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While Im not the usual rice boy fan, I do find the experience of the Need for Speed series sometimes very appealing and relaxing.

Need for Speed Underground was excellent. Nice graphics, ability to tune up cars, interesting modes (like drift) and TONS of adrenaline packed races. I've finished the game.

Need for Speed Underground 2 was actually a bit boring, so after completing about 1/3 of the game I lost interest.

Need for Speed Most Wanted: added cop chases, nice cheesy fmv cutscenes. An excellent arcade action flick for those cold winter evenings

Need for Speed Carbon: [rant] Fuck EA. They released a product so unpolished that I can't even tell whether I like this game or not! For example, the support for force feedback is screwed up - there is no way to turn it off and it is bugged in a sense that during a race it can suddenly go "hard left or hard right". Its no fun to struggle with the joystick during a race. I've got enough problems with speed, cornering and tackling opponents. [/rant]

Luckily, Im not a lifeless fanboy whore, so I will simply put this one on a shelf until a patch comes out. But it is frustrating: although the NFS series is deteroriating, I still anticipate the coming of the next titles of the series.

No way, a huge every-platform-and-it's-dog EA game has a crap PC version?

I have to think back as far as C&C Generals to remember a good EA game

Are you playing it on the PC, Tolya? I'm at 62% career completion using my keyboard, and though I've got no force-feedback issues, the collisions and handling downright piss me off sometimes. But they did take out the "catchup" AI! These are my major beefs with the game:

- The "crew" AI can be downright retarded sometimes: I've lost track of how many times I've been in a Speedtrap race and my wingman cuts in front of me and hits me about two car lengths before I hit a speedtrap. One time I took a shortcut that was an alley that sliced straight through a huge "S"-turn, and my teammate T-boned my car as she came around the first part of the turn. Other than that, my wingmen have hit me and slowed me down countless times. My favorite wingman type is the "scout". I need those shortcuts.

- Lack of race variety. There are no more drag races, and the new Canyon Duel races just don't excite me that much. Drift races are a major pain for me - I haven't finished one yet. Underground 2 had great race variety, and it's been slowly whittled down since then.

- The cops are just sort of "there". OK, having cops in the game makes it more realistic. Underground 2 was fun, but racing around unimpeded got a bit boring. In Carbon, cops will disrupt races and try to bust you, but they aren't integrated into your goals like in Most Wanted, where you need to run up bounty, milestones, and infractions to challenge the blacklist racers.

I plan on finishing the game, though I don't anticipate a replay unless some issues are fixed.

Are you playing it on the PC, Tolya? I'm at 62% career completion using my keyboard, and though I've got no force-feedback issues

Well, it would be funny if you had any. Keyboards don't usually come with force feedback.

Tolya wrote:

Are you playing it on the PC, Tolya? I'm at 62% career completion using my keyboard, and though I've got no force-feedback issues

Well, it would be funny if you had any. Keyboards don't usually come with force feedback.

Yeah, poorly worded post on my part . Though the board does sometimes vibrate when my brother-in-law is playing his drums in the next room. What I meant to say was maybe you could try the keyboard, but that shouldn't be the fix for your problem. The damn thing should work right out of the box. Sorry about that.
Overall, NFS: Carbon has been a pretty big disappointment thus far. There just doesn't seem to be as much to do as Underground 2 and Most Wanted.