This write up is going to be part review, part wish-list, and part design philosophy.
I recently picked up Need For Speed Heat after following an automotive designer for quite some time, Kyza Saleem. I loved his style of heavily modified consumer vehicles, and his homage to the neon soaked styles of the 80s. When he revealed to be working on the game, and I’d be able to tangibly drive around some of his personal design work, I was interested.
Then, I dug a bit deeper, and I found out that EA was backing off on all micro-transactions and DLC. I decided to go for it, and purchased a copy on Black Friday.
It’s almost a month later with the game, and I had to do a write-up on this. I know the community manager is busy at work collecting feedback, and I wanted the development team to know we’re digging this. I’ll be posting this on more than my blog, so that’s why I mention it.
Need For Speed Heat is the arcade racing game I’d love to put together if I had the studio resources. This game is why I wanted to be a game developer. The game feels like it’s from 2008 in all of the RIGHT ways. There is not a single bloated micro-transaction active as I write this. There is no feeling like I bought half of a game. Yes, I have some constructive criticisms as a designer, but damn, this is such GAME kind of game. It’s a game first. It’s not a sustained “service” or any of that nonsense every AAA company is trying to shove down consumer’s throats these days.
I honestly can’t believe this is an EA game, and I know some of my fellow game dev friends like to roll their eyes when consumers whine about EA, but dammit, please listen to me. THIS game is exactly what happens when consumers fight back. I haven’t seen such a clean unmolested gaming experience from EA in a decade. Hell, even Burnout Paradise from 2008 had more monetary transactions on its release.
I have no idea if the studio fought for this, or if the upper level management at EA begrudgingly changed tactics for now, but I can’t be any more happy.
So what about the game itself? Well, I have not purchased a Need For Speed since Hot Pursuit II from 2003. I have not played an NFS game since Carbon on PSP.
I’m coming back to this franchise after a decade absence, and a healthy bit of skepticism after the ratings I’ve seen on the previous NFS entries and EA’s business tactics.
I have had a blast playing this past 3 weeks. It’s a very classic arcade racing game experience, where vehicle’s can be tuned for different performance/handling specialties. There isn’t any fine tuning like Forza or Gran Turismo, but that doesn’t mean there is not a fun layer of depth upgrading your vehicle for your desired play style or event.
You could make any vehicle in this game into a rally car with the right parts, and it’s fun as hell. With the aid of visual mods, you can also make your vehicles look the part as well.
I don’t want to regurgitate all of the features of the game to people who already play it. The game has your fun mix of racing, drifting, and off-road events.
They have an interesting design choice of making the player race during the day for money, and race at night for “rep” (XP) to unlock things. I think it’s really clever, and incentivizes players to take a break from the crushing police AI.
As far as unlocks go, I think there is a healthy bit of content in this as well. I’ve seen the usual bit of complaints about “I’ve beat the campaign, so now what?”, and I can’t help but say to those folks, there are a ton of vehicles to choose from, and hundreds of combinations for each vehicle. You really need to play more with what the game has to offer. The customization reminds me of Midnight Club 3, which I played religiously back in the day. Even with admittedly doing the money glitch in this game, sorry community manager, I still have a ton of stuff left to unlock and explore.
I have a few constructive design criticisms thus far, and perhaps a few criticisms of the world building.
I think off-road racing came into the game a bit too late. It should have been introduced towards the beginning, with perhaps the player getting an off-road built vehicle given to them. I think the levels and grinding required to finally get a few dedicated off-road races was a bit ridiculous. Not like an overly dramatic “ridiculous”, but I think there are some fun gameplay experiences to be had that come a little bit too late into the campaign. Personally, I would have introduced it to the player a bit earlier to show them the different possibilities vehicles have, and shake up the normal road racing events.
Secondly, I think police in this game can be a bit too brutal. So far, I find myself spending more time during the day, because my dedicated street racing builds get pummeled on the 3rd heat level. Hot Pursuit II had an excellent system of building up your police response until you ultimately got busted or crashed.
I think this current system needs some tweaking that can be improved with either an across the board strength buff, increase in repair locations, or a decrease in police aggression. However, don’t misunderstand, I love the feeling of being chased by the police as I’m racing, and that’s fun as hell, however, they need to shift from being an aggressive mechanic, to a flavor enhancer, if that makes sense haha.
I would also enjoy some helicopter presence early on. Heat level 3 would be ideal to me with that level of aggression. On the positive side, I love the personality the police force has. It’s a healthy amount of dialogue that gives the night time a lively feeling.
Here’s were my second constructive criticism gets thrown in. I don’t think the world is dead per-se, but I think regular daytime races could totally use some more life. The racers need some more cheesy dialogue for each car. Midnight Club and NFS Underground was pretty darn good with this. Let me feel like I’m racing characters, and not AI. Secondly, some people walking around would be a nice little touch.
I suppose the team was hoping online interaction would be the breathing “life” it needed, but I’m a victim of solo play haha. I enjoy just racing AI, and a lot of folks do too, apparently.
Branching off from that, I’d also like to throw out a suggestion to add a radio host, like Burnout Paradise. Comparatively speaking, Burnout Paradise had a dead world with AI vehicles. You had no characters, no personalities, and not even a damn driver; yet, that radio DJ really added loads of personality.
The radio idea branches into my last totally biased unconstructive criticism. I think the licensed music absolutely blows. You guys could have really hit the nostalgia cord if you cherry picked a few hit NFS songs from Underground I and II. I think the radio generally needed some more variety in general. I couldn’t do the hip-hop and edm the whole time. I turned off the music, and just listen to Spotify. Perhaps that was a budget reason, or the dev team figured we’d just listen to our own music, but the music app plays over cut scenes. It’s just a nitpick I had. I would add a larger variety of music if I had the budget for it.
Now I’d like to move towards the wish-list section. I know the community manager is actually listening, and I can back up some of the community asks I’ve seen.
I’d love to be able to play as police cars. I don’t even care if a pursuit mechanic is implemented. I just want access to the exclusive police cars and police gear. Secondly, let me add police accessories to make police cars out of everything. Burnout Paradise had the Cops n’ Robbers pack that just slapped light bars and police graphics on regular vehicles. I’ve heard a lot of folks in the community suggest it, and I’m totally for it.
Secondly, I’d really appreciate the ability to add wider tires, not just larger diameter rims. I have a Charger fully upgraded, but still on skinny donut tires. Secondly, I’d love to be able to change the diameter of factory rims. Forza added this, and it would be highly appreciated. Some factory wheels look great! Oh, and if it doesn’t cause clipping, I wouldn’t mind being able to change wheel offset to close wheel gap.
I’d also enjoy just a few more off-road visual options for certain vehicles. Overall, these wish-list items aren’t a huge deal, hence just being “wish-list”.
As far as some heavy extra DLC content goes, I would enjoy a much needed map expansion. Something that gets us a bit more road and off-road racing potential.
I say much needed, because as thankful as I am for this, I can’t help but want a bit more out of it. The map feels a bit small, and I can’t quite say why. Perhaps it is the map density? I think that’s a discussion the team needs to brainstorm. Big Surf Island for Burnout is like my golden standard. Midnight Club LA had a great map expansion as well.
As far as vehicles go? I am totally biased in every way, so barely listen to me. I’m a huge fan of 70s and 80s cars. I enjoy the slow and big consumer vehicles we had in the US. I also enjoy Australian and European vehicles.
I think my wish list vehicles would be:
1977 Pontiac Can Am
1975 Ford Torino (Starsky and Hutch)
1974 Monaco Sedan (Blues Brothers and also common classic police car)
1990 Chevrolet Caprice 9C1 (Classic American sedan and classic police car)
1986 Ford Capri MkIII
1973 Ford Falcon XB GT (Mad Max)
1978 Dodge Lil’ Red Express
1989 Chrysler Conquest TSi (Mitsubishi Starion)
1988 AMC Eagle Wagon
1979 Dodge Magnum GT E58
1977 Ford Thunderbird, LTD II Sport, or Mercury Cougar
1973 Oldsmobile Omega (Evil Dead)
1974 El Camino SS
1988 Holden HSV SV88
1981 Mexican Dodge Magnum
South American 1978 Chevy Opala SS
I personally think 70s and 80s American cars are criminally underrated for racing games. Need For Speed Heat obviously lets players BUILD fast cars out of slower classics, so it fits the theme really well. I also think it would be amazing to use the studio resources to historically preserve these vehicles in a 3D space. Camaros and Mustangs are done to death. I also think there are a few cool international vehicles to throw in as well for historical sake, and the NFS international players.
That’s my lengthy 2 cents on the game so far as a fellow game dev. I think it has been a hell of a fun experience, and I hope it eats more of my time. I’m glad to see this franchise is moving in a great direction.
