- Go Deep Undercover – Race into an action-packed story of pursuit and betrayal. Take on jobs and compete in races to prove yourself as you infiltrate and take down an international crime syndicate
- Highway Battle – Fight off the cops and others as you take down your prey in high-speed, high stake multi-car chases. New and vastly improved AI mechanics mean more aggressive and intelligent cops focused on taking you out fast and by any means necessary
- Criminal Scramble – Be a cop and chase down criminals in the Criminal Scramble Mode
- Heroic Driving Engine – lets you pull off amazing moves for the ultimate driving edge
Need for Speed Undercover X360
Rating: 
(out of 33 reviews)
List Price: $ 19.99
Price: $ 16.75
Read more about Need for Speed: Undercover
Review by Craig Moller for Need for Speed: Undercover
Rating:
I am a huge fan of the NFS series and consider them classics and was really looking forward for this year’s release. However I was disappointed with the final product. Need for Speed Undercover is clearly an attempt to cash in on the success of 2005′s Most Wanted after ProStreet flopped with critics and fans. The game itself is as straightforward as you’d expect; race, come first, win cash, buy new cars. The underlying story is you’re an undercover cop working for the police, quite straight foward. Everything seems to work as it should – the racing is fast and frenetic; the sense of speed is swell and the cars look mostly nice and slick. The biggest problem with Undercover, and it’s a fundamental one, is that it’s lazy.
Undercover features a great range of cars, but it’s a simple cut-and-paste job from ProStreet and the cars that followed its release. There just isn’t enough new here, and you’ll likely have driven nearly every ride on offer here in a previous iteration of the series. The cops have basically clicked and dragged from the three-year-old Most Wanted and also the cities (there are three of them) are big, criss-crossed with wide, but they lack personality and they all begin to look the same.
NFS of old was about hot cars, hot pursuits and miles and miles of open road, a very fine example of this is the addictive NFS Most Wanted. Undercover make a semi-successful fist of recapturing some of this magic. Looks great, plays fine. There’s no getting around the fact, however, that Undercover is basically Most Wanted with a new lick of paint.
It is time to consider a new look for this one is repetitive and boring.
Review by Tommy Corvette for Need for Speed: Undercover
Rating:
I’ve had this game for a several days now and I can tell you–from the moment I put the game into my Xbox 360 I was unimpressed. I even got this game used for [...] bucks and I can’t WAIT to pawn it off on the next sucker who falls for NFS’s marketing ploy of this “hot new game”.
The Cons:
-The game physics – GARBAGE. Several points in the map have you ‘catching air’. About 1/3 of the time will undoubtedly send you careening out of control, flipped upside down, or pinned against a wall. Should you scrape up against a computer player or rub a wall, other racers will SCREAM past you–as if you’ve stopped–yet you’ve only lost perhaps 10mph of speed. AND YET…the AI is seemingly unaffected by their mistakes. Pit maneuvers don’t work on AI, yet should an AI even bump you from directly behind you’ll spin in a 180 with certain cars ultimately putting an end to that race if you’re further in the game and the AI is faster.
-The AI is insanely easy at first. You can pretty much win any race half way into the game by racing off the line 10 minutes after the race has started. HOWEVER: half way into the game, the AI gets some sort of ‘catch up’ advantage and can blast by you! You’re either ahead by a split time of 15 seconds (meaning if you parked your car during the race, it would take 15 seconds for the person behind you to catch and pass you), or you’re struggling to keep them on your GPS map, let alone in plain view. Currently the game has my $20,000 dollar car pitted against 200,000 dollar cars–cars that are not even in the same galaxy in terms of class. There’s absolutely no chance for me to win should I make even the slightest error (running over a cone, or braking around a hairpin turn). Kind of frustrating when this entire time you’ve been bored by winning races without any effort.
-The TRACKS! In another GIANT F-U to consumers, they’ve designed ‘street racing’ tracks that are closed circuit–YET have casual traffic on them. The tracks lack ANY feeling of street racing what so ever other than the simple fact that what you’re racing on is a street/dirt road/highway. There is absolutely no doubt you’re on a race track instead of a street. Yellow and black barricades block every corner. Imagine your surprise when you’re rocketing down a formula 1 track and see a Buick Lesabre in your way. Again, half way through the game, should you hit just 1 of these cars, the race is over. Don’t even bother to finish it, just restart or do as I do, and tomahawk your F***ing controller into the floor.
-Free roam is completely pointless. There’s nothing to do and no purpose to it really since they’ve made the player lazy by simply pushing down on the D-pad you’re cast off into the next 5minute loading screen. Now, there would be a GREAT purpose to the free roam feature if while you were driving around the game would be loading up the next race, but of course, this is not the case.
-Loading screens – hope you’re old enough to drink or are in need of constantly checking the mail. For the hour or two that you might waste your time with this game, at least 15 solid minutes of your time is spent WAITING.
-The Story line is pathetic. It’s full of holes, half the time you don’t really know what is going on, and the tasks you have to do just go on and on and become monotonous and played out. It’s the same thing over and over. “Go take out 5 cop cars by ramming into them and then we’ll put you further into the underground world of ‘street’ racing.” It’s a load of garbage.
After playing this game and seeing other horrible NFS releases, I’m officially refusing to buy anything else those jerks put out. I’m a true car enthusiast and have played several games that were far superior to this–SEVERAL YEARS AGO! Do you remember Tokyo Extreme Racer for Dreamcast? That game was far superior to this in terms of customization, function, and fun. Even computer games that were made by budget companies like Valuesoft: Redline Racing…way better than Need for Speed: Undercover.
What next? Need for Speed: FU-Give us your money?
The only use this game serves is for selling it back to someone else. PERIOD.
Review by R. Parsons for Need for Speed: Undercover
Rating:
Alright, I beat the career mode of it yesterday and am at 66% of “game completion”. It took just under 15 hrs to complete the career mode. So that’s a bit disappointing since it took about 40hrs to complete the career mode in Midnight Club LA, although it’s MUCH more non-linear.
The issues I have with NFS:UC:
1) The game is very easy. It never really gets difficult, although I think getting the last 1/3rd of the game may take as long as the first 2/3rds, since it’s at a higher level.
2) The game is entirely linear. As other reviewers have pointed out, the “open world” concept is pointless in this game. That being said, this game is basically Most Wanted 2. You do some races, you avoid some cops, you beat a boss, you move on.
3) The environments are lifeless and boring. The roads constantly have this sheen on them like they are wet, but they aren’t, and you can tell it’s being done just to reflect the sunlight to “look impressive”. It gets old really fast.
4) There is some SERIOUS slowdown issues in the game. To the point where I actually started getting annoyed by it during a couple of races. When you have a group of racers ahead of you (which doesn’t happen very often unless you suck) and you’re smashing into things, all the data on the screen brings the thing down.
What I like about the game:
1) As I said above, it’s basically Most Wanted 2. If you loved Most Wanted you’ll probably love this game. The cars handle about the same, the cops react the same way, the flow of the game is the same.
2) The graphics aren’t bad despite the slowdowns. There’s no night racing which is a real letdown, and all the races happen at either sunrise or sunset (and seriously, how many street races take place at sunrise or sunset??) and so the sun will be glaring at you quite often.
3) The sense of speed is INTENSE. The game is worth playing just to get the Bugatti Veyron. I can’t even explain how fast it is. It’s like driving a missle.
4) The types of races are a lot of fun. One of the most fun they have is “Highway Battle” where you have to get 1000ft in front of your competitor in less than a minute while ripping down a highway at high speeds and trying to avoid traffic.
Overall I’ve had a good amount of fun with this game. It won’t provide me nearly as many hours of enjoyment as MC:LA but it’s certainly a fun game to play. I totally disagree with any review that puts this below a 5/10.
I haven’t spent any time playing it online.
If you’re a fan of Most Wanted you really should play this game. It feels dated compared to other modern racing games, but it’s still worth playing. It’s probably not worth $60 to buy given the short amount of time necessary to beat it and non-replayability but it’s certainly worth a 7 day rental.
Overall I give it a 6.5/10.
For reference I’d give these scores to these similar games:
Midnight Club Los Angeles: 7.5/10
Test Drive Unlimited: 9/10
Burnout Paradise: 7/10
Need For Speed Most Wanted: 8/10
Need For Speed Carbon: 7/10
Review by J.S. Knapp for Need for Speed: Undercover
Rating:
[I HAVE played this game on BOTH the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 - thus am posting this review on both consoles.]
*sigh* I had hopes. In fact I had high hopes, and that’s what makes it so dissapointing.
It’s been said a lot – Most Wanted was a great game. A fantastic game. One of the very few games I decided to play through twice just to try a different approach.
What made Most Wanted different for a driving game was a compelling story. It wasn’t even a very deep story, but you had conflict right from the get-go and it made you eager – no, determined – to get revenge. It gave you a clear, linear story – 8 “bad guys” (I think it was eight…) to take on until you reached the baddest dude of all – the guy who took your car, took your reputation, even tried to take your girl… But in between those linear points, the game was a free-for-all. You had set things you had to do, but you could do them in any order, you could do them however you wanted. You always knew were the next objective was, but still had that freedom.
Undercover is just a cluster. There’s roads everywhere, cops everywhere, races everywhere… You have no idea what to do. The story is clear only because we’ve read about it here on Amazon, on other review sites… Honestly, the game has never told ME that I’m an undercover cop.
The came starts with a car chase – you at the wheel – and a million cops behind you. You’re in a 350z, pretty decked out, Red. Suddenly you get away. Then you’re watching a clandestine meeting between a woman and a shadowy, male figure. She says he’s going to be their driver. It wasn’t until my second re-start (tried a different console) that I realized, “Oh, I guess I’m that guy…” Next thing you know you’re sitting on the street in a POS Nissan. What happened to the 350z? What am I doing? What’s the objective? Who am I??
So you start running races – easy to do, just push down on the D-pad and it’ll automatically launch the next race. You’ll run a few races and then get a short, somewhat vague cut-scene. That’ll open up a unique race – which you’ll run – and nothing special will happen. So you’ll do a few more races, then something else suddenly happens… It’s really only curiosity that keeps you playing. There’s no motivation, no apparent pay-off… I’ve played now for a bunch of hours and still have only unlocked a small handful of parts. I never understood that theory – you have enough money to buy something but it won’t let you. The game just levels up the opponent cars anyways – let me buy whatever I can afford!
As far as actual game play goes, it’s… …alright. Graphics are okay up close, but distances get real vague. There are a LOT of aliasing issues, and items appear very blocky and granular. I’ve had a couple frame-rate issues during auto-saves and what-not – VERY frustrating in a driving game while you’re drifting a corner at 140 miles per hour. Technical tracks become challenging because you can’t see far ahead. You can, but you can’t make out what you’re looking at. Is that a turn? Oh, no – it’s a bridge abutment… Oh and forget the map. The cities of Undercover are pretty convoluted, which is nice, except that the map doesn’t detail elevation changes. So an intersection that appears on the map could actually be a bridge going over another road. Oh yeah – that’s fun when you’re trying to dart a corner while running from cops… *SMASH* – oh, THAT road is BENEATH me!!! Thanks for the help! You’re under arrest…
I of course have no idea how far into the game I am, but it’s not very challenging. I’ve won every race, and have “dominated” all but a few of the “jobs.” The cops are present, but they lack that… …je ne c’est pas… They have no spirit – no soul. They appear out of nowhere – hit a chase-breaker (usually a road-side object that you can hit to stop chasing police cars) and the game goes into a quick cut-scene to watch the destruction. That’s always fun, except that I’ve come out of those cut scenes only to plow into a road block that appeared out of nowhere. Very frustrating. **UPDATE** Even MORE frustrating when those roadblocks include a spike strip in later levels of the game… Sure ended THAT chase pretty quickly. Thanks EA!!! **/UPDATE** The [cops] seem to pit-maneuver you pretty easily – suddenly accelerating out of nowhere… But if you keep dodging, taking corners instead of following the road, this isn’t much of an issue. They just don’t have the organization of Most Wanted. When you think you’re about to escape, more will appear out of NOWHERE. When you finally do escape, they literally dissapear! In instances when you’re TRYING to rack up more points, more cop-car-kills, more damage, etc, you can’t!
A lot of the game just seems tacked on. Remember the first “Underground” NFS games? There were shops everywhere that focused on specific areas, like body parts, performance parts, certain brands of cars… Now you just push start [pause] and select “Cars.” You basically buy cars and customize them from the pause menu. How pathetic is that?? And if you actually go to a shop, you see the EXACT same screen.
The “crews” from Carbon are gone – thank God. You don’t have to hire certain staff members just to customize your car. Autosculpting is available immediately and that’s a welcome change.
NFS Undercover quickly becomes boring. You run a race, unlock some new races, run some of them, and maybe if you’re lucky you’ll trigger the next story sequence. But you have no idea, you have no motivation, and all you’re left with is another highly anticipated let-down.
Stop doing this, gaming industry. Quit focusing on the dollar and make us some games that are worth playing. We’re tired of looking behind us at “what was.” Give us something to look forward to, or quit wasting our money. I’m tired of the $60-dollar coasters.
**UPDATE**
I have to say, the last 1/4 to 1/3 of this game was nearly unplayable. These games are completely unrealistic when it comes to high-speed “simulation.”
Throughout the game you have “highway battles.” On these challenges, you race against a singular AI opponenet, and have to usually get 1000 feet ahead of them to “win.” Of course you start off behind them, and – big surprise, they’re automatically pulling away from you.” In the begining they were easy, towards the middle they were challenging, and at the end they were impossible. Why? Well, because you’re allegedly going 230 miles an hour, going over blind hills and around blind corners in a see of traffic, up against an opponent who of course has impeccable reaction and timing. The only way you could win these was to get lucky and have the AI “goof,” smacking into a car at the exact same time that you got a clear straightaway to put some distance between you. But many times I’d pile up into a STACK of AI “traffic” cars, and watch as the opponent deftly weaved around them like it was a cakewalk. Completely unrealistic, completely impossible, and utterly frustrating. I beat the game, and gave up on the rest of the “completion” achievements.
I cannot explain how HAPPY I am that I rented this game.
Review by Terence A. Johnson for Need for Speed: Undercover
Rating:
there are a lot of critics of this game but i think EA hit the target with this game. I havn’t stop playing the game since i got it for christmas. I’ve played midnight club LA for one day then i got nfs undercover have gone back to LA yet. the graphics are better, the sound is steller. as with anything two thngs that would have made the game better would be more after market body kits, and more cars. I think once you get use tothe raceoing style of the game its a blast.