Need For Speed 2019 Release - GameGame

At one point during my play through a fast and furious style street racer Need for Speed I hit a wall metaphorically I've been building my stock subaru into an unstoppable tuner beast for nearly 15hours at that point but for whatever reason I just could not get past the most recently unlocked story missions I tried and retried until I finally decided to just grind through some smaller side events to earn rep in hopes of just upgrading my way to victory I did eventually conquer those missions and in the process I learned two extremely valuable lessons one using a single balanced ride to both drift and race is an extremely terrible idea at higher levels and two despite all of the frustrating nonsense Need for Speed put me through I was always excited to dive back in I thought sure you would get busted back there it was nuts the game is far from perfect but what it does well it does exceptionally well it's jaw-dropping visuals and adrenaline-pumping audio and highly customizable handling makes screaming around the darkened streets of Ventura Bay and intense thrill and these sense of ownership that comes from tuning a single ride to perfection rather than simply grabbing the flashiest vehicle proved tremendously rewarding this foundation of gratifying gameplay anchors the experience while the rest of Need for Speed specifics run the gamut from equally outstanding to utterly painful take the goofy yet endearing narrative the live-action cut scenes contained hit after hit of stilted acting awkward dialogue and unwarranted fist bumps without advancing anything resembling a plot and yet this crew of misfit racers actually grew on me by the end I had wholeheartedly embraced their warm friendly corniness nineties yeah the game world fairs slightly worse but still holds up to scrutiny Need for Speed is set in a completely open world populated with events you can tackle in any order along with hilly switch backs tangled highways and tight urban corridors I somehow found myself in a few of the same areas over and over again but the level of detail variety and overall believability made the city in immersive high-speed playground seven with its suspiciously sparse traffic and perpetually rain slick streets need for speeds roster of vehicles includes the usual mix of Lamborghinis Porsches and Ferraris but you'll spend most of the campaign gradually unlocking better components and aesthetic upgrades for your less exotic tutor mobile visually your options are robust change the color design a livery add an aftermarket spoiler if you can picture it you can usually create it which makes standing out online fun and easy components like engine blocks and suspension systems on the other hand are slightly less impressive generally the more expensive the part the better your car will run so if you want to upgrade your ignition for example you just hunt for whatever part you both unlocked and can't afford there's really no strategy to it which makes the whole process feel rote fortunately buying these components also grant you increasingly granular control over your cars handling you'll eventually open up sixteen different sliders to control everything from tire pressure active shock stiffness and believe it or not I could actually feel the impact of every adjustment to put it modestly it's an impressive system fine-tuning my rides handling became a kind of game consuming obsession but one with very tangible rewards however this obsession eventually got me into trouble need for speed features a wide variety of events including point-based drift competitions traditional circle races and even Gymkhana events this mix created a welcome gameplay variety but it also led to that wall I eventually smashed into early on my limited resources forced me to pour all of my efforts into a single vehicle by the time I got to later more challenging missions it didn't even occur to me that my well-rounded ride was actually all ability and the game provided no feedback to indicate that a more drift tuned car would immediately resolve my problems that solution sounds super obvious in retrospect but other points of frustration were a bit more inescapable for example Need for Speed uses obvious rubber bands to keep opponents within striking distance during races having your competition nipping at your heels creates tension sure but allowing the AI to automatically catch players cheapens the upgrade system and can lead to un deserved losses the drifting point system is also needlessly punishing if you so much as tap an obstacle at the end of a drift you instantly lose any points you might have received to that drift it's infuriating thankfully if you persevere you'll be left with a garage full of tricked-out cars and a world populated by friends to race with cops to run from and leaderboards to top I noticed a very small but forgivable handful of framerate issues during my playtime on the ps4 and the games always online setup meant I could never truly pause the game but none of that was enough to detract from Need for Speeds tuning world and exhilarating driving mechanics your move in diesel.