5 Hollywood Influences

Somebody please tell EA and the developers under their wing to halt the Hollywood presentations in several of their games.

In the past decade the clinging and cloying of the Need For Speed franchise’s attempts at cuddling up to Hollywood has seen a myriad of ill-fitting grabs at replicating the spectacle and the drama of a blockbuster – ending up as roadkill B-movie dross that only serves to embarrass a once great series.

Need For Speed: Undercover is one example of a downward trajectory for the acclaimed NFS series. The garishly abhorrent ‘voice acting’ of the title, fronted by a sexually seductive fatale who talks at you in pre-rendered cutscenes, tries to immerse you in its webbed criminal underworld. But instead they do a greater job of coming off as multi-second spurts of flatulent, where you’re vaguely given some context – but none of your actions in the game are reflected upon in the cinematics – making you a tool who can’t speak let alone object to this dreadfully designed husk of a game. Not content at stopping there, the cringe-inducingly cliched representations of Hispanics are so distasteful to hear, you may instead opt to contact your local audiologist to remove traces of left over turgid dialogue.

Need For Speed: Undercover is like sitting in an Audi TT with nothing but carbon monoxide gas and some flirtatious pinups. It’s best to break the windows and squeeze yourself out of the frame while you can. Aptly speaking, NFS Undercover boasts very few qualities, but the cutscenes are enough to leave you desperate for oxygen.

Elsewhere, the 2015 Need For Speed admittedly does a better job at rolling out cinematic junk food, but once again the cutscenes feel detached from the racing experience you undertake. In this Need For Speed you play as a camera, where you essentially make friends with a group of McDonalds employees, who love their rides and mucking about. Despite its absurdity it’s almost so bad it’s good – not saying it’s The Room of videogame cutscenes – but there’s some positive relief to be had if you don’t mind the B-movie tat. This isn’t to say the Hollywood influence is good on this occasion, but you could find yourself endeared more than you should be about the presentation this time out.

And that brings us to the worst example of Need For Speed’s love affair with Hollywood. Need For Speed Payback is a racing game that loves cutscenes so much that a hijack sequence takes place entirely as a piece of action you watch instead of play. GTA: San Andreas on the PS2 had a pleasing hijack sequence that you could play unfettered and in its entirety; in Payback you look on as you are bombarded with cinematics as the game constantly swipes control from your hands to show you action like you’d watch in one of the Fast & Furious films. This example alone illustrates how low Need for Speed has sunk and that it needs some specialist help.