Need for Speed Unbound Reaches the End of the Road as Criterion Team Pivots to Battlefield

[Famine]

This is the discussion thread for an article on GTPlanet:

Need for Speed Unbound Reaches the End of the Road as Criterion Team Pivots to Battlefield​

As we’d inferred from recent developments, Need for Speed Unbound has made its last shift — into end-of-life status — with Criterion confirming it will receive no further updates...

 

[andersonrezende]

Take your time, make the best game possible, whenever it's possible. Absolutely no need to rush. It's not like there aren't numerous NFS titles to go back to even on current gen machines.

 

[o000o]

Take your time, make the best game possible, whenever it's possible. Absolutely no need to rush. It's not like there aren't numerous NFS titles to go back to even on current gen machines.

The developers likely would, but this is EA... like see Most Wanted 2012. Was planned as seemingly a proper sequel to Most Wanted 2005 (dunno if Carbon events would follow too).

 

[Ryan81]

Don't hold out much hope for the NFS franchise, sadly. Shame because once upon a time it was a fine and fun franchise. Sadly, after Most Wanted, it was all downhill.

 

[kjb]

I am thinking about grabbing this but I am concerned that the single player is lacking

 

[mef]

Doesn’t make a lot of sense to me to ask a studio focused on car games to help on battlefield. Those are wildly different games and yes assets are assets but character assets are very different to race tracks. The entire gameplay is also different. Just seems odd, and I can’t see how you could hit any ground running when being yanked around like that. If EA wants strong NFS games they should let team Kaizen continue. The point of Kaizen is CONTINOUS improvement and EA management seems to not understand the meaning of it.

 

[EngieDiesel]

Doesn’t make a lot of sense to me to ask a studio focused on car games to help on battlefield. Those are wildly different games and yes assets are assets but character assets are very different to race tracks. The entire gameplay is also different. Just seems odd, and I can’t see how you could hit any ground running when being yanked around like that. If EA wants strong NFS games they should let team Kaizen continue. The point of Kaizen is CONTINOUS improvement and EA management seems to not understand the meaning of it.

Remember when Activision shut down a bunch of its smaller studios and reassigned their dev teams to do code monkey work for CoD? This is basically the same thing. They're not likely doing anything related to actual gameplay or the like, it's more likely they'll be stuck on QA or backend stuff, in other words the cleanup that EA didn't want to hire contractors to do because that would mean less money for the shareholders.

 

[mef]

Remember when Activision shut down a bunch of its smaller studios and reassigned their dev teams to do code monkey work for CoD? This is basically the same thing. They're not likely doing anything related to actual gameplay or the like, it's more likely they'll be stuck on QA or backend stuff, in other words the cleanup that EA didn't want to hire contractors to do because that would mean less money for the shareholders.

In that case talented team members would leave eventually. Nobody wants to go from having agency in making their own game to cleaning up others for too long. In any case I hope the devs and artists will be fine, that’s the main thing. I just do t see the long term point In Shuffling teams. That’s such a stupid notion, only bad middle managers or top managers get away with

 

[EngieDiesel]

In that case talented team members would leave eventually. Nobody wants to go from having agency in making their own game to cleaning up others for too long.

Which also happened with Activision's case, and with many other big publishers in the past. But there are also a lot of other people who don't have the clout or resources to move on, and they're going to do what their bosses tell them to do because the alternative is not working in a market that's already overstuffed with people trying to get established in the games industry.

I just do t see the long term point In Shuffling teams. That’s such a stupid notion, only bad middle managers or top managers get away with

The long term point is to get their largest cash cow franchise out in time to satisfy shareholder demands, and by reassigning developers from less profitable projects they can do that without spending more on extra people.

Also, EA's CEO apparently thinks the latest Dragon Age game failed because it wasn't a live service game, so of course they don't have their priorities straight.

 

[McLaren]

Doesn’t make a lot of sense to me to ask a studio focused on car games to help on battlefield. Those are wildly different games and yes assets are assets but character assets are very different to race tracks. The entire gameplay is also different. Just seems odd, and I can’t see how you could hit any ground running when being yanked around like that. If EA wants strong NFS games they should let team Kaizen continue. The point of Kaizen is CONTINOUS improvement and EA management seems to not understand the meaning of it.

This has been something Criterion has been accustomed to for years. They created the shooter 'Black' in between 2 Burnout games, and have routinely helped on the Battlefield series with 1, V, & 2042 alongside two Star Wars: Battlefront titles directly between NFS 2015, Heat, & now Unbound.

That's a solid decade of this routine, I don't think it'll bother them much from beginning work on another NFS that will probably launch in 2026-2027. Perhaps in a positive spin, assisting EA on their other big projects helps the studio keep its doors open & justify any financial requests for their NFS titles.