..I'm not going to say EA didn't make Payback worse than it really needed to, but let's not forget, regardless of EA's monetization scheme, Payback still has a boatload of issues - see the (lack of) cops, second-thought online and gameplay design in general. It might be the least-bad Ghost game so far, but I'm not convinced I'd go ahead and call it decidedly "good", even with the above caveat.
Oh I agree, Payback is not a good game by any means. But compared to its predecessor I surprisingly quite enjoyed playing it, once I ignored speedcards/vanity items/offroad physics. Once you complete story there's little incentive to go back, but that's always been the case with all NFS games since Undercover I find. Compared to NFS 2015 though, where I want to throw my controller out the window every single time I go around a corner, it's a big big improvement.
I'm not a pursuit junkie, so I quite like the peacefulness of no cops in free roam. I agree they should've made it like MW 2012 with cops still driving around, but requires you to crash into them to initiate a pursuit (as opposed to Undercover's cops who will send in SWAT and helis just from you driving around with a high heat level car).
I'm not a big online player either, so that part of the game is totally irrelevant to my grading
I understand I'm the minority here though.
Ideally, they'd make a Forza Horizon style game with cops to fill the void on Playstation, but I know that bar is just wayyy too high for anything EA can muster
The funny thing here being that after EA decided not to let Criterion be a lead developer on any game from then on, they went and created Ghost from tidbits of various studios. There's a very real chance they'll just pull a stunt like that again, because that's never fallen flat on its face before. Either that or they'll do the classic Unicronic Arts thing and buy a promising developer, run them to the ground in a few games and then leave them to rot in the dumpster outside. Take your pick.
In other news, I do feel like it bears repeating what's been said elsewhere on the internets - that one statement we have about NFS 2019 is about as vague as they usually are at this point. While there are a few interesting speculations around (including some in this thread), recent NFS history tells us that getting too excited too early is a bad idea. And yes, that's a reference I've made before.
AFAIK Ghost is basically Criterion without the top guys (Craig Sullivan and a few other people). I think they also absorbed some of Black Box staff, but mostly Criterion. That's why the brake to drift handling (remnant of Burnout Paradise physics) has become a stalwart in each NFS since HP 2010.
The only studio I can think of is Firemonkeys. They make NFS No Limits and Real Racing 3, which are decent mobile racing games (though plagued by microtransactions, as usual). But they've been hit with massive layoffs as well recently.
It's sad how many arcade racing studios are gone in just one generation (Evo Studios, Blackrock, Bizarre Creations, Studio Liverpool, United Front Games). I love sim racing more but you can't help but feel the arcade racing genre is just a shell of its former self back in PS1/2 era. Indie devs are propping up the scene but it's not the same.