It’s been 2 years since we last had a Need for Speed game on Current-Gen consoles, last game we seen on Xbox One & PS4 was Need for Speed: Rivals which was released in 2013 to decent reviews from critics. With Need For Speed skipping 2014, the developmental team had some much needed extra time to try and change this series for the better. Although thinking about it, only giving an extra year to reboot an entire series seems quite short. Lets see if this reboot can show that Need For Speed still does have some air in tires.
Once you start up Need for Speed for the first time you will be introduced to the main character Spike, and also get the first look at what the story is all about in this rebooted series. Spike will be one of the 5 people that’ll help you throughout the game. Spike is the Speed in Need For Speed and when he’s racing a car, he is only going 200mph or more if possible. Spike will introduce you to his 4 friends with each one of them trying to impress a long time racing legend they each look up too. I thought the story wasn’t that great, it was too short to really get invested in to it.
Need for Speed does however bring change. These changes include wrap editor, fine tuning your car, and becoming choosing what icon you want to be. You can chose through an array of icons like Speed, Style, Build, Crew, or Outlaw. Combine all of them and become the ultimate icon. Speed lets you rack up REP and money as a member of your group who will be guiding you through with various missions and tasks.
Style lets you drive around and do donuts and drifts. Build lets you create your own car and perform in it, you can modify your performance, add decals to your car or even wrap it in the newly added wrap editor, Crew lets you drive with your crew and do various missions with them such as drift train were you have to represent win with them in order to gain Crew points. Last but not least Outlaw is all about doing whatever you desire. Destroying lights, posts, and evading cops with your newly modified car, all this and more is possible as the outlaw.
Need for Speed is set in Ventura Bay which includes a downtown area, a harbor area, and various canyons too drift from. All of it makes for a decent setting. Visual wise this is one of the better games I’ve seen in the racing genre. The city at times is just stunning to look at, and really helps create that great setting that Need For Speed managed to capture.
Need For Speed doesn’t just let you race along side your friends or random players, they ARE the game. As Need For Speed is an always online adventure. This means the game does not have any kind of single player experience for players. The always online feature could really be a downer for some people as that means there’s no single player aspect that many players like, online is great but I do question the choice for always online. With that choice it means there’s no pause button too which is expected for an online game but annoying also.
Playing and completing races in Need For Speed will earn you in game currency, because when has a racing game not done this before? That money needs spending so what do you do with all this money? Car customizing of course! Which brings us to what is offered in terms of car customization options. The customization options in this game were really definable and very strong. I could customize my car with more handling or better brakes of such. I could upgrade my stock, engine, add nitrous, edit my drifting style and my grip settings, edit my tire pressure, sway bars, and even the spring stiffness. Basically what I’m trying to say is customization is deep and I found it fun just to make my own car and tune it to the way I wanted it.
Collectibles are all around Ventuara Bay as you can perform donuts to collect some of them or park your car and press RB too take a picture too collect certain collectibles. There are over 100 collectibles to collect. Over 30 donut spots for you too collect and vista spots which require you too take a photo and even collecting free parts too customize your car with. There are also collectibles were you have too beat cars in order too collect some collectibles. Although they do pad overall game time, I didn’t really find the interest to collect them as there wasn’t any reason to make me continue to do so.
Final Verdict
Need For Speed was an okay try at rebooting the series. It comes with positives like the newly added features to the franchise such as daily challenges, wrap editors and the play styles which I really liked more than any other addition. The visuals and sounds in Need For Speed were stunning, and a real high point for the game. There are also some negatives like having no pause button plus the always online gameplay which was an odd decision to make. If you are a racing fan it’s a recommendation from me, but non racing fans might not be that accepting for this reboot. I do however look forward to the future if the mistakes of this game are improved in the sequel.
Final Score: 6.5/10
