Need for Speed Shift Review

After getting my appetite whet from a hands-on experience of Shift back in August while attending GamesCom, I was all too eager to lay my grubby paws on the finished product to see if this is the return to form for EA after the fairly wayward times in the illegal street racing scene.

Now while I can tolerate what they did with the whole Underground/Carbon series, offering players to cruise around city streets sporting Tesco Value biscuit tin exhausts and Halfords own brand 20" rims in the pursuit of increasing "street cred" in the "Hood", I was never a fan of those titles. I prefer more traditional circuit racers - titles such as Gran Turismo, Forza, TOCA Race Driver and more recently Race Driver GRID.

Thankfully it seems that EA have finally seen the light with the decision to split the Need for Speed development team into sections, those who wish to create circuit racers which push you as close as possible to the true sensation of racing - the team behind Shift - and those who still wish to create the Fast and Furious inspired chav-my-chariot street racers.

To kick things off with Shift, don't expect some deep underlining story about your meteoric rise in the world of professional motor sports, the closest thing you get to a plot is the opening race where a team have loaned you the use of a BMW M3 for an upcoming race at Brands Hatch.
You get one repeatable lap in the car to adjust the car settings, ABS, TCS, AI difficulty etc. before they let you loose in a two lap race of the circuit. Your finishing place will determine how much cash will be available to purchase your first car, so it is in your best interests to get a podium position or that shopping list will become seriously limited.

So the ultimate goal of your career is to work your way up through the tiers to reach the dizzy heights of the NFS World Tour where the cars are just as expensive and exotic as they are fast. While starting off with humble beginnings, such as Honda Civic's, Audi A3's or even the iconic Ford Escort RS Cosworth; you'll unlock more desirable machines of speed with the opening of each new tier.

While the beginnings of your career may be slow to take off with limited prize winnings available for new cars, help is at hand in the form of purchasing upgrades to your vehicle to make it more competitive on the grid. The list of parts and tuning options should appease simulation fans as once fully works tuned (not all cars are able to be works converted) you'll get to tinker with nearly every aspect of the car from tyre cambers, aerodynamics and gear ratio's. Yet, if all of these are alien to you then switch the mode to simple tuning and simply use the sliders between slow and fast or oversteer and understeer to suit your driving style.

Now it's clear that EA want players to use the cockpit view while driving in this game, with all the visual treats you will experience while driving at speed - and more noticeably when you crash - the entertainment value just increases ten-fold.

For example, while driving at speed everything bar the road in front of you blurs up as you focus on the obstacles ahead, and as for crashing - you'll experience the screen shaking all over, blurred greyscale vision for a few seconds after impact and a groan from the driver if the crash was sufficiently heavy enough; it is something that should be experienced firsthand to fully understand what EA were trying to achieve rather than reading my words and the other reviews over the Internet.

However, as spectacular as the crashes may seem, this does lead me to my first gripe about this game. Even when I had pleasure of throwing the fabled Bugatti Veyron around the legendary Nordschleife hitting 220MPH down the final back straight then inevitably losing control into the nearest Armco barrier the car, while visually damaged to buggery, still drove on like nothing had occurred bar a slight tracking issue. This led me to test the damage model by repeatedly front ending the Veyron at high speeds, it became apparent that while the bodywork crumples, windscreens crack and panels fly off; the core of the car is essentially indestructible, and this is a "full" damage model?

Back to the racing itself - you will have a few different events to get your teeth stuck into while progressing to the highest tier. Alongside the usual circuit racing which normally lasts between two to four laps akin to GRID, you will have to master the art of drifting which in all honesty is a right pain to get to grips with. Each car I have used for drifting have all had different handling characteristics so you have to adjust your technique to suit that specific car in order to gracefully drift around corners as close to the markers as possible to get the highest score possible over three legs.

Then you have car battles where two manufacturers face off in a one-on-one battle in a best of three format, hot lap competitions, eliminator battles and endurance racing; though endurance in the loosest sense of the word possible as the laps barely go into double figures.

As you race around the circuits, you will gain points in certain criteria depending on your own driving style. Prefer to overtake cleanly and keep on the racing line? Then you'll be awarded precision points reflecting this. Alternatively if you're more of a bully on the track, nudging opponents to get past then you'll be awarded aggression points. These points go towards your overall driver profile which is visible to other drivers in multiplayer so they may get an indication on how you will drive.

You will also be awarded stars for achieving track specific objectives, such as gain X number of points, master all corners or spin X opponents, finish on the podium etc. These stars are what you're out to obtain in order to unlock the race events in the higher tiers. To help with this you will be offered invitational events to compete in, usually behind the wheel of a car which is a tier or two above your current level. It's a nice touch to drive something rather exotic when you're unable to purchase one for your own garage.

The level of detail on the cars and environments should please the majority of petrol heads looking for a new racing game. While not up to Forza levels of car pornography, all the cars are officially licensed therefore beautifully modelled. This level of detail also extends into the cockpit view I mentioned earlier, pan around inside the cockpit and you'll see all the instrument panels and radio equipment in place and usually lit up. All the dials work - including oil and water temperatures - however I have not noticed if the petrol gauge works as I'm usually too busy focusing on the race.

The recognisable tracks such as Brands Hatch, Donington, Nordschleife and Laguna Seca are fairly accurate representations of their real world counterparts, though having been nowhere near these tracks myself I cannot comment on how accurate they are, but they should be faithful reconstructions. You'll also get to drive around custom created city street circuits which prove to be rewarding yet tricky to master, yet distracting on your first drive around due to taking in the sights of the scenery.

The multiplayer side of things is quite entertaining. You can pick between a driver duel between you and one of your friends, drift competitions or circuit racing against up to seven other players. Choose your track, number of laps and if any AI opponents should fill any gaps in your game lobby. Set the car restriction, if any, also if you don't own a car eligible for that race, you may select from a number of loan cars to race in so anyone should be able to jump in and race away.
What I feel is a nice touch to multiplayer is the chance to earn stars, points and cash to help your single player career which should put more pressure on players to perform well in order to grab that victory online.

So overall Need for Speed Shift is a solid all round package which should appeal to a broad spectrum of racing fans, and while the indestructible car issue is quite a strange downside to the game, it does not really deter from the enjoyment of the title - unless you're some strange person who likes just breaking things.