Need for Speed II (1997)
Need for Speed II (NFS II) featured some rare and exotic vehicles, including the Ford Indigo concept vehicle, and featured country-themed tracks from North America, Europe, Asia and Australia. The PlayStation port of NFS IIwas the first PlayStation game to take advantage of the NeGcon controller, and the Dual Analog and DualShockcontrollers as well. A new racing mode was also introduced, dubbed "Knockout", where the last racers to finish laps will be eliminated. In addition, track design was more open-ended; players could now "drive" off the asphalt, and cut across fields to take advantage of shortcuts. Need for Speed II: Special Edition includes one extra track, extra cars, and support for Glide.
Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit (1998)
Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit added Hot Pursuit mode, where the player either attempted to outrun the police or be the cop, arresting speeders.
NFS III took advantage of the multimedia capabilities by featuring audio commentary, picture slideshows, and music videos. This game was the first in the series to allow the downloading of additional cars from the official website. As a result, moddingcommunities sprang up to create vehicles. The PC version was also the first game in the series to support Direct 3D hardware.
Need for Speed: High Stakes/Road Challenge(1999)
High Stakes (North American and Australian title), also known as Road Challenge (European and Brazilian title), Conduite en รฉtat de libertรฉ (French title) and Brennender Asphalt (German title), was released in the summer of 1999.
High Stakes introduced several new types of gameplay: High Stakes, Getaway, Time Trap, and Career. High Stakes was a racing mode; Getaway required the player to outrun numerous pursuing police vehicles; Time Trap was a time lap trial, and Career was a tournament mode which incorporated a monetary reward system. Another innovation was the introduction of damage models, where after a race the player is given the option to purchase repairs. The mode also allows players, for the first time, to upgrade cars.
The PlayStation version of the game, released some months before the PC version featured improved gameplay. The AI in the game was more advanced: the five AIs known as Nemesis, Bullit, Frost, Ranger, and Chump featured different driving characteristics. In the PlayStation version, the McLaren F1 GTR was based on the 1997 Long Tail, while the PC version was based on the original 95/96 version.
Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed/Porsche 2000(2000)
Porsche Unleashed (North America and Latin America title), Porsche 2000(European and Australian title) or simply Porsche (in Germany) is different from the previous versions, because it featured only Porsches.
The vehicle handling in the PC version was said to be the most realistic in any NFS game, but the PS1 version had very simplified arcade handling that fell woefully short of the hallmark handling offered in the first game. The player had to win races to unlock cars in chronological order from 1950 to 2000. Porsche Unleashed also featured a Factory Driver mode, where the player had to test Porsches to move forward in the game and did not feature a split screen mode.
Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 (2002)
Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit 2 was the debut NFS title from EA Black Box, and the first NFS for the sixth generation consoles. Different versions of the game were produced for each game platform; the Xbox, GameCube and PC versions were developed in EA Seattle, while the PS2 version was developed by Black Box Games in Vancouver.
Hot Pursuit 2 draws primarily from the gameplay and style of NFS III; its emphasis on evading the police and over-the-top tracks. Although the game allowed players to play as the police, the pursuit mode was less realistic than preceding versions of NFS; players merely needed to "tap" a speeder to arrest them, as opposed to using simulated police tactics to immobilize a speeding vehicle.
This was the first version since the start of the series not to feature an "in the driving seat" (cockpit) camera view, transitioning EA from realistic racing to arcade street racing. It was the last game in the series for the PC version to feature the split-screen two player mode introduced in Need for Speed II. For the multiplayer mode of the PC version, GameSpy's internet matchmaking system was used in place of Local Area Network (LAN) play. Hot Pursuit 2 was also the first NFS game to use songs sung by licensed artists under the EA Trax label.
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