Added by Prelude on 16 May 2008 04:20

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Official Need for Speed series

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Duplicate - 3DO

The original Need for Speed was released for 3DO in 1994 with versions released for the DOS (1995), PlayStation & SEGA Saturn (1996) following shortly afterwards. Most cars and tracks are available at the beginning of the game, and the objective is to unlock the remaining locked content by winning tournaments. The first version featured chases by police cars which remained a popular theme throughout the series.

Road & Track presents The Need for Speed

Road & Track presents The Need for Speed - PC Games

The first installment of the NFS series was the series' only serious attempt to provide a realistic simulation of car handling and physics without arcade elements except Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed, which is the most realistic. Electronic Arts teamed up with automotive magazine Road & Track to match vehicle behaviour, including the mimicking of the sounds made by the vehicles' gear control levers. The game also contained precise vehicle data with spoken commentary, several "magazine style" images of each car interior and exterior and even short video-clips highlighting the vehicles set to music.

Prelude's rating:

7.4

The Need for Speed - PlayStation

Road & Track presents The Need for Speed - Sega Saturn

The Need for Speed: Special Edition - PC Games

The Need for Speed: Special Edition, is based on the 1995 PC release of the game, and was released only for PC CD-ROM in 1996 It featured support for DirectX 2 and TCP/IP networking, two new tracks, and various enhancements in the game engine.

Need for Speed II - PC Games

Many fans of the first edition of Need for Speed were disappointed to find NFS II was arcade-like instead of preserving the realism of NFS. Though the gameplay was arcade-like, the levels were intricately well designed. In addition, track design was more open-ended; players could now "drive" off the asphalt, and even cut across fields to take advantage of shortcuts.

Need for Speed II - PlayStation

The PlayStation port of NFS II is the first PlayStation game to take advantage of not only the NeGcon controller, but both the Dual Analog and the DualShock controllers as well.

7.5

Need for Speed II: Special Edition - PC Games

The special edition of NFS II, Need for Speed II: Special Edition includes one extra track, extra cars, and support for Glide, the then-burgeoning 3D graphics standard used in 3dfx's Voodoo and Voodoo 2 graphics cards.

Prelude's rating:

7.3

Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit - PC Games

Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit added Hot Pursuit mode, in which the player either attempted to outrun the police or be the cop, arresting speeders.

NFS III took advantage of the multimedia capabilities of the CD-ROM by featuring audio commentary, picture slideshows and music videos. This game also is the first in the series to allow the downloading of additional cars from the official website. As a result, modding communities have sprung up to create more vehicles which would otherwise be unavailable to the game.

8.5

Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit - PlayStation

7.4

Need for Speed: High Stakes - PC Games

High Stakes (North American title) and Road Challenge (European title) was released in the summer of 1999. It was widely criticised for being too similar to NFS III, especially due to the fact that all of the tracks from NFS III were contained within.

Nevertheless, High Stakes introduced several new types of gameplay: High Stakes, Getaway and Career. High Stakes is a racing mode in which the reward was the losing player's car. Getaway requires the player to outrun a pursuing police vehicle for a given time period. Career mode incorporates a monetary reward system that allowed a player to purchase vehicles and performance upgrades while earning cash by racing in a chronological set of tournaments. It is also the last game in the Need for Speed series for PC to feature a split-screen two player mode introduced in Need for Speed II.

Prelude's rating:

8.4

Need for Speed: High Stakes - PlayStation

The PlayStation version of the game, released some months before the PC version, features improved gameplay. Only all-new tracks were implemented without the additional rehashes from NFS III in the PC version. Additionally, the AI in the game was more advanced; the five AIs such as Nemesis, Bully and others featured different driving characteristics (ie. Nemesis would hound the player until a slipup occurs, whilst Bully exhibits a more aggressive style, occasionally ramming into the player's vehicle).

Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed - PC Games

Porsche Unleashed (North American title) or Porsche 2000 (European title) is different from the previous versions because it featured only Porsches and featured a wealth of information regarding them. The cars handled more realistically than in any other NFS game, and there is an in-depth catalogue of different Porsche parts that span throughout the years. The player had to win races in the Evolution career mode to unlock cars in chronological order from 1950 to 2000. Porsche Unleashed also featured a Factory Driver mode, where the player had to test Porsches with various stunts and move on with his career.

8.1

Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed - PlayStation

Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed - Game Boy Advance

Motor City Online - PC Games

Originally to be called Need for Speed: Motor City, this online racing MMORPG never gained much traction, had an alleged peak of only 36,000 subscribers, and was eventually shut down by EA in August 2004.

7.9

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 - PlayStation 2

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 was the debut Need for Speed title from the newly formed EA Black Box (created after the purchase of Black Box Games in Vancouver), and the first Need For Speed for the "sixth-generation" of consoles. Hot Pursuit 2 draws primarily from the gameplay and style of NFS III; its emphasis was on evading the police and over-the-top tracks featuring lengthy shortcuts. Although the game allowed players to play as the police, the pursuit mode was drastically less realistic than preceding versions of NFS; players merely needed to "tap" a speeder a certain number of times to arrest them, as opposed to using actual police tactics such as the PIT maneuver to immobilize a speeding vehicle.

127

7.4

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 - PC Games

Hot Pursuit 2 was the first Need For Speed version that did not feature a true "in the driving seat" camera view, complete with steering wheel, dashboard etc. In some ways this can be considered to be the landmark in EA's move from realistic racing to arcade street racing.

7.7

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 - Xbox

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 - GameCube

The Need for Speed Collection - PC Games

This is a compilation of some of the Need for Speed games. The games included are:

* Need for Speed: High Stakes
* Need for Speed II: Special Edition
* Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit
* Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2
* Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed

189

7.4

Need for Speed: Underground - PlayStation 2

A complete re-imagining of the series' formula, Need for Speed: Underground shifts focus to the import tuner culture, offering a career mode that features a storyline, and a garage mode that allowed players to fully customize their cars with a large variety of brand-name performance and visual upgrades. Races take place fully at night, and police pursuits were also forgone—characteristics that were reused in the sequel Need for Speed: Underground 2. Instead of hundred-thousand dollar exotics, Underground featured vehicles associated with import tuner culture. This, plus the increasingly arcade-like controls, became points of controversy for NFS fans. Despite this, Underground was commercially very successful.

374

7.5

Need for Speed: Underground - PC Games

Prelude's rating:

7.3

Need for Speed: Underground - Xbox

7.3

Need for Speed: Underground - GameCube

8.5

Need for Speed: Underground - Game Boy Advance

The World of Need for Speed - PC Games

World of Need For Speed features four of EA's best selling racing games:

* Need For Speed Underground
* Need For Speed Hot Pursuit 2
* Need For Speed High Stakes
* Need For Speed Porsche Unleashed

182

7.6

Need for Speed: Underground 2 - PlayStation 2

In Underground 2, the story continues, but there are new racing modes such as the Underground Racing League and Street X, new and more tuning options, as well as a new method of selecting races—just driving around the city (similar to Grand Theft Auto and Midnight Club II) and selecting race "beacons". Also included is an "outrun" mode where a player can challenge random opponents on the road and the race leader will attempt to distance themselves away from the opponent to defeat the opponent (similar to Tokyo Xtreme Racer). Underground 2 also introduces several SUVs, which could be customized as extensively as other Underground 2 vehicles and used to race against other SUV racers.

357

7.7

Need for Speed: Underground 2 - PC Games

Prelude's rating:

7.5

Need for Speed: Underground 2 - Xbox

8.7

Need for Speed: Underground 2 - GameCube

Need For Speed: Underground 2 - Game Boy Advance

5.7

Need For Speed: Underground 2 - Nintendo DS

7.1

Need for Speed: Underground Rivals - PlayStation Portable

In terms of design, the game is largely similar to the Underground series, allowing users to select and drive purchased cars from a garage, as well as customizing the vehicles (with body kits, vinyls, etc.). The game's soundtrack features both new songs and existing songs from past Need for Speed games.

In addition to cars from the import scene, Rivals features several American muscle cars, including those not featured in previous Need for Speed: Underground games, such as the 1969 Dodge Charger, the 1967 Ford Mustang, and the 1997 Chevrolet Corvette C5.

135

7.5

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Xbox 360

In NFS: Most Wanted, police chases make a comeback and represent a significant body of the gameplay, and includes the Grand Theft Auto-like free-roaming of Underground 2, but with less extensive vehicle customization features than in the Underground series. The story mode is presented in a significantly different style from Underground, with CGI effects mixed with live action. The mode also features a blacklist, consisting of 15 racers that the player must beat one-by-one to unlock parts, cars and tracks.

129

8.3

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - PlayStation 2

262

8.2

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - PC Games

8.3

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Xbox

8.6

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - GameCube

Need For Speed: Most Wanted - Game Boy Advance

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Nintendo DS

Need for Speed: Most Wanted 5-1-0 - PlayStation Portable

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Black Edition

135

7.7

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Black Edition - PC Games

A special "Black Edition" of Most Wanted was also released, which features additional races and challenges, and two bonus cars, a specially-tuned BMW E46 (M3) GTR and a 1967 Chevrolet Camaro, and also includes a Black Edition-only behind-the-scenes DVD.

7.5

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Black Edition - PlayStation 2

Need for Speed: Most Wanted - Black Edition - Xbox

Need for Speed: Collector's Series - PlayStation 2

187

7.5

Need for Speed: Carbon - PC Games

Need for Speed: Carbon sees the return of nighttime-only racing, and a selection of cars similar to that of Most Wanted, including compact cars and sports cars associated with import culture, American muscle cars, and supercars. Carbon also introduces a new feature wherein the player is allowed to form a "crew," to which members with different abilities may be chosen that aid the player in races. Drift events returned to the series in Carbon.

8.2

Need for Speed: Carbon - Xbox 360

7.5

Need for Speed: Carbon - PlayStation 2

8.5

Need for Speed: Carbon - Xbox

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The Need for Speed series was originally developed by Distinctive Software, a game studio based in Vancouver, Canada. Prior to Electronic Arts' purchase of the company in 1991, it had already created popular racing games such as Stunts and Test Drive II: The Duel. After the purchase was made, the company was renamed Electronic Arts Canada. The company capitalized on its experience in the domain when it began developing the Need For Speed series in late 1992.

Electronic Arts Canada continued to develop and expand the Need For Speed franchise for many years. In 2002, another Vancouver-based gaming company, named Black Box Games, was contracted to continue the series with the title Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2. Black Box Games was acquired by Electronic Arts shortly before the game's publication and the company was renamed Electronic Arts Black Box and became a part of EA Canada. Since then EA Black Box has been NFS's primary developer.