Login with Google or Yahoo

The big question with Need for Speed Hot Pursuit from Criterion is whether it stands up to the Need for Speed name. Criterion is known for making the Burnout games - and while Burnout might feature cars and roads, that's about all it has in common with Need for Speed. So what about Need for Speed Hot Pursuit? Is it Burnout, is it NFS, or is it a hybrid of the two, and most importantly, is it a good game?

[img]http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/7adbd51038.jpg[/img]
[i]It's not a red Ferrari and there's no blonde passenger, but it's pretty close :)[/i]

So what really defines a Need for Speed? For me it's always been the sense of speed, the exotic cars and the solid driving model - not too arcadey, still in touch with reality. All the videos of Hot Pursuit made it look like a perfect representative of the NFS series with it's amazing environment, the best car list in an NFS game so far and the re-introduction of cops. But then I got my hands on the controller at Gamescom in August and I was horrified. The cars felt heavy like cruise ships and the drift mode made me think of the game [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ou1fJ6CoRcI]Outrun[/url]. The only thing missing was the Ferraris and the blonde passenger. I was in fact so disappointed with the game that all my Gamescom focus was aimed at Need for Speed World.

[img]http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/317eba1569.jpg[/img]
[i]Watch out for cops in Veyrons![/i]

But then a couple of months passed and the demo came out. The cop event was OK, but I didn't pay much attention to it as I'm more of a racer, so it was the Roadsters Reborn event that got me hooked. And that only happened because of all the online talk about the top times and [url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qo7v2ZZ2IWc&feature=player_embedded#!]that video[/url] by The Professor (Matt Follett, game designer) who posted 3:24 time, a time that was over 10s faster than my fastest so far. So I got back in the game and found out via Autolog that one of my friends holds an even better time giving me a goal to beat. The demo features cars from the lowest of 5 tiers, but it pretty much applies to all tiers that the dual driving mode (straight, drift) has a lot of finesse to it. Once you get past the first experience of driving boats (especially the heavier and/or slower cars), the dual mode does get under your skin and you'll soon find it natural switching between drift and normal. In fact you'll turn your focus to driving on the opposite lane, slipstreaming your opponents, doing near misses on traffic cars and being on the lookout for the optimum short cuts as all these things will either give you boost or improve your top speed and time. There is a huge difference between doing a casual and a perfect runs and to get you on the top spots, you'll have to master the tracks and the cars - there's a large selection of cars available and every car drives a bit differently. Every time you unlock a new car, it will be shown in a short video and on the car selection screen there is a voiced over introduction of every car which reminds a lot of the first games in the series.

[img]http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/a19b989a46.jpg[/img]
[i]Seacrest County's mountains[/i]

While the driving physics is a step in a completely new direction and takes a lot of getting used to, I have to say that the visual part of the game will feel very familiar to old school NFS gamers. It will bring back memories of at least the Coastal and Alpine tracks in TNFS. It's really cool when roads take you from one part of the county to another and the scenery subtly changes, like from the barren desert through golden wheat fields into dark forests or to the cold and snowy mountains. There's lots of remarkable locations like the large dam, desert airfield or the forest with the impressive huge trees. Combine that with different times of day and changing weather and you get an amazing looking game. The exotic scenery from the first games in the series is definitely back. Combine that with cops from Most Wanted and you get Hot Pursuit!

[img]http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/76de15874a.jpg[/img]
[i]Autolog recomments you beat your friend's time![/i]

It's funny how I always wanted NFS to return back to it's roots and now finally after SHIFT, it did. While at first I thought they couldn't have messed it up more, but there is over 10 years of game evolution between the old NFS titles and Hot Pursuit, so naturally the game should not feel like those games from the late 90s. The question is however if they got it right. And there I have to say yes, once you get past the arcade handling you'll soon start paying attention to the cars, the environments and the incredible amount of detail in the game. And once you master the controls and start beating your friends' times you'll find out the game is not just fun at first glance but has enough value to keep playing. And that makes it worthy of the title.


More on Hot Pursuit
[url=http://www.nfsunlimited.net/article/hot_pursuit_detailed_preview]A detailed preview of the game[/url]
[url=http://www.nfsunlimited.net/hotpursuit/screenshots]Screenshots[/url]