Easily the best of the first-generation Need for Speed games, with enough content to last arcade-style players for a good while, and with very solid graphics to match - assuming you're not taking racing games too seriously (and the game itself isn't catered toward the big hardcore gamers, but instead the Filthy Casuals, which is good).

[This review is based off the PS1 version - the PC version plays a lot differently to the PS1 version]


CAREER


I sincerely don't think you could start off a High Stakes review without mentioning the biggest feature introduced to the series - a career mode. Taking inspiration from Gran Turismo's Simulation Mode, High Stakes's career mode sees players going from rags to riches (though in EA's dictionary, "rags" is a 2-storey house with a loving wife/husband and two kids, and "riches" has you owning 4 mansions, each with 10 supermodels for you to fuck hourly), going from a mere "luxurious roadster" like the Mercedes-Benz SLK 230 to supercars like the McLaren F1 (not to be confused with the Formula 1 car).

Career Mode (not officially named on the PS1 version) is split into two modes - "Tournament" and "Special Events", though both are mostly interchangable. Both modes (alongside the single-player race mode) requires players to buy their own cars, like Gran Turismo. Unlike Gran Turismo, however, players also had to take care of their own cars - getting into crashes would not only impact a car's performance, but would also cost players money to "repair" - the more mangled your car, the more money players lost on repairing - not only was it possible for players to come in first, yet come out losing money because they fucked their car up multiple times throughout a race, but players could also get into negative money. I don't believe there was any real consequence to having debt, but it's still a funny visual to see. Cleanly racing throughout a race however, by not crashing into cars or walls, would see the player earn bonus money - though this was easier said than done considering the laggy nature of the game, and how much of a dick the AI could be - AI crashes into you? You gotta pay up, which isn't a fun experience at all.

At first, players are restricted to lower-tier cars (as lower-tier as you could call a luxurious roadster), with players having to race in both the Tournament and Special Event modes to earn more money to buy better, faster cars. With the exception of the unlockable/secret cars, each car in the game could be upgraded, similar to Gran Turismo. Whereas in Gran Turismo it let players go all-in on what sort of upgrades and modifiers they wanted to give to their cars (such as being able to customise gear ratios), in High Stakes, each car just had three generic upgrades that would not only increase a car's specific stat, but also change their appearance of the cars to be more race-y (for example, adding racing stripes to a car, or adding a spoiler to a car). It was slightly disappointing that players weren't able to fiddle with stuff, but for a casual arcade game, I think this method works best. Just choose what upgrade you want for your car and plonk that shit in and you don't have to worry about a thing.

Tournament Mode restricts players to only a few cars (for example, the first Tournament available, the Worldwide Roadster Classic, only allows the two worst & cheapest cars in the game to be used - the SLK 230 and the BMW Z3). Tournament Mode primarily unlocks new tracks for the player to race on, though reaching the final tournament allows players to use the two fastest cars in the game (the McLaren F1 and the Mercedes-Benz CLK) in Test Drive Mode.

Special Events sees players race in preset conditions (for example, the players may have to deal with traffic, race in night, or partake in one-make races where players are restricted to racing one specific vehicle). Special Events are generally unlocked through completing Tournament Mode events, and their prizes range from a simple monetary cash prize (lame-o) to obtaining racing variants of a car, with full upgrades and a racing livery.

Compared to even Gran Turismo 1, the amount of events available in both Tournament Mode and Special Events mode is relatively low, at only 14 events altogether (6 Tournament Mode events and 8 Special Event uhhh events). The biggest disappointment for me was seeing how little some of my favourite racetracks got used as they were late unlocks, like Raceway 3 and Dolphin Cove (though on the other end of the scale, it meant I didn't have to deal with the Rainbow Road of High Stakes, Snowy Ridge, as much thankfully), though thankfully they're free to use in other modes onces you unlock them. Completing each mode unlocks a special, fictitious car, that can be used in any mode.


OTHER MODES


Test Drive is basically a demo disc mode - you pick a car (that's been unlocked) and a track (again, that's been unlocked) and you do a quick, one-lap time trial. You can't change any of the modifiers like racing in reverse or in wet weather, records aren't saved, and you still have to deal with traffic. Kinda lame, but like a demo disc, the point is to try instead of buy.

Single Race is uhhh a single race. You do need to use a car you own, unlike in Test Drive mode, but you do get to set the modifiers this time - mirror mode, reverse mode, night-time driving, traffic, or any combination of the four. Records are saved here for bragging rights, and you can choose how many people you face off against (if any - you could simply race by yourself for a true time-trial experience).

Outside of career mode, the other main feature players will be interested in is the Hot Pursuit mode. Returning from Hot Pursuit III, players can either race to outrun the cops, or, more interestingly, play as a cop with a special cop car and bust other racers by smashing into them. There are three cop cars that can be unlocked, with each obtained by "beating" the Hot Pursuit mode (busting 10 racers as a cop in one go) - and by completing Hot Pursuit mode with the fastest cop car, you unlock a special vehicle, so special it cannot be used in any mode besides Test Drive mode. Uniquely enough, each "location" can be set to have their own local police chatter - this includes the French track (Route Adonf) and the German track (Landstrasse), where both can speak in their native language of French and German respectively, though an English option is available as well.


TWO PLAYER MODE


Two player mode retains the same mode as the three mentioned above - Test Drive, Single Race and Hot Pursuit. What Hot Pursuit entails differs depending on which vehicles both players choose - if both players pick a normal car, they simply race first while outrunning the cops. If both players pick cops, both players have to arrest the same racers, with the winner being the one who busts the most vehicles (why they did it out of 10 instead of 9 or 11 I'll never know, since you can tie with 10). If one player picks a normal car and the other a cop car, the cop car has to bust the player several times in order to win. The main feature, however, is the High Stakes mode. Requiring two memory cards, each player wagers a car they own against their opponent - with the loser having to give up their car to the winner. There really isn't much else to say about two-player mode, as it is mostly just the same stuff you can do in 1 player mode, just with two people instead of one.


RACETRACKS


I personally think the racetracks look as good as they'll ever be in a Need for Speed game in High Stakes. Largely because I grew up with it, sure, but the tracks are very visually impressive and distinctive. From joyriding through the German village of Landstrasse, beating the train in the forested, beautiful Kindiak Park, to seeing the romantic meeting of a port and a forest in Dolphin Cove (my personal favourite track), High Stakes has a wide, diverse set of scenery set with each track. There's definitely some misses - Durham Road and the firs two Raceway tracks aren't all that impressive, and Snowy Ridge is probably the most annoying track I've had to race in a NFS game (though it does look neat), but overall I think the racetracks are very good.

It's probably also worth noting that, excluding the PS1 release of Hot Pursuit (which had 5 secret tracks that you couldn't race opponents on), the PS1 version of High Stakes had the most courses up to this point, with 10 courses - with none of them being "alternate versions" like in the previous game, Hot Pursuit, where nearly half the tracks were slightly different versions of existing tracks. The PC release not only includes all the High Stakes tracks, but also includes all 9 tracks from Hot Pursuit (with the 5 secret PS1-exclusive tracks from Hot Pursuit not available). Each track by default lets you race with multiple modifiers off the bat - you can race in mirror mode (a mode so tough that Nintendo had to restrict it to only the most elite of gamers for Mario Kart), race backwards, race in wet weather, race in traffic, and/or race in night-time with limited visibility. Each of these modifiers (sometimes multiple at a time) pops up in the game's career mode occasionally as well, meaning players need to master how to manuever their cars in the most perilous of positions.


GAMEPLAY


I think this is where High Stakes falters. The gameplay is actually really good - cars are generally easy to drive once you get used to them, and they work well with the arcadey-style physics. Taking big jumps is silly but also funny. There's two main things it suffers from - lag and framerate. In general, the game feels a bit laggy on the PS1 - laggy enough that I can quickly break, turn off breaking, and then see my car's break lights turn on. In a racing game where you need split-second reaction times (especially when going into oncoming traffic or onto other AI cars, especially when having a minor scrape could cost players thousands of dollars), having laggy steering/brakes felt annoying. But, players could probably get used to this if it wasn't for the other big problem - frame rate.

The game generally runs fine, with a solid framerate. Provided, of course, that you don't have anyone else next to you, or if you're going too too fast down certain stretches of tracks (like the pink trees in Route Adonf). However, if you had other cars on screen (especially multiple cars on screen), then the game had the tendency to go very choppy with the frame rate. Combining this with how laggy the game tended to be (as well as the penalties you got for crashing), and you can see how players could be punished for stuff that really wasn't avoidable at all. At it's worst, it was a major pain having to deal with it. Overall, though, I think the game runs fine, once you spend a hour or two getting used to the lag. It's just something that tends to happen often (especially since you start at the back of the grid in all events in Career Mode), which can be frustrating having to deal with.


SOUNDTRACK


Out of all the games, this one to me is easily the most memorable sound-wise - I genuiunely couldn't think of a bad song in this game (which is better when you have several catchy songs), though the techno-oriented soundtrack might not be to everyone's tastes. I felt the songs were catchy, both in the main menu and in races itself, and the soundtrack is large enough that it doesn't get repetitive like it would for, say, Gran Turismo 2. Personal standouts include 'Rock This' by Rom Di Priscoe 'Amorphous Being' by Saki Kaskas and 'Cost of Freedom' by The Experiment.


OVERALL


Do I get to say this is the best of the first-generation of Need for Speed games? I think I should - this is easily the best of the more arcadey and exotic style of Need for Speed that was seen pre-Underground. Easily a recommend for anyone looking for racing games on the Playstation - maybe not the first choice but certainly a solid 2nd, 3rd or 5th choice I think.