Need for Speed Unbound is a stunning and groundbreaking racing video game developed by Criterion Games and published by Electronic Arts. The game offers beautiful realistic graphics mixed with cel-shading and graffiti art while featuring thrilling gameplay mechanics and challenges.

Gameplay

Cars: Cars are given a performance score from 100 to 400 and divided into five tiers, B (100-159), A (160-209), A+ (210-269), S (270-329), and S+ (330-400+). You can drive over 140 different cars from different brands, including Acura, Alfa Romeo, Aston Martin, BMW, Bugatti, Buick, Chevrolet, Dodge, Ferrari, Ford, Honda, Infiniti, Jaguar, Koenigsegg, Lamborghini, Lotus, Mazda, McLaren, Mercedes, Mercury, Mitsubishi, NISSAN, Pagani, Plymouth, Polestar, Pontiac, Porsche, SRT, SUBARU, Volkswagen, or Volvo.
Challenges: Challenges are objective targets available in multiplayer or single-player modes that offer a specific reward for a given objective and target. Rewards are either cash, driver poses, samples, cards, or tags. Objectives can be Story, Skill, Collectible based, Activity, and Progress.

Events: Events are accessed through Meetup locations across the city of Lakeshore, and the selection of them at Meetup locations depends on the Race Playlists, including Corner King (a race of twists and turns to test your cornering skills), Delivery Car (you will be tasked to deliver a car to a specific spot), Delivery Passenger (you must reach a fellow racer in trouble with the LSPD and take them to a safe house), Drift (take it sideways and battle it out to settle who's the master of drift), Eliminator (players compete in a series of events), but also Endurance, Half Pack, Head to Head, Speed Race, Street Race, Takeover, and more. Events can have specific or general access conditions, like performance tier requirement (it limits the selection of cars to within given performances), money (the buy-in for events may be rescinded to allow easier entry or increased to create a high-stakes event), heat gain (competing in the event will add a heat gain to your car and put you at a greater risk of gaining Police Department attention), and more.
Performances: You can move and replace performance items to modify and improve your cars' performance ratings and handling. The different parts you can handle are divided into four sections, including engine, chassis, drivetrain, and auxiliary.

Visual customization: There is also a dedicated section for your cars' visual customization with components, visual flair, and wraps with over 10000 options. Hence, you can pimp various parts of your vehicles, including the body components, paint and wraps, driving effects, exhaust sound, and more.
Characters: You can choose and customize your character model attributes, including all the aspects of your head (shape, eye color, skin color, voice, face, facial hair, and hair), your clothes (hats and caps, sunglasses, tops, coats and jackets, bottoms, and even shoes), your poses, and your banner.

Graphics and sound

Need for Speed Unbound features a beautiful art style mixing graffiti art, cel-shading, and other photorealistic artistic elements. In addition, it offers 4K graphics, fine-tuned animations, and supports VRR (Variable Refresh Rate) and DLSS (Deep Learning Super Sampling) to provide a smoother and more consistent experience. Regarding the sound, you will get what you deserve as it features tracks by A$AP Rocky and AWGE. The end result is pretty nice-looking and refreshing.

Duration and game modes

The game's main story is about 15 hours long, but it offers several game modes:

Story mode: This is a single-player campaign where you will embody a young driver trying to leave a mark in the streets of Lakeshore (a fictional version of Chicago). You will compete in qualifying events to earn a spot in the Grand, the ultimate racing challenge in the city. Your goal is to win the Grand and recover a stolen custom car.
Lakeshore Online: This multiplayer mode has a dedicated progression system. You will have access to different kinds of races, and up to 16 players can play alongside each other in a free-roam session (with cross-play) and can form parties of up to 4 players. Free roam takes place during the day and does not transition into a different timeframe. Race Playlists have varying times of day and weather conditions.

What do the reviews say?

Need for Speed Unbound has been rated 77/100 on Metacritic.

"Need for Speed Unbound is what we all needed. In a world full of racing games trying to be the next iRacing or a sim in general. Unbound says, 'Hey, I'm really just here to have a damn good time,' and hands you the keys." (Digital Chumps)