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    Need for Speed

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    EA's flagship street racing series featuring many licensed cars, police pursuits, car customization, and more reboots than you can shake a stick at.

    Where "Need for Speed" needs to go.

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    BlazeHedgehog

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    Edited By BlazeHedgehog

    So I'm hot off trying the demo for Need for Speed: Shift. I came away a little more impressed with the "you feel like you are driving" stuff than I figured I would. GRiD does a great job of that already, with smart camera movement that really gives you the feeling of bouncing around a vehicle as you take turns at 50mph - but Shift takes the next step. 
     
    Unfortunately, that's about all that impressed me with the game. Need for Speed just is not a franchise about "serious" racing, so when you get games like ProStreet and Shift I just sort of shake my head and sigh. At the same time, though, I understand EA's plight - the "Fast & The Furious" direction of Need for Speed Underground and Most Wanted was most definitely tapped out. So where do you go from there? 
     
    I say go back to the beginning. I'm talking the originalNeed for Speed games. No nitrous, no chrome rims, no spoilers and no glowing lights underneath the car. When I want a Need for Speed game to play, I go back to one game, each and every time:
     

     Hail to the King, Baby.
     Hail to the King, Baby.
     
    Nobody makes racing games like Hot Pursuit 2 anymore. Not EA, no one - and frankly, it's starting to make me a little bit bored of racing games in general. I'm so tired of Forza, Gran Turismo, Project Gotham Racing, and GRiD. I'm also tired of Fast-and-the-furious Underground Street Races. 
     
     Exotic cars, exotic locales
     Exotic cars, exotic locales
    Hot Pursuit 2, on the other hand, doesn't bog us down with a storyline or an open world or sponsored events. You do not race in tracks that feel like they were set up specifically for racing. There aren't any retaining walls, bleachers or spectators. You aren't even really racing in cities, for the most part. You're just some stupidly rich thrill-seeker with an expensive sports car racing across long, winding interstate roads. Locations are just as exotic as the cars - with forests, countrysides and even the coasts of Hawaii.  There aren't many racing games today that offer up such a wide variety of vistas.
     
    That's largely because Hot Pursuit 2 doesn't bog itself down with realism. Take Need for Speed: Most Wanted, for instance. In Most Wanted, you're limited to one city, which eliminates a lot of the more exciting and varied options for race locales. Since Most Wanted is also an open-world game, you have to construct racing circuits out of city street layouts. Worst of all, Most Wanted rides the "Fast & The Furious" fad for all its worth, dating the game considerably. 
     
     You
     You "are" in the driver seat
    What I want is a Need for Speed game that takes all of the "you really are driving" concepts from Shift and applies them to a game like Hot Pursuit 2. As I fly through a sawmill in the forests of upstate California at 110mph in a Lotus Elise, I want to feel it. I don't want to drive through another city I'm going to forget in ten minutes - and I don't want to drive through locales that were inspired by famous street racing movies, either. Hot Pursuit 2 has you ramp over lava floes from a recently-erupted volcano in Hawaii, for crying out loud. Has any Need for Speed game done anything that cool since then? I'd argue it has not. 
     
    C'mon, EA and the Need for Speed Team ! Show some creativity again! Or at least put Beetle Adventure Racing on Xbox Live, or something.
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    BlazeHedgehog

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    #1  Edited By BlazeHedgehog

    So I'm hot off trying the demo for Need for Speed: Shift. I came away a little more impressed with the "you feel like you are driving" stuff than I figured I would. GRiD does a great job of that already, with smart camera movement that really gives you the feeling of bouncing around a vehicle as you take turns at 50mph - but Shift takes the next step. 
     
    Unfortunately, that's about all that impressed me with the game. Need for Speed just is not a franchise about "serious" racing, so when you get games like ProStreet and Shift I just sort of shake my head and sigh. At the same time, though, I understand EA's plight - the "Fast & The Furious" direction of Need for Speed Underground and Most Wanted was most definitely tapped out. So where do you go from there? 
     
    I say go back to the beginning. I'm talking the originalNeed for Speed games. No nitrous, no chrome rims, no spoilers and no glowing lights underneath the car. When I want a Need for Speed game to play, I go back to one game, each and every time:
     

     Hail to the King, Baby.
     Hail to the King, Baby.
     
    Nobody makes racing games like Hot Pursuit 2 anymore. Not EA, no one - and frankly, it's starting to make me a little bit bored of racing games in general. I'm so tired of Forza, Gran Turismo, Project Gotham Racing, and GRiD. I'm also tired of Fast-and-the-furious Underground Street Races. 
     
     Exotic cars, exotic locales
     Exotic cars, exotic locales
    Hot Pursuit 2, on the other hand, doesn't bog us down with a storyline or an open world or sponsored events. You do not race in tracks that feel like they were set up specifically for racing. There aren't any retaining walls, bleachers or spectators. You aren't even really racing in cities, for the most part. You're just some stupidly rich thrill-seeker with an expensive sports car racing across long, winding interstate roads. Locations are just as exotic as the cars - with forests, countrysides and even the coasts of Hawaii.  There aren't many racing games today that offer up such a wide variety of vistas.
     
    That's largely because Hot Pursuit 2 doesn't bog itself down with realism. Take Need for Speed: Most Wanted, for instance. In Most Wanted, you're limited to one city, which eliminates a lot of the more exciting and varied options for race locales. Since Most Wanted is also an open-world game, you have to construct racing circuits out of city street layouts. Worst of all, Most Wanted rides the "Fast & The Furious" fad for all its worth, dating the game considerably. 
     
     You
     You "are" in the driver seat
    What I want is a Need for Speed game that takes all of the "you really are driving" concepts from Shift and applies them to a game like Hot Pursuit 2. As I fly through a sawmill in the forests of upstate California at 110mph in a Lotus Elise, I want to feel it. I don't want to drive through another city I'm going to forget in ten minutes - and I don't want to drive through locales that were inspired by famous street racing movies, either. Hot Pursuit 2 has you ramp over lava floes from a recently-erupted volcano in Hawaii, for crying out loud. Has any Need for Speed game done anything that cool since then? I'd argue it has not. 
     
    C'mon, EA and the Need for Speed Team ! Show some creativity again! Or at least put Beetle Adventure Racing on Xbox Live, or something.
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    Kazona

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    #2  Edited By Kazona

    Dude, I agree with you 100%

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    Ashuku

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    #3  Edited By Ashuku

    Man. You make me want to dig out my copy of hot pursuit 2.... Wherever it might be. 

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    demontium

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    #4  Edited By demontium
    @BlazeHedgehog: You are basically correct.
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    BlazeHedgehog

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    #5  Edited By BlazeHedgehog
    @Ashuku said:
    " Man. You make me want to dig out my copy of hot pursuit 2.... Wherever it might be.  "
    Y'know, the PC version has online play, I think... dunno how functional it still is. Like, if it's direct-connect or if it's server-based.
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    jakob187

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    #6  Edited By jakob187

    Where Need For Speed needs to go:  to Hell.

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    bed

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    #7  Edited By bed

    Hot Pursuit 2 was AWESOME! i had so much fun with that game.  
    the games before that (mostly the first hot pursuit and NFS II SE) were awesome too. 
    it would be cool to see NFS go back into that direction, but i'm not sure if they will have the same degree of success  
    they had during 2003 and before with today's racing games. 

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    deathstriker666

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    #8  Edited By deathstriker666

    How could you forget the helicopters that dropped bombs in front of you?
    lol, good times

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    dagas

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    #9  Edited By dagas

    Underground 3 ^^ Yeah I know I'm probably the only one who never got over Fast and the Furious (or The Matrix for that matter) but I'm still into neon and NOS (and trench coats). Never played Hot Persuit 2, but played a little bit of the first Hot Persuit. Don't remember anything except that it had cops chasing you.

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