I thought I'd see a crapload of NFS III posts by now. I guess everyone is
playing it, instead.
I've had the playstation version since day one, and have spent many hours
enjoying this terrific game, as much as Gran Turismo. The feeling of speed
isn't in the PC version. I could fly through the curves at the top of the
Rocky Pass track at over 180 mph, and it really looked like you were going
that fast!
EA also made many changes from the PSX version, some not necessarily for the
better. Off the top of my head, they are:
1. Menus are harder to navigate, and are very slow.
2. No arcade or sim mode choice. You can however make seven different
tunings. The PSX sim mode was very good.
3. No skill level choice is available, except for knockouts and tourneys.
As far as I can tell, your skill level depends on the rating of the track.
The first four are beginner, and the last five are expert.
4. No separate training mode. This allowed you to see the best line, have a
navigator, as well as driving assists. This has been integrated into the
regular mode.
5. The default car chroming (reflections) is way too high. If you have a
D3D card, you can turn down the alpha intensity
6. From the one Hot Pursuit race I drove, AI is very tough!
Things that have been improved from the PSX version:
1. You can drive as the cop car
2. You can unlock new cop cars to drive
3. you can paint your car ANY color!
4. There is a virtual***pit fore each vehicle that you can look at.
(haven't tried it yet)
5. You can download cars, of course.
6. The track menu has a 3D map, which you can rotate. Also, the NFS III
website has even better, and more detailed maps.
7. AI can be aggressive or normal
8. there's four new cars! (I'll miss the Nazca C2, though. Hopefully it
will be a future download)
9. You can see the current times of all drivers during the race.
10. You can see your 0-60 and 1/4 mile times and much more, after a race.
11. Dashboards!!! BTW, what is the deal with all the dash/ no dash ruckus?
I have a 8MB Xpert 98 (Rage Pro Turbo), and the dashes show up just fine.
12. Audio feedback I haven't figured out what it is yet, but it is for
audio cues that can be helpful if the HUD is turned off.
13. A radar detector
14. You get to hear the police conversations on a scanner. Of course, that
could get annoying after awhile. I guess you could put the speech volume to
zero.
15. Rain. mud and snow splatter on the windshield, or on the screen. This
occurs if the special effects are turned on high. These too get annoying,
although they are cool.
That's about all I can think of for now. I don't know if the five easter
egg tracks are there.
BTW, there's a demo for Moto Racer 2 on the disc. I haven't tried that yet,
either.--
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The UPS guy showed up at my door at noon
today with NFS III. I must say I was very
anxious to try it. Well, I'm still not sure
how I feel about it, even after a day of
playing it. I DID notice one peculiarity;
When set to use my Monster (VooDoo I w/4meg)
card, I had no dashes and it seemed a bit too
dark. But, when I set it to use my Diamond
Viper v330 w/8meg, the dashes were available,
it lightened up alot (chrome: TOO light), and
800x600 w/z-buffer on, it looks awesome! The
AI is definitely tough! Too damn tough if you
ask me. I also, (quite by accident)
discovered that you can have access to the
bonus track if you type in "Empire" at the
main menu. And I got the Mercedes CLK and
Jaguar-XJR by typing in "Jag" in the main
menu screen. There's still one more bonus car
to get (possibly a Chevy or a Ferrari if the
alphabetical order is anything to go by) and
two bonus persuit cars to get though. It's no
sim, but it's pretty darn good. I like the
setup capability and the tracks are nice
(leaves blow around in your wake on the
Hometown track!). And, the sound is much
improved over the demo. One more thing, you
simply must see the menu interface! It's
gorgeous! I really don't think the demo did
this game much justice at all, I had no clue
it would have all this based on my impression
from the demo.
Later...
Tony Long
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