Franchise Focus - Need for Speed Underground

While it's the second game on the console, Need for Speed Underground is the first game in a whole new direction for the entire rest of the franchise. Farewell to the days of exotic muscle cars and wide open mountainside race tracks. Open your door and make room for the tuner scene and street racing.

Now, this game is an interesting one to talk to in the sense of what changed, because on one hand everything changed, but on the other nothing did. On the surface, the concept of this game remains the same as the rest of the series. You're a racer, trying to win races. You participate in said races in (what else?) cars, and even the types of races you're in are the same. And...well, before diving into what stayed the same and changed at the same time, lets drop one thing right off the bat. You won't be outrunning the cops in this installment.

So, with that out of the way, lets talk about what you can do in Underground and how it's different than everything you've already seen. Should we talk about the races themselves? Or maybe the cars you can hop into? Actually...let's start with the two new race modes.

For the first time, drifting and drag racing are now focused on as individual races, which is great because they're probably the two biggest elements of the street-racing scene. They're pretty well done too. 

Drift races is all about style. How out-of-control can you drive your car, while actually maintaining control of it? These are small, tight courses. Each driver does their laps alone, racks up a score, and whoever has the highest at the end wins. You'll gain a multiplier each time you hit a certain score during a drift, which caps out at a x5, and you get an even bigger bonus if you can hold your drift on the outside edge of the track.

Drag racing is more of a focus on shifting and not crashing. Each driver will line up alongside each other, and your tachometer fills up the left side of the screen. As your needle climbs through the RPM's, you'll have to shift at the opportune moment so you carry and maintain speed into the next gear. Shift too early or too late, and you'll notice your car hesitate a little bit. It won't seem like much until you're neck and neck with another racer, and they jump out in front of you when you miss a shift. But in these races, you'll also be contending with traffic. You'll need to avoid the cars driving on your road, and any cars that are crossing traffic at intersections to make sure you cross the finish line. You might even need to avoid a train or two. 

Everything else is where it's different but the same. In addition to the new race modes, the old favorites return. Lapped circuits, point-to-point sprint races (either against the clock or a few drivers), and lap knockouts. Only, you'll be in the middle of bright city lights, winding your way by businesses, parks, and any number of things instead of swooping through the mountains in another country. All tracks in this game are based in the same city, so it's all a matter of which map you get but you may see a lot of the same things, forwards or backwards. So, its the same kind of races, but where you race is drastically different. 

Forget about your Lamborghini's, Ferrari's and McClaren's. When you start racing the streets, you'll be hopping into Civic's, Impreza's, and Focuses (maybe Focusi?). Yup, with a change of scene, you gotta fill it with the right rides. Everything on the inside and out of these cars is fully customizable too! Pick your poison as you upgrade individual areas of your car. Performance packages are broken down into three levels, and into multiple versions of them, but the versions are just different company/brand names that offer those products in the real world. 

The fun part is with the visual customization though. Repaint your car, or swap out dozens of options for your bumpers, spoilers, hood scoops, swap out your rims, and stack up to four layers of vinyl decal all over your car. Visual and performance customizations combined, it's definitely on a level like no other in the series 

So, is it clearer now what I said at the beginning? That nothing changed, but at the same time everything did? Well, let's break down those changes and I'll let you know how I think it affected the series as a whole up to this point.

Changes 

New Environment - At the time of this game being created, the world had been introduced to the world of The Fast and the Furious. Tuner cars were on the rise, so EA decided to in a sense "reboot" the NFS franchise to reflect the trend. Not only in the sense of keeping up with current trends, but also in how well this played out as a game, this change was a big positive for the series. It would honestly be hard to say otherwise considering that not only is this franchise still alive, but things that began being implemented in this game are still present in the titles today. (However there's one thing that has yet to be introduced to fully complete the current formula for these games).

Drag and Drift -Two of my favorite modes about this game, and they were done so perfectly in their first rendition. I personally love that even the HUD changes to reflect on what's actually important for the drag races. Shifting gears, and staying in a clear lane of traffic. Powersliding was always in the games, but having a race mode focus specifically on it really lets it shine. I also like that the drift tracks are all in the same exact loction, just with jersey barriers put up or taken down to open up alternate routes for longer tracks or tighter turns. These two modes are equally impressive additions to the franchise.

Customization - It's obviously a positive change in the series, but what impresses me is how much more was included for customization options. Things went from picking a color for your vehicle, to choosing colors, custom sculpted pieces for a number areas of your car, messing with your rims. It almost feels like it went from one customization option to all of them. 

So much great changes to the series, but can EA keep the hype up? We'll find out when we cover...

Up Next :

Need for Speed Underground 2