Need for Speed Online this Summer
Gentlemen, boot your engines. EA today announced that their free-to-play MMO racer, Need for Speed Online, will go live on PCs sometime this summer.
The Need for Speed series is known for fun and speed at the expense of realism. The games have broad appeal, if not the same hardcore fan bases as more nuanced racers like Forza and Gran Turismo. According to EA, Need for Speed Online will take the franchise's arcade-style racing, couple it with an RPG progression system, and turn the whole thing loose on more than 150 miles of virtual road.
Though EA is billing Need for Speed Online as "the world's first MMO racer," it is actually the newest and most high-profile entry in a garage of obscure MMO racers. Will it bring MMO racing to the forefront of the industry? We're skeptical, but we haven't played it yet, either.
If you would like to be one of the handful that gets to take a test drive before the game comes out, you can register here at world.needforspeed.com. The English beta actually began today, so the North American version can't be far behind.
-calimer