Need for Speed: Most Wanted is currently available on Origin as their 'On the House' game. I haven't played it, since my NFS history went nearly straight from Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed to Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit, but it seems to have reviewed pretty well.

https://www.origin.com/en-us/store/free-games/on-the-house

Cool! I'll give it a shot.

But there's only one true Most Wanted in my heart.

Oh, that Most Wanted. Well, that is a reasonable price.

I found this game pretty disappointing at the time - not as good as Hot Pursuit and living up to none of the preview comparisons to Burnout Paradise. It's worth trying out for free though if you haven't played it.

I remember the rubber bandding with the AI in this game to be absolutely insane.

I really liked it's multiplayer, though it died fairly quickly. It probably won't be too hard to get into matches in the coming months.

This game is worth firing up Origin for this:

Goddamn COP WHEEL.

Oh, thought you were talking about the PS2 game, darn.

this is not the most wanted i want

Thanks for the heads up!

I haven't played this game since the first month or two since release and the DLC situation for this is kinda gross. It wouldn't be so bad if there was just DLC and that was that, but they put the DLC cars and challenges in the game for you to run into and try to hop in only to be taken to the store cause you didn't notice it had a DLC icon on the map.

Thanks for letting us know.

Also

GROW HOME FOR $1

https://www.humblebundle.com/

i repeat

GROW HOME FOR $1

https://www.humblebundle.com/

Damn, was hoping it was the good Most Wanted, i bought that most wanted on release and was really disappointed by it.

Rivals is actually a pretty good next gen evolution of what this game was trying to do.

Why are there 2 versions of this game made 7 years apart?

Starting to use Origin for once in a long time again, just joined access as wanted to play through the dead space series.

Giving away free games and the vault make it a good service to me anyway just wish my friends weren't die hard steam fans.

I fixed it for you.

Hey, it worked for the amazing NFS: Hot Pursuit and the equally amazing NFS: Hot Pursuit.

Most Wanted has been really fun for me so far. It being free didn't hurt. ;)

Only problem, I don't have any Origin friends and this game seems to be all about you having a big friends list. Anyone can feel free to add me!

Origin ID = xREMADEx

I eagerly look forward to Need For Speed: Most Hot Wanted Pursuit Underground 3 Shift Edge Horizons Club Street Dub Edition 2 Nitro World coming in 2017.

But seriously, though, one of Origin's best features to me is the games they put on On The House. They've had Theme Hospital, Wing Commander 3, Dead Space, BF3, BF1942 and Syndicate (1993 Syndicate) on there over the years alongside others so I can't complain about the selection. This seems like a great addition in terms of franchises.

I just wish EA (or whichever entity was responsible for the titles) were less confusing about naming the NFS namesakes, reboots and sequels indiscriminately like each other. To be fair, over 20 games in the series, but that makes it just as important to name things in an understandable way. Here, you've got things seeming generally consistent (new format, new title, and then a sequel, and then repeat, the spinoffs named in a very 90s way to sound like it's almost an expansion pack instead of being an "atmosphere" or "experience") up until about 2006/7 where each sequel was a one-off spinoff title and from then on alongside portable/mobile releases named similarly to main entries, you've got two sub-series reboots and a main series reboot. To me it makes the idea of personally playing through the series a little intimidating. (list courtesy of Wikipedia)

I don't know, maybe I'm being overly pedantic. Maybe I'm just so far out of the loop on the franchise that I haven't seen the games visually differentiate from each other, which would help in keeping the titles straight. The last major game I played on my own time was Hot Pursuit 2 and the last major game I played at all was Underground, I think. Any suggestions on ones to play? Other than this Most Wanted, since it's free?

Do you have to actually DL it or just add it to your games list?

Cool thanks for the heads up.

@ethanielrain: I don't work for EA Support but basically, go to the store's On The House page via the Origin client, click on Download Now, I believe the client will throw you an install dialog at that point and NFS:MW should then appear in your My Games list. It's possible to pause and cancel the download at any point, so you could just pause it a few megabytes in and be reasonably reassured it's attached to your account. If it starts downloading at all, it'll be there after you cancel the installation.

@arbayer2: 2010's Hot Pursuit was great. It's at its best if you have a decent friends list to compare yourself to, but I didn't have that when I played and I still played it for two weeks straight. It prefers the arcade handling of early NFS games and gives you a suite of weapons that are just fun. It's not trying to be an outlaw simulator, or a tuner simulator, or anything else; it's just a racing game.

Does anyone know if you need to actually download the game to your pc, or if you hit download and put it into your library does it remain there permanently?

@mlarrabee: Thank you, I'll have to check that out!

EDIT: Yeah, so it turns out that if you're a fan of Burnout Paradise, some things in this Most Wanted may be familiar to you, the open-world mechanics, driving model and UI are very similar. Some notable differences: car customization, real-world makes and models (as per usual), and cars can be found strewn across the entire map, not just via rabbit holes like the Junk Yards. You might enjoy it, who knows.