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We Thank Need for Speed For 20 Years of Entertainment

August has arrived and for most of you this means ice-cold cocktails, joy rides, ice cream and making the most out of the sun’s power before it will ‘dim down’ in autumn. But this year’s August also marks 20 years of Need For Speed, the most known car racing game series in the history of ever, with around 20 titles out so far.
NFS logo 1 photo
Photo: EA
Need for Speed defined what an arcade racing game is, being based more on the fun experienced while playing than simulating real cars’ behavior, now being considered the most successful racing video game, with over 140 million copies sold until 2009.

Need for Speed took us through four-wheel adventures in many parts of the world, like race tracks in Australia, Europe and Africa, or the sunny rural roads of France after which came the era of fictional cities, licensed international tracks again and then whole fictional states.

Ultimately, Need For Speed challenged us to beat our own high scores, laugh in the police’s face and run, defeat our enemies, collect all the cars, customize them, fine tune them, be the most wanted, win the race around the country, grab the cash, get the girl, loose our beloved car, take it back again, experience the thrills of both legal and illegal racing, infiltrate, catch the bad guys or be them, crash, burn, cry in anger or anxiously drive for hours to see the next cutscene.

And we’d like to give a big THANK YOU to all developers, publishers, talented artists and programmers that worked so hard to offer us experiences we don’t necessarily get in real life and for creating this awesome cult now defined by three letters - NFS.

I suppose you have played at least one of the title’s series, but even so, I invite you take a look at how Need for Speed started and how it is today in the following ‘short’ retrospective.

The first title in the series, named The Need for Speed was released on August 31st 1994. I was just a toddler and I had no idea of video games and playing with matchbox cars was my main form of entertainment along with watching cartoons.

This means I pretty much skipped the first title in the series. Road & Track made sure the game was ‘realistic’ for those days by introducing a lot of car tech data and photos. The game featured seven tracks and eight cars - Toyota Supra, Acura NSX, Mazda RX-7, Porsche 911 Carrera, Dodge Viper RT-10, Chevrolet Corvette C4 ZR-1, Lamborghini Diablo VT and the Ferrari 512TR.

Police was a part of the game even from the beginning to chase you down, catch, ticket and eventually arrest you. So if you think the police chase part is specific to newer titles, rest assured as it was from the first moment in the game.

Need for Speed II came around in 1997 and despite the fact I was a bit more grown up, I still had almost no contact with it. As with its predecessor, NFS II featured 9 exotic cars and seven tracks. This time though, the tracks weren’t simply made up, but were mixing fantasy with rear life landmarks.

Special features included realistic background vehicles (i.e. random traffic into which you could crash) and a ton of cheat codes to alter the game experience.

Next came Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit which represented my entrance into the world of virtual racing and NFS at the same time. I first played it on my cousin’s computer in 1998 when it came out and I was pretty much speechless...

The game had so many features to feast upon, I can’t even remember what impressed me the most; realistic graphics for the time, car reflections (static ones of course, but still enough for the time), in-car camera, vehicle fine tuning (although I had no idea what those sliders do), police chases, multiplayer, the possibility to be the chasing cop, varied tracks or the electronic OST.

Need for Speed: High Stakes came in 1999 and I think I played a bit of it over at one of my classmates who had a Playstation. Building up on the previous title, the graphics were a bit more interesting, vehicle physics were improved and for the first time in the series, a career mode and damage system were implemented.

High Stakes was also coming with a special feature in which two racer bet their cars on a duel, with the winner being able to keep the other’s car. Speaking of cars, their number was increased now to 13.

Ten original race tracks were featured in NFS High Stakes while the PC version also added the nine tracks from Hot Pursuit which required to be unlocked first by playing.

In 2000 I got my first potent-enough-for-gaming PC and along with it Need for Speed: Porsche came, which I played for a long time and still like to replay occasionally now. Why it had such an impact? First of all it was revolving only around Porsche models and secondly, it offered a very distinct atmosphere...

Detailed serene European locations, including Cote d’Azur, Normandie (my personal favorite), Corsica and Autobahn, through which around 20 air-cooled Porsches were bringing havoc was indeed an experience I didn’t found in any of the following titles.

Interesting enough, NFS Porsche was also offering some new tricks. Along with almost all models the automaker produced until 2000, improved damage and dynamic system, the game was also giving you the Evolution and Factory Driver modes. They were both some sort of career modes, but totally different: in Factory Driver you had to test cars and beat circuit times, while in Evolution you were starting with a certain amount of money to buy your first car, race to earn cash, buy more and more, tune them and reach the final models.

The developers run out of ideas a bit and Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 arrived in 2002, basically representing a sequel to the one in 1998. However, it managed to keep me entertained through further improved graphics, exotic locations, as well as more and newer cars.

Police was again a strong force and you could switch parties. And this time you had 23 vehicles to chose from on both sides.




But this pales in comparison with what Electronic Arts brought in 2003 - Need for Speed: Underground.

NFS Underground completely rebooted the franchise. First of all, it took the fun from open roads right into the streets of large made-up cities. Play it an you will feel the same atmosphere from the first Fast and Furious movie.

All exotic cars were here replaced with ‘import tuners’, mostly being Japanese sportcars, but the icing on the cake was the actual tuning system - both visual and mechanical. You had dozens of performance and body parts to unlock and use to make your car faster and cooler looking.

The tech data and real life car portfolios disappeared from the game’s content in NFSU, but making your car good looking enough and winning certain races, you could saw your ride being featured on covers of different real life magazines in the game.

More interesting was the fact that Need for Speed Underground also had a story, in which you started as a crap-car looser driver who enters the underground racing world with the help of Samantha, a short-haired chick who introduces you to different races, telling you who’s who, including top playa’ Eddie who you beat at the end and take his awesome bronze Nissan Skyline GT.

The graphic improvements were solid here, and NFSU is the first title in the series to use damp and wet asphalt surfaces. Oh and almost forgot... Drag and Drift modes also made their debut in the series with the first Underground.

Building up on the success of the previous installment, in 2004 Need for Speed: Underground 2 gets released following almost the same ingredients.

The story from the previous game is continued here as you and your Skyline are about to head for a race and get totaled by a black Hummer probably because of envy or something like that. Time passes and you end up in another city trying to take it all from the beginning with the help of another hottie - Rachel - who helps you out in your pursuit of becoming the best racer in town and find out who is responsible for the accident.

New features included even more cars (including European and American), a large city through which you could free-roam for the first time in NFS history, comic strip-like cutscenes, more tuning parts, stickers, graphics, more game modes and available SUVs to race in.

Fast-forward to 2005 and we meet the Need for Speed: Most Wanted ninth installment in the series. After two titles occurring during night time, Most Wanted switched the lights on, kept the free roam mode and invited police back in the game.

Along with the police, the developers also implemented a “heat level” so you know how much wanted you are. Another interesting feature was the fact that you could slow down time, so you could perform risky maneuvers aimed at luring the cops from your tail and then hide to get rid of them for good.

Still, doing something against the rules with a police car nearby would set the pursuit ON again and you had to once again deal with the situation. The menu was also providing you a way to hack into the PD network and see which of your cars are the most wanted.

To lower the heat level, you could simply modify the car’s appearance. Still, getting busted one too many times an you could kiss your ride good bye.

The story? Well, you were arriving in Rockport City in a racing BMW M3 GTR following Mia Townsend, a sweet chick you wanted to prove you got skills. But then Sergeant Cross enters the scene in a Corvette, stops you and tells you to be careful because he wants to end racing in “his” city.

Then you obviously start doing the opposite, win a lot, but at some point, some bad guys sabotage your fine M3 which stops right in the middle of a race, getting impounded and starting your career to hunt everyone to it back.

Oh, another interesting feature was that EA jumped from comic-strip cutscenes to almost real looking action rendered videos, using real actors.

Next year, in 2006, Need for Speed: Carbon switched the lights OFF again, raised the number of cars on the list and added some cool new features.

It was basically like the previous game, but now you could form a team. You could race with a wingman on your side, each with special abilities to increase your chances of winning.

And of course, all opponents had teams and territories you had to conquer by winning races. You first had to race several stages on a certain territory, after which you had to settle it for good up in the canyons with the boss, where danger was waiting you at each corner, because one wrong move could send you through the guard rail into the pit.

Tuning was not missing here, it was actually improved and the game had one of the best OSTs for its genre.

In 2007, Need for Speed: ProStreet said players should stop racing on the streets and take it on the racetrack.

So, no more free-roaming now, just enclosed tracks, a slightly more realistic handling, improved damage system, way better graphics and it added new cars and racing modes.

The story was the classic "starting from the bottom, now we’re here", you starting with a low-buck Nissan 240SX and having to beat a poser guy named Watanabe.

Still, a lot of fun, tons of customization options, drag racing events where burnouts were mandatory (f-yea), organized drifting and speed events.

Need for Speed: Undercover arrived in 2008 and took the action back on the streets, but this time you were an undercover cop the whole time, who’s mission was to infiltrate into the world of high-class street racing and stop the protagonists.

Fifty cars, a huge fictional city, mods, police chases, mad soundtrack and improved graphics were waiting to be explored for hours and hours.

A special feature was the fact that at some point in the game you could buy a Bugatti Veyron, and, YES, you could further tune it to be the craziest thing around.

Fast forward another year and here comes Need for Speed: Shift setting the mood right back to organized racing. This time, not as an amateur, but as an aspiring professional racer.

From the first time you started rolling on the track, you could tell something was very different, and that was because the developers focused a lot more on simulation than arcade racing.

Aaaand, for the first time since NFS Porsche, this installment was featuring a cockpit camera. Accurate, with head movement capabilities and highly detailed - just as I like them.

The only thing wrong with this game was the fact that, unlike previous ones, it was forcing you to buy a steering wheel in order to enjoy it. Controlling the cars via buttons was absolutely a nightmare, but I found a way to tune their behavior and still tap my way to the finish.

In the next couple of games, the developers run out of ideas again and, in 2010, another Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit came around for the nostalgics. It had no story, but it captured my attention real quick with 60 cars, absolutely stunning graphics and of course a matching soundtrack.

Being focused mostly on the pursuit part, the “pimp my ride” feature was gone here, and the only visual mods you had were aimed to keep your car look pretty clean. Still, you could upgrade it with devices to disable cops or temporarily reduce their abilities.

The open world element was back and some missions were putting you in the role of a police interceptor as well.

Next year, Need for Speed: Shift 2 did it again with the cooldown and took the action on track once again. Nothing incredibly new to see apart from graphics, and an even more hardcore feeling, damage system, cars and real world tracks.

Still, a good game to spend countless afternoon hours, pushing your way around the opponents.

But then, the same year brought us Need for Speed: The Run which was absolutely a piece of art. Basically, it was some sort of Gumball 3000 rally across the United States and the winner got all the cash.

It also had a nice (but stereotypical) story in which you are a racer and mechanic indebted to the mob. After they made it clear what could happen if you don’t pay the money, your only chance to get all that dough is to get in the huge illegal race.

Cool features? Well apart from the large selection of cars available to unlock, for the first time in NFS history the game got linear and you had quicktime events, with some of them having the main character running or doing something else outside the car.

The graphics were mind blowing, the soundtrack was spot on as always and the story made it almost as iconic as NFS Porsche for me. Haven’t played it? Well, give it a chance, because its an interesting twist from what the series had accustomed us so far.

Speaking of which, in 2012 Need for Speed: Most Wanted came again with almost the same ingredients. A blacklist to take down, crispy graphics, awesome OST, performance parts, milestones and new cars.

The big difference however, was that most of the cars were available even from the beginning of the game. Still you had to search for them around the map to discover and make them available.

Finally, last year, Need for Speed Rivals made its debut, coming with a Hot Pursuit aroma, but with exotic cars and a two-part career mode - one as a racer and one as a cop, each with its unique challenges and cars, leaving you to choose between good or evil.

The complex visual personalization is back once again, with a lot of paint jobs, vinyls, rims and license plates available to choose from.

Apart from the stunning graphics and soundtrack, which almost need no mentioning since every title in the series came with something special, Ferrari made its return into the franchise, with its exotics missing the action since 2002.

A great road so far, leaving us to think what the developers will treat us with in the future. They left us with Rivals to burn time in its complex multiplayer and also flicked a Need for Speed movie in the meantime, which wasn’t that bad as skeptics said before its launch. But what will it be next?

Well, no one knows for sure. At least don’t expect to see another installment this year, as an official report from May said there are no titles scheduled for 2014.

Some say it could be a new-age Underground, with even more mods, cars and features, others believe it will be something new, but we, or at leas I, believe that whatever it is, it will be great.

Why? Well, look at the previous release dates, mostly with one game per each consecutive year. They already skipped this year so they must be working on something awesome that needs more time.

Until then, we’d like to thank once again to all the franchise’s different developers for all these wonderful hours spent in front of a monitor living dangerous and doing millions of virtual miles.
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