Franchise Focus - Need for Speed Underground 2 (PS2)
This next stop on the Franchise Focus tour is a personal favorite for me. Need for Speed Underground 2 was the game that finally managed to hook me on the series as a whole. It's one of two games in the series that I have completely beaten on multiple platforms (GameCube and PS2) and it's one that I will lovingly return to time and time again. Why? Well, let me tell you.
Underground 2 continues a lot of what the first Underground title introduced. We're still racing tuners, and we're still playing as the same driver from the first game. You receive a contact from an unknown person, challenging you to a race and they "won't take no for an answer".
Right away, you'll be introduced to the newest improvement in the series : a fully explorable, open-world map. Yup, that's right. Olympic City is yours for the taking : every single inch. Instead of ticking races off of a list, starting points are placed throughout the city which you'll need to drive to in order to participate in them.
Almost all the race modes from the previous game return, with the exception of Lap Knockout mode. However, you can still choose this as a custom race mode, but in your underground career you won't see any of these. What you will see, though, is a few new modes.
An additional drift mode makes an appearance in Downhill Drift. You'll start at the top of a high slope, and have to drift down the roadways obtaining a high score. Want to increase your multiplier? You'll have to pull of a drift and get a "near miss" on a traffic car while you're zipping down the hill. Yeah, you read that right. There's traffic.
Street X is another new mode. These races take place on the tight technical drift tracks, except it's a simple race to the end, no drift points necessary. The normal drift mode also gets a bit of a change. In the previous installment, you were by yourself drifting against the scores of your opponents. Now, you'll be sliding right along side of them. It's still a score battle, but it adds the threat of losing your points by hitting another call instead of the walls being the only thing to worry about.
Lastly for race modes, you'll need to enter and participate in the URL, or Underground Racing League. These races take place either outside of the city limits, or on courses that will utilize airport runways. They're ranked by themselves, and will typically be a bit longer and have a couple extra racers in the lineup as well. Normal career races have four cars total, while URL races will have six competing side by side.
All the other modes return such as circuit, sprint, normal drift and drag racing, and they all run the same way they did in the first Underground. As I mentioned above, to get into these races you'll need to drive to their respective starting points. Luckily, the game also throws you a GPS so while you can't fast travel to the races, you can at least be guided there.
And let it be said, aimlessly driving around the city isn't all that bad. The freedom is great, and it give you a chance to locate and challenge other racers to a head-to-head battle. You're not the only driver cruising the streets, and these will appear on your mini-map as orange triangles. If you get close enough, you can initiate a race-off challenge where the goal is simple. The first driver to gain a lead of 1,000 feet, wins.
Outside of race modes and the open world, the game sees growth in the car list, and the upgrades are a bit different too. Before it was simply picking a performance area to upgrade and picking one of two or three packages with a few different brand names that offer the parts. Now, since you have to drive everywhere, Olympic City features a number of different upgrade shops, located in the various districts. Different shops will offer minor differences (and prices) on the same level upgrade part, so you'll have to shop around to see what's on the market.
As you can see, a bit has changed from the last game. So, like usual, let's see specifically what changed.
Right away, you'll be introduced to the newest improvement in the series : a fully explorable, open-world map. Yup, that's right. Olympic City is yours for the taking : every single inch. Instead of ticking races off of a list, starting points are placed throughout the city which you'll need to drive to in order to participate in them.
Almost all the race modes from the previous game return, with the exception of Lap Knockout mode. However, you can still choose this as a custom race mode, but in your underground career you won't see any of these. What you will see, though, is a few new modes.
An additional drift mode makes an appearance in Downhill Drift. You'll start at the top of a high slope, and have to drift down the roadways obtaining a high score. Want to increase your multiplier? You'll have to pull of a drift and get a "near miss" on a traffic car while you're zipping down the hill. Yeah, you read that right. There's traffic.
Street X is another new mode. These races take place on the tight technical drift tracks, except it's a simple race to the end, no drift points necessary. The normal drift mode also gets a bit of a change. In the previous installment, you were by yourself drifting against the scores of your opponents. Now, you'll be sliding right along side of them. It's still a score battle, but it adds the threat of losing your points by hitting another call instead of the walls being the only thing to worry about.
Lastly for race modes, you'll need to enter and participate in the URL, or Underground Racing League. These races take place either outside of the city limits, or on courses that will utilize airport runways. They're ranked by themselves, and will typically be a bit longer and have a couple extra racers in the lineup as well. Normal career races have four cars total, while URL races will have six competing side by side.
All the other modes return such as circuit, sprint, normal drift and drag racing, and they all run the same way they did in the first Underground. As I mentioned above, to get into these races you'll need to drive to their respective starting points. Luckily, the game also throws you a GPS so while you can't fast travel to the races, you can at least be guided there.
And let it be said, aimlessly driving around the city isn't all that bad. The freedom is great, and it give you a chance to locate and challenge other racers to a head-to-head battle. You're not the only driver cruising the streets, and these will appear on your mini-map as orange triangles. If you get close enough, you can initiate a race-off challenge where the goal is simple. The first driver to gain a lead of 1,000 feet, wins.
Outside of race modes and the open world, the game sees growth in the car list, and the upgrades are a bit different too. Before it was simply picking a performance area to upgrade and picking one of two or three packages with a few different brand names that offer the parts. Now, since you have to drive everywhere, Olympic City features a number of different upgrade shops, located in the various districts. Different shops will offer minor differences (and prices) on the same level upgrade part, so you'll have to shop around to see what's on the market.
As you can see, a bit has changed from the last game. So, like usual, let's see specifically what changed.
Changes
There will be a slight alteration to how these are presented from now on. Positive changes will be in green text (the "title" of the change itself not the whole section), negative changes will be in red, and neutral ones will remain in black.
Open City - What's not to love about being able to just drive? Granted the city limits aren't massive, but at this point in the series, giving ultimate freedom is incredible. We're eight games in, and until now it's been a simple checklist of races on fixed tracks. The first Underground introduced us to infinite layouts through city streets, and now we've been gifted with the streets themselves.
Travel to Races - This change is very cool, but gets very old pretty quickly. Again, the city itself isn't massive by any means. So you won't necessarily be faced with any long drives to new races. Olympic City doesn't offer a lot of impressive visuals to keep you entertained while you drive.It's also the second time you're seeing the city so if you're playing the two games back to back, it'll be extra stale.
New Modes - Underground 2's new race modes are by far my favorite in the series (at least what I've played of it thus far). I know that's personal opinion but really, this game and these modes are the reason I even got hooked on the series at all. Street X and Downhill Drift are beautiful additions, and the change in normal Drift mode of actually getting to slide alongside your opponents are all equally challenging and welcomed.
There will be a slight alteration to how these are presented from now on. Positive changes will be in green text (the "title" of the change itself not the whole section), negative changes will be in red, and neutral ones will remain in black.
Open City - What's not to love about being able to just drive? Granted the city limits aren't massive, but at this point in the series, giving ultimate freedom is incredible. We're eight games in, and until now it's been a simple checklist of races on fixed tracks. The first Underground introduced us to infinite layouts through city streets, and now we've been gifted with the streets themselves.
Travel to Races - This change is very cool, but gets very old pretty quickly. Again, the city itself isn't massive by any means. So you won't necessarily be faced with any long drives to new races. Olympic City doesn't offer a lot of impressive visuals to keep you entertained while you drive.It's also the second time you're seeing the city so if you're playing the two games back to back, it'll be extra stale.
New Modes - Underground 2's new race modes are by far my favorite in the series (at least what I've played of it thus far). I know that's personal opinion but really, this game and these modes are the reason I even got hooked on the series at all. Street X and Downhill Drift are beautiful additions, and the change in normal Drift mode of actually getting to slide alongside your opponents are all equally challenging and welcomed.
That's it for Need for Speed Underground 2. Next up, is our final game on the PS2. Need for Speed Most Wanted. There are a couple of games after it that are still on PS2, but they were released cross-generation on PS3 as well, and I have the later generation version of all those games. Our visit to the PS2 wasn't that long, but it's been a fun one. We'll wrap it up next time with :
