Review by: Brian Rowe

I was speeding through Cleveland with bullets pinging off my rear when my mind flipped back to an early memory of playing chess, not that I'm comparing the exploits of a street racer to the revered strategy game. I recalled my first technical win, and how furious it made me. I had made too many blatant errors and there were too many "aww shucks" mistakes on my dad's part for the victory to be legitimate. As a gamer who welcomes challenge and the pride of overcoming adversity, I was insulted.

Need for Speed has typically emphasized action and thrills over simulation, but The Run's campaign exemplifies a new level of rubber band racing; one geared heavily in favor of the player. Opponents regularly brake and crash on straightaways to let you catch up. Then, they blaze past only to mysteriously fall back moments before the finish line so that you get a thrilling photo-finish, nearly every race. It's not dynamic. It's patronizing, especially when you know that a mediocre run will still land you in first.

The Run is a high-stakes race from San Francisco to New York, although you can set aside those dreams of Cannonball Run or an extended version of Desert Bus. Rather, Black Box did a bang-up job of imparting the 50-plus events with the essence (i.e. clichés) of locations. Environmental factors, including the road-obscuring sands of Death Valley and the icy peaks of the Rockies, effectively impact driving in ways that few racing games bother to attempt.

The avalanche is an intense scene that you will undoubtedly read about in other reviews. The climactic moment is a showcase for The Run's capabilities, but its position barely halfway into the game speaks volumes about pacing. For every exciting race, two are merely time-killers using recycled sections of track, and it quickly becomes apparent that the most awe-inspiring sequences are filled with visual flair, but very little danger. After a short time, you start to feel like a passenger who occasionally helps out while cool stuff happens around you.

The forced excitement and sense of detachment is most noticeable during the interactive cutscenes, which require timed button-presses to get Jack to safety – for a driver, he's not too good about staying behind the wheel. These quick-time events are mercifully few in number, and completely worthless. No doubt the words "immersive" and "innovative" were generously tossed around the development meeting. Most frustrating is that Black Box apparently doesn't know its audience well enough to realize that we shouldn't need bargain-bin stories and quick-time events to jazz up our racing games.

Events cleared in the campaign are unlocked in Challenge mode, which takes more than a few cues from Shift. Challenge mode is not only difficult, since your main opponent is the clock and not the rubber banding AI. It is your main source of new cars, which creates a fractured experience as you flip-flop from The Run to Challenge mode and back, or you could stick with the same car. It really doesn't matter. Besides, the only place to change cars is at gas stations, which pop up unannounced on roadsides during races, sometimes during police pursuits. Seriously, does no one at Black Box raise their hands at meetings to point out crappy ideas?