Need for Speed Undercover
You never thought it would turn out like this an all-out chase where you’re both the hunted and the hunter. Now you must get behind the wheel and risk everything to infiltrate a ruthless international crime syndicate and take them down. The man you’re after is a maniac behind the wheel, and he’s driving like his life depends on escape, which maybe it does. He’s the one with all the answers you need, so track him down. That fleet of police cruisers in your rearview mirror won’t make things any easier. It will take all of your experience and every ounce of skill to outrun the law, take down the enemy, and unlock the truth that puts an end to this chase once and for all.
User Ratings and Reviews
4 Stars NEED FOR SPEED UNDERCOVER
THE GAME WAS FAIR. THE STORYLINE FOR THE GAME WAS VERY POORLY WRITTEN. TOO MUCH OF DRIVING AROUND AND SMASHING UP COP CARS/DAMAGEING PROPERTY AND NOT ENOUGH STREET RACING.
3 Stars Pretty Much NFS Most Wanted 2
Alright, I beat the career mode of it yesterday and am at 66% of “game completion”. It took just under 15 hrs to complete the career mode. So that’s a bit disappointing since it took about 40hrs to complete the career mode in Midnight Club LA, although it’s MUCH more non-linear.
The issues I have with NFS:UC:
1) The game is very easy. It never really gets difficult, although I think getting the last 1/3rd of the game may take as long as the first 2/3rds, since it’s at a higher level.
2) The game is entirely linear. As other reviewers have pointed out, the “open world” concept is pointless in this game. That being said, this game is basically Most Wanted 2. You do some races, you avoid some cops, you beat a boss, you move on.
3) The environments are lifeless and boring. The roads constantly have this sheen on them like they are wet, but they aren’t, and you can tell it’s being done just to reflect the sunlight to “look impressive”. It gets old really fast.
4) There is some SERIOUS slowdown issues in the game. To the point where I actually started getting annoyed by it during a couple of races. When you have a group of racers ahead of you (which doesn’t happen very often unless you suck) and you’re smashing into things, all the data on the screen brings the thing down.
What I like about the game:
1) As I said above, it’s basically Most Wanted 2. If you loved Most Wanted you’ll probably love this game. The cars handle about the same, the cops react the same way, the flow of the game is the same.
2) The graphics aren’t bad despite the slowdowns. There’s no night racing which is a real letdown, and all the races happen at either sunrise or sunset (and seriously, how many street races take place at sunrise or sunset??) and so the sun will be glaring at you quite often.
3) The sense of speed is INTENSE. The game is worth playing just to get the Bugatti Veyron. I can’t even explain how fast it is. It’s like driving a missle.
4) The types of races are a lot of fun. One of the most fun they have is “Highway Battle” where you have to get 1000ft in front of your competitor in less than a minute while ripping down a highway at high speeds and trying to avoid traffic.
Overall I’ve had a good amount of fun with this game. It won’t provide me nearly as many hours of enjoyment as MC:LA but it’s certainly a fun game to play. I totally disagree with any review that puts this below a 5/10.
I haven’t spent any time playing it online.
If you’re a fan of Most Wanted you really should play this game. It feels dated compared to other modern racing games, but it’s still worth playing. It’s probably not worth $60 to buy given the short amount of time necessary to beat it and non-replayability but it’s certainly worth a 7 day rental.
Overall I give it a 6.5/10.
For reference I’d give these scores to these similar games:
Midnight Club Los Angeles: 7.5/10
Test Drive Unlimited: 9/10
Burnout Paradise: 7/10
Need For Speed Most Wanted: 8/10
Need For Speed Carbon: 7/10
3 Stars Too many annoying things
I liked NFS Most Wanted and Carbon, and this one is more or less in between. If you don’t know anything about NFS you may find this game a lot of fun, but if you know the racing franchise then you may be disappointed.
I don’t want to repeat all the things that other reviewers have written, but if I may, I’d like to cite at least THE MOST annoying things happening in the game on a PC.
- the story line kind of blows because you have the boss lady telling you what to do and when, and if it would make sense I would have no problems with that, but all of the sudden she tells you to infiltrate a new team of racers as an undercover cop but you don’t even know why.
- the voice messages you get during game play may be totally inappropriate, as there is sometimes either a delay, or some comments are just plain not part of that mission (you can tell if you played several times)
- the game is ARCADE, yes, you got me: ARCADE. The car are seldom totaled, (besides in a highway battle) otherwise you do the craziest moves on your wheels and you’re still going full speed ahead!
- cop cars, as well as other cars, sometimes drop on the street from the sky!!! Also, maybe to make the game more difficult, some random drivers change lane abruptly right in front of you, just to slow you down.
- even if you drive a super car, like a McLaren F1 or a Bugatti Veyron, and you’re doing 250 MPH, you have stupid cop’s SUV going FASTER than you! What the hell?
- The most annoying thing ever: CUT-SCENES! During cop chases, you can drop the cops by breaking stuff. The chase breakers are accompanied by a cutscene DURING WHICH YOU HAVE NO CONTROL OVER YOUR CAR, and if you’re unlucky a road block with spikes is put right ahead of you and after the cut scene is over, you have no way to avoid the spikes!!!
- At the end of a long chase with the cops, as you’re about to be done, a helicopter shows up right in front of your nose out of no where, forcing you to replay the mission if you want the ‘domination’ award
- sometimes, objects like concrete walls and fences THAT YOU CANNOT BREAK are not visible on the road but you will crash on them anyway
- While you are playing, especially when you get a really fast car, the scene is not drawn fast enough (even with a super fast computer or lowering game quality to medium) and the road ahead of you is not shown, when the game finally get its sh** together again you find yourself with a short time lag of no control and you may crash
- sometimes while you’re customizing your car (aftermarket stuff) the game freezes for no reason!
If you think you can cope with all this, and the fact that EA has not yet released a patch to fix all these things, then go ahead and buy the game. Otherwise…
The Good things about it:
- The in game music is IMHO really good. That’s just me.
- Cars are really well drawn, all details really well done.
- The Tri City is kind of cool, giving you a SoCal city kind of feeling.
- The open space is not so open, you can quickly get a hold of where you are and where to go.
—————–
My setup: DELL 24″ monitor, X-Telstar ATX case, Corsair 650W PSU, ASUS M3N72 Mobo, nVidia 750a SLI chipset, G-Skill 2×2Gb DDR2-1066, Phenom X4 9850 Black Edition, EVGA GTX260 core 216 superclocked and 2×500Gb WD 7200 rpm and Logitech Z5500 5.1 surround sound system
1 Star The Waste of All NFS Games Combined
I’ve had this game for a several days now and I can tell you–from the moment I put the game into my Xbox 360 I was unimpressed. I even got this game used for [...] bucks and I can’t WAIT to pawn it off on the next sucker who falls for NFS’s marketing ploy of this “hot new game”.
The Cons:
-The game physics - GARBAGE. Several points in the map have you ‘catching air’. About 1/3 of the time will undoubtedly send you careening out of control, flipped upside down, or pinned against a wall. Should you scrape up against a computer player or rub a wall, other racers will SCREAM past you–as if you’ve stopped–yet you’ve only lost perhaps 10mph of speed. AND YET…the AI is seemingly unaffected by their mistakes. Pit maneuvers don’t work on AI, yet should an AI even bump you from directly behind you’ll spin in a 180 with certain cars ultimately putting an end to that race if you’re further in the game and the AI is faster.
-The AI is insanely easy at first. You can pretty much win any race half way into the game by racing off the line 10 minutes after the race has started. HOWEVER: half way into the game, the AI gets some sort of ‘catch up’ advantage and can blast by you! You’re either ahead by a split time of 15 seconds (meaning if you parked your car during the race, it would take 15 seconds for the person behind you to catch and pass you), or you’re struggling to keep them on your GPS map, let alone in plain view. Currently the game has my $20,000 dollar car pitted against 200,000 dollar cars–cars that are not even in the same galaxy in terms of class. There’s absolutely no chance for me to win should I make even the slightest error (running over a cone, or braking around a hairpin turn). Kind of frustrating when this entire time you’ve been bored by winning races without any effort.
-The TRACKS! In another GIANT F-U to consumers, they’ve designed ’street racing’ tracks that are closed circuit–YET have casual traffic on them. The tracks lack ANY feeling of street racing what so ever other than the simple fact that what you’re racing on is a street/dirt road/highway. There is absolutely no doubt you’re on a race track instead of a street. Yellow and black barricades block every corner. Imagine your surprise when you’re rocketing down a formula 1 track and see a Buick Lesabre in your way. Again, half way through the game, should you hit just 1 of these cars, the race is over. Don’t even bother to finish it, just restart or do as I do, and tomahawk your F***ing controller into the floor.
-Free roam is completely pointless. There’s nothing to do and no purpose to it really since they’ve made the player lazy by simply pushing down on the D-pad you’re cast off into the next 5minute loading screen. Now, there would be a GREAT purpose to the free roam feature if while you were driving around the game would be loading up the next race, but of course, this is not the case.
-Loading screens - hope you’re old enough to drink or are in need of constantly checking the mail. For the hour or two that you might waste your time with this game, at least 15 solid minutes of your time is spent WAITING.
-The Story line is pathetic. It’s full of holes, half the time you don’t really know what is going on, and the tasks you have to do just go on and on and become monotonous and played out. It’s the same thing over and over. “Go take out 5 cop cars by ramming into them and then we’ll put you further into the underground world of ’street’ racing.” It’s a load of garbage.
After playing this game and seeing other horrible NFS releases, I’m officially refusing to buy anything else those jerks put out. I’m a true car enthusiast and have played several games that were far superior to this–SEVERAL YEARS AGO! Do you remember Tokyo Extreme Racer for Dreamcast? That game was far superior to this in terms of customization, function, and fun. Even computer games that were made by budget companies like Valuesoft: Redline Racing…way better than Need for Speed: Undercover.
What next? Need for Speed: FU-Give us your money?
The only use this game serves is for selling it back to someone else. PERIOD.
4 Stars a true fan of need for speed
there are a lot of critics of this game but i think EA hit the target with this game. I havn’t stop playing the game since i got it for christmas. I’ve played midnight club LA for one day then i got nfs undercover have gone back to LA yet. the graphics are better, the sound is steller. as with anything two thngs that would have made the game better would be more after market body kits, and more cars. I think once you get use tothe raceoing style of the game its a blast.
Buy/More Info
PS3 Games Racing & Flying Boss, Career Mode, Chase, Cop Cars, Cops, Crime Syndicate, Environments, Fleet, International Crime, Maniac, Midnight Club, Ounce, Police Cruisers, Rearview Mirror, Reviewers, Sheen, Slowdown, Stars Game, Sunlight, Wheel
