Dear EA,
My name is Shelltoon, and I have been a huge fan of the Need for Speed franchise since NFS III Hot Pursuit. I remember the series always being about quality games, and every year my favorite racing game was a Need for Speed game. I was really excited for Rivals when the news about it came out. I remember buying the game for my PC on Black Friday, patiently waiting as the game downloaded to my hard drive and installed itself. I thought I was in for a real treat, but this would only be the beginning of my nightmare with NFS. I start the game, and I am greeted to some of the most ludicrously long load times I've experienced. This may be a problem on my end, but when I play other PC games, they loaded up just fine. That includes other racing games, including Need for Speed Hot Pursuit. I'm not sure why this game took so long to load, but I am still eager to play. However, I spent what felt like an eternity sitting through unskippable cutscenes and tutorials. When I first get to drive my car, I can only drive about two yards before the game locks me into some tutorial.
Why does this have to happen? Are you worried about me actually playing the game? Turns out that must have been the case. I can drive the car just fine, but as I'm going through a tutorial race, I end up driving past a section where the road suddenly ends, and I have no real control over my car. The game literally stalls. I can still use nitrous, and the game seems to think I'm decelerating, when I'm not. Thinking it's something to do with my install, I decided to try reinstalling the game, but alas, the same problem occurred in the exact same spot. I decided to try and muscle it out, but as I'm playing this game, I realize this glitch is more harmful than I thought. You see, some of my speedlists require me to complete a time trial and get a certain result. I'd like to get these results, but sadly the same glitch hits me in a different spot of the game world, and even though I'm stalled and can't move, or open my menu, the timer is still ticking! How can we be expected to complete objectives when the game is broken?
I wish I could go into the other numerous bugs such as lack of steering wheel support, camera glitching out on Xbox versions, Playstation Network download versions not allowing the car to even move forward, the PC version's unoptimized performance issues, and network connectivity problems, but this glitch with the world not loading is a serious game breaker that isn't being acknowledged. I wanted to love this game, I really did, but after the horrible experience I've had with this game, and hearing about the problems your other numerous products are having, I keep hoping you'll realize the issues and patch the game.
I do not see this happening, considering most of Ghost Games has been laid off, and it's been months since the last patch. None of the performance issues have been addressed, and the game's world-doesn't-fully-load glitch which has been present across all platforms since day 1 hasn't been fixed yet... I have lost faith in this game working as intended. EA, you have our money from the sales of this game, and I feel like we've all been scammed as a result. What's worse is finding out there's DLC on the way for a game that doesn't even function as intended. I'm sorry to say, but I will not be paying for your DLC, especially since that doesn't show us you're committed to giving us the experience we paid for.
As a result, I have decided enough is enough. This has been your worst year yet for gamers, and you have officially lost me as a Need for Speed fan if this is the quality we can expect from you in years to come. I will not be purchasing anymore Need For Speed games in the immediate future, because if this experience has taught me anything, it's that you really do not care about the consumer, but are only looking out for your own personal interests.
The slogan on this message board says "Ask. Answer. Be the Hero." I hope I can be the hero for the many gamers you've betrayed this year. Thank you for your time, and thank you for the previous Need for Speed games. I can at least go back to those, and enjoy them. Rivals, I cannot in its current state.
- Shelltoon
