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Need for Speed Carbon (X360)

• Developer:
• Publisher: EA
• Genre:
• Official Website: http://www.ea.com
• Score: 2 of 5: Strictly Rental

The Need for Speed series is special. It's special in the sense that EA makes one of them every year, and yet, only seem to make a meaningful entry into the series every couple years. Last year's Need for Speed: Most Wanted did a good job of trying to update the series in a way that helped bring the Need for Speed title a bit more credibility, and for the most part, it succeeded much more than the Underground games ever did. Now, a year later, we get Need for Speed: Carbon, which serves as an excellent example of meeting low expectations. All things told, Carbon seems to take the Need for Speed series nowhere, and while the game can be entertaining in its own right, many of the new additions aren't very compelling. The multiplayer options have improved, but aside from that, many of Carbon's elements, including career mode and new game play ideas, fall flat.

Carbon seems to be the first Need for Speed title to directly tie itself to its predecessor. The story is continued from Need for Speed: Most Wanted as you drive in a BMW M3 GTR, which you won back from Razor in the last game, towards Palmont City. It's not long until Sergeant Cross, the police chief now turned bounty hunter from Most Wanted, catches up and totals your BMW. You're soon introduced to Darius, who informs you that you'll be working with him to take out the three rival gangs in the city and rebound from your run-in with Cross. As time goes on, you'll uncover a lot of the underlying plot behind Carbon, which includes you escaping the city one night after a massive police bust some time ago. Thus begins the career mode.

Career mode is ultimately similar to many of the previous Need for Speed titles. Notable differences include a return to urban street racing as well as night racing, but the biggest difference in Carbon is probably the street racing gangs that control territories throughout the city. At the start, you'll have to compete in races in territories in order to obtain them for your gang. Once you've taken over all of the territory from a gang, you'll have to race against the leader of said gang. Repeat four times, and you've essentially got Need for Speed: Carbon's career mode in a nutshell. It can often times feel a bit dull, and it also seems a little shorter than in previous games, which, given the dull nature, may not be such a bad thing.

There are some additions as well as omissions with the race types. Drifting has made a return after being absent in Most Wanted, and there are a few new online modes like "Be the Cop," which allows players to chase down another racer as the police. Drag racing is gone, although I can't say I miss it. Otherwise, many of the other modes remain the same. The sole exceptions are probably canyon duels, which seem to be the biggest update to the series this year, and quite honestly, it's a weak one. The mode essentially has you driving through a canyon trying to stay as close to your opponent as possible to rack up points. After finishing, you do it again, only this time, you're the leader. It seems like an excuse to race the same track two times, and it's also easily exploitable if you have a faster car than your opponent. Overall, though, the mode just isn't that fun or groundbreaking.

There is another addition that EA wants to push on us, which is the wingman system. This time, you'll have access to a number of wingmen that race alongside you in most races. There are three types of wingmen: defenders, who you can command to ram other racers (you'd think this was cheating), scouts, who outline your map and find shortcuts, and drafters, who let you gain speed by driving behind them. Really, the wingmen seem to be more trouble than they're worth, often times getting in your way and slowing you down more than actually helping you. At least they can win a race if they happen to be in first, and they do offer some career bonuses, but like canyon duels, they don't seem like a huge, must-have addition to the series.

So the career mode is fairly short and can probably be beaten in a weekend. Luckily, Carbon includes a couple other areas to keep us playing past the campaign mode. There are various quick races to play through, which seem to only help you gain some of the numerous reward cards in the game. There are also a number of challenge series events that you can complete on bronze, silver, and gold levels, most of which range from racing through a track in the given time limit, to running from the police for so long and getting away. Most of the challenge series races can be difficult and fun, but honestly, unless you're playing this on an Xbox 360 and are an achievement whore, you might never notice the other areas outside of career mode.

Well, save for the online play of course. The online modes in Carbon seem to be where EA has done the most improving to the series, as there are plenty of options, game types, and more to offer to online play. Online play also includes a sort of experience meter, and as you win races, or at the very least not come in dead last, you'll end up with experience points that will eventually lead to higher levels. There are plenty of game types to play online, including the aforementioned "Be the Cop" mode. The online play holds up pretty well, although when the lag hits, things can bog down very significantly, but even then, Carbon's faults in the single-player realm are outweighed at least some by the good online mode.

Graphics stack in at about the same level as they did in Most Wanted. It's a bit hard to tell if there is any significant improvement because of the difference in lighting (night driving in Carbon versus day driving in Most Wanted), but things do look fairly good and support HD visuals. I did notice a few drops in the frame rate from time to time, but it's nothing significantly damning. In terms of sound, Carbon is also up to par with most racing titles on the market, with fairly realistic engine and shifting sounds. The soundtrack is decent enough, although by this point, I usually kick in my custom Xbox 360 music. Most of the game's soundtrack seems to lie in the rap and techno fields, although I did notice that the music seems to be very subdued underneath the sound of engine and burning rubber compared to past games, placing the music a bit on the backburner.

I felt that Need for Speed: Most Wanted took the series and improved upon the Underground games significantly, but I can't say the same for Need for Speed: Carbon. In fact, I would compare Carbon's place in the series to that of Need for Speed Underground 2, which also seemed like a lackluster update to its predecessor. It isn't that Carbon is a terrible game, and it still ranks as a pretty enjoyable racer, but there isn't much inspiration to be found, and the new additions put into it are fairly weak. You might have that need for speed in your veins, but Need for Speed: Carbon probably isn't the best way to ease your twitchy pedal foot.

Feb 23, 2007 | 1 comments
Chris Massey