Need for Speed: Payback

GameSpaceMatt Keith

7/10

Need For Speed Payback is a mixed bag. One the one hand it’s a fun arcade racer with great customization, a wide range of cars and race styles and some truly great single player moments. Yet with the other hand holding an underwhelming multiplayer experience, lather, rinse repeat story missions, and some awkward storytelling pacing, NFS never seems to hit top gear in its goal to capture the glory of the old days.

Press StartDamian Filippone

6/10

Despite Need for Speed Payback’s accessible and gratifying approach to arcade racing, the time needed to progress in a satisfactory manner regresses the joy of the rubber meeting the road to a grind that ironically brings the pace of the game to a grinding halt. Need for Speed Payback totes itself as a romp of reckless abandon but ultimately lacks the longevity, charisma and conviction necessary to make it a ride worth taking.

Impulse GamerHugh Mitchell

Need for Speed is one of gaming’s most well-known and illustrious franchises. With over 20 games spanning back to 1994, the franchise has endured a

GameSpewRichard Seagrave

6/10

Need for Speed Payback is at its best when you’re completing story missions, speeding through thrilling set-pieces and battling against cops and criminals. It’s even highly entertaining when you’re just belting around its open world, completing activities and engaging in events. But when you hit that brick wall and have to put a halt to your fun for hours at a time in order to raise your car’s performance level, your patience will be tested, and many will decide to simply not bother at all.

TheSixthAxisDominic L

6/10

Despite it’s flaws, I still found Need for Speed: Payback quite a likeable arcade racer. Just having a narrative sets it apart from the other, more serious offerings this year, even if it’s not delivered with much panache. Sadly its attractive visuals, and alternate take on the genre, can’t disguise a gamut of poor design decisions, some of which serve to make the enjoyable racing less than enjoyable.

PC GamerPhil Iwaniuk

53/100

Need For Speed Payback takes a narrative gamble, loses.

Playstation UniverseNeil Bolt

5/10

There’s a perfectly fine racing game somewhere in this mess of half-baked ideas. A fun arcade racer has been drowned in enough ‘one more thing’ additions to fill the entire run of Columbo, and the result is a rather unpleasant muddle of bland story, stop-start driving, and player control being ripped away just as things get juicy.

WellPlayedZach Jackson

5/10

Despite righting some wrongs of its predecessor, Need for Speed Payback fails to capitalise on the opportunity to put the franchise back on the podium.

DualShockersNoah Buttner

4.5/10

Need For Speed Payback is the perfect example of one step forward, two steps back. While the world is more beautiful than any of its predecessors, it feels empty in much the same way that the game does. All of the systems seem to be their own worst enemy. Want to build a car? How are you going to upgrade it? Want to customize its looks? You've got to complete unnecessary challenges. Want to progress the story just to see if it gets better? You've got to make sure your car is the appropriate level. All of these things, combined with an unimaginative and frankly boring story result in a racing g...

Push SquareSammy Barker

3/10

Republished on Wednesday 30th September 2020: We're bringing this review back from the archives following the announcement of October's PlayStation Plus lineup. The original text follows.

DestructoidDan Roemer

3/10

Once the servers for this game inevitably go offline, with no way to obtain loot boxes, earn speed cards or trade tokens, I can’t help but wonder if the casual consumer would genuinely ever have the patience to fully complete this game. Need for Speed Payback is another result of EA meddling in the concept of “games as a service” and taking an otherwise mediocre entry in the series and completely butchering it in the process to achieve this goal.

Rock Paper ShotgunJohn Walker

Unscored

I cannot fathom what Ghost are doing with the Need For Speed series. The introduction of smashable billboards (although not of course those with real-world advertising on them) seems like a hark back to the glory days of Criterion, but the repeated punch in the face that is the storyline and quest structure seems like something unwanted in either the Burnout or Need For Speed worlds. It's such a ghastly game, not because of its weakly driving, but because of every single other thing it does to get in the way of it.