Need for Speed Payback was the second installment of this cycle of Need for Speed games. It was expected to fix it’s predecessor’s failures, and bring the franchise back from years of mediocrity. Finally, it’s time to find out if Payback was yet another black mark in a series of failures, or the light at the end of the tunnel that we all want it to be.
Here’s my thoughts as to how the design of Payback makes the cars feel slow. I said in the video the physics play their part, but as with all open world racers, the physics and the road are tightly linked. The problem is one part that the roads are too forgiving. You go off in payback, you can drive back on only losing a second or two thanks to the open space and relatively quick driving physics. Unlike any other NFs where going off would usually be a serious crash. Even when you do crash in payback, it’s like a 3 second halt. This means there’s no fear in the players mind when they put their foot down. You aren’t scared that you might crash off if you go too fast. You feel no risk in going as fast as possible. Then there’s the smoothness of the roads to consider. They’re like butter, and when you combine that with how little the cars bounce, high speed doesn’t significantly force you to increase the rate of your inputs to course correct. Going 200 something mph in a game like Driveclub would require you to go like barry allen on the stick to keep yourself straight, or the inconsistency of the roads are going to send you into low earth orbit. Payback lacks all of these traits. A point I didn’t raise in the video is the true extent of “kinda”. The physics kinda match the roads, but really, it’s still not great. There’s quite a lot of open road in Payback and while the physics are closer to hot pursuit’s to match that, they aren’t close enough to make it fun enough. The live tuning doesn’t make large enough changes for you to ever come near the spec you’d want to take on Payback’s desert roads properly.
A clarification as to what I meant regarding the pay to win stuff. Payback shockingly isn’t pay to win. You carry the base cars into multiplayer but not the speed cards. I think. I haven’t messed around with it.
26 Comments
I would say I have a differing opinion to you as I think payback is worse compared to 2015. I never minded the cheesiness of that game, and I never encountered any bugs when I started playing the game, which was after payback came out. Payback splits the cars into classes rather than letting you use any car for any event, the cops, while better, are restricted instead of in the open world, the customization isn't locked by level, and the microtransactions and loot boxes for performance parts solidified the game as BS.
I don’t get the Product Placement section- was that supposed to be funny or serious..?
yea it's an old vid, but actually having a pc that can run this and other games, I find this deep-dive relevant. agreeing with most of the critique but I don't think you've stressed enough how "special" the voice acting is. to put it simply, it skirts the line between "kinda acceptable" and "uncomfortable TDU2 flashbacks". as for the tonal shifts like "hey let's do some dodgy stuff like murder and gambling" going into "burger king kids club racing"… yea, it's the age rating. EA would never let their devs make an M rated NFS game.
another thing: since frostbite engine modding has been a thing for a while, there are several mods out there that eliminate then need to grind or spend money completely. rather fun buying a 110 rated S2000 and tuning it to 350 with just a couple trips to the shop.
alas, the game is fun in places, very disappointing in others. ghost can't do middle ground, it seems. their good ideas shine, while bad ones [or those forced upon them] are painful to deal with.
keep the vids coming, I am genuinely enjoying your stuff
what's this, a review of NFS Payback that doesn't shit all over the off-roading and story like its the worst thing to exist in the universe?
They hand you a runner car in the third chapter
It does feel like an out of character act of generosity though🤣
This game’s sound track was 100% better than heat’s
I don’t see side bets as a true gamble in this game. You fork over a small amount of your in game money to opt into an extra challenge to do during the race, sometimes making the race very hard to win in 1st place making the races at times really challenging. They were fun and I almost always took them up cause the payout was almost always worth it, especially late game grinding cash, some times easy money, sometimes harder money but worth the extra effort. It’s a fun, casino themed way to add some extra depth to the racing
Can't wait to see you do UNBOUND I'm drooling for it
need a nfs unbound version of this review pls @whitelight
White light, you keep mentioning nfs HP 2010 but you don't make a review for it, c'mon man is great game plz make one 😀
When i had played this game i managed to break the balance in half with the shipments. i basically had no idea how to open them for a large chunk of the game, so by the time i found the menu to open them i had around 80-ish shipments to open. i got a lot of gambling cards from it. and since they all gave me better and better loot each time, i eventually managed to reach max level on one car and essentially stamp out all of the races aside from the penultimate mission. any spare shipments i had went to upgrading the other vehicles i had in the other classes, making the game a lot more tolerable.
15:14 "Micro-f@ckin-Transactions"
6:40 NFS Rivals was my second favorite NFS Game because it has the soul of Hot Pursuit.
I have a one big problem though. People always say that Payback has the "Break to drift" system. But I cannot drift using the break key (Down arrow key) just like I do in NFS HP, MW and Rivals. And the game said to me to go fast (which is funny) and turn hard to the direction you want to drift. But that didn't work either.
The black lady in the cutsenes look REALLY similar to Naomi Nagata from the Expanse.
I would love a game where the protagonist is an old street racer who has to get back into it to defend his legacy
It is P2W. If you can pay to get stronger faster, even in single player, it's P2W. No beating around the bush, call it what it is.
I hate gambling the aspect. It's like buying car parts based on how cool the packaging looks…
I wouldn't exactly say that Regera highway heist was product placement, no one irl is gonna be able to buy one because they wouldn't be able to afford it
23:09 Product placement definitely reads like Fast & Furious script idk what you mean (*cough* Lykan Hypersport cough *cough*)
Still F@€& Hot Pursuit 2010!
That physics was pure pain. Bullshit like that might fly in Burnout or Midnight Club type over the top nonsense, but should never got close to Need for Speed. And yet people, even smart ones like you ate it up… how!? Why!?
Payback may feel slow, but at least feels right. Not like HP'10 where I want to smash the controller into the screen then yeet the whole wreck out a closed window EVERY TIME when I see a car turning.
That crap made me put down NFS for more than a decade. Then declare it totally dead when Payback got Micro-transactions, then when Criterion got announced as returning devs. Yet somehow by some mad twist of fate Unbound turned out amazing and half I only got to it when they had a free trial weekend in June. I chewed down Heat since and even this mass has amazing moments, easily better than Anything Forza out out on PC
I just finished playing NFS Payback and I disagree with most of what you say. The game is not even close to as bad as you make it out to be and I felt like some of your points were straight up false. Actually I felt like the game was really good, I had a lot of fun playing it.
This is my dads favorite game for some reason.
Bro i muted the game when i had to drive tyer races. His voice was so fing annoying i couldnt handle it.
regarding getting a car set for the next type of events, finishing the first few leagues will unlock derelicts that you can assign to a spec.
I got my drag car off of this. There is absolutely no need to buy cars in the first chapters, and you may well be capable of taking the first cars into the end of the game.
"in depth" "need for speed payback"
oh blow me.