Fails at being what it wants to, succeeds at what it doesn't want to be
Immediatley as you set your profile for the very long and repetitive career which you obviously wish to do, you are given three driving aid styles which really allow you in essence to set yourself to how you want to play the game. In all the others the game did alot of the driving for you (corner wise), yet now you can choose the top level: 'KING' which means that all concepts such as oversteer and understeer are of your control, not the game's. This is where we get the mixed reaction however.
Because, Pro Street wants to be like its brother's, extreme racing with cars decked to the bonnet with upgrades, this is what it wants but it doesn't suceed. Instead; every race you do, every drift circuit you complete, every drag you finish, the game doesn't feel that extreme as you also would believe it to be. It reminds you of Grand Turismo in a way as the game falls into the grasp of being realistic rather than its adreniline filled brothers. You can tweak your car's settings in a major of ways through menus and methods that replicate Grand Turismo, it feels so similar that in the end you'll end up thinking this is GT5 when it certainly isn't.
But this game is not a disaster, the combination of adreniline failiure and realism success provides a strong thrill as you buy your numerous cars in order to compete in all four race types (speed, circuit, drag and drift). You begin to cherish every car you buy as you worry about damaging or totalling it. Although the crash graphics are poorer than those of a ps1 NFS, they're not needed, because the damage levels are very well implmented to the types of collision. For example; if you get shunted or shunt another car at about 60mph, LIGHT DAMAGE or HEAVY DAMAGE will definatley come up.
So in conclusion, Pro Street could be phrased as the Black Sheep of the NFS flock as it looses all the extreme thrill for a more real experience. You may feel confused to be playing a NFS like GT, yet as you slowly progress, you begin to cherish every race, every car and the reasonable graphics for the scenery which make a race all the more spectacular. You cannot simply discredit this game for failing at being like its brothers, but you have to credit it for being like GT, which is not what it wanted to be.