|
|
|
XGD > Xbox > Need for Speed: Carbon
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Information
Reviews Need for Speed continues..., November 19, 2006 Rating: 7.6/10 By Mitch Ever since Underground, the creators of Need for Speed have been incorporating The Fast and the Furious street racing image in all of their games, whether or not the production title was tagged with “Underground” or not. Most of them have carried their free roaming element too, and by now, you’d be tired of it. After Underground, Need for Speed: Most Wanted was released, which was more or less a revamped version of the game, including much better graphics and customizations, and included the greatest aspect of the game: police chases, something Underground was missing.
Need for Speed: Carbon is a sequel to Most Wanted, carrying over the same main character players grew to know via the games over the top and entertaining cutscenes. Most Wanted ended with the main character regaining his stolen car, which he seemed to work hard to recover, only to be ran out of the city of Rockport by Sergeant Cross who remained hot on his tail. Now, we’ve ended up in Palmont City where we’re ready to settle down. Immediately, things shake up when a bounty hunter smashes up your ride, and before he can take you in, your friend Darius steps in and bribes him. It turns out the bounty hunter was Cross all along, and now that his heat has been turned down for a while, you’re set loose in Palmont City.
Now, Need for Speed: Carbon tries to incorporate some story elements into this game, such as the fact Palmont City was the place the character had departed from in the first place, and has some nasty history there. The originality department is so successful, but if you’re playing this game, chances are it’s not for the story. Cutscenes return in this installment with their detailed graphics, but they slowly become cheesy as the characters symbolize the white, rich college kid type of menace that’s pretty humorous. It seems like everything has been downgraded in this game.
Gameplay wise, there are some new features among the pile of old. Scattered across the city are different areas to upgrade your car, and reaching them will often seem like a real chore to do. Like Most Wanted, there are plenty of cops around the city, but they’re more tired than ever. The police chases aren’t nearly as intense as they were in the past, and shave off a bit of the edge you had before when in hot pursuit, but it doesn’t make them boring.
The main new feature here is racer territories, which are areas on the map that are operated by racing crews. In total, there are four huge ones, taking over the entire city. Within the four blocks are different zones, all of them scattered about and in decent size waiting to be taken over. Since Carbon is a heavy racing game, the only way to take over a zone is to win events in that area. If you’re successful in two, the zone becomes yours, and you’ll have to continue the method through out all of the zones in a territory to claim it as your own. Through out the struggle, boss racers will begin to appear wanting a challenge, and the crews will also show up again wanting to take their territory back, so there’s always a race to be done.
Amidst races, you’re not longer the lone racer who’s acting alone. In Carbon, you’re allowed to bring in a CPU friend to the races, who come in three varieties, although they never prove to be much of help. Blockers are like rabid dogs being set off their leash. Let them run loose in a race with you, and they’ll try to spin out anyone that gets in your way. Scouts pull in front of you, find the nearest short cut and let you follow them until you’ve cleared it. Your final best friend is the Drafter, the car that will speed ahead of you at a reasonable distance to allow you to draft him, which allows you to gain more and more speed the longer you can follow behind another car, so the two of you can speed past opponents in no time.
Your friends sound like a lot of help, but in reality, they often fail at what they’re supposed to do, and a lot of moments in the game will have you cursing at their poor behavior. They can be necessary to win, but at other times, they’re just pointless.
Need for Speed: Carbon caught my attention for a good amount of time, because I enjoyed what little time I had with Most Wanted. Aside from that, it can grow tiresome after a while. As I always say, if you’re a die hard racing fan, then this game can be for you. But if racing falls under “mediocre” in your department, this game deserves a rent.
Similar Games
Buy It
From eBay:
From Amazon
|
|
|
|
|
Add to Collection
