The game actually got into the Guinness World Records Gamers Edition 2010 for the most detailed cockpit view in any racing game until then... Yeah, Scholastic Book Fairs were awesome.
Except Shift was at least playable with a pad. Sorry sim purists, but SMS shouldn't have lied (twice) by saying Project Cars 1 & 2 was playable without a wheel. I'm still bitter, as you can tell!! 😄
@@AchiragChiragg I've tried with both games. I know some will put up with it but I find it to be pretty much broken. The fact there are hundreds of 'how to set up for playing with pad' vids on YT and all completely different tells me they didn't really try and that many others feel the same.
@@GrummanTestPilot The problem with GT’s camera is that it’s completely still. What made Shift’s cockpit view so exciting was the subtle movement that matched the motion and momentum of the car and really made you feel the g-force.
I always felt like the psp version of shift was like that too. I also realized that the actual psp prostreet game was more similar to shift on pc and consoles. It's like the psp versions were reversed in that category.
This game really nails its terrifying sense of speed. Reaching top speed in any car in this game feels like it can total you in any second. The tunnel vision and shakiness really amps up the immersion. I don't think any racing game has come close to the shift series in this matter
The newer racing games like Forza Horizon 5 sense of speed isn't there at all which bums me out. Forza Motorsport 4 going over 400 km/h was *intense.* Screen shaking horizontally and the outer screen edges darkens makes it very scary yet so additing to watch! So far, no racing games like NFS: Shift or the 360 forza games can come close to sense of speed which makes me upset...
@@haaxxx9 i think horizon 5 has less because youre going to get to 400kmh way more often in there than in motorsport 4. you would pretty much NEVER get to 400kmh unless you were intentionally trying to in FM4, which isnt really the case in FH5, and having that extreme screen shake frequently could end up as more of bother than anything in there (also considering FH5 is an open world game with traffic and FM4 had dedicated race tracks only), at least to a certain degree
@@lRedKill3r There is a option to turn it off the speed effects in the option menu since FM4 had it. And it's true that those games going to hit over 400 km/h is vastly different. Forza Horizon 1 and 2 had the screen shaking effects and honestly it was just right how it was insane but not like "HOLY SHIT I CAN'T SEE ANYTHING OH MY GOD!" like Pro Streets did. I have a better option of all of this. Make the whole sense of speed customizable. Ranging from how the camera goes back after a certain km/h have been hit, Screen shaking, darker edges, motion blur, speed lines etc... So far all I can think of this is Project Cars which 1 and 2 was good, and then they made 3 and destroy all on what have 1 and 2 build off... R.I.P Project Cars :'(
@@haaxxx9 yeah an optiom to have screen shaking similar to fh1 and 2 would be nice, though that also would need to be tweaked as we can get to +510kmh now
The sense of speed in this game is amazing! Sorely lacking in most racing games nowadays. Plus, each car having their own speedometer is a really small feature in the grand scheme of things, but makes the game all the more memorable IMO
IMO, This is the very first game that understood the charm of G-FORCE and applied it to the camera Not like other sims where all cars seem like sliding butter on rails
I loved that figure 8 track as a kid. Especially in shift 2 where they added more advanced damage so if you got side swiped by an opponent, you could lose a wheel or two and be out of the race. However if you race that track in Shift 1, you could basically fight your way to the max level easily
shifts handling physics are what kept it from greatness imo. everything else was spot on, but the twitchy, bumpy, 'simultaneously understeering and oversteering while cornering' handling was terrible. thats what separates truly great simcades like GRID from shift - GRID is still fun to play, shift is tiresome.
I just playing shift as my first time on my PC with a G29 and... Yea. You are correct. The cars feels so underwhelming when cornering in a RWD car, they almost always under-steer than over-steer and it feels like you're fighting the car for no reason. But other than that Shift is a fun game! Just not a good racing simulator. And yes, RaceDriver: Grid is the better game even is lean more to the arcade side. It have the perfect balance of realism and arcade!
@@haaxxx9 Shift 2 was far superior with a wheel. in fact Shift 2's handling was so abysmal with a controller I think it was actually coded with a wheel in mind. Shift 1 I've got no idea what they were doing when it came to the wheel physics. if you let go of the wheel on a straight it starts really aggressively swerving from left to right until you crash. I think the devs thought that the more a car 'fought back' the more gritty and realistic it was which definitely wasn't the case.
@@ReplicantBattyman Never tried letting go of my wheel in a straight line. But the ideal when the car is "Fighting back" for control is stupid. If you don't have anything that can upset the car like a bump, steep etc than the car with a default set-up should drive straight... In a straight line. For all types of controllers not just wheels. Then again I mainly play racing games with a dedicated wheel.
I still love Shift alot due to how dangerous they portray professional racing, cars feel like fucking death machines. Unlike other sim racers who portray racing as this high class, jazz laden, wine drinking sport.
Default tune is different to every car, so tune is the key to make it more controllable, i did not have any understeer oversteer problems , especially when driving AWD car its super satisfying. I honestly dont know what are you all are talking about. I only noticed bullshit handling in Shift 2
I quite enjoyed playing Shift when it came out new. At the time, I thought the physics were really quite good (coming from a purely arcade racer at said time). I tried replaying this about a year ago, and now that I am much more experienced in sims and simcades, the handling physics are really quite...eh, and tiresome at times. The cars feel like they simultaneously understeer and oversteer...somehow. And sometimes the Works conversion kits felt like they broke cars. (70s Nissan Skyline 2000 GT-R for example). But I have to say, the attention to detail in this game, even today, is still quite spectacular. When playing on a wheel, the driver in game depresses the pedals the same way you do, the H-shifters and handbrakes are operated realistically. The sense of speed, G-force, crashes and the bumps on the track (sometimes a little too extreme, don't get me wrong) are super immersive. When driving a high downforce car at speed through dips and over bumps, the diffusers scrape the ground and spark. Cars sound like their real life counterparts. Performance upgrades influence the engine and exhaust notes. Full-spec race cars and cars with upgraded transmissions have the whine of straight-cut gearboxes. Even the tyre smoke looks absolutely fantastic while doing a burnout, wrapping around the tyres in the wheelwells and expelling out the side and rear of the guards, instead of the little pffts of measly farts Forza had at the time (for example). Graphics were extremely hi-fi for 2009, though slightly outdated now, but still holding up. But the immersion is UNREAL. My memories of Shift 2: Unleashed aren't as vivid, but I remember having the same feeling of immersion (or greater) despite the physics being wonky (at the time I played it, they may have been fixed via patches). I wish more developers would put the time into these little details in racing games. I can't speak for other people, but when I get sucked in to a racing game, like I was with Shift 1, I feel like I AM a racing driver. I feel like I WANT to compete. Even if the career progression was a little tedious. I wish Slightly Mad Studios put that immersion effort into Project CARS, because they really almost nailed the physics for a more casual simulation experience (I say "casual sim", more realistic than Forza Motorsport or Gran Turismo, but not as hard core as iRacing, for example).
In Shift every car was sliding except AWD cars and Zonda R and steering felt rubbery delayed.. it was awful to play at times.. GT and Forza or even Project Cars don't have that
That's quite interesting since Project cars 1 and 2 were both developed by Slightly mad studio's who also made both shift games. It's good to see that they fixed the handling in the Project cars games as in shift they were quite a struggle to tame.
I just wanted to say that you are one of the only channels that when you release I don't watch right away. With your videos I like to wait until I have nothing to do and I can sit down and actually watch it. You're like the favorite TV show that only comes on once a week. I like to savor it not just consume.
I actually like Shift more due to how dangerous they portray professional racing, cars feel like fucking death machines. Unlike other sim racers who portray racing as this high class, jazz laden, wine drinking sport.
If there was something that I did really like about ProStreet that I wish other games would copy more often, it would be the atmosphere. AFAIK the only other games that did it to such an extent were the Forza Horizon spin-offs. Dirt 3, Driven to Destruction, and Race Driver: Grid are also candidates.
nfs shift was my the first race simulator that i really enjoyed, that first person camera was so fun, so happy to see that is still receiving good impressions after so many years
This game changed racing games for me. The cockpit view was so good for its time that it alone turned me into a Sim racer enthusiast. Ever since Shift I've not been able to play racing games outside of cockpit view, it's like you get a whole different feel for the driving with the different perspective, at least for me.
This was my first serious simulation racer that I played exclusively through the eyes of the driver, and I still play it on both PC & my X360 to this very day, enjoying the hell out of it. To me the game aged amazingly well, and in some ways (like the Career mode) it even tops pCars games that I equally enjoy & love. This was also the game that kickstarted my passion for both car culture in general, and racing sims in particular. S2U was good, too. But something about the sequel just felt off to me - I dunno whether it was its more dramatic presentation, or smth else. And again, I really like S2U, it's just not as impactful as the original Shift to me. ProStreet holds a special place in my heart as well, but with all due respect I wouldn't call it a 'serious sim' NFS game. Thanks for yet another great NFS game series review! UPD: You know, looking at the footage from S2U I remember now how I always preferred that 'bloomey', 'hazy', 'dream-like' & overly bright look of the original compared to cleaner, more... 'crisp' visuals of the sequel. And presentation was everything to young me back then. So I guess this is why after all these years I still prefer NFS:Shift over S2U.
1. Just discovered your channel and videos today. This is my third. 2. Before watching, this is still my favorite racing game. I was never interested in moving beyond my Xbox 360 and still play a deep library of games from the NES through 7th generation games. Shift has the options to tune the game to my skill level and preference. I am not dedicated to a 100% sim and mastering in depth skills, but I also don't want a pure arcade racer either. Shift lets me play with a great first person behind the wheel perspective with amazing sounds and feel and to race on legendary courses. I am from California originally and being able to race at Leguna Seca makes me feel like I am right back at home. 3. Now that I have watched the video: Well done. I don't care about customization of the looks of the car and always use the available options. I am not good at racing games and still have never finished it, instead finding myself messing around with quick races with the lower level cars than super cars. As you said, the perspective and experience is focused on the user, and that's why I enjoy it so much.
NFS Shift is a fantastic game. Literally one of the most exhilarating games ever. None of the haters ever played the game. Some of the music is a bit grating though. I bought it for like £2 and would happily have paid like £30 or £60. Better than 99% of games for sure. The sense of speed is insane. Few games, perhaps including Drive Club and a few others, come close to the simulation of the experience of driving, instead of merely the simulation of handling. The car handling can get weird if you tune your car up crazy fast on some tracks however that may be realistic, I think my car was simply lifting off the road and I lost any control, tending to happen on small hilltops at insane speed. The drifting is too hard though, on controller anyway.
Then Shift 2 came out... and we would witness one of the most masterful game soundtracks in history. The editing was top notch and even blew the original songs away in some cases!
Love your videos man, even the ones I didn't play. You don't spoil much yet keep the main points in your speech perfectly. It's really really good, and it's quite enjoyable.
My first ever racing game, and nothing else compares to it. I may get every single gran turismo game in the future, but I will always come back to this as it holds a special place in my heart.
One thing I loved about this game is it felt like it was made to be played in first person. It is in fact the only racing game I felt more comfortable in the cockpit than I did in 3rd person
Same it is the only racing game that I play using the interior view the whole time i tried using the third person like in every other racing game the camera feels weird for some reason
I am a big fan of your reviews and after I watched this I purchased this game straight away for the Xbox 360. I have played it for a little bit and I agree with everything you say in the review. It is a pretty good racing game.
I’ve had Shift since soon after it came out and I still play it, what I like the most about it is the intensity of racing in it and how unforgiving it is. The cars are loud and sound really, really good (especially the Maserati MC12 GT1), the sense of speed is surreal, the AI will happily put you off the track if given the chance, and any small mistake and it’s curtains on that lap or race with no rewind ability. My biggest gripe is the rubber band effect and the overall incompetence of the AI even on expert. They’re fast but inconsistent, and if you’re a half decent driver in an ok car you can easily win every race.
I should also mention that this game also has main rivals on certain competitions, each having different driving style. Some being precise (Alexi Cumia & Tomas Rudall), some methodical (Kiyo Hironaga), others being aggressive (Ron Kay & Josef Taylor), which makes you have to adapt to their driving style if you wanna beat them.
The Zonda sounds incredible, no other game has the gearbox whine and tyre noise with the V12 scream. Sounds incredible even if all the 4cyl cars sound the same as eachother
I liked Shift a lot. It was the first title where racing in cockpit view felt natural to me. I spent hundreds of hours in the livery editor. Not being able to mirror what you’ve done on the other side of the car was such a pain in the ass. Especially since my liveries kept becoming more complex. That design oversight cost me tons of wasted hours. They added a mirror feature in Shift2 but there was another issue I can’t remember. Whatever it was it was so bad I walked away from that game. My main issue with Shift was being charged real money for extra garage slots and not being able to own multiple copies of one car. Meaning you can only own one Corvette or Lamborghini. That sucks when you like to paint cars.
Barge by Gunnar Olsen can never listen to it in the same way anymore everhood was such a great game using that song thanks for adding it in the background tracks colourshed.
The Shift games were among some of my hardest Platinum trophies to mostly in part of the mastering all the corners. There were just some corners that no matter how perfectly you think you took them, the game's just like "not my tempo" and and you just have to keep trying over and over and over and over until you just get lucky.
Going back to Gran Turismo after trying this back when it released was like singing a lullaby to myself. It was far from perfect physics-wise, but I loved the intensity of the whole thing... The engine sounds were great (compared to GT), the added extra layer of immersion in the interior camera with all the shaking and the driver’s panting, the crashes were scary and almost stress-inducing... It was a very well-rounded package, albeit a bit rough around the edges, and a very welcome change of direction for NFS.
well GT7 2022 still stucked back in terms of Sound (fake robotic sound in every stock car), sense of speed, cameraviews, night&rain visuals, fun of driving experience
Prostreet was frickin awesome. The early cars were kinda all round sluggish - but once you got upgrading and tuning the setup you unleashed some monsters. Drag racing was great, a powerful V8 might wheelie and then torque steer, meaning that few seconds in a hopefully straight line was properly demanding. They came up with several models of circuit racing, straight up first across the line, or trying to set best times in sectors. There were the awesome Speed races, flat out along sinuous roads trying to keep inch perfect. And of course the most important thing, the handling model, the best handling in any NFS game I've played, but I admit that somehow Shift passed me by. I might have to remedy that.
I use not to comment on your vids. I just stay for the nostalgia and your honest oppinion. But this time i will coment on this game. This game teached me as a young bloke that you can t always win and you need to grind to get to know the tracks and the car that your driving. Because of this game i got better at the green hell track.
Shifts sheer terrifying sense of speed was pretty much unmatched until Project Cars came around IMO. And the sound, the game STILL sounds absolutely fantastic.
I remember the Lotus Elise in its Works Conversion build being extremely op. Godly Acceleration and Handling. Even though it lacked in the topspeed department.
I loved this & it's sequel from the day it launched as I pre-ordered both, fantastic & unique racing games many quickly dismiss. I think the "NFS Shift 2" is far better in handling & pretty much the best & more of everything, just not the biggest fan of it's progression system which was my only minor issue with it. Look forward to a profile on the sequel my friend!
You know. NFS Shift is still my favorite racing game about legal racing after all these years. The funniest thing about this game is losing control of your car easily.
Very nice. Enjoying your Clips for about 6 Months now, keep up the good work, I still Demand people to come and watch you videos to get more Subs if not that then Break the 100k views on majority of videos for the first 24 hours :) Because everyting you release is just pure Entermainment to Watch and Listen.
After Undercover, I gave up on the series, always seeing new titles with some interest, but once the reviews came out, I knew they weren't for me. Need for Speed Heat, however, really sparked my interest. I bought it this week, and have been absolutely loving it.
Shift has that weird "x" factor that makes it the most immersive racing game I have ever played...including this generation. I did not like Shift 2. Most immersive games I have played: Racer: Shift Shooter: Killzone 2 RPG: DQXI World/Story: Mass Effect Trilogy Puzzle: The Witness Strategy: MIGHT & MAGIC CLASH OF HEROES
But, but Shift 2 was even more immersive... I mean the game had it's problems, namely the "floaty handling model", still better than the first Shift though. But as far as immersion goes, Shift 2's helmet cam was the most immersive thing in a racing game I've ever seen. It even had the official GT1 and GT3 licenses with their respective cars, if only the handling was more alike Forza/Gran Turismo, Shift 2 would be the bomb. Many of it's issues were fixed through patches as well, like the input lag with a wheel. Anyway, Shift 2 is still my go to racing game on the PC since I play with an XBox 360 controller and Project Cars and Assetto Corsa are unplayable without a wheel...
i just booted up my PS3 and played Shift for the first time since 2015 and it was just as fun as i remember. Its such a good game. I probably last played it just before i got my first PC.Not many games now days on PC have progression, instead you just get lots of mnoey and everything else immediately from the start. Thats why also got Gran Turismo 1 on my PC.
Could you make a review about its successor Shift 2: Unleashed? I personally still like and play this game up till today. The helmet camera alone is something I've only seen in S2:U, giving you a pretty realistic feel like no other racing game could deliver until VR and TrackIR where integrated and became popular. Your work will be appreciated! Great vid btw!
Shift actually has extremely good controls, but you need the analogue triggers and the correct control setup. The game is so good that the guys over at nogrip made a mod that takes it a step further and has near sim level controls. As for your criticisms, shift 2 is your game.
Both Shift and Race Driver GRID have a visual car destruction models. I know you do not race to cause accidents but this happens. And in both games it was always fun with both visual and damage model to win the race (or be on podium) when car got some scratches during the race.
Shift has a sense of speed, that Forza and GT don't have. When I go on staith in those games sometimes I just don't even need to press any buttons, because I feel like I'm in a picture that doesn't move....
Bounce issue - Ambush Canyon has a bump on the track near the first bridge that upsets cars (fixed in Shift 2), while the rest of the tracks are relatively smooth, although high speed cars can go airborne over hills. The bouncing on banked ovals is due to a physics issue. Track surfaces are composed of polygons, not a continuously smooth surface, the polygons are not dense enough , and the bounce issue occurs when the game's physics calculation results in body parts being below the surface of the track resulting in severe bouncing. I've played both arcade and sim-oriented games. For me Shift was a continuation of the GTR series. GTR 1.0 was unrealistically difficult. GTR 2.0 was more realistic. GTR Evolution | Race 07 was a bit easier to drive. Shift was essentially a continuation of that trend. Note that the g-motor physics engine was first used in EA's F1 1999 to 2002 series. As for Need For Speed with cockpit views, High Stakes (1999) and Porsche Unleashed (2000) had cockpit views as an option. I spent more time doing online races than career modes, starting with High Stakes (the first NFS with online play). The online play for Shift used a ranking system that differed from the career mode tiers. The ratings were 4.0, 6,0, 10.0, 14.0, and unlimited.
NFS shift was the second ever NFS I played after underground, but it was the one NFS I played the most ever in my life. I have feelings for this game. Other NFS titles focus on Street racing. Even Pro Street had a street racing background for the protagonist. However, Shift was the first attempt by NFS at organized Motorsport, and I absolutely love it. The best graphics of all time, the cars look so real in it! Wish it was actually on mobile (not that crappy IOS version), the closest is real racing 3, but it doesn't have car customisation (only liveries and not body kits).
Tried it not long after it released and couldn't get into it, whole game just didn't feel right and the driving felt way too heavy, and this is coming from someone who was practically addicted to GTA 4 at the time and loved the driving in that. Never understood why they even bothered trying this type of game though after the reception Pro Street received from a lot of people and Forza making a huge step forward with FM3. Hoping you review the NFS that came out the year after this for consoles, even 10 years on it's still the best one we've had since Carbon in my opinion.
Literally would play this for hours on end. Who here enjoyed endurance races? Never hit pause, just the pure sound of straight cuts and screaming engines.
8:49, Yes, thanks for correcting me, it's a BMW M3, not 135i, I'm an idiot, Haha
Hehe. Don't blame you. They look too similar.
@@elgranbocaso525 nope
@@elgranbocaso525 but a select few Xbox 360 games are backwards compatible with Xbox One though
@@elgranbocaso525 what an asshole I was just answering your question
@@elgranbocaso525 do you even speak English?
The game actually got into the Guinness World Records Gamers Edition 2010 for the most detailed cockpit view in any racing game until then... Yeah, Scholastic Book Fairs were awesome.
Memories
Lmao I bought that book from the book fair
I had the 2008 one from the book fair 🤝
More detail than gt5 prologue!?
I have the 2016 one.
Need for Speed Shift is pretty much the beta version of Project Cars.
Lol
It's even made by the same devs if I'm not mistaken.(Slightly Mad studios)
Except Shift was at least playable with a pad. Sorry sim purists, but SMS shouldn't have lied (twice) by saying Project Cars 1 & 2 was playable without a wheel. I'm still bitter, as you can tell!! 😄
@@benwilliams5760 is it really that hard to play with a controller pad ?(project cars 1&2)
@@AchiragChiragg I've tried with both games. I know some will put up with it but I find it to be pretty much broken. The fact there are hundreds of 'how to set up for playing with pad' vids on YT and all completely different tells me they didn't really try and that many others feel the same.
The thing I loved best about Shift that the other sim games didn't get right was the sense of speed. When you were going fast, it felt like it.
the tunnel vision and the screaming straight cut gears are the best part
Prostreet speed events are the scariest imo in terms of sense of speed
so truee.. Gran Turisimo felt so blah compared to this,
@@MrCarpediem6it's the main reason I prefer shift over gran Turismo, even with all its flaws
The interior view is what made me really love the game, no other game has the same quality interior camera
*GT sport has entered the chat*
@@GrummanTestPilot gt sport has no sense of speed
@@konrad1101 and that’s the only gripe 😂
@@GrummanTestPilot The problem with GT’s camera is that it’s completely still. What made Shift’s cockpit view so exciting was the subtle movement that matched the motion and momentum of the car and really made you feel the g-force.
You ever heard of the dirt series? Forza?
Love racing games that, in 3rd person, use the same gauges as the car you’re driving.
We need more of those. Like Test Drive Unlimited (RIP) or Project Gotham Racing (also RIP)
Wangan Midnight Maximum Tune series also have this as well!
John ‘Juice’ Shipper
To be fair, i hate this...
I know right, makes you actually feel like you're driving the car you're driving
Makes the car you're driving feels even more unique
Ah Shift, here we go again.
Perfect🤣
Fuzon-S nice.
Great comment. I'll give it two number nines, and a number nine large.
That is legendary
Chill, chill! It's me, CJ!
Shift on PSP is basically "ProStreet 2"
I always felt like the psp version of shift was like that too. I also realized that the actual psp prostreet game was more similar to shift on pc and consoles. It's like the psp versions were reversed in that category.
And it was shit
i played that i can confirm
more like burnout without takedowns i this it has the same engine
I don't think I ever click on a car video where you haven't commented.
This game really nails its terrifying sense of speed. Reaching top speed in any car in this game feels like it can total you in any second.
The tunnel vision and shakiness really amps up the immersion. I don't think any racing game has come close to the shift series in this matter
Which is ridiculous!! Someone, anyone should've upped this already. Time to break out shift 1 again
The newer racing games like Forza Horizon 5 sense of speed isn't there at all which bums me out. Forza Motorsport 4 going over 400 km/h was *intense.* Screen shaking horizontally and the outer screen edges darkens makes it very scary yet so additing to watch!
So far, no racing games like NFS: Shift or the 360 forza games can come close to sense of speed which makes me upset...
@@haaxxx9 i think horizon 5 has less because youre going to get to 400kmh way more often in there than in motorsport 4. you would pretty much NEVER get to 400kmh unless you were intentionally trying to in FM4, which isnt really the case in FH5, and having that extreme screen shake frequently could end up as more of bother than anything in there (also considering FH5 is an open world game with traffic and FM4 had dedicated race tracks only), at least to a certain degree
@@lRedKill3r There is a option to turn it off the speed effects in the option menu since FM4 had it. And it's true that those games going to hit over 400 km/h is vastly different. Forza Horizon 1 and 2 had the screen shaking effects and honestly it was just right how it was insane but not like "HOLY SHIT I CAN'T SEE ANYTHING OH MY GOD!" like Pro Streets did.
I have a better option of all of this. Make the whole sense of speed customizable. Ranging from how the camera goes back after a certain km/h have been hit, Screen shaking, darker edges, motion blur, speed lines etc... So far all I can think of this is Project Cars which 1 and 2 was good, and then they made 3 and destroy all on what have 1 and 2 build off... R.I.P Project Cars :'(
@@haaxxx9 yeah an optiom to have screen shaking similar to fh1 and 2 would be nice, though that also would need to be tweaked as we can get to +510kmh now
16:41
Can we all take a moment to appreciate how guttural that engine sound is? This is from a game made in 2009, eat your heart out Forza.
They nailed the audio 100%. I remember reading the reviews before I bought it and most of them.put 10/10 for sound.
I've spent hours in a row listening to the Shift engine sounds, I'll freely admit it. So damn good.
Those intake sounds and straight cut gear whines makes it sound so much more intense
The sound of the Z06 screaming it's supercharged head off never got old.
Call me an NFS fanboy but I'll never buy a Forza, even if I get it for free
The sense of speed in this game is amazing! Sorely lacking in most racing games nowadays. Plus, each car having their own speedometer is a really small feature in the grand scheme of things, but makes the game all the more memorable IMO
This makes you feel like driving a real car instead of one generic speedometer for all the cars that you see in most racing games, even Gran Turismo.
CSP: "I don't want to embarrass myself again"
Also CSP 2 minutes later, pointing at an M3: "You've got a BMW 1 Series"
IMO, This is the very first game that understood the charm of G-FORCE and applied it to the camera
Not like other sims where all cars seem like sliding butter on rails
God, I absolutely loved this and its sequel a good amount. The handling is quite unique and it has an addictive charm to it imo.
I also loved the shift serious
thr handling sucked and I loved it.
In shift 2 i had the feeling there was an awful lot of input delay
@@G4meplayVids YES, like i turned my wheel quickly, and there was like a 0.5 second delay. Awful
I wouldn't say the handling is unique but the Shift series is fun though!
I loved that figure 8 track as a kid. Especially in shift 2 where they added more advanced damage so if you got side swiped by an opponent, you could lose a wheel or two and be out of the race.
However if you race that track in Shift 1, you could basically fight your way to the max level easily
shifts handling physics are what kept it from greatness imo. everything else was spot on, but the twitchy, bumpy, 'simultaneously understeering and oversteering while cornering' handling was terrible. thats what separates truly great simcades like GRID from shift - GRID is still fun to play, shift is tiresome.
I just playing shift as my first time on my PC with a G29 and... Yea. You are correct. The cars feels so underwhelming when cornering in a RWD car, they almost always under-steer than over-steer and it feels like you're fighting the car for no reason. But other than that Shift is a fun game! Just not a good racing simulator.
And yes, RaceDriver: Grid is the better game even is lean more to the arcade side. It have the perfect balance of realism and arcade!
@@haaxxx9 Shift 2 was far superior with a wheel. in fact Shift 2's handling was so abysmal with a controller I think it was actually coded with a wheel in mind.
Shift 1 I've got no idea what they were doing when it came to the wheel physics. if you let go of the wheel on a straight it starts really aggressively swerving from left to right until you crash. I think the devs thought that the more a car 'fought back' the more gritty and realistic it was which definitely wasn't the case.
@@ReplicantBattyman Never tried letting go of my wheel in a straight line. But the ideal when the car is "Fighting back" for control is stupid. If you don't have anything that can upset the car like a bump, steep etc than the car with a default set-up should drive straight... In a straight line. For all types of controllers not just wheels. Then again I mainly play racing games with a dedicated wheel.
I still love Shift alot due to how dangerous they portray professional racing, cars feel like fucking death machines. Unlike other sim racers who portray racing as this high class, jazz laden, wine drinking sport.
Default tune is different to every car, so tune is the key to make it more controllable, i did not have any understeer oversteer problems , especially when driving AWD car its super satisfying. I honestly dont know what are you all are talking about. I only noticed bullshit handling in Shift 2
I quite enjoyed playing Shift when it came out new. At the time, I thought the physics were really quite good (coming from a purely arcade racer at said time).
I tried replaying this about a year ago, and now that I am much more experienced in sims and simcades, the handling physics are really quite...eh, and tiresome at times.
The cars feel like they simultaneously understeer and oversteer...somehow. And sometimes the Works conversion kits felt like they broke cars. (70s Nissan Skyline 2000 GT-R for example).
But I have to say, the attention to detail in this game, even today, is still quite spectacular. When playing on a wheel, the driver in game depresses the pedals the same way you do, the H-shifters and handbrakes are operated realistically. The sense of speed, G-force, crashes and the bumps on the track (sometimes a little too extreme, don't get me wrong) are super immersive. When driving a high downforce car at speed through dips and over bumps, the diffusers scrape the ground and spark. Cars sound like their real life counterparts. Performance upgrades influence the engine and exhaust notes. Full-spec race cars and cars with upgraded transmissions have the whine of straight-cut gearboxes. Even the tyre smoke looks absolutely fantastic while doing a burnout, wrapping around the tyres in the wheelwells and expelling out the side and rear of the guards, instead of the little pffts of measly farts Forza had at the time (for example). Graphics were extremely hi-fi for 2009, though slightly outdated now, but still holding up.
But the immersion is UNREAL. My memories of Shift 2: Unleashed aren't as vivid, but I remember having the same feeling of immersion (or greater) despite the physics being wonky (at the time I played it, they may have been fixed via patches). I wish more developers would put the time into these little details in racing games. I can't speak for other people, but when I get sucked in to a racing game, like I was with Shift 1, I feel like I AM a racing driver. I feel like I WANT to compete. Even if the career progression was a little tedious.
I wish Slightly Mad Studios put that immersion effort into Project CARS, because they really almost nailed the physics for a more casual simulation experience (I say "casual sim", more realistic than Forza Motorsport or Gran Turismo, but not as hard core as iRacing, for example).
In Shift every car was sliding except AWD cars and Zonda R and steering felt rubbery delayed.. it was awful to play at times.. GT and Forza or even Project Cars don't have that
That's quite interesting since Project cars 1 and 2 were both developed by Slightly mad studio's who also made both shift games. It's good to see that they fixed the handling in the Project cars games as in shift they were quite a struggle to tame.
@@lordmegatron65 PC1 still resembled shift handling a lot, i heard pc2 is much better tho
RWD in shift 2 are the worst, especially tier A
You can kinda fix it with some tweaks on advanced controls (consoles)
@@irrelevant9023 In shift 2, even with some tunings, it stil handles shit. I am referring to my Gumpert apollo
I just wanted to say that you are one of the only channels that when you release I don't watch right away. With your videos I like to wait until I have nothing to do and I can sit down and actually watch it. You're like the favorite TV show that only comes on once a week. I like to savor it not just consume.
I still like pro street more. Didnt take itself as serious.
Same here,even if ProStreet has some "tank" phyisics i prefer them over this "slippery and grippy at the same time" driving NFS Shift has
NFS shift is better in my opinion
I actually like Shift more due to how dangerous they portray professional racing, cars feel like fucking death machines. Unlike other sim racers who portray racing as this high class, jazz laden, wine drinking sport.
If there was something that I did really like about ProStreet that I wish other games would copy more often, it would be the atmosphere. AFAIK the only other games that did it to such an extent were the Forza Horizon spin-offs. Dirt 3, Driven to Destruction, and Race Driver: Grid are also candidates.
I still love carbon
the most fun you can have with this game is to set the track to the tiny figure 8 and setting laps and cars to max then letting the chaos ensue
ikr! whenever i rage quit or get bored with career mode, i always go to figure 8 for demolition derby
According to Steam, I have 1000 hours in Shift. I'm pretty sure atleast 900 were of doing exactly that. It's just too much fun
I used to use the tier 5 maserati in the figure 8 track for fun
I'm so glad I found this comment, I think 99% of my summer in like 5th Grade was doing just that. :D
nfs shift was my the first race simulator that i really enjoyed, that first person camera was so fun, so happy to see that is still receiving good impressions after so many years
The figure 8 track was my favorite back then. It was setting it to a lot of laps and *_survive_*
This game changed racing games for me. The cockpit view was so good for its time that it alone turned me into a Sim racer enthusiast. Ever since Shift I've not been able to play racing games outside of cockpit view, it's like you get a whole different feel for the driving with the different perspective, at least for me.
This was my first serious simulation racer that I played exclusively through the eyes of the driver, and I still play it on both PC & my X360 to this very day, enjoying the hell out of it. To me the game aged amazingly well, and in some ways (like the Career mode) it even tops pCars games that I equally enjoy & love.
This was also the game that kickstarted my passion for both car culture in general, and racing sims in particular. S2U was good, too. But something about the sequel just felt off to me - I dunno whether it was its more dramatic presentation, or smth else. And again, I really like S2U, it's just not as impactful as the original Shift to me. ProStreet holds a special place in my heart as well, but with all due respect I wouldn't call it a 'serious sim' NFS game.
Thanks for yet another great NFS game series review!
UPD: You know, looking at the footage from S2U I remember now how I always preferred that 'bloomey', 'hazy', 'dream-like' & overly bright look of the original compared to cleaner, more... 'crisp' visuals of the sequel. And presentation was everything to young me back then. So I guess this is why after all these years I still prefer NFS:Shift over S2U.
Not even close to sim, but ok.
You call this a sim? Lmao
1. Just discovered your channel and videos today. This is my third.
2. Before watching, this is still my favorite racing game. I was never interested in moving beyond my Xbox 360 and still play a deep library of games from the NES through 7th generation games. Shift has the options to tune the game to my skill level and preference. I am not dedicated to a 100% sim and mastering in depth skills, but I also don't want a pure arcade racer either. Shift lets me play with a great first person behind the wheel perspective with amazing sounds and feel and to race on legendary courses. I am from California originally and being able to race at Leguna Seca makes me feel like I am right back at home.
3. Now that I have watched the video: Well done. I don't care about customization of the looks of the car and always use the available options. I am not good at racing games and still have never finished it, instead finding myself messing around with quick races with the lower level cars than super cars.
As you said, the perspective and experience is focused on the user, and that's why I enjoy it so much.
That pagani screaming at the end though
You made a Shift review! I was just checking the other day if you had done a Shift review yet and BAM here it is!
Ahhh the game that got me into sim racing!
I remember just sitting on the figure 8 track when I was a kid for hours destroying the cars. It was so much fun
NFS Shift is a fantastic game. Literally one of the most exhilarating games ever. None of the haters ever played the game. Some of the music is a bit grating though. I bought it for like £2 and would happily have paid like £30 or £60. Better than 99% of games for sure. The sense of speed is insane. Few games, perhaps including Drive Club and a few others, come close to the simulation of the experience of driving, instead of merely the simulation of handling.
The car handling can get weird if you tune your car up crazy fast on some tracks however that may be realistic, I think my car was simply lifting off the road and I lost any control, tending to happen on small hilltops at insane speed.
The drifting is too hard though, on controller anyway.
Dude I love your reviews, every single view is well deserved, keep it up
All right! I’ve been waiting for your next Need For Speed review. As soon as I get home, I’m gonna grab a beer and put this on my tv.
Then Shift 2 came out... and we would witness one of the most masterful game soundtracks in history. The editing was top notch and even blew the original songs away in some cases!
Love your videos man, even the ones I didn't play. You don't spoil much yet keep the main points in your speech perfectly. It's really really good, and it's quite enjoyable.
My most fond memory of this game was the endurance figure 8 race. Glad it mentioned in this video.
YES it always makes me happy seeing a new racing game review from you, especially NFS
The helmet camera view in Shift 2 was sweet.
I loved that shit
My first ever racing game, and nothing else compares to it. I may get every single gran turismo game in the future, but I will always come back to this as it holds a special place in my heart.
One thing I loved about this game is it felt like it was made to be played in first person. It is in fact the only racing game I felt more comfortable in the cockpit than I did in 3rd person
Same it is the only racing game that I play using the interior view the whole time i tried using the third person like in every other racing game the camera feels weird for some reason
I am a big fan of your reviews and after I watched this I purchased this game straight away for the Xbox 360. I have played it for a little bit and I agree with everything you say in the review. It is a pretty good racing game.
I’ve had Shift since soon after it came out and I still play it, what I like the most about it is the intensity of racing in it and how unforgiving it is. The cars are loud and sound really, really good (especially the Maserati MC12 GT1), the sense of speed is surreal, the AI will happily put you off the track if given the chance, and any small mistake and it’s curtains on that lap or race with no rewind ability. My biggest gripe is the rubber band effect and the overall incompetence of the AI even on expert. They’re fast but inconsistent, and if you’re a half decent driver in an ok car you can easily win every race.
just discovered your reviews, I'm in a marathon of your videos. Nice.
I should also mention that this game also has main rivals on certain competitions, each having different driving style. Some being precise (Alexi Cumia & Tomas Rudall), some methodical (Kiyo Hironaga), others being aggressive (Ron Kay & Josef Taylor), which makes you have to adapt to their driving style if you wanna beat them.
The Zonda sounds incredible, no other game has the gearbox whine and tyre noise with the V12 scream. Sounds incredible even if all the 4cyl cars sound the same as eachother
8:53 that's the M3, not the 1 series
the inside camera view made it feel like your were in vr with a motion chair shaking you about
I don't comment nearly enough, but I'm so glad this channel exists
Another awesome review. Great job.
I liked Shift a lot. It was the first title where racing in cockpit view felt natural to me.
I spent hundreds of hours in the livery editor. Not being able to mirror what you’ve done on the other side of the car was such a pain in the ass. Especially since my liveries kept becoming more complex. That design oversight cost me tons of wasted hours.
They added a mirror feature in Shift2 but there was another issue I can’t remember. Whatever it was it was so bad I walked away from that game.
My main issue with Shift was being charged real money for extra garage slots and not being able to own multiple copies of one car. Meaning you can only own one Corvette or Lamborghini. That sucks when you like to paint cars.
Man i subbed to you when you released the gran turismo 4 review, you've grown so much since that! Keep the amazing reviews coming
I love the Shift series. One of the best game racing games of that era.
Barge by Gunnar Olsen can never listen to it in the same way anymore everhood was such a great game using that song thanks for adding it in the background tracks colourshed.
1:18 that M3 is an automatic (look at the steering wheel) but has 3 pedals.... my brain cant cope with this stupidity
There was an old picture back in the day. that NFS Shift was originally in developement by EA Black Box until SMS got the ip
The Shift games were among some of my hardest Platinum trophies to mostly in part of the mastering all the corners. There were just some corners that no matter how perfectly you think you took them, the game's just like "not my tempo" and and you just have to keep trying over and over and over and over until you just get lucky.
Going back to Gran Turismo after trying this back when it released was like singing a lullaby to myself. It was far from perfect physics-wise, but I loved the intensity of the whole thing... The engine sounds were great (compared to GT), the added extra layer of immersion in the interior camera with all the shaking and the driver’s panting, the crashes were scary and almost stress-inducing... It was a very well-rounded package, albeit a bit rough around the edges, and a very welcome change of direction for NFS.
well GT7 2022 still stucked back
in terms of Sound (fake robotic sound in every stock car),
sense of speed, cameraviews, night&rain visuals,
fun of driving experience
Prostreet was frickin awesome. The early cars were kinda all round sluggish - but once you got upgrading and tuning the setup you unleashed some monsters. Drag racing was great, a powerful V8 might wheelie and then torque steer, meaning that few seconds in a hopefully straight line was properly demanding. They came up with several models of circuit racing, straight up first across the line, or trying to set best times in sectors. There were the awesome Speed races, flat out along sinuous roads trying to keep inch perfect. And of course the most important thing, the handling model, the best handling in any NFS game I've played, but I admit that somehow Shift passed me by.
I might have to remedy that.
I use not to comment on your vids. I just stay for the nostalgia and your honest oppinion. But this time i will coment on this game. This game teached me as a young bloke that you can t always win and you need to grind to get to know the tracks and the car that your driving. Because of this game i got better at the green hell track.
Shifts sheer terrifying sense of speed was pretty much unmatched until Project Cars came around IMO.
And the sound, the game STILL sounds absolutely fantastic.
The intro for this game got me hyped to get into a race
I remember the Lotus Elise in its Works Conversion build being extremely op.
Godly Acceleration and Handling.
Even though it lacked in the topspeed department.
I still have Need for Speed Shift to this day and still think it's the best racing game ever.
I loved this & it's sequel from the day it launched as I pre-ordered both, fantastic & unique racing games many quickly dismiss. I think the "NFS Shift 2" is far better in handling & pretty much the best & more of everything, just not the biggest fan of it's progression system which was my only minor issue with it. Look forward to a profile on the sequel my friend!
You know. NFS Shift is still my favorite racing game about legal racing after all these years. The funniest thing about this game is losing control of your car easily.
I like this guy. He's videos are pretty damn awesome.
Very nice. Enjoying your Clips for about 6 Months now, keep up the good work, I still Demand people to come and watch you videos to get more Subs if not that then Break the 100k views on majority of videos for the first 24 hours :)
Because everyting you release is just pure Entermainment to Watch and Listen.
After Undercover, I gave up on the series, always seeing new titles with some interest, but once the reviews came out, I knew they weren't for me. Need for Speed Heat, however, really sparked my interest. I bought it this week, and have been absolutely loving it.
Update on Heat: what's your opinion on it now?
Agree 110% , its a real throwback and the closest we've gotten to the holy trinity of nfs games.
NFS shift engine sounds are more better than Heat! Heat's engine sound "sounds" terrible
God damn... looked like a unicorn shat on ya car bro (7:19)
Awesome vids looking forward to the next one CS!!
Shift has that weird "x" factor that makes it the most immersive racing game I have ever played...including this generation. I did not like Shift 2.
Most immersive games I have played:
Racer: Shift
Shooter: Killzone 2
RPG: DQXI
World/Story: Mass Effect Trilogy
Puzzle: The Witness
Strategy: MIGHT & MAGIC CLASH OF HEROES
But, but Shift 2 was even more immersive...
I mean the game had it's problems, namely the "floaty handling model", still better than the first Shift though.
But as far as immersion goes, Shift 2's helmet cam was the most immersive thing in a racing game I've ever seen.
It even had the official GT1 and GT3 licenses with their respective cars, if only the handling was more alike Forza/Gran Turismo, Shift 2 would be the bomb.
Many of it's issues were fixed through patches as well, like the input lag with a wheel.
Anyway, Shift 2 is still my go to racing game on the PC since I play with an XBox 360 controller and Project Cars and Assetto Corsa are unplayable without a wheel...
first person mode looks really cool, the shakiness is what i really like
i just booted up my PS3 and played Shift for the first time since 2015 and it was just as fun as i remember. Its such a good game. I probably last played it just before i got my first PC.Not many games now days on PC have progression, instead you just get lots of mnoey and everything else immediately from the start. Thats why also got Gran Turismo 1 on my PC.
Do more Need for Speed reviews. I love your reviews.
Could you make a review about its successor Shift 2: Unleashed? I personally still like and play this game up till today. The helmet camera alone is something I've only seen in S2:U, giving you a pretty realistic feel like no other racing game could deliver until VR and TrackIR where integrated and became popular.
Your work will be appreciated! Great vid btw!
Is the Shift 2: Unleashed review coming next?
Shift actually has extremely good controls, but you need the analogue triggers and the correct control setup. The game is so good that the guys over at nogrip made a mod that takes it a step further and has near sim level controls. As for your criticisms, shift 2 is your game.
Great review, as always. I'd love to see you reviewing the best NFS game ever made - Porsche Unleashed :).
Both Shift and Race Driver GRID have a visual car destruction models.
I know you do not race to cause accidents but this happens. And in both games it was always fun with both visual and damage model to win the race (or be on podium) when car got some scratches during the race.
I love Shift. It’s one of my favorites NFS. Great vid
There's a video about 400km/h in racing games and the Shift's series has the best sense of speed. It's literally terrifying! :D
NFS Shift has, imo, the best sound in a racing game.
Just blast it on your 7.1 Headset or Home Theater and you'll see what I mean
Generally later NFS games, from Criterion and such all had pretty good sounds, and polish.
@@ThatTonnatoTenrec They did. But the overall sense of rawness, allied with the brute wonky physics of Shift gave it some more charm
Shift has a sense of speed, that Forza and GT don't have. When I go on staith in those games sometimes I just don't even need to press any buttons, because I feel like I'm in a picture that doesn't move....
Bounce issue - Ambush Canyon has a bump on the track near the first bridge that upsets cars (fixed in Shift 2), while the rest of the tracks are relatively smooth, although high speed cars can go airborne over hills. The bouncing on banked ovals is due to a physics issue. Track surfaces are composed of polygons, not a continuously smooth surface, the polygons are not dense enough , and the bounce issue occurs when the game's physics calculation results in body parts being below the surface of the track resulting in severe bouncing. I've played both arcade and sim-oriented games. For me Shift was a continuation of the GTR series. GTR 1.0 was unrealistically difficult. GTR 2.0 was more realistic. GTR Evolution | Race 07 was a bit easier to drive. Shift was essentially a continuation of that trend. Note that the g-motor physics engine was first used in EA's F1 1999 to 2002 series. As for Need For Speed with cockpit views, High Stakes (1999) and Porsche Unleashed (2000) had cockpit views as an option. I spent more time doing online races than career modes, starting with High Stakes (the first NFS with online play). The online play for Shift used a ranking system that differed from the career mode tiers. The ratings were 4.0, 6,0, 10.0, 14.0, and unlimited.
Could you do Shift 2 when you get the chance? No one’s really made a recent review of the game
NFS shift was the second ever NFS I played after underground, but it was the one NFS I played the most ever in my life. I have feelings for this game. Other NFS titles focus on Street racing. Even Pro Street had a street racing background for the protagonist. However, Shift was the first attempt by NFS at organized Motorsport, and I absolutely love it. The best graphics of all time, the cars look so real in it! Wish it was actually on mobile (not that crappy IOS version), the closest is real racing 3, but it doesn't have car customisation (only liveries and not body kits).
Tried it not long after it released and couldn't get into it, whole game just didn't feel right and the driving felt way too heavy, and this is coming from someone who was practically addicted to GTA 4 at the time and loved the driving in that.
Never understood why they even bothered trying this type of game though after the reception Pro Street received from a lot of people and Forza making a huge step forward with FM3.
Hoping you review the NFS that came out the year after this for consoles, even 10 years on it's still the best one we've had since Carbon in my opinion.
Since Slightly Mad made this, this is a precursor to project cars. Also A test drive game was made by them that drove exactly the same.
I may look crazy but i was thinking "man i would like to see a nfs shift review of colourshed" i enter youtube and BOOM!
The Zonda vs Veyron showcase event on Nurburgring was so memorable!
Count me excited for your reviews on the rest of the series. Heat is supposed too be good but I want a reliable opinion on the last generation games
Literally would play this for hours on end. Who here enjoyed endurance races? Never hit pause, just the pure sound of straight cuts and screaming engines.
10:51 LMAO i thought it was max's car from Carmageddon for a second
I love cockpit view in racing games. I don't know why the newer NFS games don't have it.
I did love shift was really hard to get used to the heavy feeling cars but from what I remember one of my most underrated titles
Awesome video, great for a late night watch.
Its 2024 and it's the shift duo that had a interior view
Unlike unbound it doesn't in today's generation of hardware of consoles
cant wait for shift 2! bet you'll love it
NFS Shift Crash physics are absolutely fantastic.
Do you plan on doing videos on TXR/maxi tune series?
Huge fan of NFS: SHIFT, used to push that Pangani Zonda R at nordschleife all the time. Good times!