Game: Need For Speed: Underground
Console: Sony Playstation 2
Developer: EA
Release Date: 17th November 2003
The first game in the "second era" of the Need For Speed series, Underground took to the PS2 with an emphasis on street racing with a selection of import cars which could be tuned up aesthetically and performance-wise. All races take place in a generic city at night, which is not to say that the city is boring, landmark-wise, however its name is never mentioned and the player is not able to explore it outside of the races.
The goal of career mode in the game is to gain the #1 spot in every racing discipline in the city, these include Circuit, Drag, Sprint and Drift racing. To challenge the respective place holders (you start unranked, attempting to move into the #10 spot for each type of racing) the player must impress in a series of seemingly unimportant races, before receiving a message from the racer they wish to challenge. This formula can get a little stale as you progress especially with 10 places to each of the 4 racing types to obtain.
The gameplay is faced paced, with the tracks and city nicely rendered. Although the maximum of 4 cars in a race seems small by today's standards, the races remain close most of the time, although the game can be a little to easy to beat if you're experienced with the series. Drag races are interestingly different from the circuit and sprint events, with manual gears and an automatic lane switch system, leaving you to solely focus on your gearing. Drift mode is also markedly different from the others, requiring the player to master more than just one racing skill.
Musically the game has a tracklist of varied songs which fit the night racing mood decently, but allows you to choose which songs play if there are any which are too far outside your tastes. Car customisation options are unlocked by winning races, and style points, earned by drifting and doing other dangerous maneuvers. Compared to games later in the series there's not a whole lot of choice in terms of bodykits and paint options, but its in line with games of its time.
Overall Need For Speed Underground was an impressive game for it's time and its race experience still compares favourably with later installments. The style point system and customisation options are strong points of the game, although the repetitive nature of the career mode brings the replay value and overall completion incentive down somewhat.
Rating: 75/100
Grade: B
Game: Need For Speed Underground 2
Console: Sony Playstation 2
Developer: EA
Release Date: 15th November 2004
Adding SUV's, refillable nitrous and perhaps most importantly open world exploration between races, Need For Speed Underground 2 is a sequel that surpasses its predecessor in a lot of ways. There's a wider selection of cars, including SUV's for added variety, more customisation options and some new race modes in the form of Street X and the Underground Racing League.
The game begins with some backstory (although as with most plots in NFS games its contrived and can be easily ignored without too much loss), using a comic book style to illustrate the cutscenes. Its nice to actually have some sort of perceived motive for winning street races, but winning races is all you really need to do to complete the game.
With an open world map in the game, choosing your races works the same as in the previous installment, except you have to drive to them to begin competing. You can still choose in which races you want to compete although sponsorship deals are a new feature which will offer perks for winning certain types of races. New race types are Street X which features short tracks with tight corners, leading a lot of jostling between competitors, and Underground Racing League races which feature 6 opponents on track at one time, and no traffic, more like a sports racing game than a street racer. Drift Races also feature all 4 opponents on track at one time, instead of just your own car in the previous installment.
The player can also choose to challenge any other racers they meet around the street, with the simple press of a button. This will initiate a mini challenge for extra money, or "bank" which the game chooses to constantly refer to it as. This, alongside the comic cutscenes seem to be the worst features of this installment. Other than that the music leaves something to be desired, with a forgettable collection of "EA Trax", which are possibly best turned down on the mixer in favour of your own favourite music.
Overall then, Need For Speed 2 delivers an updated racing experience with more cars, an open world map and a plot of some kind. Although the 2 racing modes it added were shortlived (we've not seen Street X since, and URL races only seemed to rear their head again in ProStreet as the main part of gameplay), they don't detract from the experience. The graphics are nice, not massively better than the first game but an improvement, and the changes in weather are a classy touch. Musically and attitude wise the game feels a little off, with the best course of action being to ignore all NPC's and cutscenes, but on the whole its a better game.
Rating: 79/100
Grade: B
Game: Need For Speed Most Wanted
Console: Sony PlayStation 2
Developer: EA
Release Date: 25th November 2005
With two fairly successful 'Underground' titles in preceding years, you'd have forgiven EA for making a third game under that title. Luckily what they did was much, much better; adding action packed police chases, tollbooth time trials and a challenge mode, Need For Speed Most Wanted impresses right off the bat in terms of gameplay and features. For a start there's structured goals; achieve certain feats in police chases, and win these races to challenge the next player on the blacklist, the car selection is bigger and better than ever (with no SUV's), and there's miles of open road to roam around.
Graphically at least, it seems more realistic than the previous installments, perhaps only due to the fact that it isn't constantly night-time, the bright colours of trees and other decorative roadside objects finally visible. There's a good sense of speed, thanks to motion blur and good use of processing power. The cars themselves are nicely rendered with more choice than the last 2 installments and more cars in the high performance category.
The career mode progression is split into 2 parts, completing races (circuit, sprint, drag, lap knockout, tollbooth and speedtrap) and accruing enough police bounty through pursuit milestones, to challenge the next player on the blacklist. The tollbooth time trials and speedtrap races are new additions to the series, the first being a simple single player time trial race, and the second a race where finishing first doesn't guarantee a win, places are decided on who went fastest through set points on the course. Both of these modes have good gameplay and stand out from the other racing modes.
The police pursuits are possibly the best feature of the game, challenging the player to rethink their approach to racing through the streets. Dotted around the map are hiding places and pursuit breakers which can throw off trailing cops, another new feature is the speedbreaker which puts the game into slow motion for a short time, allowing the player to dodge a roadblock or pull off difficult maneuvers which may not otherwise be possible.
Outside of career mode there's also the challenge mode which uses pursuit combos and tollbooth times as trials with which to test the player. This can be helpful to build up skills for career mode, or just as a break from it. Musically the soundtrack has a lot of enjoyable songs, which fit well with the action on screen. Police chases have their own theme to evoke the tension onscreen, and this adds to the overall feel of the game.
This installment of Need For Speed delivers on a lot of levels, the career mode is engaging with plenty of challenge both from races and pursuits, the car customisation options as well as the choice of cars is wide and the map is larger than both of the previous installments. The AI racers can sometimes obviously use "rubberbanding" to give a closer result to races, and police pursuits can be difficult to evade after enough time being chased, but on the whole what could have been another night-time street racing series game became something much more enjoyable with its own character.
Rating: 86/100
Grade: B
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