Skip To...
Need For Speed is a mainline series among the racing games franchises, giving fans the good memories of drifting the corners in a Hot Pursuit and nitro passing the Black List in Rockport City. Now, while titles like Most Wanted and Hot Pursuit are the bold statues, there are some underrated Need For Speed games that didn’t get their deserved shining spot in their release year.
4. Need For Speed: Pro Street
Need For Speed: Pro Street was one of the hardest games that has ever been released in the series. And that’s exactly why it is an underrated Need For Speed title. The game offers some assists for taking corners and using brakes, but even with all of them turned on, finishing Pro Street was a real-life achievement for most players like me.
Pro Street took a very different direction by leaving street racing behind, opening a big creativity gap that gave birth to NFS: Shift. Some of the best car customization options are featured in this game, and the career mode was so in-depth and challenging to complete.
3. Need For Speed: The Run
Need For Speed: The Run’s approach to street racing is the golden ring of this installment. The game is completely narrative-based, and that’s probably why some players didn’t like the pivot at the time. But in which other game do you get cross-country illegal racing?
The gameplay is balanced, the quick-time actions are thrilling, and the tracks take you from a sunny desert to snowy volcanos! Not to mention that the music featured in the game and the way it shifts tone based on your winning or losing position is so dramatic. With all the features combined, Need For Speed: The Run is truly an underrated game.
2. Need For Speed: Rivals
It’s hard to believe that Need For Speed Rivals isn’t among the top-selling games of the series. After the success of NFS: Hot Pursuit, it was a safe assumption that another title with HP’s features would do well, but it didn’t.
Need For Speed: Rivals took the gameplay and style of the Hot Pursuit and added a free roam to it. The police force is there, and racing is still as hot with all the weapons and features we had seen in HP. So, in a sense, Rivals was a sequel to Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit, with one being underrated and the other a massive hit.
1. Need For Speed: Carbon
This game has some of the best and most unique features, like the addition of crews, breathtaking tracks, and solid car customization options. But the thing that makes Need For Speed: Carbon an underrated game is the canyon races. The amount of stress, the seriousness of the rivals, and the way that the camera shifts to the side to show how close you are to falling off the cliff are all it takes to make an ultra-unique and intensely memorable racing experience.
After the massive success of NFS: Most Wanted 2005, Carbon came along as a direct sequel. It uses exactly the same gameplay mechanics as the MW, and still, the shadow of the Black List stopped the Carbon from grossing.
