This title is so amazing, that the police would want to lock up the developers for making such a badass game.
The player enters Rock Port city with a really awesome BMW M6 GTR, he meets Mia, one of the street racers of the city. As the player proves his worth, he is meet by Police officer Sgt Cross, who vows to take the player down. As the player process in the beginning, he races Razor, a top street racer, who later and unfairly wins your vehicle.
The police arrive and with no vehicle to escape in, Sgt Cross arrests the player. With lack of evidence, the player gets released and meets with Mia, who tells you that Razor is the most wanted in Rockport City and has used your BMW to get to the top. However to get to the top, the racer needs to defeat other racers on the most wanted list, this list is called the 'Blacklist 15'.
The whole city is an open world environment where you have 2 other areas to unlock during the process of the game, the races are set from Dawn until Dusk, unlike the previous night racing.
The graphics of the game have improved and with the High Range Rendering, make the game look alittle more realistic. The cars in the game looks really good with smooth model body works and the sound they give when they drive off sound like there counterparts.
The player sets out to buy a car and here were the real game starts. To defeat the blacklist members, the player needs to complete a set number of races and milestones and have a limited amount of bounty to compete.
There are some new race events in the game. The Circuit, Sprint, Drag and Lapknock out still exist in the game, however the two new events are Speedtrap and Tollbooth.
Tollbooth is a time attack mode and reaching other tollbooths which are check points.
Speedtrap is where the player drives past multiple of speed camera at the fastest speed, the speed gets recorded, at the end of the race, the player speed is totalled up and giving out the end score, the racer with the highest score wins the event. The score is reduced over a period of time after an opponent crosses the finish line first.
Milestones are used in the pursuit part of the game, when you are being pursuit by law enforcement, examples of milestones include avoiding spike strips, smashing or avoiding roadblocks, being pursuit for a lengthy amount of time or to evade and escape a pursuit in the short amount of time.
The pursuit of the game are the most exciting and interesting part of the game, depending on how much hassle your vehicle has to offer, the law enforcement will issue you with a 'heat level', this 'heat level', ranging from 1 to 5, will bring out most powerful vehicle to slow down or halt your car, this range from simple Civic from Heat Level 1 to SUVs, road blocks and spike strips on level 4 to powerful Corvettes on level 5. The player can immobilize the vehicles in the game earning him bounty. Useful elements have been added in the police chases such as pursuit breakers can be used to immobilize a whole squadron of vehicle, which is useful if you want to quickly escape or earn a lot of bounty in the process. A 'speedbreaker' will slow down time and add more weight and control to your vehicle which is useful to avoid roadblocks or spike strips.
Evading the police for a while will activate a 'Cooldown' mode, where enforcement is looking for the player, the player can hide in the hiding spot which will speed up the cooldown mode, completing this cooldown mode will end the police pursuit and earning you the bounty or completed milestone you earned.
Getting caught however will give you an option to buy your fines or use a 'Get out of Jail' card and act like nothing ever happened. The player will also get an impound strike, which when the strikes are filled up, the vehicle will get impounded.
The customization feature has been reduced, however it is still playable as it can reduce your heat levels as well making your vehicle look visually good. Another way to reduce your heat level is to drive other vehicles in your safe house for a period time.
When challenging Blacklist members of the game, winning their race events will give you an option of 6 markers and the player has to choose two of them, if you're lucky, you can obtain a pink slip and have the opponents ride. Other markers include free body, part or visual work on your vehicle.
The stories pace get interesting and it kept up with continuous phone calls and text messages throughout the game.
Other features include a challenge mode, where you are offered to complete up to 60 challenges to the game, which gives you extra rewards in the game and a Rap sheet, which process every blacklist member including the player in the city, the game offers you to be number 1 on the Rap Sheet and give you a reward at the end of it.
This game offers a totally reworked formula for the pass Need for Speed titles, it proved to be a great enjoyable game which works extremely well for today standards, despite being a short game.