Need for Speed Unbound - Review (PC)

• Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
• Operating system:Windows 10 64-bit
• Processor:Ryzen 5 3600, Core i7-8700
• Memory:16 GB of RAM
• Video card:Radeon RX5700 (8GB), GeForce RTX 2070 (8GB)
• DirectX:Version 12
• Network:broadband Internet connection
• Memory:50 GB of available space

• Operating system:Windows 10 (64 bit)
• Processor: Intel: Intel Core i7-7700 3.6 GHz
• Memory:16 GB of RAM
• Video card:Zotac Geforce GTX 1070 AMP EXTREME with 8 GB VRAM
• Installed on disk:SSD 512GB SAMSUNG EVO
• Resolution:UHD 2560x1440

More round, more race!

Two years after the last title of the series,Unbound presents in everything and for all the general features that made the brand famous. NFS continues to attract to itself video players who want to spend time away from the most stressful simulators and have fun with its classic dynamics that are shaken by realism, focusing more on the more purely playful and unfair aspect of the guide.

The mode single player has three difficulty levels, linked more to the number of chances of repeating a test than to the skill of opponents. The level of IA in the race is however worthy of note: you will not be able to easily beat the strongest drivers if not with an almost perfect and error-free guide.

Errors that will sometimes be "caused" by almost sudden events and it will seem, at times, that in race against you there are not only opponents but an entire city. This is the most frustrating aspect of the game, which we also found in previous titles.Some manoeuvres made by cars on the road, as well as by the police in the middle of a race, seem almost carried out to cause exclusively our accident, always leaving the other drivers indemnity.

Before putting you behind the wheel, however, you will have the opportunity to create your pilot alter-ego and to live the evolution of dense story of scene shots, with the competitions to represent, of course, the highlights of the action. You will face challenges with car of different categories, defined according to performance ( B, A, A+, S, S+),that you will be able to customize completely to your liking both in components regarding aesthetic appearance, and in those regarding performance.

Open World in the presence, Arcade in the substance

The general structure is that of a Open-world that allows us to turn undisturbed, or almost, within the city of Lakeshore, alternating sprints, derapes, jumps and accidents to total destruction. At the end of the day, however, we are going to travel around the city exclusively to move from one event to another or to escape the police chases.

Police acting with 5 alert levels (a little like on GTA) and from which you can run away without too much difficulty.But look at the level of damage of the vehicle that, during a pursuit, becomes vital: in case of total destruction of your car, or if the police can block you, you will be arrested and you will be confiscated the cash you had hard earned on that day of racing.

The passage of days defines the longevity of the game very precisely: after a first part of introduction you will discover thefinal goalor that of participate in an event that will decree the best driver of the city. To do this, you will have to live 4 weeks of races through which you can earn money to buy and improve your car park and to enroll in qualificationsfor the final event.

The structure of the single day resumes the dynamics of some past titles and alternates the day races at night, with the only real difference in the fact that usually night races allow higher recesses and that return to the garage or refuge (if you unlock several during the game) in the morning allows you to pass directly to the evening, while returning in the evening you can go directly to the next day, also eliminating the alert level of the police.

The types of races are seven (the maximum measure of everything - cit. Dr. Culocane), all as already said divided by car category, where you participate with a variable registration fee depending on the type of event. In some casesyou will also earn, in addition to the cash premium, including already customised cars.

• Race Clandestina: A race in the heart of Lakeshore through curves and narrow streets.
• Ace of curves: A curved race to test your skills. Derapa or take the ideal trajectory to get to the head.
• Speed Race: A Lakeshore classic. Test your car on some straights.
• Deraptured event: Put the traverse car and compete to determine who is the phenomenon of derapes. Accumulate more time in derapture to get the highest score.
• Resistance: A wrinkle and determination test. Stay on track, don't make mistakes and come to the end.
• Bracket: The final test of your skills at the wheel. Derapa, jump, hit destructible objects and try to get the highest score.
• Head to Head: This time it's a personal matter: only you and another pilot. You play everything. Demonstrates who commands

During the various days you will also be contacted by some characters related to history who will ask you to make "lavoretti" for them, which will allow you to round your earnings or unlock new cars to buy, as well as shelters to use instead of your garage.

A completely new dynamic is the pre-gara betting system:whenever you face a challenge you can bet with one of the other drivers a default cash sum on who of the two will arrive first at the finish line. Winning the bet, I miss to say, will guarantee you valuable bonus revenue at the end of the race.

History and Environment

As already mentioned before, Need for Speed Unbound this time takes us to Lakeshore, metropolitan city of fantasy where the whole narrative plot develops.
The political scene, with the upcoming elections of the new mayor, is a backdrop to a city where the biggest problem is the clandestine races, which in turn play as protagonists in the electoral campaign of the two mayor candidates.

In this peculiar scenario you develop the story of your character, made of love for cars, competition but above all of betrayals and desire for rivalry.

The city of Lakeshore is a bit 'discounted' in its virtual urbanization, but it has a great variety of different views and scenarios and this has allowed developers to implement many different types of races.

In addition to the normal urban area, there is a good motorway network where you can reach the highest speedsOf the extra urban mountain areas characterized by insidious bends where you can give vent to your derapture better, in addition to a series of yards and underpasses where the evolutions and the most spectacular jumps.

Mari / lakes and mountains alternate in a landscape similar to what is possible to find around the American city on shore of Lake Michigan.

The multifaceted visual experience will allow an interesting story, but at times too repetitive, to retrace the classic dynamics that turn around the car racing in pure American style, with a strong hip hop propensityin all its forms.

In this sense, the participation of American rapper must be underlined. ♪ within the history of the game.

Style and technical features

If there is one thing that definitely amazes in this Need for Speed Unbound is the graphic style, bold and unexpected. The 3D graphics of the ambientation and the cars are accompanied by that of the characters and some special effects in cel-shading.

We're honest, the style used or you hate it or you love it, in any case it is to appreciate its boldness in choice. The alternation of details defined to the almost comic effects of the derapies and characters makes everything heterogeneous but at times disturbing.

The urban centers are slightly more defined than the natural landscapes where, if you stop looking well, you can see some pixelated detail that obviously goes on the second floor when you push your foot on the pedal.

We wondered why these graphic choices and the answer is possibly up two basic points:

1. The desire to give a precise and original identity to the title(Unbound = Uncirculated, out of the box)

2. Earning something in terms of fps especially for allow the execution of the game in 4k on consoles new generation.

The one obviously does not exclude the other , that is, it will be likely that with the excuse of creating an identification style the solution has been found to stabilize the fps by decreasing the less "useful" and even heavier details from the point of view of the necessary computing power.

One thing also really surprised us, and this time definitely positive, that is the extremely stable performance of the game. Optimized to the best for all types of platforms, Unbound makes the experience can also be enjoyed at very high details. In all cases playing in 2K (2560x1440) on a PC not of last generation, to average details, we are not never descended under 60 fps also in very popular stages (the screenshots were made in resolution 2K graphics ULTRA).

The audio department is another flagship of this title: hip hop/underground musicmake everything more immersive and help to create that atmosphere from American suburbs where the tuning and clandestine races make it the master. From good Italians we also signal a featuring an increasingly international Sfera Ebbasta in one of the 70 songs by international hip hop artists present in the game.

The possibility of customization present in the game allow to show off all your own creativity and creativity.In fact, we do not hide that, as always when we approach NFS, a good part of the game time we pass it precisely to customize the cars and to choose the style of our avatar. Several brands are present in the game, especially on the garment side, with brands of thicknessChampion, Vans, Puma, Fila, Palace, Born x Raised and Versace.

Wide choice from the point of view of the cars present. From classic to modern models with 34 brands and well143 cars: Acura, Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin, BMW, Bugatti, Buick, Chevrolet, Dodge, Ferrari, Ford, Honda, Infiniti, Jaguar, Koenigsegg, Lamborghini, Land Rover, Lotus, Mazda, McLaren, Mercedes, Mercury, MINI, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Pagani, Plymouth, Polestar, Pontiac, Porsche, SRT, Subaru, Volkswagen, Volvo. It is also not to exclude the possibility (which is perhaps almost certain) that additional cars will be added with updates in the coming months (you will need to see if in a free or paid way).

Lakeshore Online: has the potential but does not apply!

The online experience, which then is what should guarantee longevity to the game, takes everything and for all the dynamics of the single player. Of course there is no follow-up of day and night and days of the week, but it is present the system of races and events scattered for the map of our city.

I multiplayer servers host up to 16 players simultaneously, and these willparticipate in the races with a click whenever an event will start, or turn freely around the city and give vent to the crazy evolutions guaranteed by the open-world system. Here too the participation in the events guarantees a profit that can be invested successively in the purchase of cars, to enhance and customize them.

To emphasize that the avatar and multiplayer cars are different than those you own in the History mode, with the only exception of cars won in single player races. Those cars will also be available in the online garage, without obviously the improvements or customizations applied in the History mode.

Also here are all the types of race listed before. Unlike the single player, here events are divided into three races and not in a single race, taking back the structure of the final event of history and qualification events. In this sense, choosing an event to participate, we will have to face three different races all with the same category of car, or changing category in each race,allowing us from time to time to choose a different car from those present in our online garage.

In general, however, the online still seemed to us poor content.The potential is:new challenges, events, more captivating rankings and exclusive content could definitely enrich the multiplayer gaming experience, at the moment a little short.

The real enemy in these cases however is time, we wonder how long will it be before we can appreciate some improvement in this sense? And then, will the servers still be rich in drivers ready to compete?

We therefore feel that we can pronounce the famous phrase that your parents have heard dozens of times in the interview with professors: has the potential but does not apply!

At this point EA and Criterion decide what to do, try to improve or simply aim at sufficiency?

Conclusions

In the last two weeks we have spent more than 40 hours in Lakeshore streets, during which we managed to finish the story of single player and to experience the experience multiplayer.

History, leaving the scene shots, it turns out to be too repetitive in the four weeks preceding the final event and we do not hide that we have struggled to find the desire to bring it to an end.

The great potential of the open-world goes to collide with the few possibilities outside the race events. The police alert system, in our opinion, is to be reviewed: a few races are enough to send to the maximum state of alertness and chases often become long and exhausting if there is not some jump off road worthy of note.

The speed of police means is too far from logic and reality. In some situations you are overcome with extreme ease even traveling at extreme speeds. In short, the Italian Police also owns three Lamborghinis but, for the sake of fact, they are only three.

Among the best aspects, as already mentioned, there is graphic optimization, sound column and the large number of models available, as well as various car customization solutions.

The gameplay of the single race and the guide in general is also very fun and catchy. Spectacular details during the start of the various races; the reflections, the water on the asphalt and the rain droplets on the body take the attention of the player in those adrenaline seconds preceding the way. More present the elastic effect in running, especially during the release of NOS, but that is now a trademark of the title.

The game is totally translated into Italian both in audio and video content, Exception for ASAP Rocky rapper that maintains (in our opinion rightly) its original voice with subtitles, to further emphasize the participation of the character seen the comic aspect.

Small curiosity is the presence of a long, very long motivational speech during the scrolling of queue titles of the same rapper who tells and explains what he thinks is the true path to personal success. Nice for the first 5 minutes... then in the remaining 15 we have not followed it (pls don't hate us Rocky ndr.)

As we said above, the stylistic choice of relipping 3D graphics and cel-shading or you love or hate. To us he did not believe at all, de gustobus, but we recognize its originality and audacity in wanting to implement it.

Our attention now goes on the online and its future implications. We'll see if EA will want to make Need for Speed Unbound one of the longest titles of the saga or simply only the twenty-fifth title released from 1994 to today.