Need for Speed Shift

The Need for Speed franchise has been on a streak of lower quality games recently. Ever since Carbon disappointed in 2006, each game afterwards, from the bland Prostreet to the unpolished Undercover, have failed to come close to reaching heights of Need for Speed: Most Wanted. Now, the game has shifted back to a simulator style from Prostreet but much more pure simulation, a la Forza Motorsport. But as we all know, realism doesn't always mean fun, and that seems to be the problem with Shift-it's not very fun.

Shift thrusts you immediately into the driving seat as you perform a hot lap. But this isn't just any hot lap, after this, depending on how well you do on it; it will change the difficulty, driving model and other options judging you on how you drove in the hot lap. Some may be offended when they get shoved onto easy with no damage modelling and the assists turned on, but the game does a good job of judging how you should be driving, meaning that if it says go on easy, you probably should go onto easy and take the advice.

After that, the game's options open up. You can access quick race for a spur-of-the-moment race with whatever track you want, or jump into the career mode. The career mode is all about the stars, as you earn podium positions you gain up to three stars and there is a bonus challenge on each race like leading for a whole lap or sliding around a corner for three seconds. There are also two more stars for reaching the point threshold (explain more in a sec) which means you can usually earn a good six stars per race, but considering you'll need about 280 to complete the game, it's by no means a quick win to the top.

The core of Shift comes from its driving style system. Performing actions like overtaking drivers or completing a sector of the track without going off it or crashing earns you points. These points are catagorised into two styles-precision and agressive. Precision points are rewarded when you overtake other drivers without hitting them, follow the race line provided on easy and basically be a gentlemen driver. The agression points are dolled out if you use crash into other drivers, ram them to overtake them and even cause them to flip out altogether. And that's where things go wrong. The problem is that the game rewards you more for being reckless rather than careful, for example a clean overtakes is 30 points while a dirty one is 50. And if you can flip out another driver, you can gain a whopping 75 points. This causes races to turn into demolition Derbys rather than actual races as you try to earn the most points.

The first thing you should do in Shift is adjust the handling, as the default setting is too sensitive unless you're using a steering wheel. But once you fix it, you'll find the driving to be solid. The physics are somewhat weird as when you crash into the back of other cars they sometimes fly over your car. However crashing into the side of another car produces much more realistic results, and when you turn on the damage modelling, the damage is impeccable. Also try turning off all the assists and you find Shift to be a realistic driving experience as it can be. However, there are some problems which hinder Shift.

The career mode is bland, quite honestly. The game is mostly tier after tier of races which never change really as there's but two race types. Racing and time trials are the only modes, meaning the couple of hundred events get boring fast. The only shake ups come in the form of car battles where two evenly matched vehicles race and it becomes more about the driving rather than the car, as well as drift events which are extremely hard meaning you'll probably skip those events, and because the career is flexible, requiring about a quarter of the stars to complete the game, then you will be able to skip these lackluster events.

The disappointing online hurts Shift some more. Online you can partake in driver duels tournaments where two players compete and whoever wins moves on while the loser starts again. There are also custom races where you can change options and the like and if you have a fully upgraded vehicle you can take it online. However online is nearly ruined by the same points system from the career. Again, you gain more points for agression, and in every game I joined at least one other driver attempted to ram me off the track which was annoying to say the least. Another issue is that cutting corners slows your car down for a few seconds, however the game is bad at judging what corner cutting is meaning you could slightly ride over a bump and be punished.

There's also a limited car selection of 55 cars which range from Nissans to BMWs to Porches. There's some decent cars here but most of them have been seen plenty of times before. The disappointing car customization also doesn't help. You can't mirror designs onto the other side of a vehicle, most of the cooler liveries are locked until you reach higher levels and most of the designs in general are quite poor meaning it's hard to create a decent looking design. There are some preset liveries but they're simply uninspired racing stereotypes. The good comes from the preset body kits which can turn an average looking car into a beast, but it's not enough.

Shift has some pretty nice visuals backing up the game. The car models look great even if the vinyls look less than good. The environments look good when going at high speed but if you pause the game and look closely with the camera view you'll notice a lot of blocky edges and textures especially with the pedestrians. However you'll be going to fast to actually care. The sound is good too with roaring engines and perfect sound effects like the whistling in the wind. You'll also notice if you drive past containers or in tunnels the sound effects change, which is a nice touch. However the music in the menus is dreafully repetitive, though during the races there is no music thankfully.

Is Need for Speed: Shift good, bad or ugly?

Shift doesn't exactly break the current trend of less than average Need for Speed games but it's a slightly better effort than Carbon or Prostreet. It has a solid racing engine, even if the handling isn't perfect from the get-go, but the bland career mode, disapointing customization options and lacking online play let the game down, mostly due to the driver profile system which rewards too greatly for driving recklessly. If you're a fan of hardcore racing sims like Race Pro or Forza Motorsport, then this will be too light of a simulation yet if you're more of a Burnout redneck or were brought up on the thrills of underground racers like Midnight Club LA, then this will be too boring for you. It tries to appeal to all racer fans, but ends up allienating them all.

Controls: 7
Gameplay: 6
Graphics: 7
Sound: 8
Value: 6
Overall: 6.8

Need for Speed Shift was released on September 18th, 2009 for Xbox 360, Playstation 3, PC and PSP. It is rated 3+ due to no offensive content and can be bought for £40.