NFS Most Wanted Vita - Developed by Criterion, not dumbed down or cut content

Wow, this is much better than I expected, if the Vita keeps getting games like this and people start supporting it, companies will pay attention and give bigger funds for games so it'll be pretty much a win/win situation.

Yeah, I'm really hoping this sells well. I know it's getting a sale from me. We have to support stuff like this.

Not big into racers but this sounds great. If there aren't any slowdowns then I'll definitely pick this up.

Trust in Criterion. They are beasts with tech. I don't think I've ever seen slowdown in any of their games.
 
Yeah, I'm really hoping this sells well. I know it's getting a sale from me. We have to support stuff like this.

Trust in Criterion. They are beasts with tech. I don't think I've ever seen slowdown in any of their games.

I also trust Criterion. They are amazingly talented and this is everything I could want in a Vita racer. Open world, not consolidated at all with features, just pure brilliance.

Also, if my memory serves me right, I remember going max speed on the best bike in Burnout: Paradise and having the game lock up for a second to load the map - but maybe I'm thinking of another racer ... but I'm pretty sure it was Paradise. I didn't complain, I knew I was literally going max speed, probably the fastest possible in the game, and I usually crash soon after because that bike is just so insane.

I hope they eventually add bikes to NFS: MW. I can see them adding a lot of stuff post launch, just like they did with Paradise. Also, that remix of Baba O'Reilly in the multiplayer trailer has me hoping they use that as the theme song for MW.
 
Sounds great. Too bad there's no cross-play/save sync, though.

I'm curious as to how you came to that conclusion?

Pic with person playing looks absolutely fantastic.

Medal of Honor for the PSP had 32 player matches.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medal_of_Honor:_Heroes

It's funny, the first couple years the PSP was out, developers really tried with a lot of their games, then they seemingly stopped caring.

Can you blame them with the rampant asshole pirates that devalued the system.
 
My jaw dropped seeing those screens ;)

I suspected that with no cut content the graphics will be victim like in Mortal Kombat. And lack of screenshots made it even more likeble.
 
I loved Paradise, so I'll day 1 this on Vita just to cast my vote of support for the concept of not farming out your portable ports.
 
I don't understand what the amazement is about...this is precisely what I expect from the Vita given its specs. It should not be hard to get games looking like this.
 
I don't understand what the amazement is about...this is precisely what I expect from the Vita given its specs. It should not be hard to get games looking like this.

I'm not even used to seeing great looking games on handhelds. This happened with PSP and I can't wait to see tons of games on that HW and screen. This looks 1:1 with the console versions. That alone is exciting.
 
Yeah I'm in the same boat, a lot of people hate on the whole "console experience on the go" mentality, saying console games don't belong on handhelds because of the predominant bite-sized nature of handheld games but I rarely have time at home anymore. I have a day job and then I come home to my family so naturally if I can have that awesome home console experience on the go, that means I can have it during my lunch break.

I am with you. Even when I am at home with the family, I can play my portable while the wife watches TV.
 
I don't understand what the amazement is about...this is precisely what I expect from the Vita given its specs. It should not be hard to get games looking like this.

Since launch, we haven't seen anything of this quality. In the meantime all the naysayers have seen subpar graphical releases and assumed that is all the system was capable of.

At launch, there were a few games that showed off the Vita's abilities. Not to this level, but what NFS:MW is doing is not unexpected.



Because sadly some devs prefer to port inferior iOS or 3DS versions to Vita.

Also, this.
 
Because sadly some devs prefer to port inferior iOS or 3DS versions to Vita.

Since launch, we haven't seen anything of this quality. In the meantime all the naysayers have seen subpar graphical releases and assumed that is all the system was capable of.

At launch, there were a few games that showed off the Vita's abilities. Not to this level, but what NFS:MW is doing is not unexpected.

I understand and agree, but I guess my reaction is more towards being underwhelmed by these previous lackluster looking games than overwhelmed by NFS Vita, as this type of visuals is exactly what I expected from the system given its CPU/GPU and other specs.
 
You probably weren't looking very hard then. Wipeout is insanely good-looking for one and that was out ages ago!

It was really nice to read how Criterion wanted to get the positive rep for the NFS MW Vita game - once they looked at the specs. That's what skilled, competent developers who are confident in themselves should be doing.
 
PCS360 on top, Vita on bottom.

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Handheld gaming in 2012 y'all.
 
I understand and agree, but I guess my reaction is more towards being underwhelmed by these previous lackluster looking games than overwhelmed by NFS Vita, as this type of visuals is exactly what I expected from the system given its CPU/GPU and other specs.

I felt the same way at launch minus the few exceptions. Made me wonder if any of the Vita's components are underclocked.
 
I understand and agree, but I guess my reaction is more towards being underwhelmed by these previous lackluster looking games than overwhelmed by NFS Vita, as this type of visuals is exactly what I expected from the system given its CPU/GPU and other specs.

Agreed, to a point. The Vita is strong and I expect more PS3-quality effects and engine-work, and when it's a port I don't expect it to be a port-up of lesser platform versions, I expect a port-down of the HD version (grrr, Lego Batman 2...) with the appropriate features intact and with a reasonable conversion of assets. Where storage and horsepower cannot match another platform's feature set, I can understand (and will vote with my dollars how much slack of understanding I'm willing to offer,) but I expect the platform to be used to its abilities.

That said, it's not just a PS3 with a screen attached. Vita is its own system, with graphical limitations against what is possible on heavier and more electricity-hungry consoles, and when we're talking bleeding-edge games (which is what I expect from Criterion until the end of the Earth,) it's hard to expect a 1:1 translation despite wanting it desperately with every fiber in my being.

The other aspect to consider is that Vita games tend to be $10-20 less than their console counterparts because customers have that expectation that handheld games should be cheaper. If a game is going to cost less and it's going to sell fewer copies and it's on hardware with less capacity, expecting it to still be just as good (plus bonus features like touch implementation and Near) is hard pressure to put on a developer. The fact that it's happening here is something worthy of great praise, no matter what expectations might be.
 
Criterion are a quality dev, so this doesn't surprise me one bit that they're doing an excellent job with the Vita version. Burnout Legends on PSP was a lot of fun and did justice to the series on a handheld.

They did some sensational stuff with Burnout Paradise to turn it from a very good game to an excellent game and kept rewarding gamers with fantastic content. They really won me over with that game as a developer who would go the distance. (not to mention all the other brilliant burnout games and the underrated Black)
 
Criterion are a quality dev, so this doesn't surprise me one bit that they're doing an excellent job with the Vita version. Burnout Legends on PSP was a lot of fun and did justice to the series on a handheld.

I can't seem to find my copy, but I'm 85% sure that both Burnout Legends and Burnout Dominator were done by EA UK (despite the credits to Criterion on some sites to both, not just Dominator.) Not sure it matters to this thread, but that's a common confusion. There were Criterion guys who transferred over to the expanding EA UK at the time though (it was part of EA's "Team Fusion" process at the time, which PSP fans know from some EA Canada games but apparently it was a wider initiative than that) and it did use the Renderware engine. Regardless, there's only been one not-amazing Burnout, that was the tragic DS game by an outside developer that's long since been forgotten about.
 
I can't seem to find my copy, but I'm 85% sure that both Burnout Legends and Burnout Dominator were done by EA UK (despite the credits to Criterion on some sites to both, not just Dominator.) Not sure it matters to this thread, but that's a common confusion. There were Criterion guys who transferred over to the expanding EA UK at the time though (it was part of EA's "Team Fusion" process at the time, which PSP fans know from some EA Canada games but apparently it was a wider initiative than that) and it did use the Renderware engine. Regardless, there's only been one not-amazing Burnout, that was the tragic DS game by an outside developer that's long since been forgotten about.

I thought Criterion did Legends and another EA developer did Dominator?

Been a while since I played either though, so you might be right.
 
I think that quote from Criterion saying the Vita wasn't as powerful as they were lead to believe, is very interesting. Thinking back on the Vita software lineup so far, with that thought in mind, I've got a theory to throw out there.

My Theory:

Sony gave developers specs to work with, and maybe even a development kit that worked on regular PC's and simulated these supposed Vita specs. So developers, including Criterion began working on Vita games in early 2011. Then, as the launch approached, Sony showed up with the exact specs and they were a notch below what Sony had told developers earlier. What's the easiest way to make your game run smoother at the last minute? Drop the native resolution.

The fact that Criterion made a point in saying "we were lead to believe" makes me think they were told one thing, and then later had that changed on them. I've found it strange how many Vita games so far have run at a sub native res, and this would pretty much explain why that happened.
 
I think that quote from Criterion saying the Vita wasn't as powerful as they were lead to believe, is very interesting. Thinking back on the Vita software lineup so far, with that thought in mind, I've got a theory to throw out there.

My Theory:

Sony gave developers specs to work with, and maybe even a development kit that worked on regular PC's and simulated these supposed Vita specs. So developers, including Criterion began working on Vita games in early 2011. Then, as the launch approached, Sony showed up with the exact specs and they were a notch below what Sony had told developers earlier. What's the easiest way to make your game run smoother at the last minute? Drop the native resolution.

The fact that Criterion made a point in saying "we were lead to believe" makes me think they were told one thing, and then later had that changed on them. I've found it strange how many Vita games so far have run at a sub native res, and this would pretty much explain why that happened.

You also have to consider the launch batch of games is just that, launch games. Even only at 6~ months in (in the west) we're seeing games look better and better. I haven't seen extreme cases of lower than native res so for the most part, things still look amazing on the OLED. I think it's great that we're already seeing this kind of parity (even with obvious technical compromises) at this point in Vita's life.
 
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looking closely at the hoods aliasing/weird texture id say these arent bullshots (prob looks 100 times better on vita screen and youd barely notice it)
 
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looking closely at the hoods aliasing/weird texture id say these arent bullshots (prob looks 100 times better on vita screen and youd barely notice it)

If this is render resolution, then there will be little alisasing on 5" Vita screen, but not much.

Golden Abyss for example is rendered @ 720x408!
 
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looking closely at the hoods aliasing/weird texture id say these arent bullshots (prob looks 100 times better on vita screen and youd barely notice it)

Well most games on Vita tend to look weird in screenshots, at least to me. Then, when you see it in motion, it's a whole different ball game. I couldn't be more excited for this game - again, I'll reiterate that I hope they use that remix of Baba O'Reilly for the game's theme :)
 
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