Gaming Target - PlayStation 2: Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit 2

Written by Adam Woolcott on February 14, 2002

First Impressions: I fought the law, and the law popped my damn tires!

Along with Gran Turismo, the Need For Speed series has always been one of my favorites within the racing genre. Fast cars, great tracks, awesome sense of speed (in the last 3 games, anyway), and tons of different modes are what define this series. Now EA, along with Black Box is resurrecting the popular NFS series with the PlayStation 2 incarnation, Hot Pursuit 2. A straight sequel to NFS III: Hot Pursuit (I know, the number thing is strange), Hot Pursuit 2 takes the best of the NFS series and brings it into the next generation. Scheduled for a May release, Hot Pursuit 2 intends on bringing the stagnant NFS series back into the limelight for another spin.

What makes the Hot Pursuit game stand out from other racing games is the Hot Pursuit mode. In this gameplay type, you are on the run from the law, who take much displeasure in your constant racing. They'll do anything it takes to run you off the road and arrest you Ц they'll start out light with multiple cop cars, and then bust out the speedy machines to outpace you (or try, anyway). If you're not stopped by then, out come the roadblocks, and when all else fails, the road spikes come out to give your nail guard tires a little deflation. Such is life on the hot pursuit.

When NFSIII came out, all you could so was play against the law. In NFS: High Stakes, you could play as the law, and run down those law-breaking bastards. With a few button presses, you could call for backup, be it the basic roadblock or those nasty spikes.

Hot Pursuit 2 should feature this option to play as either side of the law, as well as allow for a multiplayer mode where you can play head to head against a friend. If it's not included, there should be hell to pay for Black Box Games, the developer.

Besides that, Hot Pursuit 2 will have a Championship mode, where you race on the many tracks, to unlock new cars, and additional tracks for use in HP mode. Because everything is unlockable, it adds a multitude of replay, to go back and unlock all the bonus features, instead of getting them all at once.

Also returning to the NFS fray are cars from multiple manufacturers. Unlike the disappointing Porsche Challenge, which featured, you guessed it, nothing but Porsches, the game will feature top speedsters from all the usual suspects, as well as many new ones.You'll find Ferrari's, Porsches, Lamborghini's, the Dodge Viper, Lotus's, the Ford Mustang, and the McLaren line of racers. All in all, NFS HP 2 will have a total of 22 cars Ц yet only 5 cars are available at the onset; you'll have to unlock them as you go on.

Visually, NFS already looks great on PS2. It runs at 60 FPS and has detail that may not rival Gran Turismo 3, but I can't think of anything on the system that can equal that. The sense of speed will be high (it wouldn't be good if a Need for Speed game felt slow, would it?), making for intense action on the racetracks.