served without it, or at least should also have an offline option available that solves the suspend/resume functionality at the same time.
You also have no pause function – again, because you’re always online – meaning that if you want to step away for a moment you either have to remember to bring your car to a stop, or as was more often the case you hit Option, put the pad down, and see your car smash into the nearest object. Heaven forbid if you want to stop mid-event as well. I regularly found myself exiting the garage, bringing up the map to choose an event, only to find myself shunted from behind as another player in my game left the garage as well.
Petty annoyances also include the game asking you to turn around in order to start an event, but as often as not it’s inaccurate and you turn the wrong way again. There are arrows on the ground to indicate the correct orientation but I don’t know why you can’t just pull up to the area, hit R1 to start the event, and have the game re-orientate you correctly.
The key problem at the moment is the obvious rubber-banding in the majority of races you take part in. Fall a bit behind and the pack remains within sight, make it to first and other racers are dogging you every step of the way, whether you sped past them or not. It maintains tension, but equally you’ll lose events when you genuinely feel like you shouldn’t have. It’s a shame, when the game looks and sounds as good as it does, and you can tailor the handling to your liking as well, that at least a portion of the events feel unfair or underwhelming, though it’s thankfully not the case for all of them.
What’s Good:
- Attractive graphics.
- Adaptable handling.
- Likeable characters.
- First-person fist-bumping.
What’s Bad:
- Unnecessary online requirements.
- Rubber-banding AI.
- No pause function.
- Some minor graphical pop-in.
Need For Speed feels like a plucky contender, that is close to greatness but tragically falters at number of key moments. There is genuinely plenty of fun to be had in its world, and the return to the themes of Need For Speed: Underground are welcome. However, there simply isn’t the level of consistent quality that the franchise has had during Criterion’s stewardship, despite a large number of their staff moving to Ghost Games, and indeed in a number of ways it feels like a step back from 2013’s Rivals. This year’s Need For Speed is close to greatness, but it doesn’t quite make the podium.
Score: 7/10
Version Tested: PS4
Youles
I personally think a 7 is over-generous.
Having been ranting about this in the forums since release, I agree entirely with the first “What’s bad” point. Specifically, that it’s unnecessary – that’s what’s frustrating about it. The only reason I can see for EA doing this, is so that they can turn off the servers when the next game comes alone.
Many things are missing like customised brakes, specific manufacturers decals, events (imo – too few, and too short). It’s laughable they say all future DLC will be free “gamers deserve it”. That’s because it’s fucking missing in the first place you cheeky sods!
There are also very, very few aftermarket parts to choose from for the high-end vehicles (one variant of each of the following – front bumper, side-skirt, rear bumper), and in some cases there are no alternative mirrors or fenders. Very odd considering the number available in older Needs for Speeds like Underground 1 and 2 which had an emphasis on customisation.
You also spend most of your time drifting, don’t expect any intricate tight cornering racing that require you to use any skill (or the brakes to slow down), you just drift your way around everything. It should have been called Need for Speed Drift.
And the cut-scenes are cringey, if not clever.
As someone who loves cars, I love the customisation element (albeit limited to the lower-end cars) and will have probably spend more time doing than I will racing, which doesn’t say much about the gameplay. The only other thing to love are the visuals, they are good.
Youles
I haven’t been bothered by the rubber-banding, it would just add to my annoyance if I had to keep restarting an event due to one crash that caused me to fall behind. I know that’s not realistic, but who wants to keep replaying the same event over and over until you complete it “perfectly”.
However it is odd when you lead for the first 85% of the race, have someone then speed past you for the next 10% of the race, then slow right down to let you past just before the finish line, as if to say “go on, you win, you lead for most of the race”. It’s obviously badly implemented in that sense.
Starman
I’m enjoying what I’ve played so far, though the always online is totally unnecessary. Tried to play this morning and after a short while was informed the servers were going off for maintenance in 10 minutes. Went out for a couple of hours, went back on it, and again the servers were going down after about 10 minutes of playing.
bigchrissyc
I also agree, a 7 is generous. The always online is a ridiculous feature, it has no place here as almost none of the game requires any online component at all. The rubberbanding A.I is annoying, losing drift points after being hit by A.I also very annoying, the lack of customisable items for vehicles is funny, some cars only have a changeable hood and front bumper, as they have been going on about going back to its roots this seems like a funny omission, they dont even have Neons, in a night-time only game. Hopefully the next installment will improve upon this, as this game could have been incredible.
Lieutenant Fatman
Always online, sounds like DRM to me. Excuse the hilarious pun but I’m going to steer clear of this one. ;)
camdaz
I’m not liking the ‘always online’ part of the game, there’s been a few times mid race it has lost connection with the servers and it throws you out to the start menu. Apart from the other players crashing into you I’m enjoying the game.
The setup for the grip/drift handling is very good but I wish you didn’t have to go to the garage every time to tweak it.
Blayney
Only played the beta (from what I can gather it was the full game with a level cap) but a 7 is too high. Completely missed opportunity in my opinion.
freezebug2
The always online inclusion was surely a massive oversight by the Devs after being repeatedly reminded of it’s unwelcome appearance in the the last NFS iteration.
I utterly loathed it in Rivals, although did manage to to somehow play through a single player mode of sorts.
As has been mentioned, no pause function so if the phone rings or you need to use the bathroom you’ll crash!
camdaz
Stick the phone next to your seat, have a bottle to pee in…… Hey why not go the hog and get a colostomy bag as well, just in case you need a number 2! Sorted!!!!
TSBonyman
It seems a bit odd having “likeable characters” and “fist-bumping” make up half of the positive bullet points for a racing game.
If they plan on continuing this always-online nonsense they might be better off just making it free-to-play.
Amphlett
It’s quite worrying that other players might start dogging me.
Crazy_Del
Not to be rude but a so so review. (I have been drinking) the game itself is really bad! Always Online is a huge no as I completed everything Solo online so what is the point. No multiplayer only 1v1 when challenged and it is very short. Cut scenes are very annoying if not the worse. Easy to complete with the highest car early in the game such as Ferrari or a Lambugie (sp?)
Lack of customization and cars and only limited to 5 in the garage!
I’d give it a 5 plus it is too easy to complete even a Platinum which I could get tomorrow or the next day even when I am finished with trophies! I want Burnout so badly as the vehicles are locked when ranking up granted no customization but I’d choose Burnout over NFS any day! I WANT CRITERION *Rant Over* *pours a Jack D drink*
scavenga
I absolutely agree with above comments about 7 being too generous.
The always online is an immediate disqualification to me.
Me and my mates regularly go on cabin trips to play games (so they can escape wives and kids and keep their focus on what’s really important), and there’s no internet there at all.
Also, I don’t like playing online in general, and considering how many asshats there are out there who live for trolling and being dicks to other people, even thinking about having a race disrupted by a premeditated frontal collision by *_-^kamikazzzee89^-_* is too much to bear…
Thanks, but noooo thanks.