The Need for Speed series is one of the biggest gaming franchises in history, one of the pillars of mega-publisher EA’s universe.  In the fifteen years since its debut on the defunct 3DO Need for Speed has grown into the dominate game in the racing world with sequels pumping out once a year. But recent slips in quality have seen the series come to a curious crossroads. Need for Speed Shift launches this week  with an eye to reinvigorating the franchise and bringing it back to where it belongs: at the top.

Need for Speed the franchise was born in the humble hands of Distinctive Software,  who were best known for the Test Drive series of games before being  bought by EA and forming EA Canada in 1991. Appearing in 1994 on the 3DO and eventually making its way to PlayStation and Dreamcast a couple of years later, Need for Speed took what was generally reserved for arcades (with Ridge Racer and Virtua Racing dominating arcades around the world) and brought it home.

The Need for Speed

At the time the game was a stunning rendition of racing, one of the most accurate depictions of the sport on consoles to date but it had on crucial element that would prove a masterstroke for EA and the franchise itself, it had the license, the license to some of the greatest cars ever made. From a Lamborghini Diablo to a Porsche 911 Carrera, the original Need for Speed had the supercars that everyone wanted to race, but few, if any could.

Need for Speed II followed a couple of years later, forgoing some of the simulation aspects of the original and concentrating slightly more on the arcade style of gaming. EA took the series to Australia (the closest it’s come to having a track in New Zealand) and expanded the line-up of supercars with some of the ultimate drives ever produced and introduced the ‘tuning’ elements to gameplay, something that would be greatly expanded on later in the series.

Need for Speed 2

1998 brought the series the start of the iconic Hot Pursuit branch of Need for Speed. Though not altering the fabric of the game, the 3^rd Speed title added the ‘pursuit’ mode wherein players attempted to outrun the police, something that would be a trademark of the game for the next several years.

Black Box took over the development of Need for Speed in 2002, being drawn into the EA Canada stable when EA bought Black Box Games that same year. Black Box produced the first PlayStation 2 and Xbox version of Need For Speed, Hot Pursuit 2 and brought gamers back to the style and mechanics of the first Hot Pursuit title. Over-the-top tracks and cars complimented the almost exclusive arcade feel of the gameplay, alienating hardcore fans while expanding the casual market exponentially.

EA followed Hot Pursuit 2 with perhaps the most successful game of the franchise, Need for Speed Underground. Taking a leaf from Hollywood, Underground borrowed from the 2001 blockbuster The Fast and the Furious and focused almost exclusively on street racing and drifting. The addition of drag racing and drift racing proved to be a masterstroke as Underground established itself as the most popular racing game around.

Need for Speed Underground

Need for Speed Underground 2 followed a year later adding more cars and customization options until the combinations became almost limitless. Expanding on Underground’s in-depth storyline, Underground 2 was a runaway success and with EA’s scoring another massive racing hit with the phenomenal Burnout 3, EA was now the number one gaming developer in the world.

2006 saw the debut of the series on current-gen machines with Need for Speed Most Wanted appearing on the Xbox 360 as well as PlayStation 2, Xbox, Gamecube, PSP, PC, DS, GBA, Virtual Boy, Commodore 64 and binary. Cutting down on the customization aspects and ramping up the story, Most Wanted marked a return to the Hot Pursuit style of gaming.

Need for Speed Carbon launched in 2006 and stuck closely to the import dynamics that peppered the Underground iterations of the series. Need for Speed Pro Street followed closely behind in 2007 and saw EA take the game away from the modern arcade sensibilities of the previous titles and back to the simulation aspects that the franchise was built on. Pro Street was seen by many fans as a step back from the open world (a world perfected with Burnout Paradise in 2008) aesthetics of the previous titles and was criticized for being too much of a departure.

Things didn’t improve in 2008 with EA’s release of Need for Speed Undercover which garnered more average reviews from critics and consumers alike. Although Undercover returned the open-world racing of the Underground games, it suffered from a lack of variety in the story which led many to abandon the game after only a few short hours.

This year’s Need for Speed Shift marks another departure for the storied franchise, with the game being developed by Slightly Mad Studios (the studio behind the acclaimed GTR 2). Shift takes Need for Speed back to the tracks and the simulation focus of the original games.

Need for Speed Shift

With Shift releasing this Friday, keep an eye out for a review coming soon to VGNZ!