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.
{ Oct 21st 2009 at 2:30PM } 
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
sonicspike41 @ Oct 21st 2009 2:33PM
*Waits for someone to bust out the Kanye meme for the years 2009 and 1998*
Traceur_Ryuk [All Digital until December] (PSN: Ryuk_shinigami) @ Oct 21st 2009 2:41PM
Nope, just because you said that no one is gonna do it.
Meh @ Oct 21st 2009 2:49PM
Shit, I forgot it.
sonicspike41 @ Oct 21st 2009 2:54PM
@Traceur
I know. ;)
MrXile @ Oct 21st 2009 2:43PM
Forza 3/GT5.
Enough said.
90+
Neuromancer @ Oct 21st 2009 3:13PM
DiRT/GRID series
Enough said
Livi70590 @ Oct 21st 2009 4:51PM
Are we talking a mathematical divide operation or an SQL DIVIDE statement? Because only one could possible be done.
Wes @ Oct 21st 2009 8:01PM
I do like the fact that NFS has a lot more quantity however. GT4 was great but the gap from GT4 to GT5 has been well ...a very long wait. The gap between NFS games is usually yearly or a bit quicker. I like that prospect a lot as with NFS I enjoy playing through the story modes, unlocking more difficult races, unlocking the new cars, upgrading them with your newer upgrades, winning new cars and trying to balance your cash.
Sure, NFS might look only not as good as GT5, but, I'll take a 80% game(review score) versus a 90% if it means I can get 4x as many of the 80% games.
B3astofthe3ast @ Oct 21st 2009 2:44PM
Need for speed III: hot pursuit was the best one. End of story.
Mr Mobius - the wandering artist @ Oct 21st 2009 3:03PM
Yes! Had it on PC and it was definitely a good game especially since Burnout wasn't around to compare to.
Whocares @ Oct 21st 2009 3:06PM
I think underground 2 is still the best, didn't play much of carbon or hot pursuit though.
Neuromancer @ Oct 21st 2009 3:14PM
Never played that one but High Stakes was great too
Draken Stark @ Oct 21st 2009 3:32PM
I remember getting some modded cars for NFS3:HP. Things like a car that weighed 2 tons and could plow through everything. Also an R/C car that was damn near uncontrollable, but increadibly fast. I can't remember the exact site I got it from, but it was some of the best racing fun I'd ever had back then.
maveric101 @ Oct 21st 2009 4:48PM
i disagree; NFS: hot pursuit 2 on PS2. spend countless hours on that game.
Sly @ Oct 21st 2009 5:39PM
most wanted was really fun. *i know, i know*
CDN Crockett @ Oct 21st 2009 6:33PM
Road & Track Presents: The Need for Speed
Smoke_me_a_Kipper @ Oct 21st 2009 6:57PM
III was the first driving game I bought for the PC. Well actually it came with my Logitech wheel.
Wes @ Oct 21st 2009 8:04PM
@Sly
Most Wanted was REALLY fun. I agree. Realistic no, but fun yes. I'd prefer fun if the graphics are horrible. (IE, Wii games can be fun but let's not jump back to the beginning of the decade in graphics). Most Wanted looked pretty good for a near launch game on the 360 and was a big step up in graphics from NFS 2 on the PS2.
Coogan @ Oct 21st 2009 9:25PM
Need for Speed 3: Hot Pursuit was amazing. I still play it when I need a good race. I like the canyon courses. I play the longer version, set all the cars to Corvettes, use the harder setting, give the computer a full lap head start, and I still place first. I know that course like the back of my hand.
Hot Pursuit 2 was just as good. I love both games and wish the series would go back to that style. I don't need a storyline to have fun. The cops in both Hot Pursuit were aggressive, but not to the point that the game was annoying.
EA needs to look towards those 2 games to get my interest back in the series. The first Underground was ok but since then it's gone downhill. The Shift game is a start to getting better. Let the Shift makers produce a game like Hot Pursuit and I'll buy it on day one.
atrimus @ Oct 21st 2009 2:44PM
the checkered quality of NfS games over the past decade is keeping me from giving kudos. Hot Pursuit was the pinnacle of the series for me.
i wonder how other racing series compare. i think Gran Turismo (spanning three systems and 12 years) is in the neighborhood of 50 million in sales.
Meh @ Oct 21st 2009 2:51PM
Porsche 2000 and Carbon (seriously, I loved the neon stylistic) have a special place in my heart. Shift was pretty cool because it taught me that it's sometimes good to slow down to 40kph on a hard turn.
AsherR [Planeteer | Power of The Hoff] @ Oct 21st 2009 3:04PM
Has anyone picked up Shift? How is its longevity? I'm not a huge racing fan, but I dug the demo.
atrlegend205 @ Oct 21st 2009 3:10PM
I picked it up for 360 and I thought it was cool. The open world enivroment is gone and you're back on a track, which makes it a little different. However, the drifting events are just awful and you repeat races on the same circuits. To me it feels like GT: Lite. But it's worth a rental.
AsherR [Planeteer | Power of The Hoff] @ Oct 21st 2009 3:15PM
Sweet. I'll probably add it to my Gamefly list. I typically prefer arcadey racers, but I did play GT2 back in the day. So something a little more sim than what I typically might play would be a nice change.
Shimrra @ Oct 21st 2009 3:09PM
I still own the original Car & Driver Need for Speed on the 3DO and its still a great game to play every now and then.
spikeylee @ Oct 21st 2009 4:34PM
that game was amazing back in the day! i remember having my teenage mind blown at the stunning graphics of the Porsche 911 and Toyota Supra!
btw, it was Road & Track, not C&D.
Shimrra @ Oct 21st 2009 5:34PM
I stand corrected.
ill trooper @ Oct 22nd 2009 2:42AM
I have that downstairs in the basement too, with the 3DO in a box! I've played about half of the releases; my favorites were 'Underground' and 'Underground 2'.
P @ Oct 21st 2009 3:20PM
'the first step was to release a new hardcore sim racer in Need for Speed: Shift'
'Need for Speed Nitro an arcade racer'
'Need for Speed World Online for the casual market'
...and all said without any suggestion of irony.
Love the GT series, but even thats hardly passable as a simulator, at least judging on what they've released. Shift is almost the racing equivelent of COD4 as a combat simulation. It might be popular, but only because people are happy to settle for dumbed down games because its easier for them, and to label them 'Hardcore' is just laughable. I dont even find Shift appealing as an arcade racer, which is exactly what it is, because theres no way in a million years someone could call it realistic under many a catagory.
Just because theres retards in the world, doesnt make me a genius, and for the same reason it doesnt make Shift a hardcore racing simulator, certainly not a realistic one.
Galley @ Oct 21st 2009 3:15PM
Hot Pursuit 2 is still the most fun I've ever had with a racing game.
johnnynumber5 @ Oct 21st 2009 3:21PM
I've never been a fan of the series up until NFS Shift. So far this generation Shift & Midnight Club LA have been my favorite racers. While I don't think Shift is going to be as good as GT5 or Forza 3 it was still a welcome addition to an extremely stale franchise. It needed more polish imo but was still more than servicable as a stop gap to GT5. Well done EA ... you deserve it.
Katana Master @ Oct 21st 2009 4:12PM
Any one know how this racks up against CoD or Halo? I'm just curious...
maveric101 @ Oct 21st 2009 4:49PM
pretty sure a recent article said about 27 million total for Halo. not sure about CoD, but i suspect it's more.
Jason @ Oct 21st 2009 4:52PM
Oh DSG, how easily you could have fit into one of the boxes on that chart!
MrXile @ Oct 21st 2009 4:55PM
Stop being pedantic.
You're not clever.
Your like a gimp, only being given the opportunity to spout nothings about nothing.
Jog on! :D
joe r. @ Oct 21st 2009 5:43PM
I found NFS Shift to be terrible. I love Forza, DiRT/GRiD, GT (all), even some arcade racers like the older NFS's, but the driving mechanics in Shift are just horribly wrong.. Every single turn the car goes into drift mode and slides sideways WAY to much. I've never disagreed with critics and reviews for a game as much as I do for this one.
X,L113TFD @ Oct 21st 2009 5:56PM
It's interesting to note that Need for Speed's review ratings went down almost exactly during the period that Project Gotham was popular.
Now that the Project Gotham series is no more, the NFS series goes up again.
Perhaps this is more than just a coincidence. During the Porsche Unleashed era, NFS focused more on realism than subsequent years. Project Gotham filled the old NFS niche between arcade and realism while NFS went more into the arcade racing style.
Now, NFS is rebooting the series back into its old niche balancing between realism and arcade and taking it back from the dead PGR series.
PLD_Exander_FFXI:Online @ Oct 21st 2009 6:09PM
Meh only decent Racing racing game NFS put out was Most Wanted. Rest went down hill.
Faceman @ Oct 21st 2009 7:52PM
I thought the demo for Shift was awesome. It felt more immersive than the Forza demo..
Wewtaco @ Oct 21st 2009 10:08PM
Can someone explain to me how you make $2.7 billion from 1 million games sold? Wouldn't that be $2700 per game?
viper_tavita @ Oct 21st 2009 11:44PM
You got your math or reading abit wrong. "raced past the 100 million sold mark ...and earned $2.7 billion in life-to-date sales". I think thats a tad closer to $27.
Johnny @ Oct 21st 2009 10:30PM
Need for Speed on the 3DO was the best game on the system. In the early days of 3D graphics, it was amazing.
The draw distance was awsome with miles of unrepeating scenery, i have yet to see better flip flop crashes, how many modern road racing games allow cars to tumble? Driving was realistic with good physics.
The immediate sequels all went downhill with arcade type physics and closed circuits.
In fact i will plug in my 3DO and fire it up, and see how it holds up without rose tinted glasses.
Johnny @ Oct 21st 2009 11:35PM
Well after dusting off the old 3DO, and plugging it in, all played well. Watching that annoying guy challenge you to a race and trying to push any button to get past the video, i found my controller not working. So i blew in the joystick hole and plugged it in and out a few times and i was in business.
Graphics have a blocky jerky look, the sound is pretty good. The framerate is ordinary but the gameplay is fun, chasing that red ferrari through traffic while avoiding the police led to some spectacular crashes, which you can replay and watch in slow motion.
Im just surprised the bloody thing works at all, now for Roadrash and Starfighter
Wewtaco @ Oct 21st 2009 11:52PM
oh okay, I read 100 million as 1 million. That makes more sense.
gcountach @ Oct 22nd 2009 1:47AM
Like that trick they did with completely cutting off the 90-100% mark to make their games look better (or less worse) than they really are.
sonicspike41 @ Nov 20th 2009 6:30PM
Darth, this is off topic, but it's the easiest way to leave you a message. Consider this evidence for the future.
My laptop and Crysis:
http://d3pjvfidpfofxp.cloudfront.net/assets/images/graphs/mp_rp_7.gif
Intel Core 2 Duo 2.2GHz processor, 4GB ram, GeForce GT 130M, Direct X 10, and:
Features: Recommended attributes of your Video Card
........................Required.......You Have
Video RAM...............640MB...2.7 GB
3D..................................Yes...Yes
Hardware T&L................Yes...Yes
Pixel Shader version.......3.0...4.0
Vertex Shader version.....3.0...4.0