A nice and awaited upgrade from the first. This time with celebrity breasts!
User Rating: 8.6 | Need for Speed Underground 2 (Greatest Hits) PS2
Hehe, I knew that title would draw someone! But seriously, NFSU 2 is a very fun and in depth game into the world of street racing. That is, if you consider this travesty of a fantasy they created street racing. Basically, this game is so far from realistic, it's not even funny, but it does make the game fun, so screw it. NFSU 1 was really cool, as it was the first game to not only delve you into the street racing scene, but really let you customize all kinds of things on your car, it was crazy. Now, NFSU 2 is here, and it's more of the same, but with plenty of additions. The driving physics haven't really changed here, except for now, there's rain, although it really doesn't seem to do anything to your traction, not much anyway. But I guess they added the rain to explain for the constantly wet looking streets, unfortunately, it rains approximately once every 5 minutes in Bayview. The big new addition is the free roaming mode, which they totally jacked from competitor SRS (Street Racing Syndicate). Honestly though, free roaming was the only thing SRS had over NFSU, and now NFSU 2 has taken that away. Unfortunately, SRS allowed you the ability to automatically jump to anywhere in the city instead of driving there, NFSU 2 didn't get that memo (must be lost with the TPS reports!). In fact, the new free roaming mode is quite a hastle. EA saw GTA San Andreas make a huge new map and though it was a good idea. Well, it wasn't a good idea for racing games. It takes far too much time to get from place to place (often longer than the race itself), and the long loading times really kill the mood. Not too mention the 10 or so mediocre songs that repeat over and over again, luckily you can turn them off, but then you have no music to race to! Anyway, another big addition is the new stuff you can put on your car. A lot more of everything from the original, including body kits, lights, vinyls, etc. But now you can add hydraulics (which have crappy controls and are worth nothing more the visually upgrade to your car) and spinners, which are actually cool. Did I mention you can get SUVs in 2? No? Well, you can, an H2, Escalade, and Navigator, which all look great on the 26" spinners you can put on them. Unfortunately, they handle like a brick (although I've gotten my h2 to do an 11 sec 1/4 mile!). Same race modes are here, but now you get a URL (Underground racing league) mode, which hosts most of the game's cinematic sequences, and the Street X mode, which is a technical race on tight drift tracks. Unfortunately, all of the voice acting is either weak (Brooke Burke) to absolutely horrible (the main bad guy). And the writing is through the floor bad. They really had monkeys do the dialogue for this one. They use slang that would make anyone embarassed. And they use it so poorly, too. Also, the story is very weak, and goes away for quite a while without seeing it again, so you can pretty much just enjoy the game without the cutscenes. There are now visual ratings for your car, from 0 stars to 10 stars, in incriments of 1/100th of a star. Basically, you just need stars to get paid more by photographers and to be able to access certain photographers. You get more stars by adding things to your car to make it look prettier (this is the only place you'll get use for the hydraulics). Now, for the online feature. Well.....I admit, I didn't do my homework here. I'm afraid you'll have to look at someone else's review for it. All I know is that there aren't any content DL's, I checked. Finally, there's the great new Race Breaker feature! Sound cool, huh? Well, its not really. It's just a feature the game borrowed from its sister racer, Burnout 3: Takedown where you do things like have close calls with other traffic and do drifts to gain more nitrous (or "boost" in Burnout 3's case). But enough about the new, now for what makes NFSU 2 an NFSU: The physics of the driving are okay, fun even, but nothing as realistic as Gran Turismo 3, but that's okay. Visually, NFSU 2 is stunning, with highly detailed environments that don't carry the whole Flintstones background feel. The cars look kinda cool, although they're a much more fantasy look than maybe they should be (they look like they've just been waxed 500 times). Unfortunately, still no car damage (unlike SRS) because EA couldn't get the car licensers to agree to it. The cutscenes are weak, as they're all still shots, many in a comic book page (lame idea, EA). But the gameplay is fun, my favorite is the drag racing, which well simulates real street drag racing, except for all of the cars on the street. Drift is my second favorite, especially with a rear wheel drive car (for some reason, front wheel drive cars can to incredible donuts in this game!). And circuit and sprint races are pretty much there to fill in the game. And there you have it. I might have sounded pretty nasty on the game, but look at all my other reviews, I'm always critical (except on Goldeneye 007, of course). I do really like this game, enough that I bought it, even on my very tight budget right now. This game isn't entirely one that you'll sit down and play throughout the night on, more of a few hours here and there (it gets a little stale if you play too much in one sitting). So rent it, buy if you have some cash, you'll get a good 20 some odd hours out of its play.
