NFS ProStreet - Article from IGN.COM

Don't be surprised. This is not just another arcade racer from EA with impossibly bad handling. This is ProStreet. In fact, EA has created an entirely new racing genre: a street racing simulator. A fusion of Fast and Furious and Forza. But don't say that to producer Michael Mann. His team at EA Black Box, responsible for NFS: Most Wanted, wants to distance Pro Street from Fast and Furious as much as possible. Pro Street is not about the glow of pink underglow on your car. Pro Street is all about tuning and street racing culture.
As you probably
know, street racing is considered illegal. To bring the masses into it, race tracks are opening their doors to a huge number of novice street racers. Pro Street will take place on real race tracks, such as Sears Point Raceway (Infineon Raceway in the game). EA isn't going into details about other tracks yet, but you can definitely expect some iconic tracks from Asia, Europe, and the USA.
Live from Infineon
What we definitely didn't expect from EA was how they created a real world in NFS. We watched an EA employee do a lap at Sears Point, and it was drastically different from what we'd seen in previous NFS titles. It looked impossibly realistic! Sears Point is created with photographic precision. But far more important is the sense of speed — this game feels more like Forza than previous NFS games where you smashed cops and knocked opponents off the road. We watched him take a corner and nearly break our necks using the brake.
Our main question to EA was: "why"? Pro Street is not a continuation of the series but a significant departure from the division's main direction, a move toward an entirely new direction. Simply put, says an EA representative, street racing fans asked for realism. Welcome to our races.
There will be a show at the races.
When street racers gather, they show off their most powerful cars to each other. They do this in various ways, so EA has included the following modes in Pro Street: Drag, Drift, Grip, Circuit and Speed Challenge. The career goal will be to climb to the top of the career ladder in each discipline and become the "street king". Now you'll need to retune your car for each race. You won't win a drag race in a drift car. EA's goal was to create a tuning system that is both deep and convenient. If you have time, you can create a car from blueprints; if not, install an existing real-world kit. The autosculpt system in NFS: Carbon was quite decent but had a purely decorative effect. In Pro Street, every change will affect performance. If you need that spoiler, you'll sacrifice speed for stability. Thank god you'll know what effect installing a particular part will have — it will all be displayed in real time. Unlike traditional racing like NASCAR, there are no rules regarding appearance. You can use various brands as much as you want. EA has already mentioned partnerships with companies, but there will be even more here.
The new graphics will blow your mind.
Once you've built the perfect car, don't get too attached to it. Pro Street brings a sense of danger back to racing. Every dent, every scratch, every encounter with a barrier will have consequences. We watched in awe a clip where a car was torn into hundreds of pieces. However, this isn't Burnout. The car won't explode and reappear a couple of seconds later; Black Box spent many hours creating a realistic damage system, hoping to show the danger of these cars. Yes, there will be real consequences — beautiful, thrilling, and dangerous consequences that will knock you out of your boots and a few bills out of your wallet.
But all of this would mean nothing if the game didn't look unreal, so Black Box outdid themselves and created fresh graphics. If by "fresh" Black Box means "gorgeous and completely unexpected", then we agree. At Sears Point, the sunset bathed the track in golden rays, and the car paint (about 21,000 polygons) gleamed. When the cars launch, gray smoke bursts from under the wheels and stretches down the starting straight. It's also interesting to watch your opponent follow you in clouds of smoke and fly into the wall at a turn. Just don't be in his place!
Blow smoke in our eyes!
Despite our surprise, we share EA's decision to move away from arcade Need for Speed games to Pro Street. Realistic street racing is an entirely new genre in game development. But can EA pull it off? Time will tell. All we can say is that we'll happily wait out this "red light" on the way to our first acquaintance with the game itself!