Need For Speed- A look into the Franchise.
Now it’s sin to write a small paragraph on NFS 5: Porsche Unleashed. It deserves an epic dedicated to itself! I am sure the guys at Porsche would have been thrilled when NFS proposed to make Porsche a household name with this title, which is probably why they collaborated openly and incorporated just about any Porsche made in this world (and cockpit views of the same too!) The game was again leaps ahead in racing and graphics and added novel elements like racing through history or performing racing stunts / jobs apart from the usual career mode, thereby ensuring one did spend weeks playing the game without getting bored. The cars had realistic physics and driving them required logic, rather than just the gas pedal as in NFS 2. For the first time in my life, I learnt to use brakes in a racing game to avoid loosing precious seconds crashing into corners. All in all, I will not be far off the mark if I claim that I beat Ferdinand Porsche in driving the number of vehicles designed by his esteemed organization! And I sure wish I get to drive one before my validity on this earth expires…
NFS seemed to be running out of ideas now, because I seriously hated NFS: Hot Pursuit 2! It was probably a more refined and better looking version of High Stakes but considering the sky-high benchmark set by Porsche Unleashed, playing it felt so painful that even a dozen shots of crocin could not make me feel better. The chase was nothing close to High Stakes or even Hot Pursuit (apart from the helicopters dropping exploding barrels that would have your car’s nose pointing straight upward – a neat addition!). The racing felt devoid of speed and it seemed like an excuse of a game churned out for the heck of releasing a NFS every year. I uninstalled the game as soon as I finished it (which I did more out of respect btw); it was plain yucky for me!
EA must have thanked ‘The Fast and the Furious’ movie for dishing out the wonderful idea of illegal street racing and car tuning to the masses. Their next offering – NFS Underground, was an experience just like NFS 2. Not only did it entice with its superior game-play and sound-track yet again, it also educated my to the world of car-tuning through phrases like ‘spoiler’, ‘side-skirts’, ‘vinyls’ etc. While the cars felt made of hollow metal because the ‘crash – banging’ affair always churned out unpredictable results, the city created for the racing was quite jaw-dropping. The shiny effects were over-done but the lighting and reflections were definitely in place! Modding cars you’ve seen regularly in auto-mags was a treat and racing was fast and fun, if not furious. Drag, Drift and Sprint were welcome additions. One can pick up and play Underground even today for it was a true revolution for the series.
But EA got sucked into the black hole of ‘capitalizing’ on fan following when it introduced Underground 2 to the world. While it boasted the largest number of customizations in any game ever, it forgot that gamers like me will really spend 10 minutes on customizing rides and 10,000 on racing! Had it not been for the SUVs (that too, just Hummer for me!) which was a true delight to race and play car foot-ball with, I would have probably crashed a jumbo jet into EA’s office! Yes it had some cool new cars and a slicker city, but while aping Grand Theft Auto, it forgot that there was nothing to do beyond and between races which made driving pointlessly across the entire city pretty irritating. Racing was fun but nothing seriously evolutionary unlike its predecessor. I finished the game because it was terribly easy to beat and ofcourse, I still was under the ‘underground’ fascination spell! All in all, a game saved by its ‘name’ yet again more than anything!
Now EA did what it knew best, combined its proven ‘cop chase’ elements into an open driving style and dished out ‘Most Wanted’ – only this time, it was baked to taste perfect! Probably the only game I played like a rabid dog clocking more number of hours than favourite NFS 2 and still not getting tired of it. Driving was fast and crashing cops was sooooooo much fun, not to mention rewarding moments like passing under a semi in slo-mo or crashing pursuing cavalry into police roadblocks. Racing was relatively less fun, but the main idea here was ‘chase’ and not just ‘race’! Featuring an arsenal of enviable super-cars (to be raced in daytime compared to night settings in the previous 2 iterations), cool soundtrack, thrilling chase moments and over-the-top cartoony presentation, the game was responsible for me almost failing in one of my MBA courses, and was one of the last games I played on my PC before graduating to next – gen consoles. Precision driving was out and fun was in; for the game was really very forgiving if one made driving errors and was supported by equally idiotic car mechanics! However, with the highest fun quotient of all NFS games, ‘Most Wanted’ is still the most wanted game for me!
Thank You for sharing your knowledge.