Need for Speed Most Wanted: breve preview

[VELOCIPEDE]

Car Customization

If car customization was the heart and soul of the Underground series, it's become at least #3 in Most Wanted. Don't worry, you'll still be able to customized the car quite a bit, but it's not really the purpose of the game. I must say that I actually didn't get to customize cars ingame much since we didn't get a savegame with everything done. So exactly what visual parts are in the game I don't know, but I do know there's a big difference: no more bumpers and sideskirts. That part of exteriror customizing has been reduced to about 6 EA designed bodykits, different for every car. Additionally exotics and tuners have about the same amount of modding options -> yes you will have the ability to make a purple Mercedes SLR with pink vinyls, a huge spoiler and chrome rims.

With performance tuning, the system is about the same: you get to buy perfomance upgrades. But there's a catch that I'm not too happy about: you will get to tune a euro hatchback to the point where it will actually be able to compete with any exotic. There is some logic in the fact that if you invest $200.000 in a tuner car that it'd be pretty fast, but as fast as a Carrera GT?

The World

As you know Most Wanted takes place in Rockport city which is an imaginary city that takes some inspiration from the real world, especially if you're from Vancouver you could notice some similarities. The size of the world is about one and a half of Underground 2 but if Underground 2 had only 3 distinctive parts (Jackson Heights, City Centre, Coal Harbour), this world is much more diverse. Expect downtown tracks, industrial areas, countryside and more! Another huge difference is the amount of off road tracks: if NFSU2 contained a few parking spots off the main road, you'll be able to drive through golf court, countless parking spaces, garages, gas stations... All these off road locations have a special meaning: cop evasion. But I will talk about cops later . If hitting a tree in Underground stopped you down to a full stop, in Most Wanted you'll actually be able to run the tree down: but not just trees, there are benches, streetlights, people... (just kidding, we won't be able to run over people). There are also certain objects that by hitting them can cause a much bigger reaction: like gas station exploding, huge objects dropping. And remember such things will be crucial in pursuits - the best way to get rid of a cop is to have a huge donut fall on their car (I'm serious here).

Car Physics and Racing

Since the game is pretty much based on Need for Speed Underground 2, there's not much difference in the way the car handles on the road. I didn't have much time for car customizing, so I can't tell you how handling changes when you upgrade the car, but I did get a chance to drive both ultimately tuned cars and a completely stock family car. Top speed still flies with the same motion blur effect while the handling is still pretty easy so I can tell you now that you will not need the brakes much, except when you do 180 turns to avoid the cops. Compared to NFSU2 there was no racebreaker in the game I got to play but the nitrous did however refill in slowly. Weight plays a very important part in the game as you won't be able to move cop cars around, especially when at low speed and with a small car. Need for Speed Most Wanted has a completely new never before seen feature called Speedbreak. It can be used like nitro (start with full amount, when you use it, it refills slowly) and what it does is it slows down the time and highly improves car handling. It is very useful in sharp turns, hairpins and with 180 turns which with speedbreaker you can do without touching the walls. From what I've experienced it's a really good and fun addition to the arcade styled racing. Another thing I noticed is that wallriding has been made a bit harder - I couldn't really make turns so easily without losing speed as in NFSU2.

Pursuits

The most important feature of Most Wanted are definetly the cops. And I must say there are lots of cops! Go over the speed limit near a cop and the chase starts. At the beginning there's only one cop behind you but in time as you commit more illegal actions (speeding, ramming cops, destroying public property...) more will join your pursuit and your wanted level will increase. Wanted level will determine what kind of cops will be on your tail: level 1 will be normal police cruisers which will be replaced with level 2 undercover police cruisers which you can't see on your radar. Since I usually drive by the law, I didn't get past level 2, but I can tell you what the next levels are: after undercover police you can expect SUVs with a completely different technique (expect them going directly into you) and different performance cop cars. EA says there is no way to lose the cops unless you use certain strategies, you will not be able to shake them and I can say that is more or less true. Just by driving straight and no matter how fast you go, cops will be behind you. But by taking sharp or even 180 turns you can actually get out of their visual range and when they can't see you they also will not follow you. Then you can expect them to cruise around the area where you were last seen so a good idea would be to hide somewhere. And there are plenty of locations on the track available. When hidden there's a cool down meter which slowly progresses. At the time it took in my opinion a bit too long but might change untill full release. But hiding from the cops is not the only way to shake them: try ramming straight into them at high speed. Unlike Underground games and Hot Pursuit 2, cops in Most Wanted can actually be damaged and even destroyed. Yes, by hitting them enough you can damage them completely which makes them stop chasing you. Damage itself is quite good looking but when I played the cops were pretty hard, it took a lot of power to damage them.

Overall the pursuits are not only the most important part of the game, but also the funniest! Since I don't want to make a 3 page essay on just cops I'll stop here and if you have any other questions, feel free to ask here and I'll be happy to answer.

Unfortunatly the cops have their bad side: we won't be able to join their sides which is a shame really as playing as cops would add a lot of fun especially to online races.

In Game Animation

One thing that has really change a lot since Need for Speed Underground 2 is the way the story is presented to the player. If NFSU2 had these boring comic book like video clips, Most Wanted is completely different with high quality animation a bit similar to those in NFS Underground, but much better looking and especially much more of it. All the animations actually began at EA Canada studios in a huge room all covered with green screen. They even brought in cars all covered in green! They applied special effects to the footage so the ending result is very lifelike character movement with animation-like appearance that goes extremely well with the game.