Need For Speed: Underground 2

You know, there’s times when it’s hard to feel pity for the underdog in the games software, er, game. Remember not-too-long ago when a Fast and the Furious game was coming out. The timing was exquisite – interest in modding cars had never been higher, people were drifting everything from supermarket trolleys to mechanised wheelchairs, and Paul Walker still had a thriving movie career. Times where good.

Rockstar, whose Midnight Club series once again demonstrated that the company was unerringly tapped into what’s hot, was first out the gate with Midnight Club 2. Meanwhile Vivendi Universal, publisher of Half Life 2, amongst others (and therefore no stranger to delays) had to watch the “official” Fast and the Furious game get pushed back to Q1, 2005.

So who did that leave? Those wacky droids at EA, who promptly re-routed the aging Need for Speed series in a bold new underground, ricey direction. Boom. It was alll over. Need for Speed Underground was fantastic – simple to play, compelling, and it looked gooooood. The issues that cropped up – no replays or missing mirrors were just the tip of the iceberg – were overwhelmed by some fantastic styling.

Need for Speed Underground 2 fixes these problems, and a whole bunch more. You get the replays now. You get the mirrors. And for fans of female eye candy, you even get “B grade” Brooke Burns fronting the whole thing. Brooke only appears in cartoon form, but doubtless she’ll get more than a few motors running.

Probably the biggest miss the game makes is in the voice acting. It’s too cool for school now, and comes across like the nerdy kid who has been reading too much Source magazine. A Paul Walker voice alike talks you through a lot of the game’s modes, “bro”, and sure has mastered that half stoned, wannabe surfer sound that apparently passes for LA “tuner” culture. Whoever it is, it sounds like he and the uber annoying Ryder from the Burnout 3 game need to get together and write off each other’s vocal chords. Trust me on this – after hearing the “dope crazy stupid fresh” chat in NFSU2, you will be wishing the game came with Braille subtitles.

In a way, it at least makes Baywatch Brooke bearable, although the storyline is hashed out via a comic book style that is kinda cheesy, and the main screen of the game has her looking quite…pixellated. Maybe that’s a graphic design decision, because the actual meat and potatoes of the game – the cars and streets – look great. They have that glossy rice look so favoured by “enthusiasts”.

Also cool is the audio (outside of the voice acting of course), which adds a chunk of grunt to the game. Although why your bog standard car that you buy first off inevitably has a tuned sounding raspy note to it defeats me; aren’t you meant to pay for those upgrades? My 106 sounded like it had been worked over at Maranello before making its way into my hands.

And it’s messing with those cars that will keep you coming back to NFSU2. The number of mods – both visual and performance – that you can apply to your car has skyrocketed from the first game. Once again, rather than just strictly tying the mods to cash – you know, like real life – you have to unlock them in game via the storyline, which to be frank is a little limiting.

Also controversial is the Grand Theft Auto-isation of the game – you cruise around several large zones and pull up at holographic style icons to participate in different races. It’s fun for 5 minutes, and then you will be looking at the more austere and to-the-point world map style interface to select your races in. You can tell where EA are heading with this ‘open cities’ idea, and doubtless in NFSU3, it will be expanded on in a bit more RPG-style detail. For now though, it’s pointless, especially seeing as there’s no car damage, so you end up just flooring it between challenges and bouncing off the (sparse) traffic.

EA have tried to sexify the racing modes, but it’s pretty bog standard. There’s that outstanding drag race element that won hearts from last years NFSU – tapping left and right switches lanes, time your gear changes and hit the boost at the right moment. There’s also standard crcuit racing variants, and a mode called OutRun, which is essentially you trying to lose a tail as quickly as possible. It’s pretty fun, and a mode that like drag, you’ll find hard to tire of. It’s racing for god’s sake – there’s only so much you can do with it!

Need For Speed Underground 2 is a typical EA upgrade – add a couple of cool new features, fix glaring omissions from the last game, and exponentially increase the amount of options and depth. But the ‘tude foisted on you comes across a little stale, and the posturing of the characters in the storyline is bound to make real tuner and mod fans cringe more than a little. For this reason alone, buy it. You’ll also get a great multiplayer, attractive racer thrown into the bargain. Not as huge a revolution as last year’s ultra high selling first Underground, but still worthy of consideration as a contender for SECOND best (hello Burnout 3!) arcade racer of the year.