Need for a Camera
The first thing that will catch your attention here is the graphics. The night-time lighting at times is superb and will have you taking some screenshots. There is a bridge I went over early into my playing time that wowed me. The series has always been graphically sound but the nocturnalism of this is a winner. I remember similar feelings with Need for Speed: Underground, that had flashy night-time visuals as well.
The gameplay takes it back to that Underground/Underground II feeling where you are racing illegally, earning cash to improve your ride, with free roaming available. There are other collectables to find like attractions to take a photograph of, cars that have free gear to collect and areas to donut in. The racing mechanics are fine; it's fun enough, and at times challenging. Once you have an upgraded ride you can afford some mistakes though. Catch up is on. If you crash, the AI seem to slow down, and if you are in front, they race faster not allowing you to get too far away. There are police but they are the most pointless of any racing game with police that I've played. There are challenges such as escaping a pursuit after building up a certain amount of fines, and I had to race at half pace so the pursuit wouldn't be over before I could accumulate that amount of fines. It's like trying to run at the same pace as a child.
There is a mixture of time trial events, sprint, circuit, and drifting. I've never been a fan of drifting events in racing games, even when they're easier to do than they are here, and the thing is that there are many of them that are needed to progress the story which is told through live action cut scenes. This isn't the worst or most difficult drifting mechanics and I got the hang of it, but they are rarely my thing. Another annoying thing related to drifting is that you will probably want to change your set-up depending on the event. As it's constantly changing between racing and drifting means the set-up needs to change constantly and you have to travel to the garage to do that.
Lastly, I'm tired of saying this and maybe there is something I am missing, please someone enlighten me if I am, but why do I need to have a connection to play against AI on an installed game? It does my head in. The game can't be paused and you get kicked if your connection drops out for a minute. I hope this common feature that has been in games the last number of years disappears. Gran Turismo Sport had it when you were only trying to complete license tests...An update corrected it but why was it there in the first place? End rant.
All in all it's an open world racer that doesn't do a lot to set itself apart from the rest but won't leave you disappointed if you feel the need for some fun arcade racing with picturesque visuals.
Gameplay 3.5/5
Graphics 5/5
Sound 3.5/5
Difficulty 4.5/5
Originality 3/5
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