Those two games are on pedestals at the moment. As the creator of Shift, how do you do that? This time around we wanted to streamline, innovate and take that core experience to the next level.Įurogamer interviewed EA driving and shooting boss Patrick Solderlund recently, and he said his vision for the Shift series is for it to be the market leader in the authentic sim category and beat Gran Turismo and Forza at their own game. We clearly innovated in key areas in Shift 1 on the core experience of driving, making it visceral, making it fun and accessible, XP and precision versus aggression. There certainly wasn't a, 'Let's see how the sales figures go and then push out a sequel,' because it's not that type of game. Towards the end of Shift 1 we were starting to think of Shift 2.

We always knew we wanted to add more features and innovate in new areas. Like many games, many movies and TV shows, we always knew we wanted to do another one. So we're very clearly going after the sim guys.ĭid EA wait to see how the first game performed before asking you to do another one, or did you get the green light before it released? If you look back over Need for Speed's history, maybe the early roots of that started in ProStreet, getting people who aren't used to circuits.Īnd then with Shift 1 we very deliberately said, 'We're on circuits now.' Shift 2 is an evolution of that, taking on the feedback from the community, feedback from critics, innovating in key areas and deliberately going after the sim category now the Need for Speed franchise is open to many types of game, like Hot Pursuit and World. We've got a long-term strategy that we want to make a competing, relevant sim game. How did it come about that you began work on this sequel?

Sorry to be vague, but it's spring at the moment.īunny rabbits and. Here, talking to Eurogamer, lead designer Andy Tudor reveals how Shift 2 will attempt to beat them all. It's a desire born out of a frustration at Shift's 'stamp collecting' rivals. Turn 10's Forza Motorsport 3 was released last year, Polyphony Digital's Gran Turismo 5 launched last week, and next spring will see the game EA hopes will trump them both: Slightly Mad Studios' Shift 2: Unleashed.īut EA's ambitious expectation for the game is not headline-grabbing bravado. And all of a sudden the simulation racing genre is pretty competitive.

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