The lack of a variety may be a cause of Pro Street’s shortcoming in holding onto the series’ tradition, as every race day are just plain and simple time attacks, drag races (which use the same shift system we’ve seen before in Underground and Most Wanted), and straight up races. It lacks the challenges that one could find in roaming an open city – the speed traps in Most Wanted, Outrun races in Underground 2, and such all added to the game’s fun factor. Pro Street lacks this, however, and gets repetitive as you go from race day to race day. At least in Forza Motorsport 2 you develop relationships with parts manufacturers and car dealers as your car and your driver level increases upon winning events.
When I first spun up Pro Street and began playing, I was expecting another street racing game, an open city to explore, jerk off racers who wanted to best you, and all that fun stuff that we had come to see in the series ever since NFS: Underground, but when I entered my first race day and realized all the races were legit circuit races, I had to ask: did Electronic Arts get threatened or in any other manner get in trouble for using street racing in its games, despite the public service announcements in the beginning of each game? Is there a reason why they are moving the game’s environment off the streets and into legit circuits?
Bottom line is, Pro Street does not uphold the expectations that Need for Speed fans have of the series. It lacks the story, the police chases, the various game modes, and emphasizes more strict and realistic racing ability on your part, that the game has lost the classic NFS touch.
Electronic Arts ought to bring the game back on the streets and throw in some chaos: cops, or something to initiate a chase, and traffic to complicate it. Higher speeds. As Pro Street stands right now, since they have turned up the racing sim aspect of the game, there’s no more throwing your car into 200 miles per hour along a highway full of cars. It’s strikingly similar to playing Forza Motorsport 2, as I mentioned before, just not quite as realistic. And as weak as previous storylines have been, putting some effort into some kind of story will make the game just a little more appealing! And give us more variety in game modes, let us explore and test our abilities in our customized cars. I say to Electronic Arts, bring back the thrill!
