Wozza's Blogs

Finding The Need For Speed

Published: Wed 6 Aug, 2008 | 25 Comments
Tags: The Need For Speed, Need For Speed, For Speed, Speed, NFS, Wozza

Before Need for Speed went underground, it had prestige. The first NFS game was all about cars you couldn’t afford. Purebreds. Instead of a roster of a billion cars and customisable wing kits, you got to race Ferrari’s and Lamborghini’s straight out of the factory. For me the whole idea of the game was racing exotic cars in exotic locations.

 

 

The cars were the stars of the game, and in the vehicle select menus were all kinds of specs on the cars and flashy videos about the cars – giving you appreciation of what you were pretending to drive. Cut the roster, select only the chosen few and then polish, polish, polish. The original game is one of the reasons I am now a car nut.

 

Almost stealing the show from the cars though were the locations. Every game before (and after) NFS uses circuits. The realistic roads in NFS were a breath of fresh air. Give me a swooping alpine track up (or down) a mountain over a free-roaming city or circuit any day of the week. The alpine track in NFS was sheer brilliance, the further you got, the more snow was on the track. Single roads allowed the scenery to change along the way to really give the impression you were actually driving somewhere.

 

Of course faster access times and harddrives in consoles means that instead of having the road split into three stages, the roads could be epic. Here are a few locations that would be possible:

 

New Zealand – Manawatu and the Desert Road. You start in the green pastures of the Manawatu through lots of slow twisties but as you drive the road straightens out and the scenery changes as you floor it. Is that Mount Doom in the background?

 

Japan – Mountain Roads above Tokyo. Famous from the Initial D series, these roads feature many switchbacks and epic scenery. Don’t let yourself be distracted here comes another corner!

 

Switzerland - St Gotthard Pass, the picture says enough.

 

 

America - California Highway 1. Offering a change from the altitude of the last couple of tracks, this coastal stretch gives you the chance to just go for a cruise and admire some scenery. All the time nipping between traffic.

 

I could go on, but a few fleshed out tracks would be better than an infinite amount of similar ‘seen it all before’ loops through a city. These tracks would also have some footage both of arial views and of cars ripping them up.

 

Gran Turismo lets me race my existing cars, Project Gotham lets me weave cones and Burnout offers sheer speed – Need For Speed should go back to it’s routes (see what I did there) and celebrate standing out from the crowd. Of course the handling ect would have to be spot on, but I’ll just deal with the concept here.

 

Supercars on the worlds best roads – that is all it was ever about.

Read all of Wozza's blogs »» Return to Top