I don't know why I even try Need for Speed anymore. I mean, I really want to like the games. I am one of those Underground, Most Wanted, Carbon loving group and think of those times fondly.
But: I don't think NFS needs to have this to be enjoyable, and on that note, start with the positive!

This game is handling better than NFS Reboot and maybe even better than Unbound. It looks good, especially for being almost 8 years old. There is a story! And while this game also has some cringe writing, there is variety, and I like the idea that different characters drive different styles. But that is all that can be said about it.

Now I have some issues with this game. The easy ones are that there is severe rubber banding for AI, but that is ok. I also like that harder difficulties are not impossibly hard (as in the opponent driving on rails and seemingly a different class all together), but as usual with such a system, some races are just ridiculous while others can be completed by a toddler.

The soundtrack is lacking. I feel like there are ~15 tracks running on repeat, and after 9h I am sick of them. I am pretty sure games in the past did not have 100s of tracks, but maybe 60-70? So they did not get that extremely repetitive. (Let's say Burnout Paradise for comparison felt way more varied and, as such, did not have me listen to the same track 3 times within 30 minutes!) I don't even talk about the fact that there were times when the music in NFS was so good, it formed an entire generation.

Last small issue is the visual tuning. Also, again, I don't expect NFS Underground 2 level of tuning; no Auto Sculpting like in Carbon, so the possible styles look fine. It is always visible which parts were designed by actual companies like Liberty Walk and which parts are done by NFS devs, since they cut corners so much! This is reflected in the screenshots on the store page; none of the cars use "Ghost Games" parts. But what really reminds me of the "monetize everything" aspect of EA games is the "vanity items" part. This also goes into the performance tuning. Both work with "items" that have to be dropped via multiple ways. All of them feel like loot boxes and are randomized. Why? Part of being creative may be that you have constraints, but I should not have to open 300 cases to have a pulsing underglow in purple because I only ever get them dropped in yellow, green, white or rainbow wave.

While we talk about performance tuning, the system in place will make pretty much every car be the same. This is good because you don't have to "min/max" your car and drive a VW Beetle just because it accelerates better than the 240x you'd like to drive. But it is also very bad because the Audi R8 performs the same as said VW Beetle, and it feels wrong. Pretty much every car has a natural ceiling, and it diminishes the feel a M5 has over a torn-up Fairlady Z since they will be able to keep up with one another.

Ok, what do I hate?
Handling!
The drifting feels so unnatural, I can't get it to work.
You have to steer into the corner to keep the drift going? The hell?
The handbrake does not behave correctly either. It just slows the car down instead of locking the rear wheels. This behavior is also wildly inconsistent!
There is severe understeer until the point that there just isn't, and I don't have feedback. I usually drive rear-wheel-drive only cars since I just enjoy a happy rear end. But in this game? Not only don't those cars feel as tail happy as they should, they don't feel RWD all together!

Speedcross and the drift events are the worst offenders here, since they rely on drifting to be successful. It seems you have to undo everything learned by more simcade racers just to be successful in this.

And lastly: Something EA has done before, Payback and even worse in Unbound. They destroy pacing with DLC cars and Event rewards. I started the game with a car in every class; I had a Nissan GTR with 300+ score (which seemingly is endgame scoring). Those cars are there and even interrupt the story since you are supposed to go to the dealer and buy a new car for e.g., Drift or Drag, while you already have possibly multiple cars because of reasons.
This is also an issue with Forza games, but there they don't get in the way as much.

Do I recommend this then? No, because it just feels like I keep trying due to nostalgia, and the racing is just not that good.

Criterion > Ghost

It's an Okayish game.
BEWARE!!! G29 Wheel not working and PS5 controller too.

4/10