NFS Shift user reviews

2009 Need for Speed SHIFT
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NFS Shift user reviews

Post by TSX »

Right. Another NFS. God knows witch number is it anyway. Its called shift and at first glance at the trailers i thought: Here goes copy of the GRID.

But now, i have the game, played it around 1h and here is my review of how the game felt so far.

At first, its back to ProStreet. There are no gangsta talking teenagers with small penises so they have to attract ladies with their flashing glittering cars. There is this deep male full of wisdom voise, talking seriously about track racing and stuff. Again there is this classic NFS welcome screen that we have seen before. Stylish background around the featured car of the game, and then... terrible menu. You have this huge font covering most of your screen, so you have to scroll a lot just to see all the options in the menu. And at first, like anybody else does, i went to options - graphics. Now, there are around 160 different resolutions to set from :roll:. The problem is screen resolution, refresh rate and AA are embedded into same option. So for example Setting No160 is 1920x1080 x 70Hz x 8AA, No159 is 1920x1080 x 70Hz x 4AA. Once AA reaches 0, Hz value drops to 60Hz, resolution is still 1920x1080 and AA is once again X8. On my PC refresh rates went all the way down to 30Hz, witch is ridiculous since i have LCD with fixed refresh rate. And once you scroll to your desired resolution/refresh rate/ AA it says, - new settings will be applied upon restarting the game. (Well F... you EA). I would also like to say that there is no benchmark option in the game, and default settings option is a bit weird. My PC is 3GB RAM, E5300 Dual core, Ati 4870 Sapphire and by default all settings are maxed out except for 2X AA and medium shadows quality. Not bad - quite a good engine then you would say. But! Once you start your first race, all collapses. Frame rate is painfully low, car reacts too late... so the moment you hit throttle, nothing happens, but half a second later, it revs to the limit. You let go, it still revs. Now imagine how annoying this gets when you try to hit optimum revs at start for perfect launch. Impossible! Not to talk about cornering that happens too late. Seeing that i scrolled again though menus to select lower resolution, and perhaps some gfx options as well. At setting No122 there it was - 1280x800 x60Hz x2AA. some effects were lowered to medium and it was time to quit to windows - so that after restart i could have new setting and perhaps smoother frame rate. But guess what - Saaaame shiznit! To slow reactions, and when to many cars are in front FPS drops to below 20. Once i am alone on the track, its smooth, but as soon as I am racing, it slows down. Now i reckon, if i overtake them all, there are no cars in front to render and all will be fine, but how to overtake when steering is late, you brake too late, accelerate too late. I lowered gfx settings again, but when message - "new settings will be applied upon restarting the game" appeared I gave up life all together. It reminded me of NFS Undercover and its poor engine, and why i uninstalled the game after just 20mins of play.

Now something about racing itself. First race in career is a sort of training. 1 lap around Brands Hatch Indy track, and based on your lap time, game suggests difficulty of the career - opponent skill, ABS, traction control, driving aid. Nice idea. Too bad I found it useless. Controls are set to arrows instead of WASD. Nothing too bad, but since lately all the games are on WASD, suddenly controlling the car with your right hand is a bit odd.
Also, you start of with cockpit camera. Ok, that has finally returned to NFS, and they made such a big fuss about it, but... they made too big fuss about it. You cant adjust your seating position - you are stuck way back so you can see all the little details EA has been working on hardly. I don't know about you, but i find it more useful while racing to look through windscreen than looking at the center console and dashboard.
Now i don't know if there is the same issue with other cars, but in M3 and Scirroco, while in cockpit, that bloody A pillar often gets in a way when cornering, so you sometime miss the apex - just because of that. If there was an option to adjust seat more forward, and upward maybe, cockpit camera would be my choice. When i wanted to change the camera, i found that C is not the key for it. So i stayed stuck with it, and after only one lap - first time behind the wheel an new physics and new track - as you can guess i performed badly. And based on that game has set me the easiest career difficulty. Oh come on, give me 5 laps and rate me based on best lap. You can restart that training until you get the feel of the car, and at the end of race you can set difficulty manually. So, all this rating based on lap time is unnecessary.

As for physics. It says it has Physx engine, but unless you have hardware for it you will not experience it. Neighter have I. All i can say, this no physx engine is terrible. Cars feel wooden, crashes feel numb. I bet EA has again put the best technology in real cars to capture their handling, but this doesn't feel anything like it. Head on crash just digs in your car, but if you hit another car its back end goes flying. Its way to easy to flip over the side opponents cars, and way to easy to spin them of the track. And if you think you will see some spectacular crashing in the game, forget it. At high speed, if you hit something, whole screen blurs, and when the screen sharpens you see slightly scratched car. It takes a lot of effort before some parts of kits start to fall of. But when that does happen, another disapointment. Under that bodykit, there is still the same box shaped bare car we used to see in Prostreet.

As for tuning & customizing, now you can apply beautiful full on racing kits. No more rice crap. No more choosing between same old spoilers, hoods or exhaust tips, all is included in kit. From what i have seen so far, they look really good. Some are maybe even real stuff you see on race tracks. There is no autosculpt (thank God, it was so terrible), but still, you can fine tune all the parts you apply. Much like in ProStreet. Every part you choose affects your aerodynamics, top speed, etc etc. Also you can quick-dress your car in some of premade great looking liveries. 5 per car, and every car has its own liveries. But when it all seemed perfect, EA ruined it again. There are still 1000 different shapes of rims. And since every part of car affects its handling, it seems that there is no difference between 15" and 21" rims on same car.
But the worst bit is that you can again rice up your car with same old shapes and vinyls we are seeing all over again since Carbon. Color tinted windshields only make things worse. Why o why...

EA also though of one very interesting thing to implement, well at least they thought its interesting and thus they hyped it up so even some of us thought thats a cool feature - its so called Precision vs Aggressive racer. If you are driving pitch perfect laps you are gaining points for precision, if you tend to knock opponents of the track, drift the corners, trade paint with other cars you get points for aggression. The only trouble is... Aggression points aren't really rewarding. Its hard work to drive perfect lane through every apex, its hard to avoid contact between cars on track and all other sort of things that award you with precision points. On the other hand, all you need for aggression points is lack of talent. Brake too late and you will ram into cars before you, hit throttle too soon in the corner and car will drift of the perfect lane, touch any other car in narrow corner etc. Eventually because you are new to the game and physics of driving the car, and because frame rate drops when there are some cars around, you will smash and drift around earning aggression points. After you accumulate required number of points you advance to level 2 aggression, and this new stylish badge with spiked hammers appears on the screen saying - wow, you are cool, you are aggressive, ROAR, a real beast. Where as it should say - you talentless idiot, you shouldn't drive anything more powerful than shopping pushcart!
In one of loading screen it says you can advance to Lv50 aggression/precision. I wonder, whats the reward for that? I doubt Lv50 aggression gives you a pair of machine guns, although that would be cool. Also i would like to mention that loading takes so long you can actually feel as you are getting older.
Something else bad? Well, hood camera swings too much so its hard to follow the road.
Also i have tried one quick race with Maserati MC12 Corsa - one of the fastest cars in game, to see if game feels any better at its best, and the answer is no. It drives faster, car sounds better than 2.0 TSI Scirroco, but all the rest is still there.
And correct me if I am wrong, but the game lacks soundtrack. While racing there is no music whatsoever, and in menus all you hear is distant crowd and distant revving cars.

Good stuff?
Well, gfx do look nice and realistic. This is the first time cars had full reflections on them, so you could see reflection of other cars on your hood. And finally someone realized that V8 Vantage is more suited for racing than DB9, so you can find it in the game as well. There are some real world legendary tracks like Laguna Seca, Circuit de Spa... and thats about it.

So, to sum it all up... Again its unfinished, unpolished, not well thought through game from EA with that same already disgusting name Need for Speed. Developing team has once again spent too much time designing menu, icons, trailers, "how to master race track" trailers, and all those little details that dont even need to be there - 3 stage cockpit, and all inside it. And since every year there HAS TO BE new NFS there isnt much time to make something new and good. By new i mean, it has all the same cars you used to see before, and most of the vinyls are sold again and again every year. Now, im not that stupid to pay every year for same shiznit.
But crucially, what this game is missing is what differs AutoCAD from Burnout Paradise. Its FUN!

3/10
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by aryamen »

Yeah, you pretty much summed it all up there. I also experienced much of those things you so eloquently explained especially regarding the fact that EA spent so much on trailers, teasers and screenshots, to market yet another undone NFS. This only creates more expectations and when the game finally doesn't live up to those expectations, the game won't sell! I had HUGE expectations because I thought EA was really going to surprise us.

Menus are terrible. Text font size ridiculous which requires a lot of scrolling and never have I seen before so poor graphics on the (menu) cars (poor detailing, ugly rims and constant spinning the car around to view if from different angles - it's a wonder our eyesballs are still in their sockets!). Oh and did I forgot to mention, loading times are horrible!

The game is far from flawless, not only graphically but the driving aspects as well. It seems almost impossible to hold a steady course on the vehicle using your keyboard, either you turn too wide and wind up crashing into the wall or you turn to much which causes you to momentarily drift and wiggle the car, trying to maintain a steady course. In fact EA probably want us to spend another hundered bucks on steering wheel an what not. Hopefully some of the minor issues can be fixed with a patch but if you're really looking for a simulator/arcade racing game...head over to codemasters and have some GRID, Race Driver GRID!
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by TSX »

Btw I apologize.
@ Any moderator: You can delete this topic and put my post into "Talk about NFS - SHIFT" where it belongs.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Kaerar »

LOL instead of moving it, they stickied it :D

Good review so far, it's a shame EA have decided to continue lying to their customers. Ah well, just means things look extremely good for Codemasters to take over and steal the NFS crowd with the next GRID. I just hope they fix the keyboard issues there too ;)
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Summ »

Review pretty much matches my thoughts and feelings about this game, though I reserve judgment of the physics and the actual driving experience to the day I can actually run this game smoothly. The one thing I would like to touch base on however is the AI - I don't mind competitive AI as in good AI, but AI that expressively targets you and tries to use you as a brake before a corner.. is just a lame, retarded AI playing like the lame, retarded kids online! It's the reason I never played a single NFS game online.. and now I'm stuck with the same kind of opponents OFFLINE?! What the.. ?! If I wanted to be crashed into all the time, I'd go online! No one in real life drives like a maniac out of hell! No one! The AI in this game is one of the most frustrating things I have ever been faced with. Being spun out or smashed off-course by a retard really isn't my idea of fun. Restarting the same race 10 times because of something the AI did, rather than my own mistake, is not fun. It's worse than frustrating. It's horrible!

Sure, there are other games with bad AI - GT5, for all its splendour has some of the worst AI in history.. but at least those are predictable! You know that if you brake a little too early or get in the way, that the AI is likely to bump into you. In Shift the AI is all over the damned place! There isn't a safe spot on the entire track! It is ridiculous!
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by zedex »

the physics seem oversensitive because the game seems to put the throttle and brake to the max as soon as you even touch the keys...

so "realistically" it WOULD wheelspin and fishtail and do whatever it's doing *except the BOUNCING!* because no one in their craziest mind would ever floor a 500+hp racecar off the grid, it usually as a gradual release...

they should really just tone down the sensitivity of steering and pedals and it SHOULD be fine... i have no clue because i don't have a wheel and i can't do half throttle... while i've seen videos of people driving with all assists off and they drive perfectly fine

I'm not sure if that would cure most of the problems but with a keyboard it's like flying in Lock-On without a flightstick... it's outright nearly impossible but manageable
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Nitrodemon McLaren »

Wow...

So hyped, looked so great by the trailers and yet... criticized.

Goes to show ya can't trust review sites.

I'm getting my copy later today...
...
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by <Jeroen> »

I just played the demo and fully agree with the author. Crashed into a wall at 250km/h and all I see is this little little scratch...

I scraped a wall just a tiny bit and directly get a full blur...


As for the feeling of the cars, I prefer Grid. Just played around with a Lotus and man, that car went right off the track as soon as I went into a corner. If this is realistic(car on 2 wheels once you start to turn a bit at 125km/h) then give me arcade please...
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by krazyammo »

I felt like the handling was way too loose, so easy to serve out of control and spin out. Some crashes and bugs really bogs down the game. I just felt like it should have been release around when Nitro is going to be release. They needed to more work time on it.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Summ »

About car handling and input sensitivity - it's not a sensitivity thing, it's a Shift thing. The application of braking and acceleration IS gradual. Standing still at the start line, I can see the needle responding to my varying applications of power. Yet in both cases, while racing, it feels like there is a gradual buildup to around 50% and then the bulk of the force comes down like an anvil. In the case of throttle, you get wheelspin all over the place. I guess the effect could be comparable to turbo-lag. As in, the turbo only sets in when you reach the higher rpm. When the power finally arrives, it does so all at once. Thanks to the input delay, it can be quite tricky to correct it some times. Braking is much of the same story. Coming in at 200 km/h, I apply gradual pressure on the brakes and the car starts to slow down. Suddenly, around 30% or so, it just locks the wheels and the whole car spears off in one direction with scarce chance of atually pulling it up again. It's like the last 50% of the pedal's run is compressed into 10%, yet when merely testing things, it doesn't feel like it.

The funny thing is, it's not always the same. It's situational. If I'm driving along at 100 km/h or less, the wheels won't lock until the brake is farther down its run. Somwhere between 70 and 80% would be my guess, which is the opposite of what should happen in real life, as far as I understand! It should be far easier to lock your wheels at low speeds than at high velocity. Yet in this game it is the other way around!

In the same sweep, let me mention that cars in this game feel a bit like boats. They tend to drift around the track unexpectedly. You head in what you think is a straight line and yet somehow, inexplicably, your car pulls sideways and ends up somewhere else than you predicted. This is instantly recognizable at high speeds and it's bothering the crap out of me.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by aryamen »

Come to think of something. For those of you who are experiencing issues related to the gameplay (i.e. handling, breaking and what not), head over to OPTIONS -> GAMEPLAY -> DRIVING. Once you get there, you'll find the difficulty settings for your profile (which is based on your performance on the test track in the beginning of the career mode, if you remember). Changing those settings alters the gameplay considerably. Mine was set to PRO, which was apparently the main reason the cars were so difficult to drive, so give it a shot and see if you can make something out of it.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by TSX »

I just gave Shift another go by trashing some cars around Nordschleife , so here is updated review.

Driving around legendary track really is great fun, especially if you have a go in one of everyday cars like Scirocco or Megane RS. FWD takes away some of the drifting fun, but its still quite an experience. Next i tried with S2000 and I could spot the differences right away - its much sharper and focused car, and since its RWD, you can have a much more fun through corners. Only trouble is - you need to have wheel. I have cracked the steering problem, at least on keyboard - witch is what most of PC users will use. When you steer, it steers graduately weather you use wheel of keys. Naturally keys have pressed/released states, so when you are approaching easy-left for example, you tap a little the key and car manages to steer just slightly - enough for the corner. But if you are up against tight turn, you need to start turning much sooner so when you hit the apex, wheel is turned to the maximum. Since wheel is turning graduately at the same speed every time, you cant steer violently, instead you will find yourself often approaching corner in drift style - steer before corner, and then correct it afterwards. Now there is another problem with correcting - wheel is returning to neutral at the same slow speed as it turns. So sometime when you get through the corner and you need neutral position of the wheel for the straight that lays ahead you will tap the opposite direction to straighten the wheel. The problem is, it will steer violently to the other side throwing you into the walls. So the easiest car to drive really is Megane RS since it has little stripe on top of the wheel, so while in cockpit, you can track the right position of wheel at all times.
Other thing that bugs me a lot - how can the game accuse me for cutting corners if I because of lack of talent run out of the track widely... but i mean OUT... too much speed, too late steering, and I am wide OUT! Now, its ok, if I because of same lack of talent start swinging car around and accidentally cut the corner from the inside. But how can it be that I can cut it outside. 3 times in a row i was disqualified for running out widely at one corner in Murcielago. 4th time i went sloooowly, no problem at all, but later same thing happened at one other corner. Disqualified! And i so wanted to see how much faster can I go in Lambo than in Megane.

Such a bad game... just when i started liking it (As a racing game overall, not like NFS), it killed me with disqualifications.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Hydro_PT »

I used to hate that in ToCA 3 too. If you would step for one second one of the wheels in the grass, you would get a warning. After 2 warnings you would get a time penalty of 5 seconds, and then disqualification. It bothered me so much... ahh.

And most of the times I wouldn't be faster, because my car would slow down so much I could even stay behind some opponents. Yet the game penalized me for "cutting the corner to gain unfair advantage". WTF? In SHIFT it seems to be the same weird and annoying system.

@Summ: I don't notice that with my wheel. The accelerator works like it should, and so does the brake. Maybe it's a problem with the G25... dunno. It works perfectly for me. Did you try different settings for deadzone, sensivity and so on? It might help you out.

Another thing I don't like about the handling is that the force feedback force isn't that good. Even the at highest setting, the wheel seems too loose. I had to use the Logitech profile thing to force the wheel to act with a stronger force feedback. Problem is, it ruins the settings for all the other racing games I have installed, so I must change the FF settings everytime I want to play SHIFT. For some odd reason, you can set different game profiles and tune sensitivity, deadzone and so on for pedals and wheel, but the FF effect is general and it's the same on all profiles. You change one, you change them all.

Oh and btw, after some more time playing, I noticed that no, after all GTR2 and SHIFT aren't that similar. Dunno what's wrong, but my Honda S2000 would slide so much when exiting the corners that I had to turn ABS and traction control on. The game is much more enjoyable this way, but it's also too easy. However, without any assists, I find it too damn hard and unrealistic to drive. After some 5 hours playing, SHIFT is starting to show me some bad stuff I wasn't expecting after playing the first hours. I'm sooo glad I didn't buy it yet...
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Koenigsegg_Rox »

Someone wanna give a user review of the PS3 version rather than the quite frankly meaningless reviews of the PC version? Cause they all seem to be following exactly the same trend: NFS on PC is absolutely sh*thouse.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by AERO_HDT »

I have just bought NFS Shift on the PS3. Admittedly, my two days worth of experience may amount to be rather meaningless, but as a huge fan of the racing genre, I have played just about every racing game out there.

My expectations weren't high. How could they be after the disappointment of Carbon and Underground? I'll begrudge the fact that Most Wanted and Pro Street were not bad games, in fact, they were rather memorable and quite decent overall, if overhyped and underdone.

But SHIFT, is another matter and as soon as I grabbed hold of the wheel and took an M3 for a good fling around the Hatch, I was pleasantly surprised. I spent a good hour tweaking the difficulty options until I realised that the best way to get the full experience was to switch all aids off, set the AI to max and see what I could do.

Two days later, and I cannot wipe the grin off my face. This is one of the best Need For Speed games I have ever played, and I kid you not because I've been at the side of this franchise since 1994, I've bought multiple versions of the same NFS game across different platform. The PS3 version is absolutely brilliant. The graphics are smooth, the cockpit views are superb, the physics are excellent and require deft control and give fantastic feelback. Gone are the days of super-high grip, wall-surfing and kiddie-glove gameplay - this Need For Speed is by far the most grown up, most polished and most worthy NFS instalment since the first one.

Quite frankly, the game is worth every cent, I cannot recommend it highly enough. If you enjoy your racing sims, you will not be disappointed by this game on the PS3. If Slightly Mad Studios are to continue their work with EA, then I'll continue to buy NFS games. I only hope that it's not too late, because EA have made some terrible development choices with the franchise over the last 10 years or so, trying to cash in on the non-existant Fast&Furious culture that they believe exists. SHIFT takes the game to a much more mature level, it takes the game to where it should be in the marketplace. I played GRID for all of ten seconds and I was expecting SHIFT to be the same. Thankfully, it's nothing like the Codemaster product, it's a brilliant piece of work by Slightly Mad and I'm proud to say that I love it and I highly encourage anyone who's doubtful to spend the money on it and see for themselves.

Now all I have to do is clock the game and get online.....

;)
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Koenigsegg_Rox »

Thanks for that, the only part I don't agree on is the part about GRID. Aside from the fact that the arcade-y physics make handling cars next to impossible with a racing wheel, I love GRID, and that along with ProStreet which I feel are the two big competitors in the racing sim business are the games I'm going to be comparing to SHIFT. Mind you when I mention ProStreet I do realise it's not a sim lol.

That said, I'm most likely going to be skipping SHIFT. Simple reason being, I can only afford one game next Tuesday and while SHIFT looks promising...there's also that little thing called Halo 3: ODST...
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by AERO_HDT »

SHIFT destroys both GRID and Pro Street, it is a much better game.

Shift versus Halo 3 though, I'd be a fool if I told you NFS was the better purchase.

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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by <Jeroen> »

AERO_HDT wrote:SHIFT destroys both GRID and Pro Street, it is a much better game.

Shift versus Halo 3 though, I'd be a fool if I told you NFS was the better purchase.

Cheerskis!
You must be out of your mind! The only (and the very ONLY) thing NFS beats GRid in is GFX. GRID > NFS in all other areas. In NFS im still experimenting with controls to make the cars feel less slow/heavy/immovable/uncontrolable. In Grid, all you have to do is race 1 or 2 times, and you're already used to the controls. Not to mention Grid has more camera angles/ better crash physics and the cars aren't made of some super metal that doesn't scratch even when rubbing a wall at 200km/h...

Oh, winning in NFS is easy, all yuo have to do is ram yuor oppenent from the back and he'll fly up your hood and crash. Do that in Grid and yuo're the one that is in trouble. As it should be.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Daniel2Hot »

i cant even play it...it load n stopped working...T_T
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by AERO_HDT »

<Jeroen> wrote:
You must be out of your mind! The only (and the very ONLY) thing NFS beats GRid in is GFX. GRID > NFS in all other areas. In NFS im still experimenting with controls to make the cars feel less slow/heavy/immovable/uncontrolable. In Grid, all you have to do is race 1 or 2 times, and you're already used to the controls. Not to mention Grid has more camera angles/ better crash physics and the cars aren't made of some super metal that doesn't scratch even when rubbing a wall at 200km/h...

Oh, winning in NFS is easy, all yuo have to do is ram yuor oppenent from the back and he'll fly up your hood and crash. Do that in Grid and yuo're the one that is in trouble. As it should be.
:lol:

Sorry good sir, but I think it is you who is out of his mind, not me.

Admittedly the crash physics could be better with Shift, but I find the super-twitchy and ridiculously unrealistic handling of Grid to be in every way inferior to Shift.

The fact that you're still trying to adjust the "controls" to make the cars feel lighter, more nimble and more controllable speaks volumes as to what kind of racer you are. You should be adjusting suspension setups, cranking on some camber and dialling in a bit of toe.

And if you think that camera angles and "crashing" defines a game, then you clearly have no idea. And if your method of winning involves ramming your opponent, then you have a great deal to learn as well.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Koenigsegg_Rox »

If SHIFT's physics are anything like ProStreet, they're on a winner imo. Yes, ProStreet's physics weren't very realistic and most people found them terrible, but I got used to them quite quickly. The only stickler for PS was the AI, especially in the speed challenges where they're outright dumba$$es.
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by zedex »

the whole comcept of speed challenges were dumb... that's the ONE event i hated in PS

this game has a LOT of pretty good events... other than the fact that drift is EXTREMELY hard...
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Hydro_PT »

AERO_HDT wrote: Admittedly the crash physics could be better with Shift, but I find the super-twitchy and ridiculously unrealistic handling of Grid to be in every way inferior to Shift.

The fact that you're still trying to adjust the "controls" to make the cars feel lighter, more nimble and more controllable speaks volumes as to what kind of racer you are. You should be adjusting suspension setups, cranking on some camber and dialling in a bit of toe.

And if you think that camera angles and "crashing" defines a game, then you clearly have no idea. And if your method of winning involves ramming your opponent, then you have a great deal to learn as well.
Could? They should be better. The crash physics in SHIFT are one of the worst physics around at the moment. Even GTA IV has better physics when it comes to cars crashing/being deformed. And GTA IV isn't even close to be a racing game. GRID, DiRT, even FlatOut games have much better physics.

GRID is an arcade game, not a simulator. It doesn't try to be an arcade game mixed with simulation, which is something SHIFT tries to be, and that's where it fails. So don't compare their handling. At least GRID, even being arcade, is not frustrating and annoying like SHIFT is sometimes, instead it's a much more enjoyable game IMO. SHIFT is also good, I like the game, but it doesn't give you the same excitement and vibe that GRID does. It feels like a better ProStreet, but kinda boring.
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Summ
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Summ »

^Never found Shift boring tbh - perhaps with driving aids on, I wouldn't know.. went with 0 assists from the start and would never dream of turning any assist on anyway. Shift is incredibly frustrating, I'll give you that, but not boring. You know why it's frustrating to me. I don't need to reiterate over it. But aside from the obvious performance issues, the AI just kills the fun. However, I think I understand what AERO_HDT means and how he feels about these things and if I'm right, I'm fully with him on this one.

The core, essence experience, which IS the game itself, which DEFINES the game, is the feeling that you have with your car. What really MATTERS in a racing game is how the car responds, when you take it on the track.. alone. Crash physics, camera angles and whatnot.. it's all bollocks. Nice-to-have's. To some people they might be a dealbreaker, but to people like me, they are details. The essence of the game is how your car drives and how it responds to the inputs you give it. To me a driving game isn't about winning or losing, progressing in the career or unlocking new things. I can spend hours on end alone on the track, just getting to know my car and the track at hand. To me the magic happens, when I can sit down and really tune in to my car, learn the engine sounds, find out where the limits are and then practicing at pushing the envelope. That's why I want my racers to be sims - they give me an idea of how something is, which I will most likely never get the opportunity to try out in real life. That's what I love about them and that's my passion, really. =).

In that regard I find Shift better than GRID as well as Pro Street. I find the driving physics in Shift to be miles ahead of those of any previous NFS title and a very solid step towards simulation. It's not quite there yet, because of the cars sailing and drifting when going in a straight line and because acceleration at low speeds and braking at high speeds feels off, but other than that, I find it quite.. interesting. For me, that's where it's at. That's the essence of a driving game. And that's the premises by which I judge this game. =). So you see, in my world the things you mention are mostly of secondary importance. I believe AERO_HDT feels similarly to me. Let's see if I'm right =).
Last edited by Summ on 19 Sep 2009, 20:42, edited 1 time in total.
Hydro_PT
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Re: NFS Shift user reviews

Post by Hydro_PT »

Maybe I didn't make myself clear. SHIFT isn't boring most of the times, in fact it's pretty entertaining. But there are times where I almost fall from the chair because the game is sooo boring. Either you're alone in first place, racing over and over on an easy track or you're trying to beat some "time trial" and you got it in the first lap, yet you have to race the remaining 3 to finish the event. Not to count the long loading times...

In GRID, there's no boring feeling. Never. You never race alone, you don't need to complete time trials, the track feels alive (unlike in SHIFT) and even if you're in first place, that doesn't mean you can relax. The AI will press you, trying to overtake you like they would in the real life. You make a mistake on a corner and unless you catch up really quickly, you lose the race. I still remember those epic LeMans races, where I would end a 24 minute race with my arms tired and sweating because I was full concentrated all the time, and I couldn't do a single mistake. That's racing IMO, that's the kind of feeling I'm looking for when I play racing games, something that GRID does extremely well, and where SHIFT fails sometimes. In real life a pilot must be always focused on what he/she is doing, and no mistakes are allowed. I want to feel that too.

As for the "core" or "essence experience" that you're talking about, I couldn't agree less. A game (every game) is made of several important things, not only one. That's why you don't find "perfect" or "mind blowing" games all the times, because they can be very good on something, but they fail or they're not so good on other things. Those "legendary" games, that are praised everytime and are truly a masterpiece, are so rare precisely because of that: they manage to be really good on everything.

In a racing game, I don't only care about how the car feels on the track. I care about the sound, the racing environment, the opponents and what they do, the track's design, the graphics, the crash physics, etc, etc. What's better: a game that makes you feel great when driving but that misses nice and realistic crashes, or a game that makes you feel great when driving and also makes you feel great when you accidentally lose control and you have an amazing and realistic crash? I prefer the second one. And you can add a lore more variables to that. :)

In that aspect, I think that GRID mixes everything pretty damn good. It's not perfect, of course, the game has problems and I'm the first to say so. But it's an amazing racing game, it has quality and it's well done in almost everything. SHIFT isn't, it's good in some things, it sucks in other things. It's better than GRID in some aspects, but it's way worse on others, and overall, I find SHIFT worse than GRID. This doesn't mean the game sucks or it's bad, of course. It's just worst.

Like a friend of mine used to say: GRID might not have invented the wheel, but it makes it spin with much more style.
(or something along these lines lol).
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