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| NFS Hot Pursuit Previews & Interview (Update) |
Saturday, 25.09.2010 |
 Need for Speed Hot Pursuit was recently presented to the press in London and now the first experience reports come up:
IGN wrote a  preview about NFS Hot Pursuit and seemed to quite like it:
In combining the chase-oriented thrills of the Need for Speed franchise, and the high-speed mayhem of the Burnout series, EA may have found the right balance of exciting racing-action that seems like it will please fans of both franchises. Add to this the ambitious social interactivity, the beautiful graphics engine and the strategic gameplay, and it's not hard to say that Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit is looking to be Criterion's most polished effort to date.
VG247 tried and loved the game as well:
Criterion Games has taken social features, speed and carnage and crammed it into one satisfying package. This may be Need for Speed, but it’s Criterion’s Need for Speed: November 11 can’t come soon enough.
If you're interested, you should also check out this interview at VG147 with Matt Webster from Criterion Games, who talks about the development of NFS Hot Pursuit, his "healthy paranoia" regarding competition and why a story isn't necessary in this game.
Update:
Now also Gamespot brought up its Preview of NFS Hot Pursuit:
Hot Pursuit mode looks like a welcome return to the high-adrenaline chase feel of Need for Speed games of old, and we're keen on having more hands-on time with this fast-paced title. What's clear right now is that the game looks great, with Hot Pursuit having that same awesome sense of speed and controlled chaos that fans of Burnout Paradise will be used to.
 NFS Hot Pursuit Preview @ IGN
NFS Hot Pursuit Preview @ VG247
Interview with Matt Webster @ VG247
NFS Hot Pursuit Preview @ Gamespot
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| EA admits mistakes in NFS development |
Wednesday, 22.09.2010 |
 According to CVG John Ricitello talked about the development of Need for Speed and admitted mistakes, which caused the decline in both sales and quality:
"I'll tell you a story. If you went back to when I first got into the games industry, 1997, Need For Speed was a really strong title.
"I'd come into EA just after we'd shipped a couple of relatively miserable ones. Our Need For Speed business was off... dramatically. We came up with this idea of putting a cop in the game. Suddenly this whole cat and mouse, cops and chasing thing blew the roof off."
"We had several consecutive years of growth. We reached a bit of a lull period and came up with Underground which has sort of that night-time vibe and lightning which brought it to new heights - north of 10 million units for the franchise."
"In the '04 to '07 period, we had a single studio, Black Box, up in Vancouver, building our [NFS games]. And we literally had them on a death march building for five years in a row. [They were] annual iterations, they had to put it out; no rest for the weary.
"It'd happened before - games publishers do this from time to time. We should have put them on two-year alternating cycles but we didn't. And the title declined dramatically. We started to lose people. they didn't want to work 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year.
"It was definitely our fault. Those days are gone. We're back in two studios and we've got them on bi-annual cycles. We made really great progress... with a strong entry last year, which was more of a simulation game.
"This year [with Hot Pursuit, NFS] is right back in the core action driving... it's had a two-year dev cycle... I feel great about it."
And indeed the Slightly Mad Studios made a successful relaunch of the series with Need for Speed Shift last year and Need for Speed Hot Pursuit from Criterion Games, which is being released in November 2010, appears to be a good title as well.
EA Black Box on the other hand concentrates on the long-term project Need for Speed World and develops extensions and new features for the free-to-play onlineracer.
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| Criterion wanted to develop Need for Speed: Split Second |
Monday, 30.08.2010 |
As Gamerzines reports, Criterion Games approached to EA in 2002 (after finishing Burnout 2) to make a stunt racing game Need for Speed: Split Second.
Unfortunately it didn't work out with EA Canada, because of a dispute over a sequel to C64 classic Skate or Die, a secret game that Criterion agreed to develop for EA.
"We called a meeting with the EA guys, told them we were walking away and they went mad, threatening to sue us, put us out of business... there was a lot of anger and frustration.
"Then we got a call from the Need For Speed guys and they said 'we can't work with you guys any more; you just walked away and there's a shame on your company, so we can't talk to you'.
"I remember coming back to my desk and there was a folder on my desktop called EA and I just clicked delete. We learned a lot about how a game should be made."
Anyway, it all worked out fine in the end. Criterion got a chance to develop another Burnout sequel instead and this year they can show us what they got with Need for Speed Hot Pursuit, coming in November for PC, Playstation 3, Xbox360 and Wii. :)
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| DICE collaboration on NFS Hot Pursuit |
Monday, 16.08.2010 |
The swedish development studio DICE (creators of Mirror's Edge and Battlefield), worked closely with Criterion Games on the development of Need for Speed Hot Pursuit. The target was to create an in-game map, four times the size of Burnout Paradise's city, so Criterion Games asked DICE to lend them a hand in creating a new world for the latest Need for Speed title. So far, they seemed to have done a great job, according to Art director Henry LaBounta:
"It's been a great collaboration actually. Early on we set style guides for what we wanted to create out of this game, to offer players the ability to see a wide variety of types of environments from the deserts to the mountains to the forest to the coastal routes and so forth.
We started talking to them about what we wanted to do and they got excited about the project; they have a very talented team of artists at DICE led by Johannes Söderqvist, their art director. We created all the roads here, we did a lot of work to get the gameplay right before we made it look pretty. They took those roads and those style guides and delivered 110 per cent on what we were looking for with the final result."
NFS Hot Pursuit targets fully on the exotic cars and their beauty, which works better in wide landscapes and deserts than in cities. In this fact Hot Pursuit differs clearly from Burnout Paradise and the latest NFS titles from EA Black Box:
"We do have some towns and stuff in here but this is about driving on the ultimate roads with these really powerful machines - the last place you want to do that is in a city.
In general, in Need for Speed in the past, putting the game in a city has been really challenging because if you want to make it a convincing city with a city grid, that's not going to be much fun to drive so you end up having to bend the roads round and the city looks a bit odd. It doesn't make the game more fun to play having buildings all around. I actually think getting the road splines perfect is the key to making the games fun."
You can read more about the collaboration with DICE at the blog of Digital Foundry:
How DICE collaborated on Need for Speed's game world @ Digital Foundry
Preorder Need for Speed Hot Pursuit at Amazon.co.uk!
Preorder Need for Speed Hot Pursuit at Amazon.com!
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| NFS Hot Pursuit Interview with Darin Perfonic |
Wednesday, 21.07.2010 |
The videoportal Gametrailers made an video interview with NFS Producer Darin Perfonic, where he talks about some details of Need for Speed Hot Pursuit.
There will be around 65 cars in the game - until now mostly the Lamborghini Reventon and Lamborghini Murcielago were shown. He also talks about the weapons of the cops, "Bounty" - the currentcy and the philosophy of Criterion Games behind the Need for Speed development. You can watch the interview here or download it under the following link:
NFS HP: Interview with Darin Perfonic @ Gametrailers
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| NFS Hot Pursuit at Gamespot's E3 2010 Stage Show |
Sunday, 20.06.2010 |
Creative Director Craig Sullivan from Criterion Games was guest at Gamespot's E3 2010 Stage Show, where he talked about the upcoming Need for Speed Hot Pursuit and shared some new details.
So NFS Hot Pursuit will have an open world, where cops can chase the racers. Additionally you'll get their hands on high-end cars pretty early - but unfortunately there won't be any tuning and customization, because the focus lies on pursuits and escaping, rather than showing off your car.
So it seems the game is heading directly into the arcade-direction...but see for yourself - Craig Sullivan is also showing the game in two example races:
E3 2010 Stage Demo: Need for Speed Hot Pursuit
Preorder Need for Speed Hot Pursuit at Amazon.co.uk!
Preorder Need for Speed Hot Pursuit at Amazon.com!
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| NFS HP: 3D-Support? |
Friday, 18.06.2010 |
Sony presented at the E3 several games which will be playable in 3D on the Playstation 3 with a 3D-capable screen. Among them is Gran Turismo 5, which is slated for release in November 2010.
As it seems a new tweet from Criterion Games announces 3D-support for Need for Speed Hot Pursuit for PS3 and PC:
3D support on PlayStation 3 and PC
There are no details know yet - also not if the new Playstation-controller "Move" might be supported, as in Gran Turismo 5.
We'll let you know, as soon as we know more.
Preorder Need for Speed Hot Pursuit at Amazon.co.uk!
Preorder Need for Speed Hot Pursuit at Amazon.com!
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| NFS HP: Hands-On and Video-Walkthrough |
Wednesday, 16.06.2010 |
After the presentation of Need for Speed Hot Pursuit slowly the first videos and reports are coming in:
Here you can see a 1 vs 1 race, which was played at the presentation at the E3:
Gametrailers was able to play Need for Speed Hot Pursuit themselves and show you the game in a walkthrough-video.
The onlinegamazone Gamespot sat down with producer Craig Sullivan and gives you more details on the game in their hands-on article.
Excerpt
The game focuses on two different playable classes--the cop and the racer. The relationship will be "like a dog chasing down a rabbit," according to Sullivan. He said, "We want the racer to feel like the rabbit, and the cop to feel like the dog." Like the dog, the cop is more powerful--not only will police cars be faster, they also won't take damage. Racers actually have it pretty tough in comparison--they'll have more speed and stealth-related power-ups, but they'll take damage every time a cop car hits them. Like the rabbit, the racer should feel vulnerable to attack and will have to outsmart the cop to survive.
Additionally IGN wrote a first preview of NFS Hot Pursuit:
Excerpt:
The thrill of the chase is intoxicating within itself, thanks to an exhilarating sense of speed that's amplified by a rechargeable nitrous boost and some sublime handling. It's initially galling, especially to anyone schooled in Burnout's own unique model, and is much weightier than Criterion's past games. The low-slung Lamborghinis soon reveal themselves to be a delight to throw around, swinging their plump posteriors around corners simple yet satisfying.
It runs deeper than that though, and there's a surprising level of nuance to the chase. The win states are self explanatory – for the chaser, it's about pummelling the suspect into submission, and for them it's just about getting away. Power-ups add strategy; the d-pad houses four of them, ranging from the cop deploying a helicopter to keep eyes on the suspect or calling in a road block to a radar jamming device that renders the mini-map useless and an EMP blast that temporarily immobilises the opponent.
Gametrailers Walkthrough Video
NFS Hot Pursuit Hands-On @ Gamespot
NFS Hot Pursuit Preview @ IGN
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