Are Anime Graphics and A$AP Rocky enough to make NFS cool again?
So here’s something that you might not know as a casual gamer. Need For Speed, the racing franchise you likely grew up on if you’re reading this, is in trouble. It’s been in trouble for quite a few years now actually. NFS Rivals was the last big successful game in the lineup sales wise and it was considered mediocre by fans. 2015’s reboot Need For Speed was unfortunately a misfire, being an interesting game that got hindered by being online only and NFS Payback was outright underwhelming, called by many one of the worst games in the franchise. 2019’s NFS: Heat was actually great and a return to form, but the sour taste from the previous 3 games seemingly hadn’t worn off, and its low sales led to the game losing support after only 2 years, in a world where The Crew 2 from 2017 still gets new cars and content. But thankfully EA are persistent enough as a company to keep trying to make Need For Speed a force again, and this year’s installment by being a little different, using anime-style cell-shaded characters and effects, and a story mode featuring rapper A$AP Rocky, this seems like NFS’ attempt to slightly adhere to more people while staying as fun as it’s always been.
Now if the trailer didn’t show it, perhaps the gameplay video below will basically show how Unbound seems to look and play like an extension of NFS: Heat. And that’s not a bad thing in my book. Heat was basically a spiritual successor to the original Most Wanted in my book, so getting that game’s driving physics and core gameplay model back is something I’m more than up for. The big difference seems to come from how the game’s challenges are set up and the aforementioned art style and story. EA is clearly willing to let Criterion games flex some creative muscles here, because even I think this approach is a little crazy. The studio is essentially using Anime-style CGI to represent it’s human characters and all of the game’s big effects such as a car’s nitrous or things like a wing effect when u jump off a ramp. It looks pretty cool though I won’t lie it can take some getting used to. But considering the big boom in anime who am I to challenge the goal here. On top of that is the story, which seems to follow a group of young street racers trying to fight off a corrupt mayor and police force.
EA have gone on record multiple times to state that their games are not The Fast and The Furious knockoffs despite the differences between the two (NFS Most Wanted and Tokyo Drift are the same basic concept in different cities), but this time the subtle difference perhaps can elevate the new game . There’s also the slightly different challenges and seemingly shorter sprint races, hopefully they aren’t the template for all races in the game, but of course only time can tell there.
So will Unbound be enough to revive Need For Speed’s former dominance? I hope so. At the very least I hope it gets the attention it deserves . NFS lost a lot of ground in the PS4 generation to the likes of Forza, Project Cars and even Gran Turismo , which is ironic because outside of Forza Horizon, these sort of simulation racers used to be considered the “boring approach “ that NFS helped people escape from. Let’s hope that becomes truer this year. Especially since Unbound launches tomorrow.
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