A flawed reboot
With sim race giants like Forza and Gran Turismo (maybe) on the horizon I couldn't figure out why NFS wanted to enter the market with those powerhouses pretty much owning both platforms. However I saw the beautiful cockpit view and some positive early reviews and thought maybe there was something here. After a few days of playing the game, I quickly wondered what game those reviewers were playing, and all the good aspects of the game were overshadowed by the inability to customize the controls for d-pad driving and never feeling like I had true control of the cars. I never had fun with the game, I was fighting the controls it more that I felt than I should. Before you go off and say well that is because you just are not used to analog steering. I handed the controller off to some buddies during a gaming day session and they are analog stick drivers. All three of them had the same issues of not feeling the car. All of us kept having the "Goldilocks syndrome" of where no matter what we tweaked it was never just right. Maybe we just all sucked.
I will say I like the direction of the titles, how they have split the brand to let you pick your flavor. I would love to see this cockpit view across the board for all of their titles, as well as for some other titles. The speed blur is cool, as well as the sound design. This is definitely a step up for the NFS series, but ultimately why bother with this when you could grab Forza and maybe Gran Turismo in a few months, where the sim pedigree is very solid. Definitely a game to rent first to see if it feels right to you.
Pros:
Great cockpit view. First one that I have ever felt comfortable in.
Sense of speed: The sensation of speed is well done. You get tunnel vision on the road and everything else gets a nice blur to it.
Sound: The raw sound of the tires grabbing on for traction is one of many great sound aspects of the game.
Good graphics: It is a pretty game.
Points for everything you do: There isn't a time in the game you aren't earning points to the next level.
Cons:
No d-pad controls for steering. All the d-pad is used for is HUD controls, that could have been pushed off onto a button.
Laggy steering: Even after a weekend of playing the game, I never felt I had the controls down. I never got the response I wanted from steering. I adjusted the deadzone and all that I could think of and never got the response from the vehicles that I wanted. Acceleration and braking were fine.
Terrible load times: You would think after installing 3GB of data to the drive it would be a little better on load times. I would hate to see it without the data dump.
Aggressive/Precision aspect not that big a deal: You can literally bounce off every car, pit a few opponents, but still come out with more precision points because following the line and cornering is still a necessity to finish first.
