Rumors are circling that the new Need for Speed game – to be officially revealed this Thursday – will be the next NFS Underground.
EA is no stranger to handling precious IP’s and reboots; what with it being responsible for both the new Star Wars Battlefront and the new Mirror’s Edge game in the future. But is Need for Speed Underground in safe hands?
Perhaps that depends more on the developers. Whilst I thought that the 2012 reboot of Need for Speed Most Wanted was absolutely fantastic – the best in the long-running franchise, no less – many gamers disagreed. A lot of the criticism was directed toward Criterion Games if only because the studio had never made a Need for Speed game before, instead having been responsible for the Burnout franchise prior.
Well, it’s safe to assume that with Criterion working on a mysterious new IP of their own, the next Need for Speed is likely to be handed over to another studio – most likely Ghost Games – the studio responsible for the most recent outing – Need for Speed Rivals.
The teaser below hints at an Underground-esque theme and there’s strong evidence to suggest that’s exactly what we’ll be getting, as Ghost Games boss Marcus Nilsson told VideoGamer.com two years ago that “if people would come to me and say, you know… make Underground 3 with Frostbite 3 with exactly the same features and you’ll go back and sell 15 million copies, then yes, I would build that game. I would. But it’s not that simple.” Well, perhaps it will be happening after all.
The NFS franchise has not been active since 2013 so it will be intriguing to see it return, but are you excited by the prospect of a new Need for Speed Underground, or do you worry that the development team will disappointment the faithful fans of the franchise?