Intro

The Need for Speed series of games has gone through quite a bit over the last few years. Starting off way back in the days of the 486, it’s surprising to see how much can be pulled out of a task as mundane as driving. The first game started off with point-to-point races, the following releases went with some loops, followed by the introduction of the cops in Need For Speed 3. To actually be the cop in the game turned the tables a full 180 degrees. It’s one thing to be chased, but to be the hunter – now there is thrill.



Somehow that same feeling didn’t quite transfer over when I installed Hot Pursuit 2. Maybe it’s because I’d already been there and done that, even with the new features a certain something was just missing. It seemed as though this game was quite a rush job, so many details and finishing touches seemed to be missing. This could have been due to the game being released on so many platforms at the same time. Why go deep when you can just go broad?

Title screen

Hot Pursuit menu

In game browser

Putting the disk in

You just have to love the little boxes that new games come in now. It’s actually quite surprising that the industry took so long to switch over to something so obvious. Less clutter, less waste, lower shipping costs - oh wait. Now I see why - it’d be efficient! After popping open the jewel case, installing the game was relatively painless. No big snags of any sort. Even running the game was relatively pain free.

Ah the M5

Time to roll

catch up time

Stability

The bane of being a PC gamer has always been compatibility. Wondering whether the game you just bought is riddled with bugs. Lord knows we’ve run into our fair share of botched software. Traditionally we haven’t had any problems from any of the games in the Need For Speed series, with the exception of Motor City (I don’t think I had a running copy for at least a month, but we didn’t miss much on that tip).

From our experiences with Hot Pursuit 2, we feel pretty safe in saying that this game is in good shape. We didn’t run into any big problems, or any major crashes for that matter. The only minor problem we did encounter was that the game absolutely hates it when other programs are running. Programs like Trillian and Kazaa brought the game to a grinding halt. Don’t think you can get away with listening to an MP3 while playing either – that too will drop your frame rates right down the tubes.