6 years old in November but still the best Need For Speed!
The game has a good, structured career mode which I find much better than in NFS: Undercover. That game seemed to have random cutscenes now and again, but in Most Wanted there is a basic formula: Win races, complete milestones (e.g. ram 3 police cars in a pursuit and escape) and get bounty from escaping tense police pursuits.. then race a "blacklist" rival and get to the top of this list of the 15 best street racers in the county. Once you beat one you get to choose 2 markers, which can get you upgrades, or mystery markers that can get you a get of of jail free, cash, an extra chance for your car so it's not impounded by police, or their car! Every now and then you'll get these brilliant cutscenes though that help progress the story further.
The races in NFSMW are on the whole, great. The sundrenched city looks great and this game (still) has some of the best handling I've EVER used in a game. It's brilliant. The cars in Most Wanted have plenty of grip but skid brilliantly , and you can still drift well with the handbrake. In newer NFS games, the cars have heavy, unresponsive steering and artificial drifting. In this, it really is you driving, and it's great fun. Seriously, the best handling street racer ever. Period.
The police chases are great and pretty tense. You can ram and disable the police, that get progessively harder as the chase goes on. Driving through destuctable "pursuit breakers" (often in the form of a giant donut) can also immoblise the pursuing cars for you. There are also hiding places that speed up the "cooldown" period, once you've lost the cops and they're looking for you. But if you're busted it's a different story entirely: a funny cutscene shows your player getting arrested. Sadly, if you're busted 3 times your car can be impounded (but you can just turn off the console ;D ). You can also do a challenge series which is no way linked to career, if you are really worried about your beautiful car being taken away.
The map itself is relatively small compared to newer games, but it looks great, has variety over the 3 main regions and is relatively memorable (unlike in some of the latest installments, which have lots of boring, generic highways). You get a decent amount of cars and customization (although NFS: Underground 2 for the last generation of consoles had more modification), so you can a relatively unique ride.Sadly, the cars are now quite old and many models have now been facelifted or completely replaced, but this isn't a huge problem. I can't imagine someone ramming police cars in a brand new lambo anyway..
The good:
Looks great
BRILLIANT handling
You can have a sweeeet car
Tense blacklist races and police chases
Interesting map
The bad:
Not much really, but customization on the previous game, Underground 2 was better
Cars seem a little dated, and theres not as many as in other games
Overall 9.5/10, this is a great game to get. Nowadays it's really cheap too, so definitely worth buying due to it's lovely graphics and handling. On the older consoles, Underground 2 is also worth buying, although it's in the night-time and there's no police.