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Electronic Arts has once again invited the owners of the The Need for Speed fan sites back to Vancouver, Canada to test Pro Street. Having no previous hands-on information of the game, it was an opportunity to test out Pro Street for my first time at EA BlackBox Studios. While trying not to bore you with an over abundant amount of information, I will try to explain what the game feels like and how it actually plays, more of the details we saw, and my reactions to the newest installment in the NFS Franchise.
Overview
Pro Street will have 4 different types of Race modes at 14 various locations around the world, challenging the different Organizations, to become the Street King. In our demo we had an opportunity to play included the Speed Challenge, Grip Racing, and Drag. Missing was Drift. In these modes, we played as the Boss of the Specific Organizations to those modes, to defend our crown.
Career
The Career mode this year, will be much longer than Carbon (Thank you!). With somewhere near 400 racing events (or more) in total, it is estimated that it would take 20 or more hours to plow through to complete just the career mode, and up to 50-60 hours, depending on your skill level, to complete all the racing events. You will not need to race all the events to finish the career mode. So if you have troubles with one type of racing mode, you do not have to complete them all, except the minimal amount to proceed through the game. Your car stable this year will be larger. You will bring multiple cars to each Race Day Event, one for each specific Racing mode, plus an additional car as a backup to use WHEN you wreck your car. I would have gone through at least 5 or 6 cars already in the Speed Challenge.
How the career mode will work:
After starting your career, and getting your car, you start out at the bottom of your 3 tiered racing events. At the bottom you are invited to race at the Battle Machine Org RaceDays hosted in North America. Being balanced in all different types of racing you face challenges and work your way through race events to Challenge the Battle Machine Boss. If you are skilled enough to beat the BattleMachine Boss, you advance to the next tier, React. The React Org members are tougher, and more challenging opponents, while racing in Europe and Asia locations. Doing well between these first two tiers, you will be invited to mode specific race events hosted by Rogue Speed (Drag), G-Effect (Grip), NoiseBomb (Drift), and Nitrocide (Speed Challenge). Each Race event comes with new challenges and rewards while fighting to become the King of each Mode.
Back to the original 3 tiered Race events, once you beat the React Boss. you will move on to SuperPromotion Org, which is the top tier, where the best racers compete to dominate events anywhere in the 14 locations. After finishing the Race day events through the Super Promotion Org. You have a chance to race the Showdown King, Ryo. in a showdown to affirm your position as the new Street King.
Speed Challenge
The new Speed Challenge event, which is in a way, similar to Speed Trap of Carbon, is where you try to go as fast as possible posting the top speeds through checkpoints, and having the highest possible cumulative speed at the end. In no way, will this be an easy feat.
John Doyle, the head producer EA blackbox, had put $20 on the line, challenging any one of us to complete the Speed Challenge on our first try while trying to keep above 150mph. Sadly for us, John managed to keep his twenty.
Racing on the Nevada Desert track, the cars left the gate in a staggered pattern, so everyone is not leaving at the same time, which is alright, seeing as time does not matter for this event.
NOS has been affected in this challenge, in our demo, we had 3 shots of NOS to utilize at appropriate times. No longer will there be a refilling bar as you race, instead, its a charging system, which prevents your multiple usage immediately one after another. Limited NOS shots means using them all off the line is not an option. Nos off the line or after crashes, will not launch you up to speed quicker, it will be a waste of your crucial shots. As the Race progresses, you feel how fast you are actually going, over bumps and imperfections in the road pushing your car off its line, putting you into the cactus patches, or worse. When catching up to your opponents, avoidance is required, smashing into the back of them hoping they'll crash, sometimes hurts your car more than it might his. Don't get me wrong, the AI may be smarter, but they will make mistakes, taking corners too fast, or jumps too hard, putting them into Telephone poles, just as easily as it would you.
"Telephone poles hurt alot," Doyle says as an AI opponent hits the pole exceeding 155MPH, crushing the front end, completely totaling their car. This Mode will be a fun challenge for all players, new to the game the old school racers.
Grip Racing
Grip Racing, a fresh look of Circuit racing, now comes with multiple driving assist options. Similar to a well known Simulation Racer, you may choose to have All assists on, which all you pretty much do is hold the gas down, and steer, while the game automatically brakes at the corners for you, or you could also choose to turn off all assists, for a no-holds barred race around the track.
In a sense, you can have a beginner who's playing PS for the first time, and another player who's played it for months, each will different assists can still play a competitive match. We had tried different setting modes on the Autobahn track, and even though assists may have given us lower lap times, yet, the races were more fun to hit the handbrake and drift around the corners while holding your counter-steer to avoid spinning out.
The curbs also have depth to them so hitting them at a bad angle while cornering may put you into a roll and up onto a fence. Now you have more width to your driving area.
Within the grip events, again you are only allowed a specific number of NOS shots, depending on how many you have previously purchased.
Drag Racing
wow!
The New Drag event is by far my and several other members' favorite game mode so far. We had a chance to examine a 1/2 mile Drag Strip on the Autobahn track. Since drag mode has been completely revamped this year. The days of moving obstacles, and traffic are a thing of the past. What you know of the drag mode from previous installments are out the door. You now have 3 heats, where the best time overall Wins the Event, and only two lanes, one for you and your opponent, though steering will be required as the torque spin may throw you towards the wall or center meridian. I'd like to give you a sense of what it felt to be arriving for the first heat, even with the most meticulously worded details, I would not come close to giving a proper description of how exciting the Drag mode really is.
"NOS! NOS! CRASH!" was quoted many times, as we laughed at the wrecks.
The car we used in the demo was a 750HP Plymouth Hemi Barracuda, with Fat, drag slick tires. Pulling up to the line, you hear the growling revs of the Engines, as the flag girl walks out and stages you and your opponent.
"Heat your Tires" is a new feature exclusive to Pro Street, You use your throttle to burnout and warm up your tires while watching your grip bar, gaining more perfect shift area, as well as a much larger perfect shift area get a better advantage. You watch the smoke your wheels, fills the air, rolling around the tires as it would if it were real.
After the short burnout, you are staged and ready to go. The camera quickly changes views, placing your screen with fresh smoke in far cam, the flag girl drops her arms, and you step on your throttle, hitting the joystick, dropping the hammer.
Perfect Launch. Your Wheels spinning, the car screams off the line, lifting your front end up off the ground, gaining speed and RPMs up to a perfect shift into 2nd, keeping your wheels in the air, pulling ahead of your opponent, revving up throwing into 3rd, you hit the NOS, your tires still in the air, half way down the track, pulling 70-80mph, your NOS cuts out. Up to 4th, your front wheels finally touching back to the pavement continuing to rocket away from your opponent. Jumping into 5th, exceeding 130mph, you look back, no sign of your opponent. Grabbing, having your NOS system charged up you hit the NOS once more, propelling your car with one last hard burst over the finish line at over 165mph.
Drag, however, is not as easy as it sounds, You still can blow your engine, though you must actually be trying to do so, as it is alot harder to do than before. I had to stay in first gear for about 6-10 seconds with three on screen flashing text warnings about engine overheating before it would actually blow, it almost sounded as if the pan blew off. Engines blowing and Wrecking your car would end the entire race day unless you brought your spare car for that event.
You will be disqualified from the Heat if you decide to jump the gun, and take a False Start. To avoid this, be careful when hitting your gears, Watching for her arms to drop before the on screen words "GO" is crucial to get lower reaction times.
Damage in the Drag Racing happens when avoidance of the wall or meridian is hard as your front wheels may be off the ground.
Physics
After testing the three different game modes, the physics have been improved to a new and more realistic feeling than previous setups, the game is not entirely simulation, at the same time, it is in no way too arcade like. You will get that real sense of "stupid fast" speed while trying to keep your car on the road.
Blueprints & Customization
Another new feature for Pro Street is the Blueprint customization, which are extensively detailed performance plans which may be traded among friends, to prove your garage skills with high powered tuning setups they can use online. Ranking boards will show the car owner, along with the blueprint designer, so you can see who created the ultimate tuning specs for the top racer. Unfortunately for the friends, the blueprints that are traded will not have specific details of what is under the hood, only front end details including top speed, Horse Power, 0-60 times, and so on, making it unknown to you what parts are under your hood. Blueprints will eventually have a "viral effect", in which your friends will pass your blueprint to their friends, and so on, while keeping you as the original designer, meaning you could meet an opponent who has your setup.
This time all parts in the game will be unlocked from beginning of the game, but you will need to afford the parts as you purchase them, and balance your money wisely amongst all the cars in your stable. So finally, you will not need to start your career with only a stock performance car.
Within the visual customization side of things, you have up to 30 layers to make your ride unique. Each body part you have autosculpted, affects your areodynamics and downforce while adjusting sliders in the Wind Tunnel showing giving real time data changes, so you can max out your ultimate Horsepower and Top speed combination.
The Dyno this year, will automatically race your car on the track, and give information on your tuning. It will usually only take around 5-6 seconds, showing a spec sheet of what your car can do.
Battle Organizations
"Battle Orgs" as they are called, are also being represented by each of the need for speed fan sites and have specific themes and videos. There are seven of them in total, one for each racing mode, plus three which are multi-diversified groups. More will come about this as the sites are updated with their new theme additions.
Visuals
Now, down to the looks of the game.
The environments created for the tracks are unbelievable, Professional photographers were sent out to real locations in order to take as many pictures possible to add as much detail to each of the tracks, from pavement cracks, to the background mountains. The time of day adjusts over the course of each different event, so you can hit the same track several times, and have 15 different times of day in which the sun position, and lighting change the environment around you looks. When you race these tracks, you will feel like you are there, see unbelievable scenery, and can almost smell the rubber being burned off your tires.
Downfall
Unfortunately, not everything in Pro Street is as perfect as I was hoping. I noticed while trying to wreck my opponents in the Speed challenge mode, that they still have that 'rail' feeling to them, making it hard to push them into the dirt or phone poles, but it can be done. Hopefully this may be adjusted near the final stages of the game.
Another drawback we were told, is that the replay mode will not be a full out replay system, which you can go back and watch the entire race. It does replay while you crash your car, letting you watch as you flip countless times in through cactus patches, over into the side of mountains, and other cars.
The damage, has been turned down a few notches from the first teaser trailer videos released, I did not notice a single tire that flew off the cars, but the body crumpling is still quite extesively detailed. Also there will be no half fix, or part fix repairs, only full or none. meaning if you wanted to restart your game, you'd choose to leave your car as is, in damaged condition, or else, repair it fully, costing you quite possibly alot of cash, frustrating players when they crash with only 100meters left to the finish line.
As well, there seemed to have been a lag in the controller as it did not always register your joystick shifting.
In Closing
Even with the game we tested being a pre-beta demo, I have a strong feeling that Electronic Arts will redeem themselves for what happened with Carbon. With still two months left before the demo and Release of the game, the waiting will be extremely tough. I'm certain that Pro Street will be a strong push in the right direction for the Need For Speed franchise.
Need for Speed: Pro Street will be Released on October 31, 2007, with a LAN Patch Available for PC sometime after release.
The demo has been hinted as an early October release to the PS3, 360, and PC.
Go to www.needforspeed.com for more info.
If you would like to read the reviews of some of the other NFS Fan Sites, they will be continually added as they are posted.
NfsAddons - Rogue Speed Org - Take your Beast to the track and prove you are the King Drag racer.
Racerplanet - Nitrocide Org - Race your cars top performance as you challenge the Speed King in an all out race.
NFSUnlimited - Noise Bomb Org- Show your Drifting skills to out corner the Drift King taking the crown.
NFSCars - G-Effect Org - Grip the Circuit to gain your new crown and show you are King.
NeedForSpeed.com - React Team Sessions - They are the 2nd Tier of Multi Disciplinary Race Days Hosted throughout North America.
NFSPlanet - TBA
ND4SPDWorld - Super Promotion Team Sessions - They are the Third Tier of Multi Disciplinary Race Days Hosted throughout the World
Please post any questions you have about Pro Street after reading the review in this forum thread.
That what cannot be discussed, will not be..
