Need for Speed: High Stakes

"One of the best arcade racers out there"

The fourth regular installment in the Need For Speed series, High Stakes is perhaps the best one yet. the game sports a very impressive line-up of cars that any racing fan may want to take a look at. It excels in many areas, but falls short in others. Gamers can expect to use a variety of high performance exotic cars on about 10 different tracks.

Graphics : 9/10
Need For Speed: High Stakes presents some of the best graphics on any Playstation racer. Cars resemble their real-life counterparts very well, even being able to notice little marks and decals on the side of the car. The tracks are just beautiful. There are many nice special graphic effects in the game, such as lights reflecting off of wet roads, realistic smoke, physical changes to upgraded cars, damage effects, and sun glare that is not blinding. The lighting effects are great. You can even see a man driving your car, turning the steering wheel and everything. This is different from most other racing games, whereas the cars' windows are not see throughable. As cars scrape and collide with other cars and objects, damage appears. Damage not only effects the look of the car, but the handling as well. Damage effects vary from cracked winshields, missing spoilers, car scrapes, and the car dragging on the ground. However, there actually is no bent car metal. Damage is a great feature in High Stakes. But, with all good must come the bad.

Objects look a bit grainy up close, and the in-car view is terrible. You can almost make nothing out on the dashboard or anything else you can see inside the car. It seems like they didn't take any time to polish it up at all. Another thing on the downside is that all the civilian cars look a bit square without much detail. But that isn't too big a gripe, as you can usually make out what real life car the civilian cars are meant to be.

Sound : 9/10
Again, another portion of the game that excels. The sound effects are great. Nice ambient sounds, distinct engine sounds, tires squealing, and very clear voices. The announcer has great charisma, and really adds to the sound effects. Plus, in hot pursuit mode you are able to hear the police talking over the radio, requesting things and giving instructions. They even shout out to you various phrases. You can even set them to local language and hear them speak the language of the country of the track that you're racing on. The ambient sounds vary from owls at night, dogs barking in the day, crowds cheering, and just the general sound of atomsphere. Upcoming cars can easily be heard from behind, and traffic cars even blow their horn at you.

The music also delivers. There are a good amount of music tracks heard in the game, not to mention the menu music, all suit the mood. Don't like what track you're hearing? With the press of two buttons, you can switch the track. You can also control which tracks will be played, or turn them all off and take not of the ambience. Cool indeed. The only gripe really is that there wasn't more variety of music. A little hip-hop would have been appreciated, but the music is great nontheless.

Gameplay : 7/10
Perhaps the games lowest point. General controlling of cars is good. Nice, fluid control which is even better if a dual shock controller is being used. Its just when other cars become involved that things take a turn for the bad.

When 3 or more cars are on screen, especially with effects like rain, snow, or if theres alot of smoke, the framerate takes a big dip. It really kills the speed of the game and will leave you in an awkward position. Spinning out cars is a hard task, harder than it should be, as opposed to computer cars being able to spin you out with seemingly little effort. Cop cars sometimes plow through civilian cars and keep going like nothing ever happened, and even when they do crash, they always seem to land on their wheels and keep coming after you. Speaking of traffic cars, they behave strangely.

You might be coming around a bend at 120 mph and a civilian car may just jerk its car in your lane as if seemingly working with the police to try and stop you. It gets pretty annoying when you're doing all good and that happens. Another thing, though not really important, is that they travel very slowly and unrealistically. They may occasionally switch lanes to pass slower cars, but not for awhile. Also, the speed you're going to trigger the police to chase you is a bit unfair. You may be strolling down the road at 30 mph and a cop car sitting on the side of the road may proceed to stop you and give you a warning. Police actions tend to get a little predictable after awhile, but the fun is still there. While being a cop, you have a menu of things you can do, like have a road-block set up, a spike belt put down, or call for a backup partner to help nail a hard to catch speeder. However, for some reason, rarely are you able to have a spike strip put down. This takes away the value from being a cop, not to mention that speeders are hard to catch.

Replays offer great camera angles, but the camera can only focus on your car. Another thing sadly missing in High Stakes is two-player full grid racing. When racing another human opponent, you only have the option of you two being the only racers on the track. Overall, the gameplay could be a bit more realistic, but you're still sure to have a blast when playing against another person in a high speed race.

Replay Value : 8/10
There's an above average amount of cars to own, upgrade, and race. Cars range from the sporty BMW Z3 to the wickedly fast McLaren F1 GTR. Cars are bought at fairly high prices, so it will take awhile to own every car. After you do, you can start your own car collection. Besides that, there's always the hot pursuit mode, duels, tournaments, special events, and the high stakes mode, which the game was named after. In hot pursuit mode, you can choose to be the get-away person outrunning (or at least trying to) the law, or be a cop yourself and try to nail opponents. But nailing the opponents is a hard thing to do, especially if playing against another smart person, as they can weave from side to side, turn around, and such and such. Being a cop chasing another human person is a bit unfair as rarely you won't be able to lay down spike belts, one of the computer polices' best working tactics.

There are a variety of different tournaments and special events for you to race in, all awarding a trophy, money, and some even a prize car. You can race these over and over, but they may seem to get boring over time. High Stakes mode is a great way to test your skill and confidence in a duel race for each other's car. The rules are simple: buy a car. Upgrade it and do whatever you want with it. Save it onto a memory card, and have a friend do the same. Then go to high stakes mode and put your cars on the line in a match race. Whoever loses, they lose their car for the winner's keeping. Simple as that.

Generally, try to be creative. You can set up challenges for yourself and for your friends. You can have a blast trying to beat each other's record time. All it takes is a little brain power, and a creative mind, and you'll be playing this game for awhile.

Presentation : 7/10
The game is presented very well, with a great opening cinema, nice menus, and the showroom. The showroom presents the chosen car in a showroom that lists its info and stats with the announcer giving out a vocal description of the car. What the game does present is well done, but its lacking in this area with no video of the real cars racing or anything of those sorts.

Pros :
Around 20 cars to buy and own, paired with around 10 tracks and various conditions such as weather, time of day, traffic, etc...

Great graphics, physical changes to upgraded cars, nice ambient sounds, distinct engine sounds, special effects, and damage

Hot pursuit and high stakes mode provide for great multiplayer fun

Cons :
Framerate suffers when 3 or more cars are on-screen or screen is heavily smoke filled

Computer cars (civilian, raicing, and cop cars) drive unrealistically as if they are strafing the track and make sudden, unrealistic movements

Final Appeal :
Well, if you're an arcade racing fan, definitely take a look at it. It should be cheap now-a-days. If you're a simulation fan, you still might want to take a peek at it with its very impressive line-up of cars. I'd say give this game a rental. If you like it, then you can buy it. But, it leaves some people to think the game is sort of incomplete. The helicopter is very dissapointing and offers no lifting controls at all, making it feel like a car just hovering on the ground. All in all, like all games, it could've been better. But hey, it could've also been worse too.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 06/28/01, Updated 06/28/01