need-for-speed posts (Subscribe to this feed)

EA's preparing a new pack of cars for your virtual garage in Need for Speed: Shift. On December 1st, Xbox 360 owners worldwide will be given five classic rides to race around in, free of charge, while PS3 owners in Europe and North America gain access on December 3rd and 10th, respectively. Dubbed the Legendary Car pack, this new bit of DLC puts gamers behind the wheel of these five classic rides:

• 1967 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray 427
• 1967 Shelby GT-500 (Nicolas Cage not included)
• 1969 Dodge Charger R/T
• 1971 Dodge Challenger R/T
• 1998 Toyota Supra Mark IV

The free update will also bring with it a new Team Racing mode, which will allow two teams of up to six racers to compete against each other online. You've got some time, so find a few friends and get ready to shake and bake.

"In recent years, we failed to put adequate resources behind the franchise and, as a result, quality suffered," EA Games label president Frank Gibeau said of the Need for Speed franchise, currently in the midst of a reboot with the well received Need for Speed: Shift, the recently released Need for Speed: Nitro, and the we're-not-sure-that's-going-to-work Need for Speed: World Online. But there's a fourth post-reboot Need for Speed title in development at Criterion Games, the devs behind the excellent Burnout series.

Removing any doubt that the series will miss an opportunity for annual exploitation (again, the massively multilpayer online racing of World Online doesn't count!) Gibeau said "Next year's Need for Speed has been under development now for some time at our award-winning Criterion Studio." We're not sure what type of Need for Speed Criterion is creating, but we wouldn't be surprised if it was heavy on the crashing.

Despite being an arcade racer, Need for Speed: Nitro will boast some very real rides when it releases next month. The latest update from EA focuses on some of the higher-end automobiles you'll be able to get behind the virtual wheel of -- including a Mustang, Charger and a Corvette. There are even a couple of Audis and the Lamborghini above, if you prefer to zip around in something you could probably never afford in real life. Hit up the gallery below to check 'em all out.

We always thought Rio was only good as a backdrop for gritty crime dramas or a place to shop for gigantic Jesus statues. Alas, the tropical climate is also very suitable for street racing -- at least, according to this new trailer for EA's arcade racer, Need for Speed: Nitro. The racing looks intense enough and it seems EA did a good job getting the sense of speed aspect down. However, even though EA is willing to take a risk on the platform, we hope the company is prepared should Nitro suffer the same fate as our beloved Dead Space Girl.

Yep, EA has announced the Need for Speed series has raced past the 100 million sold mark -- thanks to recent sales of Need for Speed: Shift -- and earned $2.7 billion in life-to-date sales, cementing its status as the best-selling racing brand in gaming. Just because it's sold the most doesn't necessarily mean it's the best franchise in terms of quality, however -- so we cooked up the graph you see above!

There are a couple of things to keep in mind as you follow the red line's progress:

• First of all, we didn't include cell phone entries and tried to focus on the main entries in the franchise
• The general quality of the series seems to be high, yet starts to dip after the release of Underground 2 in 2004; Shift seems to have brought the series back from the brink of critical mediocrity

EA's focus now is on rebooting the franchise -- the first step was to release a new hardcore sim racer in Need for Speed: Shift. The next move is to release Need for Speed Nitro, an arcade racer for the Wii and DS market, and follow that with Need for Speed World Online, a free-to-play PC racer for the casual audience.

Need for Speed Nitro, the graffiti-laced second entry in EA's "fresh" Need for Speed trio, has pulled out of the garage sooner than expected. Promising a mixture of "the franchise's trademark attitude, sense of speed and addictive gameplay," the colorful Nitro has gone gold, with both Wii and DS versions now set to ship on November 3 in North America and November 6 in Europe.

Capitalizing on its Unique Art Style, the game will drape in-game vehicles with skins designed by popular "lifestyle brands," including Upper Playground, tokidoki, and i am 8-bit. You'd be right in calling it a product of marketing, but it's preferable to the alternative conjured up by the Dante's Inferno promotional team: in-game vehicles draped in human skins.

Attention, race fans: EA's Need for Speed: Shift will have a demo ready for a qualifying run this Thursday, October 1. The demo features two tracks (Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps and London River) as well as five different vehicles to master:

• BMW M3 (E46)
• 2008 Dodge Viper SRT10
• 2006 Lotus Elise 111R
• 2008 Nissan GT-R
• 2006 Pagani Zonda F (unlockable)

As for that last car, you'll need to excel on the two courses and earn enough points to unlock it. And remember: The demo is not limited to Blur developers, so feel free to make with the loading down!

This morning, Joystiq received two images, from an alleged Norwegian GameStop employee, in which multiple PlayStation 3 250GB game bundle SKUs are visibly on display. In one image, claimed to be an internal email to all Norwegian GameStop employees, instructions on the difference between the rumored 250GB PS3 bundles and the current 120GB PS3 are found. The email "there is no difference" aside from storage space and posits four possible "PS3 250GB" bundles: One paired with "NFS" (presumably Need for Speed: Shift); another with "FIFA" (presumably FIFA 10); a third with Uncharted 2; and the final one with Assassin's Creed 2.

In the second image, our anonymous tipster supposedly snapped what looks to be the familiar GameStop clerk inventory screen, albeit with commands in Norwegian. It suggests yet another 250GB PS3 bundle, this time with "Ratchet" (presumably Ratchet & Clank Future: A Crack in Time) attached. If we're to trust these images, the bundles will be priced at 3799 kr ($644.16), a 500 kr ($84.78) increase from the current price of a 120GB PS3 Slim at Norwegian GameStops. No release dates are given.

We were told last week by Sony of America that an image of an Uncharted 2 PS3 250GB bundle was a "complete fabrication," and as such we've contacted Sony of America as well as Sony of Europe for comment on these images. We'll update this post as we hear more.

Electronic Arts has announced that a demo for Need for Speed: Shift is now available for PC. You can grab the demo from Big Download right here. The demo offers five different cars, including the BMW M3 (E46), the 2008 Dodge Viper SRT10, the 2006 Lotus Elise 111R, the 2008 Nissan GT-R. The fifth car, the 2006 Pagani Zonda F is included in the demo as an unlockable.

While the demo is currently confined to the PC, take heart, console owners. A demo is scheduled to hit the Xbox 360 and PS3 in early October.

We've been following the last quarter-mile of Need for Speed: Shift's race to release and this latest video should delight those of you with 40 weight oil in your veins. The video focuses on the Car Battle mode, which pits two racers against each other to settle the dispute of who has the better auto. Of course this doesn't apply if your car has a Mr. Fusion. In that case, you automatically win.

EA has partnered with three "lifestyle brands" to create art assets for the Wii/DS racer Need for Speed Nitro. Upper Playground, tokidoki, and i am 8-bit will contribute custom skins for in-game vehicles, as well as a set of over 140 "brushes" that players can use to customize their cars. After the break, see a video demonstrating some of the customization options! Examples of the art groups' skins can be seen in the gallery below. i am 8-bit's cars don't look terribly ... 8-bit, but we love tokidoki's Lamborghini Gallardo, which is now some kind of Day-Glo land shark.

Using creative texture work to offer a distinctive look is one of the smartest things EA could do for a Wii or DS game in a genre that is so often used as a graphical showcase.

The folks at EA dropped a teaser video on us today (seen above) for Need for Speed: Shift's tie-in video series, "The Driver's Experience." Premiering this Friday evening/Saturday morning on YouTube -- and likely here, dearest readers -- the show is said to profile various race car drivers associated with the game.

More specifically, it will focus on the experience of speeding around places like the Nürburgring. A personal look into the human face behind those who drive multi-million dollar sponsored race cars sounds like a hoot, but we're not sure how much it'll effect our need to play the final product over those other perfectly competent (and proven) racing sims. We'll just have to tune in on Friday at midnight (EST) to find out.

EA is ready to take Need for Speed Nitro out of the garage and onto the road on November 17th. The Wii- and DS-exclusive title is designed to offer "fun and intense competition for every type of gamer." This wouldn't be the first time a more casual approach reinvigorated a franchise.

Nitro, like upcoming scarefest Dead Space Extraction, is part of EA's ongoing effort to establish some big hits on Nintendo's console. Other titles from the test lab, like EA Sports Active and the Tiger Woods 10, have already proven to be quite successful. Let's see if EA can keep up the Wii streak!

The latest trailer for Need for Speed: Shift not only provides us with footage of beautiful cars in motion (including the game's cover star, the BMW M3 GT2), but also gives a bit more insight into the Driver Profile feature. The Driver Profile is something EA hopes will help the game stand out, with the goal being to shape how other drivers perceive you, according to your style of driving. Considering our basic driving abilities, we expect competitors to be in a constant state of mirth.