By Ned Jordan
Fasten your seatbelt, here come the clichés. The "shift" in Need for Speed
SHIFT is of the paradigm sort. This iteration in the long-running series
represents a total franchise reboot. The "street" has been taken out of the
street racing game and the result is a game that has shades of Gran Turismo but
is far more accessible. Racing sim purists may scoff, but for everyone else Need
for Speed SHIFT delivers some serious racing excitement.
SHIFT dispenses with all of the story that was packed into recent Need for
Speed games - which is probably a good thing because the rookie street racer
racing his way to the top thing was getting a little worn out. A disembodied
voice speaking to you through your radio headset offering racing tips at the
start of each race is the closest thing you'll get to a story this time out.
SHIFT shows you that it's seriously all about the racing right from the start as
it immediately drops you behind the wheel of a car and has you run a few
practice laps. These laps are used to gauge your relative skill level and the
game will automatically adjust its realism settings based on how well you handle
your first few laps. Of course you can fine tune the difficulty settings on your
own, but it's nice to have the game adjust itself automatically at the start
rather than forcing you to run a number of races that are either far too
difficult or way too easy before you find the settings that you prefer.
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The practice laps also give you your first look at how much things have
changed in SHIFT. First of all you're now racing on closed courses and not
weaving through traffic on city streets. Second, your default view is no longer
from a chase camera sitting behind and above your car; SHIFT is meant to be
played from the driver's seat. Sure, you can switch the game camera to the chase
view that you're used to seeing, but I don't know why you would want to
considering how impressive the cockpit viewpoint is in the game. Capturing the
feel of speed in a videogame isn't easy, which makes it even more impressive
that SHIFT does such a great job doing so. The game makes going 200 MPH actually
feel like 200 MPH, not just in the way the scenery flies past but in a myriad of
subtle ways as well - sound, jitter, vibration; you can almost feel all those
horses putting a strain on the metal and rubber surrounding you. I've played
racing games in which I've flown off of curves because I wasn't closely watching
the speedometer and had no idea how fast I was going, but in SHIFT I can tell
when I'm approaching a curve at too high a speed because it feels like I'm going
too fast. SHIFT also makes wrecks feel like wrecks. The viewpoint will snap in
the opposite direction from the collision just as your head would snap towards
the impact point and if the impact is hard enough the screen will momentarily
fade to grey or black just as your vision would after a nice little knock to the
head. It's not just a gimmicky effect - it really makes you feel each collision,
so much as can be felt in a videogame.
The game's career mode is not so much a career as it is a progression of
event tiers. Within each tier there are a number of events for you to compete in
and master, that include both straight races and other competitions such as
drift events, elimination races, manufacturer events, best lap time
competitions. Each class of event in a tier will be comprised of a number of
individual events each set on a different track, so there's plenty of variety
within each tier. Most racing games would require you to win all of the events
at a level before advancing to the next, but SHIFT employs an interesting reward
system that's not entirely tied to being the first to cross the finish line.
SHIFT employs a point system that measures your race performance in two
categories: precision and aggression. You earn precision points by doing things
like sticking to the Gran Turismo style racing line on the track (the line shows
you the best path through the course and dynamically changes colors to indicate
when you need to let off the gas or apply the brakes to get through a stretch),
passing opponents cleanly, and mastering turns and corners. You earn aggression
points by bumping opponents, spinning them out, drafting, and other such
aggressive race maneuvers. These points accumulate to determine your driver
level, and your driver level leads to unlocked accessories and detailing items
in the garage. Also, each race has a couple of point thresholds and if you
accumulate enough total points in a race you'll earn stars for the race - more
on stars in a bit. For these things it doesn't matter whether you earn your
points through precision or aggression, but the difference does come into play
for two things. The first is that as you level the game builds you a custom
racing badge that others will be able to see online. Earn more precision points
since your last badge upgrade and you'll get a precision related piece, or earn
an aggression related piece if you earn more aggression points. It's an
interesting way to advertise your driving style to others online, but it doesn't
go much beyond that. The other difference between precision and aggression
points is that the game has a multitude of badges that you can earn, and the
badges are tied to specific precision and aggression milestones such as cleanly
passing 25 other cars or trading paint with 100 rivals. One last thing of note
on the precision/aggression points is that you can earn them in online races as
well and they will be added to the same totals as your offline points, so you
can advance in level by racing in a mix of offline and online events.
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