Surviving the Rush of NFS Shift 2: Unleashed
There’s nothing quite like the adrenaline of driving Pagani’s latest creation, the Huayra. From the banshee scream of its massive engine to the blackout-inducing acceleration rate, it takes a very special kind of driver to tame this beast.
Thank God we’re doing the driving virtually, lest we end up with a $500,000 wreck on our hands.
Need For Speed’s latest title, Shift 2: Unleashed, allows you to take a number of multi-million dollar supercars out for a spin, without pulling a stunt like Mr. Bean (who recently crashed his ultra-rare Mclaren F1.. that’s gotta hurt).
Even driving these babies on a screen, however, can be very challenging. In recent years, the NFS franchise has undergone a slow evolution from purely arcade racing to serious sim driving. From Underground 2, Electronics Arts decided to step back and return to the roots of the series, back in the day of Porsche Unleashed.
All this added complexity and real world physics means its much easier to destroy your ride than ever before. No wonder EA invested a lot in damage modeling. From hiring professional crash-test experts to Atlanta web design experts to stunt car drivers, the game developers spared no expense in portraying realistic scrapes, damages and crumple zones to these precious cars. No doubt because they expect players to crash, and crash often.
So to disappoint EA’s low expectations of you, and manage to cross the finish line without looking like the result of a free-for-all derby, here’s a guide for the PC version of the game.
Hot Laps
Hot Laps put you in one specific car and send you around a track, by yourself, for a set number of laps, normally 3. You’ll have that many laps to try and beat the target times. If you manage to beat all three, the race ends early.
Invitationals
Invitationals are usually simple races, but they are still very important. You will be put inside the reward car and you must win the race to win the car. The car will almost always be something that’s a step up from what you’re currently driving, so doing these events will help out greatly in the next Modern event.
Drift
Before you start these, you’ll go through a tutorial of sorts to get the hang of drifting. It’s actually not that difficult once you know what you’re doing. Drift events are not timed, so there’s no rush. You will have a certain number of laps to drift as much as possible. If you mess up, you won’t be able to go backwards or reverse and try again. The game keeps track of how far you are along the course, and it won’t reward you any points for trying to drift the same section in the same lap.