PlayStation 4 Critic Reviews

EA knows not to mess with the classic formula, so the largely visual upgrades work, creating a satisfying game. Truth is, racing games haven’t changed that much in the last decade; it’s about speed, and letting you feel that speed. Sure, you’re missing the “rewind” feature of current racing games, and it might have been nice to get that added in here.

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered takes players back to what these games used to be and looks great doing it. As it includes all of the major expansions and comes at a discounted price, it’s also a fantastic value. Despite playing the original to death, I’ve put way too much time into this fresh release and feel like I haven’t done even half of what I want to do with it. A perfect companion to the also highly-recommend Burnout Paradise Remastered, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered should serve as a baseline for what these titles should be in the future.

Despite some slight disappointment from thinking about what else this remaster might have offered, the giant grin on my face while playing was impossible to remove. Being able to play on consoles at 60FPS makes it a monumental upgrade over the older versions, and the core experience has aged surprisingly well. Despite the fact that this is a fairly modest remaster package, Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit remains one of the finest arcade racers in recent memory, and anyone with even a slight interest in the genre should jump behind the wheel.

Even after 10 years, Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered is bursting with some of the most thrilling racing gameplay out there.

Despite the aged feel, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered offers cross-platform asynchronous multiplayer powered by Autolog. While this may be hit or miss for new fans, it’s admirable that Criterion Games and EA wanted to maintain the original gameplay experience that created the cult following within the Need for Speed community. This is now the best way to play Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit as it’s updated for the PS4 and Xbox One without losing anything that made the original game great.

An eye-opening restoration of arguably the purest title in the series, Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered brings distilled white-knuckle thrills and furious racing back in fashion once more. It's time to party like it's 2010.

Need For Speed Hot Pursuit: Remastered is a solid update to a classic racing title, bringing the fun gameplay and blistering action of 2010's original to current systems with improved online functionality and new graphics.

Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered brings back a fantastic arcade racing game, and is still brilliant fun 10 years down the line. Autolog feels right at home in 2020, and the over-the-top cops vs. racers gameplay is a blast. While the remaster itself is a little underwhelming, and some of the original title's issues remain, this is nonetheless a great game for petrol heads and adrenaline junkies everywhere.

Need for Speed Hot Pursuit Remastered feels as great as it did in 2010, and modernizes the graphics just enough to make it look as good as I remember the original looking at release on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. But with little new here other than those improved visuals and some nifty cosmetic additions, this is definitely the bare minimum expectation of a remaster. That’s a bit of a bummer as we head into an ambitious new generation of consoles this month, but Hot Pursuit still holds up as a great game in its own right. Races are blistering fast, the car selection is mouth-watering, and the high-speed dances between opposing cars never gets old.

Hot Pursuit Remastered misses a few chances to really bring itself into the current era of racers, but it still has no trouble reminding you why it is one of the best racers of its time.