Super Street Game Reviews
| Game Title: Need For Speed Underground |
| Genre: Arcade Racing |
| Console: Playstation2 |
| Publisher: EA Games |
| Developer: EA Games Canada |
| Hot: PS2 against PC online racing, the best graphics of any racing game |
| Not: Still looking for it |
| Score: |  |
Buckle up, gamers, your next "must have" racing game has arrived--Need for Speed Underground. Electronic Arts (EA) continues to set new standards with the latest release in the Need for Speed franchise. Need for Speed Underground takes a plunge into the illegal street racing world by providing racers with fully customizable high performance tuner cars and challenging races all wrapped up in one of the best looking games we've ever seen.
First, the whole look of the game is completely gorgeous. The refined photo-realistic scenery combined with special blur light effects, camera wobbles, and cut scenes (jumps, skids, accidents) add to your game play instead of interrupting or stalling it. We think that all these enhancements made it seem like we were looking out of our own windshield as we blitzed through the city streets. Totally sweet.
Gamers take note, the game is produced with THX surround, so after you pick up your copy--warn the neighbors. NFSU has a great, full soundtrack with a good mix of musical genres and over two dozen songs to choose from. Your subwoofer will be rocking, and if your couch is vibrating more than your controller, you're doing something right. Like we said, warn the neighbors.
This a fully loaded game with several different racing modes, including the Underground mode, where you take your basic racer out for some exercise to win parts, race tracks, cars, vinyls and paint jobs. The only two things that count here is winning and doing it with style. Do everything you can to take the top spot. Cut other drivers off, ram them into buildings, but be careful--you don't want to take yourself out in the process. Racing in the Underground series is where it all comes together for a series of different racing competitions. You will be challenged to drag races, drifting contests, and timed races as well as the "usual" lap races through the city streets. One of the best features added to this mode is the ability to choose your difficulty along the way. If your driving dramatically improves you don't have to get stuck driving in the easy mode for the full racing series. Neat, huh?
There are 20 cars for gamers to fully and completely customize. Winning races will get you access to hundreds of aftermarket parts to enhance your vehicle. New tires, steering packages, engines, NOS systems are just some of the things waiting for you to upgrade your racer with. Not only that, the amazing graphics lets you see how your car looks as you customize the paint jobs, choose your vinyls, and pick up new parts. Once your satisfied it's just a few clicks until your racer is enhanced and ready to race. The state of the art car and driving physics makes it easy to tell the performance improvements in your car right away.
Fans of Need for Speed are definitely going to want to pick up the latest title in this mega-selling racing series. Visually stunning and instantly addicting, Need for Speed Underground will keep you up late--just like all those illegal street races you will keep trying to win. It's an all around great racing game and should keep you racing for a long time. We give this game four and half nukes.