E3: Need for Speed: Most Wanted Amazes

Every year at E3 there’s at least one game that surpasses the logical part of my brain and knocks my socks off, and this year, Criterion’s “Need for Speed: Most Wanted” is that game. Being a fan of their work on “Hot Pursuit” I was looking forward to seeing it, but I assumed it was more of what I already knew. When EA ushered me into the media demo, I had no idea I was in for a revelatory experience.

Although “Most Wanted” takes its name from the early NFS classic, in Criterion’s own words, “we don’t make sequels to other peoples’ games.” This new iteration of NFS:MW borrows as much from “Burnout: Paradise” as anything else, and that’s a good thing. The open world, no-lobby nature of the multiplayer is fun and immediate, and there’s a variety of great challenge types, from straight-up races to jump challenges, time trials, speed tests, and so forth. All you gotta do is drive to a meet-up point, wait for your friends to arrive, and the race is on. Autolog is back (now called Autolog 2), and it tracks every minute thing you’re doing and constantly stokes competition between you and your friends.

All of that you can glean from gameplay videos. What you won’t glean from gameplay videos is how amazing the cars of NFS:MW feel to drive. It’s as if Criterion threw out the excellent “Most Wanted” and rebuilt everything. Each vehicle has satisfying weight, they shudder and rumble with each gear shift and lurch with the realism of a Forza ride. Until you hit a turn, that is, at which point Criterion works its magic and lets you impossibly swing the back of the car around like a bucking bronco. It’s an arcade racer with the gravity and heft of a sim, and it’s flat-out spectacular. Ditto for the sense of speed and exquisite damage modeling on the cars themselves. This is about as good as a racing game can feel.

Plus, “Most Wanted” has great personality and humor. While you and your fellow drivers wait at a designated checkpoint for a race to begin, destruction derbies inevitably break out where friends ram each other over and over, trying to cause Criterion’s signature “Takedowns.” Clearly Criterion intended for this to happen. Speaking of Takedowns, they’re always an option for the mischievous racer who’s concerned a competitor might best him/her, which adds a layer of unpredictability and mayhem to each event. And the massive open world is littered with billboards cheekily emblazoned with the names of rival developers, such as “Bioware.” Crash through one of these, replacing it with a “Criterion” banner, and the game rewards you. It’s Criterion’s wry way of being competitive with their EA brethren.

I know a lot of other games have your attention at E3, but “Need for Speed: Most Wanted” is shaping up to be a serious achievement in racing design. You need to start looking at this thing.

_AA

and i can see for miles and miles and miles