The racing is classic - well, modern classic - NFS. It’s that frustration that twitchier racing games don’t have - although you could argue they’re harder to play in the first place. It’s just less nuanced than it could be in its car controls - and that means you’ll have those moments where you’re heading towards a wall or car or other obstacle and you realise you’re going to hit it, and there’s nothing you can do about it. Need for Speed Payback is definitely enjoyable.
That’s not to say at all that it’s not enjoyable, though. It’s an arcade racer, and that should come as absolutely zero surprise to anyone that’s played any of the recent titles in the series. When it comes to actual racing, it’s telling that EA demoed Need for Speed Payback PC with Xbox controllers hooked up rather than anything more serious - like, say, the racing wheel you’d use on a semi-sim like Project CARS or a full-on sim like iRacing. You get all the storyline you need from the intro video above. Boosting cars from trucks on the freeway, a group of rough and tumble I-don’t-got-friends-I-got-family going up against a legitimately evil cartel, regular cameos from a host of strong-willed and interestingly-motivated characters.
You’ll recognise the Payback story, too, as a melange of various Fast & Furious tropes. The Underground series has huge cultural cachet with a certain racing game-playing age group, and the Furious movies’ phenomenonal box office success makes it a no-brainer for the racing game to dip its toes back in the water. It was always pretty obvious to even a casual observer that a faux- F&F, baddies-versus-more-badder-baddies story was the direction that Need for Speed has been heading in for some time. It’s predictable in a good way, sure, but you always know what you’re signing up for.įrom my few short minutes playing through the same gameplay segment that was demoed in EA’s glitzy pre-E3 show, it’s pretty clear that Need for Speed Payback is an evolution of the existing franchise, but also adds in some gameplay elements that fans of the early takin’-it-to-the-streets Underground - and fans of the Fast & Furious movie franchise - will love.
Need for Speed is nothing if not predictable.
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