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Need for Speed Undercover @ Games Convention Asia
Preview on Need for Speed Undercover at Games Convention Asia in Singapore. Pictures on customization and in-game.

Being one hardcore Need for Speed fan, I went down to the Games Convention Asia at Suntec Exhibition Center in Singapore. I'm not a good reviewer, but I'll review on what I recall from the convention.

You all may know how players have asked for combinations of all 3 recent installments for the new Need for Speed. EA heard them and that's what they'll get this year in Need for Speed Undercover. From Most Wanted, they'll get the graphics and handling. Graphics in Undercover is almost identical to that of Most Wanted. Handling is okay, as arcadish as Most Wanted, but more sensitive in my opinion.

But in my opinion, Need for Speed Undercover's handling is just a tad more sensitive than Most Wanted, not that much. Damage and smoke is back from ProStreet, with the addition of water splashes, which have been featured in most of the screenshots released by EA. Originally from Carbon, Autosclupt is back too!

First of all, John Doyle, the executive producer of this Need for Speed installment, were there to give some info about the upcoming release. The first thing he showed us was one of the race feature of Need for Speed Undercover, which is Highway Battle. There it was, a Merecedes SLR, versus the Audi RS4. The sound which the RS4 produces sounds sweet and smooth, all the way in the battle. Well at least halfway through the battle, because I crashed into the traffic when I was near the finish line. The traffic was quite heavy in the battle, so its quite of a challenge to gain a far lead, and more even challenging to avoid the traffic.

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The damage system in Undercover is less vulnerable than ProStreet, parts only start coming off when its punished well enough.

Got a sneak preview on customization in Undercover. Basically, I can't see any differences in the customization feature this year, other than a different paint system, which is shown in the picture here:

[url=http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/5dd8615827.jpg][img=http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/1d8fd31b29.jpg][/url]

John Doyle also mentions that customization will be deep this year. We are not quite sure how deep that will be, but we can say there are more vinyl types. We saw some cartoon vinyls, pretty sweet.

Went on to try what seems to be an "under development" version of Need for Speed Undercover. You get the blue map showing which races you can go to. The map is very big I could say. Different area on the maps have different characteristic.

[url=http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/c249a3e2e9.jpg][img=http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/44318ead3f.jpg][/url]

There you are, stealing the state police's GTR. You need to lose them, while the helicopters chase you from on top. So it's quite impossible to lose them other than running through a tunnel and making a U-Turn, just to confuse the chopper. That's what I did and voila, lost them! After that you need to follow the yellow route to your garage. Be careful not to total the GTR, or you'll lose the chase.

After that you'll play the Audi RS4, in free roam mode. Finally! There'll still be cops roaming around. The cops were in many different cars; GT-R, Challenger, and Mustang. Unfortunately, this is as far as I can go with the playing, as I haven't gotten my dinner yet.

[url=http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/2d5ebd536d.jpg][img=http://media.nfsunlimited.net/upload/165cf47a96.jpg][/url]

The version I played wes quite laggy. For example on some part, the road in front will be just blank, until when you're near, and then it loads. Sometimes it will even pause a while before it loads, and sometimes even return back to the map screen. We know this is an early version of the game, and it definitely won't happen in the full version.