Need For Speed Underground 2

Here is my first review. It is for the game Need For Speed Underground 2.

Title: Need for Speed Underground 2
Developer: EA Games
Platform: Gamecube, XBox, Playstation 2
Genre: Custom Racer

As you know, when the first one came out, people were astounded with the graphics and ability to customize your own street machine. The second one offers even more customization and even better graphics. But there are some downsides. Read my full review here...

STORY
If you have beaten the first game, you know that you were the King of the Streets, you had all kinds of street cred, and many people feared you as the ultimate racer. The Second game starts off within the same month of the ending of the first game. You are cruising through the streets, looking for races to make some more moolah, when an SUV comes out from no where and slams into the side of your car. Although you survive, you are in the hospital for 6 months. You have lost all your street cred, you ride is smashed and your friend leaves the city. She leaves you in the care of her friend (voiced by Brooke Burke) Rachel. You get out of the hospital and you start the game in her car. You then work your way back up the underground ladder and try to reclaim your title as King of the Streets.

GRAPHICS
The graphics are a step up from the first one. You see the reflections of everything you drive past in your paint, and the lights light up even the darkest of alleys. The cars look exactly as they do in real life. The locations, although they aren't real, look as though they came from a real city. The only down side is the extra cars, they are just plain generic boxes with lights to look real, but when your doing excess speeds of 200 on the freeway, who can tell and who cares.

GAMEPLAY
Newer games in the custom racer genre are hard to tell the responsiveness of vehicles, because they are very real in the areas of handling and performance. You may press the D-Stick to go left, and your car will still slide forward, because you have crappy tires or horrbile suspension. But the controls, with a fully tricked out (performance) car is excellent, and the vehicle responds to the slightest tap of the D-Stick. The meat of the game is the races, and probably the only reason you are reading this review. There are a few new race modes and a city map to race around on and find the races. Each race is a little color icon that shows what type of race it is. There are Drag, Drift, Sprint, Street X, URL, and Circuit. The 2 new race modes are Street X, a circuit race on a drift track, and URL, Underground Racing League, a race that gets you sponsors and the big bucks. You have many races all around the city, and you choose which you want to complete, but you eventually have to do the URL to continue with the story. As you complete the races you will get very few things unlocked. You will get some kits and small upgrades, but the real earnings are the Outrun races. The Outrun races are done on the city streets against other street machines. You get up close behind them, and if they flash thier tail lights press up(Gamecube version) on the D-pad to accept the challenge, and you will have to get ahead of them, and outrun them (put 1000 feet between your rear bumper and thier front bumper). You get small money and major unlocks this way, but if they win, then you lose money. The Minimap is your main tool for navigating the city of Bayview(Same as in San Andreas isn't it?). The icons on your map are as follow: Circles with black center--Races; Solid Circles--Shops; Green Arrow--You; Orange Arrows--Outrun challengers; White lines--Streets.

MULTIPLAYER
This is the main downside to this game. The multiplayer is just using your cars or whatever cars you pimped out at the main menu, and race them on tracks you've raced in career mode. It is a very dull racing mode, that could have been done better. Oh, and you can change the Traffic density, weather, and direction (forward or reverse) you race the track, so there are a few options in multiplayer.

SOUND/MUSIC
The sounds are amazing! The sound of your engine humming when your doing blinding speeds, and taking neck-breaking turns, down to the tires skidding when you burn out. Even your engine over-revving and getting ready to blow sounds great. Well not great as in blown engine, but great as in its great they got the sound. You could choose between Automatic or Manual Transmission and you could actually use th engine noise to check when your supposed to change gears, just like in real life. The soundtrack is pretty small, but there are a few songs from a few different genres of music, so its not just for the Hardcore Gangstas out there. (my favorite is Snoop Dogg eaturing The Doors--Riders on the Storm)

REPLAY-ABILITY
Well, its not THAT high, but there is some value there if you want to get the rest of the visual upgrades, which you can do after you beat the game. It allows you to race and rerace all the races in the game, and even do the outruns to get more upgrades.

SPECIAL
The most noticable addition to this game is the SUV's Cadillac Escalade, and the Ford Navigator. You can put a MASSIVE speaker set up in the back of these vehicles, up to 12 different things. The other vehicles allow for smaller speaker/trunk visuals, and you can put split hoods (hoods that open from the middle out) and suicide or scissor doors, as well as put Neon in the trunk and engine. The visual pimping is almost endless.

Overall I give this game:
9.0/10


P.S. How was my review people?