Nowadays it seems you can`t swing a blown gearbox without hitting a PC racing game. This genre has proven to be almost as popular as the first-person shooter and real-time strategy ones. You now have racing games to suit every mood with the quality ranging from just plain silly to the sublime.
In my mind, the granddaddy of them all is Test Drive. It offered you a selection of cars (okay as far as I can remember there were three or, at most four), a couple of fun tracks, traffic and police cars that were determined to book you if you so much as honked your horn. The graphics and sound were nothing to write home about, but then we could only play in four-colour CGA or (for the lucky and rich few) 16-colour EGA graphic modes. Sound was restricted to a beeping PC speaker with steering wheel peripherals and force feedback technology not even registering a collective blip on the gaming radar.
What made the game fun was its playability. You could sit inside the "cockpit" of a Porsche or Ferrari and drive as fast as your 16MHz PC would allow. The introduction of police cars and road courses added fun elements and completely redefined the genre. The arrival of the Need for Speed franchise has seen it taking over from Test Drive as one of the most fun racing titles around.
It was therefore with no small degree of anticipation that I awaited my copy of Need for Speed Hot Pursuit 2. I was lucky enough to see a sneak preview of the title at EA Imagine a couple of weeks ago. Admittedly, the preview version was on PlayStation 2, but it had a room full of gaming hacks agog with some of the cars and game modes on offer.
After installing my copy, I cranked up the sound and started the game. Need for Speed titles are known for their stunning soundtracks and this one continues in that tradition. The music is as fast-paced as the driving action and is sure to get most people`s adrenalin pumping.
After creating your drive profile, you can select from the five game modes on offer: Hot Pursuit, Championship, Single Challenge, Quick Race and Multiplayer. Aside from the Quick Race, each mode has a host of different race types.
Hot Pursuit is exactly what the name suggests. There are 33 challenges that, for the most part, you need to win while evading the police. Not only do you unlock new races by performing well in a current race, but you also get points for your performance in a race.
These points are awarded for every lap you lead, a top three finish, winning a race and for shaking off the police in a chase.
The points can be used to unlock new cars and tracks. Obviously, the better and faster cars and more difficult tracks are the most expensive items on the shopping list. The ability to choose which cars and tracks are unlocked differs from the majority of racing games that automatically unlock new cars and tracks as you go along. Another feature that adds to the game`s replay value is the ability to choose which races to unlock.
The Championship mode removes the cops and focuses on more traditional racing with time trails featuring quite prominently. As with the Hot Pursuit mode, you gain points for your race achievements.
The Single Challenge allows you to select from five race types: Single Race, Be The Cop, Lap Knockout, Tournament and Free Run. These are similar in style to the ones you will encounter when playing either the Hot Pursuit or Championship modes. However, these races give useful training for those not used to the Need for Speed racing style.
What is the Need for Speed racing style, I hear you ask? Well, it combines real-world exotic cars with arcade style racing. Anyone looking for realism in racing games should be wise to avoid the Need for Speed franchise. On the other hand, Need for Speed does not want to offer a realistic racing experience. It has been developed to provide players with a fun and different way of racing. Needless to say, having access to a host of exotic cars that the majority of us only read about in magazines does help.
Unfortunately, the game has not proven to be very stable on my machine. I know I have a fairly low specification system by today`s standards (catch the hint anyone?) but it still exceeds the minimum requirements by a healthy margin.
Stability issues aside, Need for Speed Hot Pursuit 2 remains a worthy addition to the franchise. While most sceptics will argue that it is similar to previous incarnations in many ways, its high replay value and sheer number of cars and tracks will see it being played by racing fans the world over for quite some time.
More screenshots
More screenshots (well, what did you expect?):
Share