Need for Speed: Shift is awful
Posted: 19 Oct 2009, 17:16
INTRODUCTION:
I'm used to old-school NFS games like Hot Pursuit and Most Wanted. However, I also reached a very high level in NFS: Underground for the Gamecube, which has much less arcade-y physics and gameplay.
That said, Shift is probably much closer to real-world racing. How do I know? Because it's about as fun as watching Nascar.
SETUP:
I recently bought a wireless X360 pad for Windows, and I'm using 3rd party profiling software essentially for the purpose of mapping the start button to "enter" and the select button to "esc", thereby allowing me to navigate virtually any game's menu.
It also unfubars the default trigger configuration, where both triggers are treated as half of the same axis. I don't know, maybe this works in some games, it sounded retarded to me.
I have a high-end system, probably in the top 5% of anyone on this forum. 3.6 ghz C2D 45nm, Radeon 4890 heavily overclocked, 3 gigs of ram running at 1000 mhz, and my FSB is 1600. I'm just telling you this so you know I'm not hardware or performance-limited in any way. I have a console controller for a console port, and a PC that makes consoles look very outdated.
THE ACTUAL REVIEW, THE GOOD:
It's very pretty and you can really tell the difference between different cars. I first bought a RWD car and could immediately tell it was the rear wheels propelling me because of various factors. Switching to an AWD or FWD car was immediately noticeable.
Many parts of previous NFS games that were very questionable, such as magically regenerating nitrous, have been removed - this might be a good thing or a bad thing depending on what style of racing you enjoy more.
The selection of cars is very nice, if sometimes confusing. (Ford Escort? Really?)
The imaginary "racing line" that's drawn on the track is VERY helpful and a clever idea. I don't know if this is the first game to use the concept, but it's excellent. It basically draws a line for you on the track which shows you what the developers feel is the most efficient route to drive. As you come up to sharp turns, the line will change color from green to red, depending on how unsuited to handling the turn you are, based on your current speed and your car's handling characteristics. You can then decelerate and see the line change color to judge whether you've slowed down enough. It actually works very well, but unfortunately you aren't able to see it at all times because of simple visibility issues.
THE ACTUAL REVIEW, THE BAD:
This game is pure boring shit and the menu system is horrible, horrible, horrible. I am very familiar with console ports, so I was not at all expecting a clear and intuitive menu system. Even so, it's confusing and you need to jump through about eleven menus and categories to do anything at all. If you don't have all the buttons on your controller memorized (ie, this one's button 1, this one's 6, this one 5, etc), the menu system will be especially confusing. The same button will do very different things in different menus.
I played through the first eight regular races, and got all the "stars" that can be awarded for these, sometimes requiring a few tries. I also played through the first six invitational races, winning all of them. I feel I gave the game a fair shake, and I find it completely unenjoyable.
I played on what I think was called intermediate difficulty or something similar, with no driving assistance active and car damage set to "full". I also tried with car damage turned off and felt that the game was better served by you being punished for running into walls.
The game just isn't fun. You never get up to full speed, and if you do, there will immediately be a sharp turn. At 1680x1050 resolution, it was impossible to see the road very far in front of you because of small hills and turns. Attempting to look to either side of you to take in how nice the inside of the car is rendered will immediately result in you flying off the track or into a wall.
If you stay off the track for any length of time you will be warned, or eventually removed from the race. However, the severity of going offroad is often misjudged, and skipping an entire section of the track is often equated with slipping off the track on a tight turn. Because you're given so many warnings (4 or 5) for going off-track, and most races are circuits that are often short in length, you will probably find a spot where it's better to just get a warning on every lap and have a guaranteed win because you skip a large section. You can say that's unsporting, but when you hit a wall or something and you need to catch up to the pack, you'll do it too.
Theoretically you can use different cars for different types of track, but you don't know what kind of track you're really going to be facing until you're on it, so you will probably have to restart many races after picking a new car.
Rewards for winning races are completely out of line with the rewards for causing harm to your opponents, which seems odd in a game that is supposed to be centered around realism. You can, for instance, play the same race 10 times. You can only get a reward for winning it once, but every time you race on it you will accumulate points for completing objectives, such as causing monumental damage to your opponents or remaining on the "racing line" for a long period of time. Guess which one of those you'll actually be able to do easily. As you accumulate points, the game introduces you to a system I don't think I've seen before in any game, wherein you can "level up". This "levelling up" is done automatically, and gives you access to higher tiers of races, but more importantly gives you massive cash bonuses.
To put things in perspective, winning a given race will reward you $4000, but this can only be done once. Forcing an opponent off the track or doing something similarly macabre will net you in excess of $40000 after you've done it a few times and level up.
Rewards for actually winning a race and harming your opponents are completely out of whack, but so are the rewards for racing cleanly and efficiently. For every couple seconds you remain on the imaginary "racing line" which is drawn on the track, you gain ONE POINT. For plowing into an opponent on a sharp turn (my trademark move), you receive something like 300 points. Leveling up requires around 1000 points, but I think this scales up as you progress.
I still don't think I've drilled this home. You can complete 10 races flawlessly and get around $40,000, plus some small point bonuses that might eventually level you up. Or you can come in last place on a single race 10 times, but cause grievous harm to your opponents, and receive somewhere in the neighborhood of $250,000 as well as access to higher-tier races and other rewards. Finally, you never have to pay for your car's repairs and there are no penalties for doing anything wrong, ever, except for accidentally going off-track for a couple of seconds 5 times, which will end the race.
I would never have guessed this was an EA game.
CONCLUSION:
You may have read this far in the review and think that I hated the game. Well, I did, but I haven't actually covered the most irritating part: your co-pilot/buddy/token Australian. His accent's not too irritating, it's simply what he says. Oh God. No, it's not the things he says, it's what he says before everything he says: "OKAY!"
Every voiceover begins with "OKAY!..." or possibly, "SO!...". It begins to grate on you. Eventually it starts to itch, and turns into a rash that colors your every perception of the game, until you just want him to shut up so bad you don't want to play anymore.
If you want a racing game, buy Need for Speed: Most Wanted. It's a tremendously enjoyable open-world game, though not very realistic. The graphics are also top-notch, and except for the car interiors, just about as pretty as Shift.
I'm used to old-school NFS games like Hot Pursuit and Most Wanted. However, I also reached a very high level in NFS: Underground for the Gamecube, which has much less arcade-y physics and gameplay.
That said, Shift is probably much closer to real-world racing. How do I know? Because it's about as fun as watching Nascar.
SETUP:
I recently bought a wireless X360 pad for Windows, and I'm using 3rd party profiling software essentially for the purpose of mapping the start button to "enter" and the select button to "esc", thereby allowing me to navigate virtually any game's menu.
It also unfubars the default trigger configuration, where both triggers are treated as half of the same axis. I don't know, maybe this works in some games, it sounded retarded to me.
I have a high-end system, probably in the top 5% of anyone on this forum. 3.6 ghz C2D 45nm, Radeon 4890 heavily overclocked, 3 gigs of ram running at 1000 mhz, and my FSB is 1600. I'm just telling you this so you know I'm not hardware or performance-limited in any way. I have a console controller for a console port, and a PC that makes consoles look very outdated.
THE ACTUAL REVIEW, THE GOOD:
It's very pretty and you can really tell the difference between different cars. I first bought a RWD car and could immediately tell it was the rear wheels propelling me because of various factors. Switching to an AWD or FWD car was immediately noticeable.
Many parts of previous NFS games that were very questionable, such as magically regenerating nitrous, have been removed - this might be a good thing or a bad thing depending on what style of racing you enjoy more.
The selection of cars is very nice, if sometimes confusing. (Ford Escort? Really?)
The imaginary "racing line" that's drawn on the track is VERY helpful and a clever idea. I don't know if this is the first game to use the concept, but it's excellent. It basically draws a line for you on the track which shows you what the developers feel is the most efficient route to drive. As you come up to sharp turns, the line will change color from green to red, depending on how unsuited to handling the turn you are, based on your current speed and your car's handling characteristics. You can then decelerate and see the line change color to judge whether you've slowed down enough. It actually works very well, but unfortunately you aren't able to see it at all times because of simple visibility issues.
THE ACTUAL REVIEW, THE BAD:
This game is pure boring shit and the menu system is horrible, horrible, horrible. I am very familiar with console ports, so I was not at all expecting a clear and intuitive menu system. Even so, it's confusing and you need to jump through about eleven menus and categories to do anything at all. If you don't have all the buttons on your controller memorized (ie, this one's button 1, this one's 6, this one 5, etc), the menu system will be especially confusing. The same button will do very different things in different menus.
I played through the first eight regular races, and got all the "stars" that can be awarded for these, sometimes requiring a few tries. I also played through the first six invitational races, winning all of them. I feel I gave the game a fair shake, and I find it completely unenjoyable.
I played on what I think was called intermediate difficulty or something similar, with no driving assistance active and car damage set to "full". I also tried with car damage turned off and felt that the game was better served by you being punished for running into walls.
The game just isn't fun. You never get up to full speed, and if you do, there will immediately be a sharp turn. At 1680x1050 resolution, it was impossible to see the road very far in front of you because of small hills and turns. Attempting to look to either side of you to take in how nice the inside of the car is rendered will immediately result in you flying off the track or into a wall.
If you stay off the track for any length of time you will be warned, or eventually removed from the race. However, the severity of going offroad is often misjudged, and skipping an entire section of the track is often equated with slipping off the track on a tight turn. Because you're given so many warnings (4 or 5) for going off-track, and most races are circuits that are often short in length, you will probably find a spot where it's better to just get a warning on every lap and have a guaranteed win because you skip a large section. You can say that's unsporting, but when you hit a wall or something and you need to catch up to the pack, you'll do it too.
Theoretically you can use different cars for different types of track, but you don't know what kind of track you're really going to be facing until you're on it, so you will probably have to restart many races after picking a new car.
Rewards for winning races are completely out of line with the rewards for causing harm to your opponents, which seems odd in a game that is supposed to be centered around realism. You can, for instance, play the same race 10 times. You can only get a reward for winning it once, but every time you race on it you will accumulate points for completing objectives, such as causing monumental damage to your opponents or remaining on the "racing line" for a long period of time. Guess which one of those you'll actually be able to do easily. As you accumulate points, the game introduces you to a system I don't think I've seen before in any game, wherein you can "level up". This "levelling up" is done automatically, and gives you access to higher tiers of races, but more importantly gives you massive cash bonuses.
To put things in perspective, winning a given race will reward you $4000, but this can only be done once. Forcing an opponent off the track or doing something similarly macabre will net you in excess of $40000 after you've done it a few times and level up.
Rewards for actually winning a race and harming your opponents are completely out of whack, but so are the rewards for racing cleanly and efficiently. For every couple seconds you remain on the imaginary "racing line" which is drawn on the track, you gain ONE POINT. For plowing into an opponent on a sharp turn (my trademark move), you receive something like 300 points. Leveling up requires around 1000 points, but I think this scales up as you progress.
I still don't think I've drilled this home. You can complete 10 races flawlessly and get around $40,000, plus some small point bonuses that might eventually level you up. Or you can come in last place on a single race 10 times, but cause grievous harm to your opponents, and receive somewhere in the neighborhood of $250,000 as well as access to higher-tier races and other rewards. Finally, you never have to pay for your car's repairs and there are no penalties for doing anything wrong, ever, except for accidentally going off-track for a couple of seconds 5 times, which will end the race.
I would never have guessed this was an EA game.
CONCLUSION:
You may have read this far in the review and think that I hated the game. Well, I did, but I haven't actually covered the most irritating part: your co-pilot/buddy/token Australian. His accent's not too irritating, it's simply what he says. Oh God. No, it's not the things he says, it's what he says before everything he says: "OKAY!"
Every voiceover begins with "OKAY!..." or possibly, "SO!...". It begins to grate on you. Eventually it starts to itch, and turns into a rash that colors your every perception of the game, until you just want him to shut up so bad you don't want to play anymore.
If you want a racing game, buy Need for Speed: Most Wanted. It's a tremendously enjoyable open-world game, though not very realistic. The graphics are also top-notch, and except for the car interiors, just about as pretty as Shift.