Need for Speed (2015)

[TommoAE86]

Alot of mail order retailers do that, it's so that you have it for midnight on the day of release and don't miss out compared to those that will queue up at the store.

Game used to do it, then stopped, and now do it sporadically. Rockstar are the only company I've heard who forbid Game to do it (it was the same for Amazon iirc) when GTAV came out on PS3/360.

[TommoAE86]

Haha thanks for the clarification! My game one arrived on the day of release so I think Game complied to Rockstar's request!

[TommoAE86]

Looks epic, didn't get it last night so hopefully will do today! I think work tomorrow is going to be hard What is the AI like? Seem the really bad from reports on there, but a friend who played the beta said it was just like Rivals which wasn't that bad.

[TommoAE86]

Yeah rubber banding AI was mentioned, my friend insists it's only as bad as it was in Rivals (& the 2012 version of Most Wanted) which I've played and was able to manage.

Not long now, 3hrs and I'll be home Have you got anymore car pictures to share?

[TommoAE86]

I played about 5hrs last night, but two of those were just messing around with my mate so I'm still level 12. I sold my first car and the free pre-order parts I got and bought myself an AE86 and a R32 Skyline. Sorry Rogue but I cannot agree with your comments on it, it's not as bad as you see it.

As per previous posters the graphics and sounds are spot on! The cars look amazing too and the small amount of damage you get when you hammer into stuff looks good with the general grime you pick up if you stay out of your garage for a long time adds to the finishing touches.
Two small points with the graphics - 1. no changing view at all and 2. if you are stationary and turn the wheel you see the whole steering wheel move down and in the direction you are turning... so all these cars have moveable steering columns!!! Nice work EA.

The AI is quite noticably rubber-banded to your car, but it's greatly improved over Rivals where you're almost guaranteed to be passed near the end. However I wouldn't say that Forza Horizon 2 is really showing how it's done given the foibles that AI has.

The handling took some getting used to but is pure NFS, you now have two setups you can do; Drift and Grip. Grip is very much like a normal arcade game and you have to have a small bit of planning to make each corner in the fastest way. Drift is total NFS where you can blast upto a corner and then tap the brake and slide round it (or into things until you get used to it )

Customization is epic when compared to the last few games and it's great to see EA have actually listened to the fans after dropping the ball following Carbon. You get a vast amount of options and fine tuning, with the added bonus that paint & decals are free to apply, there's even enough decals for your "stickerbombing" fans! A great tool that is now you can save down your decal & tuning sets to chop and change between a few loadouts.
Only criticism I have with it is that you are still restricted on size, making it hard to do unique shapes. For example last night I started doing an Initial D panda car setup for my AE86, I had to stop as I can't make the Japanese character's down the side due to not being able to make the basic shapes small enough to create the correct letters.

Bad points are limited to some of the lines in the cutscenes really make you cringe (though on the whole they fit the theme), 90% of the music is terrible and you can't select a custom set of ingame tracks or even a particular genre, which frankly is retarded. You can have the music on... or off!
The always online thing is also dumb, however I haven't yet experienced the flaky servers as mentioned above so can't comment on that. Where it does manifest itself is how difficult it is to join a game with your friends, it took at least 15 mins to work this out and as far as I could tell there is no voice chat either. With the likes of GTAV covering this function very well it does make EA look like amateurs.

I found this article explaining why it has to be "always on" saying that they are going to weave your friends stuff into your game, experienced nothing close to what is mentioned so guess they failed to implement it properly: http://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/need-for-speed...

All in all it is a good game and easily the best (arcade) racing game on the PS4, I'd also wager is more fun that GT6 given the mess that franchise is in at the moment.

How did you guys get your snaps out of the game? When I get home I'll add my cars to a post

[TommoAE86]

Hmmm I wonder if I've missed something glaringly obvious re: the view. I was obviously drooling too much over the graphics.

Thanks for the how to on the screenshots seems silly you can't get them out of the game naturally like you could with GT5

I've started a Calsonic R32 and have got quite far, it's just the little bits I now have to recreate, like the "total" bit and the safety logo's. I've got to work out how I can go back and amend a particular layer as the "N" on the bonnet is a different font to the roof/sides lol. Would be fun to sell that like on Forza but I guess that's abit too technical for EA

If anyone wants to add me on PSN my tag is Torrentt0 (zero at the end)

[TommoAE86]

Underground has a great soundtrack, I think there are two songs on this one that I like, and 4 or 5 marginal ones but the rest is terrible.

Agree on not being able to copy even single layers across to another side is irritating, though on Horizon 2 (apparently the benchmark) it's not exactly easy either.

What do you guys do for performance parts, always apply the latest or go upgrade gradually? My 86 is part way upgraded and is very happy drifting around everywhere

[TommoAE86]

There is only 1 Skyline and that's the R32, I have one and it's a joy to drive. I'm currently trying to get the grip setup perfect but I do like abit of slip from the rear wheels.

I'm trying to decide which cars I'd like to fill the remaining slots, so far I have these two but can't decide on the last:

AE86 (drift - got)
R32 GTR (grip - got)
Camaro (saving)
Viper (saving hopefully turn it into a speed run car)

• blank space* - I'm thinking either an RX7 // NSX // F40 // Supra // 180SX // GTR KPGC10...

[TommoAE86]

I don't like full drift, even on my eight-six, I have to be a couple of clicks right from the max otherwise it's just too slippy through the long faster freeway sections. I know I'll change my mind many more times before choosing which other cars to put in the final 3 slots. I'm leaning towards doing the NSX as one of my grip cars right now. I'm also moving away from the RX7, all RX7's are lovely but I don't get as excited over them as Supra's and Skylines :/

I do get annoyed with the inclusion of the triplets Scion FRS/Toyota GT86/Subaru BRZ... 3 "slots" in game for the same car, just put one in... or have it take up one slot with the option to choose the badge and wheels when buying it, but that would be extra programming and EA's accountants have to produce everything like a Vectra!

The Viper is the SRT 2014 version and is 88,400 credits, I've been using this list here: http://nfs.wikia.com/wiki/Need_for_Speed_(2015)/Ca...

Edited by TommoAE86 on Friday 6th November 16:26

[TommoAE86]

I've got a few of those, trying to find everything without a map though. Was playing alot last night and got to level 31 ish, I still have my Eight-six and my R32, managed to get close to an Initial D lookalike but it's far from perfect;





Btw that shut line was down to the arches, and when I was in decal editor it all lined up, then as soon as it was confirmed it went out of joint.. have since removed that arche

I've also messed around with it and given it another more "fully loaded" setup



I sort of messed up abit because the Eight-Six is so good in the beginning I claimed my pre-order bonus parts onto that instead of the R32, so I've had to wait for parts to be unlocked on that, now the big items are starting to come through it's my favourite car. Everything is so cohesive when driving it and all I've done is given it grip tyres and then set it to about 3 notches towards drift and everything is so much better. Incidentally my Eight-six is on drift tyres and occasionally I find it is jerking to the right (and only the right) which I have a feeling is down to the tyres as otherwise it's pretty much the same as the Skyline.







I am working on a Calsonic version of the R32, but it's abit annoying when you have to build all the sponsor logo's up in component form. I found the way to move the layers/edit old layers btw (on PS4), when you have done and confirmed the layers you go back into the decal editor, hit triangle on your chosen panel and then it's up/down on the d-pad to move the selected layer up and down, then the left joystick to move the cursor up and down the different decals. Hope that helps.

I also bought the Viper last night and will probably give the Camaro a miss, hopefully they will add some more classic muscle in DLC form as right now there is just a Mustang which is my least favourite classic muscle car..

I was playing with my friend last night who is high level and he has used a ton of cars including the F40, GT3 and Huracan(sp) and prefer's the F40 to all of them for it's handling and willingness to drift

To add to my review now that the handling is "sorted" when using my R32 I am totally in love with this game and it's easily the best racing game on the PS4 right now including the simulators and certainly comes close to Forza Horizon 2 imo (taking into account my listed negatives). The engine noises are totally epic and spot on compared to real life version of the cars they represent and while the cutscenes are pretty cringeworthy sometimes they do fit with the "scene" and how it's moved on from the original Fast & the Furious film/Undergound.

[TommoAE86]

I'm afraid I must point out the other side of the coin on 2 of your points:

The handling you need to tune (and re-tune everytime you add a part) but it's great when you get it right imo and adds to the fun getting the sweet spot for your driving type. Also tyres have a great effect on the way your car handles finally.

The engine noises are exactly what each car sounds like, especially for the AE86 and the RB26 I am running, yet to try the others though.

Completely agree on everything else, especially the lack of manual

[TommoAE86]

MarkRSi said:

1. 1 So I assume, once tweaked, it's possible to drift the car by destabiling the car (e.g. scandinavian flick/braking drift etc.) without using the handbrake?

1. 2 Do the engine noises change when fitting parts (exhaust/air filter etc)? Not sure if we tried these. Having just watched a video of someone using an AE86, it does sound a bit nicer so maybe some cars are better than others.

1. 3 Oh and we both agreed the music was st.

1. 4 If they can include a manual transmission option, I'll give this a try on PC when released, if not I'll probaby just pass and continue replaying NFSU2 again

Edited by MarkRSi on Sunday 8th November 11:15

1. Yup, if you turn off "Drift Stability Assist" you can "scandi flick" cars into the corner, you also should play with the tyre and tuning setup on your car. For me I've gone arcade, so drift stability = on, tyres = grip, tuning = 4 notches to drift on the main scale. This sets it up like a Burnout: Paradise type handling, tap the brake and away I go, just need to control throttle and steering.

2. Yes, agree at the start they sound abit flat, but start putting the exhausts on and they take their "true form" as it were. My AE86 and R32 GTR sound like the real things. Also when I come off the throttle, especially in the GTR, I'm treated to a lovely load of pops/bangs/wastegate chatter.

3. So so agree, I like 3 songs, and "like" is pushing it.

4. Would be nice, but if there are eight gears then it might be abit of a big ask lol

[TommoAE86]

The snapshots can take a while to upload, I took a ton of them and went to have a look and they weren't there. Went to check a couple of hours later and hey presto! all present and correct.

[TommoAE86]

I got level 50 last night and fully upgraded all 3 of my cars. Loving tooling around in my Eight-six and R32 with the latter having over 1,000bhp The Viper is less interesting but makes wonderful sound and can still get a drift going. I'm currently trying to find all the snapshot/donut/car parts and am getting close, think only 5 of the snapshot/donut locations to find

The graphics continue to be stunning, like when you stop the car drips (different direction to the rain falling, so it's not drops going through the car) water you've collected. My AE86 is pretty much spot on given the restrictions in the decals. My Calsonic R32 though is in the doldrums, the decals have all "bled" into the surrounding paint which is insane for a computer game, so I think I'm going to have to redo them at some point. Have heard rumours that decal copying & mirroring is going to be brought in "before December" which is great news and will probably wait for that before finishing that particular paint job. Thinking of doing a Gran Turismo 1 - esk White & Blue GTS-T Viper paint job next.

Bad points, the AI mostly. It's getting all too easy even doing the "final" races for a particular character set of events sees me leaving the opposition for dead a long way back. It's like they've turned the rubber banding from Rivals back abit too far. The only exception is the drift train races where you have to be close to the opponents to score, and they seem to only be able to crash into you, abit like GT1 & Forza Horizon 2 tbh.
I also worry about what you are supposed to do when you've finished all the story missions, as I can't see much to do afterwards. Even with my friends in a crew just beating each other's high scores is not enough, it almost needs something like the multiplayer lobbies from the Crew to keep people playing. Maybe there will be some decent DLC in 2016.

[TommoAE86]

I found the Toyota AE86 to be really good, the usual suspects are also great (180SX/Supra/muscle cars) also the F40 is pretty good if you want the expensive option. I've pretty much only used the AE86 & R32 GTR for my drifting, when tuning I go to the top bar and then select one notch down from having the visible sliders 2 notches left from centre if that makes sense? For pure drifting I put it on the two notches and tweak until I'm comfortable with it.

[TommoAE86]

It seems not rogue, though they are introducing a bunch of stuff before the end of November. Fingers crossed for fast paced dlc?

Here's what they are planning to add;

More balanced ‘AI Catch Up’
New Wrap Editor features:
Mirror functionality
Improved colour picker
Hoonicorn and Morohoshi-San Diablo
Gifted upon completion of their respective narrative threads
First look at neons
Early in development version on Morohoshi-San’s Diablo
REP increase 50-60
3x Trophies & Achievements
New daily challenges
x30 new pre-set wraps
General bugs, tweaks and improvements

I've done nothing except take moody pictures and got my platinum trophy, ridiculously short but I really enjoyed it and hope they can add to it.

[TommoAE86]

I endured 20 mins of that spastic spouting off before I had to turn it off. But I'll run through the points I heard:

- lack of parts on some cars: AGREE, it is annoying but given the release notes for the first update they are being pretty responsive to feedback. He also didn't really touch of the decals which other than lacking an angle measure is pretty spot on so.

- Tuning parts: Disagree, he was only level 32 and hadn't added any of the parts he had unlocked. Add the parts to the cars and it makes a material difference to the driving experience and the noise of each car.

- Always at night: Invalid point, omg, I can't believe it, a game about illegal racing which is almost exclusively held at night is set almost exclusively at night...

- Handling/lots of HP & not spinning out: handling is mentioned above numerous times, you need to tune it to meet your needs, if you don't the whole game is crap. I've got mine set to a burnout: paradise setup and it works perfectly on all my cars. Not realistic HP/Spinning out, it's a fking arcade racer.

I imagine he goes onto the AI mentioning rubber banding, it's been mentioned alot. I personally only experienced it at the start and in drift train events, all other times the AI was laughably easy. The obvious conclusion is that it needs to be increased not decreased and everyone shouldn't be so st.

Here is the gamespot review, even they who are normally quite critical of games gave it 8/10 and is much more balanced in it's criticisms: http://www.gamespot.com/reviews/need-for-speed-rev...

This is not a perfect game, it is far too short and agree with the visual parts, also the AI should be tuned up and there should be something more concrete for multiplayer. However lots of games suffer major flaws, the crew with nothing to do once you're done, forza horizon 2 with it's pathetic AI. It will be interesting to see what happens but one would hope this would go the same way a drive club and be made much better over time (I remember it being heavily criticized when it came out).

[TommoAE86]

I still play occasionally, you really can't do much to the later cars other than decals and paint which is abit of a shame. Some of the updates are nice though, a snapshot mode and repairing your car going into fuel stations.

For the handling you should try and set your car up in to be on the 2nd blip on the "drift" side of the tuning slider, then make sure you put grip tyres on (leave the drift ones out). Make sure "drift stability control" or w/e it's called is on and away you go.
You might fine you need to fine tune the slider around the 2nd blip but you'll be thereabouts. What I found with this setup is that you can hold some pretty epic slides very easily without crashing but you maintain the straightline grip when hammering through gentle corners.

Good luck

[TommoAE86]

Oh cool, I have to admit I don't follow the updates. For my cars I had an AE86 first, then I made that drifty and bought a R32 GTR. I didn't really need any cars after that lol

[TommoAE86]

Sweet I'll be playing this again, have got very bored of Farcry 4