Dear street racing fans

I remembered that Criterion Games and Codemasters Chesire/Evolution Studios got merged together this year, one day I hope they will develop a new Burnout game and buy the rights of Motorstorm from Sony Interactive Entertainment so the fans can relive their fun memories of it.

Let's jump straight to my thoughts prior to the reveal:
I'm expecting the driving model is going to be a mixture of Burnout and Motorstorm, going to have a good roster of playable cars, an open world map and many other features included, but hopefully, it won't have so many free-to-play elements like what ever other EA published titles.

Art direction is alright, but that is about the only thing I can say from this trailer. Hope they show some gameplay soon.

Watching this via BlackPanthaa.

Alright Criterion. You have my attention. ...maybe not $70 worth of my attention, but still more so than Forza.

Looks cool. Minor point, they should just call it Underground. Need for Speed Underground is still a name with a lot of fond feelings behind it. And I feel like "Unbound" is kind of a sideways acknowledgement of it. Just go all the way.

They're at least trying to do something different, so I do appreciate that. The bigger question though is what this game will be like from a gameplay perspective.

NFS Heat was a decent C+ imitation of Forza Horizon, but it had a lot of problems in terms of progression and car handling (every car felt nearly identical). Hopefully this isn't purely an aesthetic change, and they're trying to make some gameplay adjustments as well.

Heat was really fun, had a great time with it. I've enjoyed NFS driving a whole lot in recent years, and playing Hot Pursuit Remastered last year got me ready for a new one.

As long as there aren't mandatory drift events and the game isn't buggy and broken, I'll be down for more NFS.

@judaspete: Me too, I'm still curious about its gameplay.

@facelessvixen: Then I suggest you should wait for its discount.

@lab392: I see, also the trailer reminds me of Need For Speed No Limits for mobile.

@chaser324: We'll see how is the game going to be like.

@csl316: I hope Criterion Games will learn from their mistakes as they improve Need For Speed Unbound.

Overall, the character designs remind me of CSR Racing.

@chaser324: Okay, I have to ask since I keep seeing similar comments and comparisons about Heat and Forza Horizon over the years, and I mostly can't understand it.

How exactly is Heat an imitation of Horizon? Like, is it just Heat and Payback including off-road races, off-road exploration, speed traps, and drift zones, or is there either more to it that I'm not seeing from the Horizon side due to my tens of hours with Horizon 3 and 4 compared to the over 100 with Heat? Also, And what's wrong with Heat's progression compared to Horizon's?

@facelessvixen: The whole festival atmosphere and tone along with the inclusion of the off-road and "PR event" stuff really invites comparisons to Horizon for a lot of people.

As far as the progression goes, there are three primary problems with it in my opinion.

The first is that while ostensibly there is variety with the off-road, drag races, night events, etc., the game is really dominated just by the main circuit races and feels lacking in many of the other event types.

Second, there's not much going on with the online as far as interacting and racing with other players. Seeing other races happening in the open world is cool but I'd like to have some open world challenges and an equivalent to the seasonal/weekly Horizon playlists.

My biggest personal beef though is that the vehicles just don't feel distinct enough from each other. I get that NFS Heat is more specifically an arcade racer than Horizon, but the handling model just feels stiff and awkward in a lot of ways compared to the more nuanced "simcade" feel while also not feeling like it's exaggerated and over the top enough to be making the most of being "arcade" focused. In the Horizon games, building up a car collection, tuning them, trying them out, and finding favorites is a big part of the appeal for me. However in NFS Heat, I don't feel that compulsion much at all since most cars feel so similar.

All of that said, NFS Heat is still a pretty good game and a marked improvement over many of the other recent NFS games. I think they're heading in a better direction, and I hope to see that improvement continue with Unbound.

Not gonna lie. I have never given a heck about a Need for Speed game never ever ever, but that trailer looks dope. Wishlisted.

This is the first time in a long time that I had the urge to watch a trailer over and over again. No idea how the actual game is going to pan out, but that is one effective trailer.

It sure has a look and style to it. I like the comic book/high school notebook look of the people and effects with the realistic look of the cars and world. Hopefully that's not all just for the trailer and actually the look of the game. But i have personally never really cared for the NFS games for the most part, only playing Most Wanted and the Criterion versions that where basically Burnout for the most part. Not into there story and car culture stuff, and don't care the "festival" style of story. Just give me cool looking cars and let me do dumb stuff around a city. Don't try and come up with a "reasonable" explanation for why all this crazy car shit is going on. And most importantly the driving has to be fun, which NFS normally misses that mark.

So im still going to yell at EA to pay/hire Three Fields Entertainment to make another Burnout game. But hopefully Wrekreation works out for them.

@chaser324: I disagree, strongly in some cases, but thanks for elaborating.

I've grown tired of the racing festival gimmick. It's been going since... like, Motorstorm. They don't need a premise to get all these racers in one place. It's just expected people turn up to race because CAR ISLAND or something.

@shindig: I can see Need For Speed Unbound is going to feature an illegal street racing organisation, by judging a group of tuner car meetings while cops raid & seize them.

@mach_go_go_go: I agree, but I was expecting the character designs to look more similar to Initial D & Wangan Midnight prior to its leak & premier.

@lab392: All we can do is stay tuned.

@lego_my_eggo: I see, I'm still hoping Wreckreation is going to be good as well, oh I also forgot to mention that Codemasters Chesire should also buy the rights of Driveclub from Sony Interactive Entertainment to develop a sequel or port the original PS4 game to PC, PS5 & Xbox Series X/S.

As I know, Sony Interactive Entertainment doesn't seem to care about MotorStorm & Driveclub as they only care about Polyphony's Gran Turismo these days.

yes, you have to wait for another released for them to make something good . This looks like it could be the worst need for speed. ever

My dislike for hip hop pushes me away from it. It's hard to tell from the trailer whether it's going to be story driven or not it's just an art style, there's no hint of a plot these characters are involved with, at the moment it just looks like a bunch of people breaking the law which is fine if the gameplay is amazing... we'll see.

@lab392: Underground was about import car culture, glowing neons, body kits and pearlescent paint, accompanied by the popular rap, EDM and metal of the time, this feels like it should have the Def Jam name on it.

@cikame: I'm not a fan of hip hop and rap music as well, I guess the story wise is going to be similar to the first three Fast & Furious movies.

This is the first interesting looking Need for Speed game in a decade. Like others have said, the gameplay is still a question mark but at least they're trying something interesting with the visuals. I'll certainly try the 10 hour free trial on Game Pass.

@isomeri: I hope you will have a good time playing the 10-hour free trial version of this game on the Xbox Game Pass before you may want to buy the full version in the near future.

@chaser324: Yeah, hard agree on the vehicle handling.

NFSs of recent feel too floaty. Maybe Horizon has spoiled me on having the right mix of simcade, but it is hard to find the sweet spot in tuning/controller settings for NFS.

@wardcleaver: To me, the most recent NFS’ car handling feels almost exactly like the Burnout series.