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Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2
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Graphics & Sound:
Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 (NFS) has breathtaking, fast paced, arcade style graphics. The cars are attractive, and move at smooth, impressive speeds. Most of the cars featured in the game, from manufacturers like Ferrari, Lotus, McLaren, and Porsche, are sports cars, and they appear as flat projectiles, skidding in a realistic fashion, and flying into the air during collisions. Environments are huge, with lots of shortcuts spread throughout the tracks. Trees, bridges, tunnels, houses, businesses, and other objects fill each location. Signs and barrels on the tracks, when impacted by the cars, fly realistically through the air, landing on the track as debris that remains there throughout the race. The camera can be changed at will, and the setting is saved as part of your player profile. Available settings include several behind the car views, as well as one in the cockpit. The HUD (Heads Up Display) can be customized, with the ability to turn on or off the rear view mirror, map, and speedometer/tachometer gauges. Specialty cameras can be turned on or off from the Options screen, and can show your car in a wide, slow motion view during jumps, or in a 360 degree overhead view during collisions. While impressive, these can be somewhat disruptive to the flow of a race. Sound effects, while not up to par with some of the other Xbox racing titles, are good. Some of them, like the echo effect in tunnels, are quite impressive, but some of the car engines sound more like a dying goose than an expensive sports car. Engine noise also appears to cut out when using the hand brake, which is odd and disconcerting. NFS sports helicopters, which can drop explosives onto the tracks, and police cars, complete with sirens and voiceovers from the officers pursuing speeders, and the sound effects associated with these vehicles are quite good, which really pulls you into the action. The licensed music tracks from the likes of Bush, Rush, The Humble Brothers, and The Buzzhorn, are fitting for the adrenaline soaked racing, and you can replace it with your own music using Xbox soundtracks. A nice aspect of this is the soundtrack replaces all the music played in the various screens of the game, as well as the music played during the race.
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Gameplay:
One excellent aspect of Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 is the huge selection of gaming options. First, there are the Hot Pursuit and Championship modes, which offer race trees with lots of challenging and varied racing events, both with and without cops and traffic, respectively. Next, there's the Single Challenge mode, where you can define the number of players (1, or if you want to race against a human opponent in split-screen mode, 2), whether cops should be present or not, the number of computer opponents, the difficulty level, and whether traffic should litter the track or not. Last but not least, there's the Quick Race mode, which gives you a randomly generated single-player race. When racing in Hot Pursuit or Championship modes, you have to complete 33 events in order to be crowned World Champion. Some events are a single race, while others are several consecutive elimination style races. In some races, you only have one or maybe a few cars to choose from, while others let you choose from several cars. The Single Challenge mode actually offers a number of sub-modes, including a customizable Single Race, Lap Knockout, a customizable Tournament, Be The Cop, and the much appreciated Free Run. The actual racing is tremendously rewarding, and often extremely difficult. Cars do not handle as realistically as they do in Sega GT 2002 or even in Project Gotham Racing, as they are quite overpowered and easy to steer in NFS, but they move fluidly and at amazing speeds, which makes for a visceral and exciting romp. The various cars handle differently and definitely move at different speeds, as well as offer different gauges in the HUD, so unlocking cars becomes an addictive and fulfilling endeavor. And speaking of unlocking cars, as in previous games in the series, this is one of the cooler aspects of NFS. Every event, whether it's during the Championship, or in a Single Challenge, gives you points you can use to unlock cars and tracks. There are a host of cars available, which range in price from a measly few thousand points, to well over a hundred thousand. Each location offers not only multiple tracks, but mirrored and reversed tracks as well. Each of these must be unlocked if you want them to be available in Single Challenge mode. |
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Difficulty:
A difficult race between two supercharged cars can be won or lost by a single mistake. As in most racing games, it is imperative to learn the track, including the location of objects like rocks, trees, and of course the shortcuts. The use of the hand brake is quite important, as even though most curves can be taken at full speed, the sharper ones need for you to simply skid your car through the turn. When racing with cops and/or traffic, things are even trickier, as the police cars will attempt to knock you off the road, and police helicopters will drop explosives onto the track that will blow your car up into the sky. For traffic, if you don't spot cars, trucks, and buses before you run into them, you will lose precious time dealing with the resulting collision. Crashes don't have any effect except to cost you time, but time is extremely valuable in this game. Races can be extremely challenging, with cars jockeying for position and ramming into one another, so you have to get to the front of the pack and stay there if you want to win. |
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Game Mechanics:
NFS offers a streamlined user interface, with sparse screens, a slick player profile system which automatically saves your points and available tracks and cars at the end of each race, and a number of controller options that allow you to tailor the Xbox controller in a number of useful ways. Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 is an outstanding title. While it doesn't offer the depth of something like Sega GT 2002, its tracks are far longer and more detailed, and its game play options are much easier to access and enjoy. The available cars are a joy to drive, the environments are breathtaking and alive with nuances, and its support of soundtracks is excellent. Bottom line: If you like arcade style racing game, you will love NFS!
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-Gordy, GameVortex Communications AKA Gary Lucero |
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