Despite some very questionable design choices, Need for Speed Carbon is a tremendously enjoyable racing game.
The story in Carbon picks up right where Most Wanted finished, with you escaping from the police and fleeing out of Rockport in search of new territory, having reached legendary status amongst the police's most wanted list (the Blacklist). Unfortunately for you, your old buddy Cross (one of your rivals from Most Wanted) won't let you off so easily and is still in pursuit of you. The game starts with Cross chasing you, and inevitably, your car gets totaled, Cross gets a hold of you, and you're introduced to a new set of rivals, whom you'll have to defeat as you attempt to take over the city. While the story isn't as engrossing as the one in Most Wanted, it's still enjoyable and not without a few twists. For one, the hot girl isn't on your good side (played by Emmanuelle Vaugier) right from the startup, since she's actually your ex-girlfriend. Though she's forced to help you at the beginning, she wastes no time showing her dislike for your actions when you left Palmont City (it's assumed this was your old turf). Carbon's story centers itself around the night you left Palmont City, were a mysterious incident occurred in which you were the only who managed to flee from the police, while taking a nice bounty for yourself. Throughout the game, more tidbits around this event will be revealed. The story manages to be captivating and as was the case in Most Wanted, is delivered through some excellent FMV sequences, which for the most part are hilarious (intentionally and unintentionally).
Carbon spices up the NFS formula by shifting the focus of the game from evading the cops or climbing the ranks, to gaining territory. You will compete with rival gangs for small territories, while slowly gaining control of the whole city. In order to take over a small territory you have to win 2 of the 3 races in that territory. Once you've taken enough territories within a district, you can challenge the gang's boss. These boss races are 2 stage events, a normal race across the city and a canyon duel.
Canyon duels are the main new race type introduced in Carbon. The setup is simple; you and your opponent start at the top of a canyon, and on the first round, you'll start behind your opponent, trying to keep your distance. The second round is the opposite, with you being the chased. In this races you're not allowed to use your NOS or your time breaker, so passing your opponent isn't as easy as in a normal race. But if you manage to do that and stay in front for 10 seconds (or if you manage to pull away far enough), you'll instantly win. It's a neat concept and it provides a real challenge. Unfortunately it's also the source of immense frustration, because for some unforeseeable reason, the developers decided that if you fail in the second stage of the race, you have to start all the way from the first stage. I'm gonna quote Yahtzee Crosshaw by saying that "this aspect of the game can f*ck right off!". As if the high difficulty wasn't daunting enough, you'll have to put up with the prospect of repeating those damn things over and over again. Fortunately, with the right car and the right tuning, it's always possible to quickly overtake your opponent and pull of the 10 second getaway win.
However that's not the only frustrating aspect of Carbon. At the start of the game you'll be given the chance to choose what type of car you want to start your career with. The choice you make determines which district you'll start in as well which upgrades you'll unlock first. Given my preference for well balanced cars, I chose an Exotic car, which meant I started in the district dominated by Wolf's gang, TFK. The races leading up to the battle with Wolf provided no problems at all, but once I encountered Wolf, it was a battle to no avail. The reason for this was that Wolf's ride was simply too powerful for my sucker of a car, and unfortunately, due to the unlocks associated with this district, I had no access to either a better car that could pull the trick, nor better upgrades that could even up the battle. Believe it or not I was forced to restart my career and choose a Tuner car instead of an Exotic. Starting in the downtown district proved to be much better since not only did I have access to better upgrades and one particularly excellent car (the RX-7), but the district's boss, Kenji, wasn't impossible to beat. From there on, it was a smooth ride through the other two districts. The second encounter with Wolf went ahead with no hiccups. While it didn't take long for me to recover my lost progress in the career mode, it's still unforgivable that the game would put you in such a situation.
Putting those issues aside, once the racing is up and going, it's a blast. NFS Carbon introduces a crew element (due to the turf wars you'll engage in), where you'll be able to hire different drivers across your career and select them as your wingmen during races. This is a really excellent addition to the game. Wingmen come in three varieties: blockers, drafters, and scouts. Blockers will interfere in any nearby rival path at your request, drafters will provide a chance to get a speed boost by drafting them and getting the correspondent slingshot effect, while scouts will highlight any available shortcuts. While none of their roles are essential to victory, they can provide some crucial help when things get hairy, but the best aspect of the wingmen is that as members of your crew, if they win a race, you win. When you consider that in every previous NFS game, it was you against the world, it's nice to have some real help on the road for once.
Another great feature is your ability to neatly tweak for your car's performance. It's not just upgrades that you'll install, you'll be able to specifically tune your car for different situations. Whether it's better acceleration, high top speed, drifting, better handling around corners, all those elements can be tweaked to your liking. This allows you to tune your car for specific events, which can sometimes be the difference between victory or defeat.
Carbon's emphasis on enhancing the actual racing means that the cops' role in the game has been greatly downgraded. While the cops are here, and they'll get in your way should cause too much trouble, police chases are few and far between. While this may seem like a step backward, with the focus on the game not being evading the police, I felt that Carbon succeeded at distinguishing itself from Most Wanted by making the standard racing much more enjoyable (in Most Wanted the racing felt more like a chore at certain times, when compared to the exciting police chases).
The career mode in NFS Carbon is much shorter than the one found in all previous NFS installments. This is both due to a smaller number of races, as well as an overall lesser level of difficulty, particularly in the initial three districts, where you'll raise hell along with your crew. Unfortunately the difficulty curve in Carbon goes way up once you enter the fourth and final district. This really breaks the flow of the game quite a bit and can lead to plenty of frustrating moments. But what really feels like a slap in the face is the final boss encounter in the game. This is a multiple race event, which consists of 4 races, two against the three crew leaders you had previously beaten, and two against the final crew leader. The first two races aren't too hard, but the last two are insanely difficult. However none of this would be too bad if it wasn't for the fact that the game will force you to do all four races in one shot. Should you decide to take a break and exit the game before finishing all four races, you'll be forced to start from scratch. This terrible design issue prevents Carbon from ending with a bang, and don't be surprised if you end up watching the final credits on YouTube, rather than on the game itself.
The presentation in NFS Carbon is top notch. The game uses the same graphics engine as in Most Wanted, and while the permanent night setting doesn't help to provide as impressive visuals as those found in Most Wanted, they're still pretty sharp. Cars in particular look spectacular, and there's a great attention to detail spread across the city. One aspect however that I personally didn't like, is the unrealistic trail effect that cars leave as they cruise around the city. It just doesn't look good at all, leading to a more cartoony, over the top look. Overall though, the graphics are awesome. The sound is great too, as has been in every previous NFS game. Cars sound realistic, the music selection is good (though it seems underused at times since during most races you'll hear the same tune over and over), and the voice acting during the FMV sequences is solid.
Need for Speed Carbon feels a bit rough around the edges, but it succeeds at distinguishing itself from its amazing predecessor, something that is no small feat. Terrible design issues aside, this game provides an excellent racing experience that fans of the series as well as new players will thoroughly enjoy.