NFSU 2 Headache

S

speshylives

Member
I'm addicted to this frickin game.. and I despise it.

Whoever thought it was a great idea to put in extra reputation points for winning by a sizable margin while racing against a rubber band AI needs to be shot... dead.
 
Whoever thought it would be cool to implement BK ads everywhere should be shot as well. It is almost as bad as rubberband AI. I would never be caught dead playing this dribble.
 
speshylives said:
Whoever thought it was a great idea to put in extra reputation points for winning by a sizable margin while racing against a rubber band AI needs to be shot... dead.
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The rubberband AI was weird for me, because sometimes it seemed to be there and sometimes it wasn't. Very odd.

After a while it stopped bugging me, though, because I couldn't discern any tangible effect from the reputation points anyway. What were they supposed to do again? I forget.

DFS.
 
Just sit there and do nothing for the first 90 seconds in the first round, you will still win the race thanks to the AI if you're half decent. Also cheat yourself some unlimited nitro, the AI is gonna be right behind you.
 
mumu said:
Just sit there and do nothing for the first 90 seconds in the first round, you will still win the race thanks to the AI if you're half decent. Also cheat yourself some unlimited nitro, the AI is gonna be right behind you.
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I'm all for Hot Pursuit over this series, but I've played this second one and while it still has a lot of repulsive features, it's better than I expected. And except for the occasional race, I haven't noticed the AI tailing me much. Depends on the race, but having a very noticeable rubberband engine isn't something I would fault this game for. I've often taken out other racers just to see what happens in that regard and many times they never ever catch up. They also have some random accidents in a realistic manner which is rare for a racing game.

That burger king and best buy shit though...ugh.
 
Glad to see a fellow addict. Picked it up on cube a few weeks back. IMO they should keep the Underground series for car tuning, and that whole night racing theme - it has it's place - but bring back more of the old style Need for Speed, updated to todays standards. I love the free roaming, having to find different shops, being able to challenge cars and lose them on the streets etc.
 
Could someone please explain the 'rubberband AI' term in a little more details please? I must of missed the creation of that phrase...
 
GrandPipe said:
Could someone please explain the 'rubberband AI' term in a little more details please? I must of missed the creation of that phrase...
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It means that the AI will catch up to you no matter what. Winning by a 30 second lead? They'll be right next to you by the next lap...
 
It works both ways, too -- some games will also let you catch up more easily if you fall way behind.

It was a REALLY grotesquely obvious feature of the older Need for Speed games. They toned it down a lot in more recent titles, made it much more subtle, but you can still feel the Hand of God giving certain cars a speed boost sometimes.

DFS.
 
i also haven't tried part 2 due to hating so badly part 1, but there has been a ton of praise for part 2 even from people who didn't really like the 1st one. so i'm gonna try it and see for myself soon.

i do however agree with everyone else... bring us NFS: HP3 pretty please.

p.s. Burnout 3 also has really bad rubberband A.I. some of the worst i've ever seen.
 
NFSU2 is sooo much better. I really didnt like the first one much and the only reason I completed it was becuase I compulsive about finnishing games, it was a chore but 2 is alot of fun with tweaking all the performance settings and pimping my ride now that it has some affect to your career. NFSU2>BO3 imo. I would go for another underground over a HP anyday.
 
I hate it when devs get lazy and decide to incorporate rubberband AI. Makes the game far too easy, and horribly predictable.
 
The only thing that frusterated me about NFSU2 (just beat it, probably gonna start another career) was the traffic. It would be at the end of one of those stupidly long curcuit modes, and I'd hit a random car and watch in displeasure as the other three cars speed past me and finish. URL, Street X, and Drift were pure fun though. My favorite game of the year.

Never had a problem winning races otherwise. Or maybe that is the complaint?

A tip... spend all your money on performance upgrades, and search for the next performance shops every time you unlock a new area. Keep doing the outrun races, and get a unique widebody kit. Then convert the kit to carbon fiber when you unlock the ability. Instant 10 point car.
 
My coworkers have gotten addicted on this game. One of them just bought NFSU 2 and hasn't stopped playing it since (it got hooked by playing the first one). They really enjoy customizing their car and I have admit, even not being a fan of racing games, it does look pretty fun and the graphics are nice.
 
This game is vastly improved from the first one. IMO this game has the most believable virtual city ever created in a video game.

I don't see why people have problems with The Best Buy, Circular One and Burger King ads. IMO they add to the realism of the city, but hey that's just me.

I'm the guy who downloads custom ballparks for my PC baseball games to get the real life bulletin boards etc to make it more realistic. I just don't see why people have a problem with it.
 
Drifting, Drag Race, and Street X are easy. Street X is fun, it's like Super Sprint 3D. Those races don't give me the headache though.

It's the long sprints where I have a 6/7 second lead only to smash in to some car that decided to swerve right in front of me. Or the stupid circuit races where I only win by a small margin that I think I have to do all over again because of the reputation points (don't they unlock upgrades faster or something like that?) I've thrown the controller twice now. I just don't see the point of adding something like a bonus for big wins when there's a cheating AI.

Other fun things I've "noticed" are the AI cars that suddenly spaz out and swerve for no apparent reason. They pull out in front after slamming Nitro in 2nd, and then they drive like Stevie Wonder on crack and hit a guard rail. Also fun are the Outrun races where the opponent magically steals the lead and by the time you notice, he's made a U turn and is 800 feet gone.

You just get the feeling though that this game could have been that much better if it didn't have to make it out by Christmas. It's not that it's bad, it just feels like it could be better. I'm 40% in currently, I just don't know whether I can keep going and expect to maintain a healthy mental state. I'm yelling at the television. Maybe I should read up on what the damn reputation points do. Perhaps at this point, they don't really matter as the Audi I'm driving is upgraded nicely. I'd probably enjoy it more if that were to be the case.

Oh, and I completely hated the 1st one. This one is leagues beyond it.

Oh part 2, with all those ads, why are we still paying 50 bucks for this game? Shouldn't that have brought the price down?
 
speshylives said:
Also fun are the Outrun races where the opponent magically steals the lead and by the time you notice, he's made a U turn and is 800 feet gone.
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Yeah, the Outrun mode is broken. The game isn't smart enough to accurately judge who has the "lead" and it fucks up in wrecks and big intersections. Drift is broken too, in the player's favor -- you can sandbag at low speeds and completely nuke the opposition.

I'd definitely agree that the game needs some work in some areas. It's kinda the opposite of the first NFSU -- that game was very polished, but pretty limited, whereas this game is a whole lot more ambitious and could have stood a fair bit more tuning and polishing. It also needs a bigger soundtrack EXTREMELY BADLY, because if you're gonna give me a city to cruise in, you goddamn well better give me a radio to flip channels on too.

If they do another Underground in this vein, I trust it'll be a whole lot better.

Oh part 2, with all those ads, why are we still paying 50 bucks for this game? Shouldn't that have brought the price down?
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When I was writing up a feature story on in-game ads, I asked someone at EA more or less that same question. The response was nice and tactful: "We don't see this as reducing costs. We see this as increasing revenue." In other words, those ads are more money for them, not us ^_^

DFS.
 
WarPig said:
Yeah, the Outrun mode is broken. The game isn't smart enough to accurately judge who has the "lead" and it fucks up in wrecks and big intersections. Drift is broken too, in the player's favor -- you can sandbag at low speeds and completely nuke the opposition.
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You're exactly right on the Outrun races. It almost makes them too easy.

Drift if fun, but I wouldn't say it's any worse than the drift in NFS:U. I do like the addition of the downhill drift -- it's very fun (even if pretty easy).

I'd definitely agree that the game needs some work in some areas. It's kinda the opposite of the first NFSU -- that game was very polished, but pretty limited, whereas this game is a whole lot more ambitious and could have stood a fair bit more tuning and polishing. It also needs a bigger soundtrack EXTREMELY BADLY, because if you're gonna give me a city to cruise in, you goddamn well better give me a radio to flip channels on too.
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It seems like the graphics are hit or miss in this game. In some spots they are really nice, but then other areas look like ass. And I'm pretty sure the cars are not as detailed in this version. There's just something about them that doesn't look right.

The IGN review had several complaints about the lack of stuff to do between races and the framerates. First, the Outrun races provide ample to do between races. Also, the races are not far from each other, so there's really not much travel time. I'm not sure what more they want.

As far as the framerate, I'm just not seeing slowdowns on a wide scale like the review makes it out to be. And I have the supposedly bad GCN version. :lol The only place I notice it is when there are 5-6 cars on the screen at once while turning in the URL races. Other than that, it's completely comparable to the first NFS:U. The sense of speed is also very good, especially when the cars start to get some faster upgrades. Flying along the highway and exiting into City Core doing 150+ is just so much fun. :D

Anyhow, I've been addicted as well. I've had it since launch and have put in ~20 hours and I'm on the last URL race in Stage 4. This game is huge.
 
I just tried this game on PS2 and was disgusted by how bad it was. I would have rated it 2/10 or something.
I cannot for the life of me understand what people see in the NFSU games, they are fucking awful.

The graphics looks like utter shit, the framerate is appaling and I can barely see what`s going on
I don`t think I`ve played a worse looking and playing racer this gen. Even Ford Racing 3 was better than this shit.
 
Gregory said:
The graphics looks like utter shit, the framerate is appaling and I can barely see what`s going on
I don`t think I`ve played a worse looking and playing racer this gen. Even Ford Racing 3 was better than this shit.
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Are you sure you are playing the same game? Come one now, worse than FR3? It seems to run a solid 30fps on my ps2 and the game looks great. Getting to drive around the city from race to race really helps getting use to new performance parts and tuning. I just got a Supra, im in love. The corolla aka Trueno AE86 is an awesome car to start with.
 
It's too bad that the customizing has to be so formulaic. Building the neon underbody, vinyl decorated pimpmobile is cool, but it would have been nice to create a stealth rocket with more subtle tastes. Anything where aesthetics comes into play is going to be such a subjective matter too making it all the more difficult.

To me the game works because the handling model strikes a good balance between enough physics and weight transfer to make it "feel" right and enough arcade to be spectacular and forgiving.
 
Ashtetics is not subjective. The more it cost the more star points you get. Im not sure that the game requires you to change the appearance of the car in order to advance. Maybe at least one car needs visual upgrades to get by.
 
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