NFS: Shift Will Feature Nitro/Drift Events News

The Game Team Producer on Need For Speed: Shift, Jesse Abney, has detailed some of the car customisation elements in the game such as nitro boasts, as well as confirming the inclusion of drift events.

Despite a change in direction for the series in this year's game, with Shift putting the emphasis on realism and closed circuit racing, Abney has confirmed that some stalwart Need For Speed features will return in this year's game.

Speaking in an interview with the Need For Speed Blog, Abney commented that, "Performance customization and tuning will be more in depth than ever before and will provide tuning options for areas like alignment, aero, tires and brakes, differential, and gears prior-to a race event."

"There are options for interior customization to drop weight in your favourite car as well as specific tuning prior to drifting or race events," he added, while confirming that the game will feature an extensive list of aftermarket parts that you'd expect to see in the real world of professional racing.

As for the inclusion of nitrous, Abney was very direct on the issue even though Slightly Mad Studios has been secretive on the exact details of Shift's car customisation features in the past.

"Nitrous will be a performance component to upgrade. It will also be tunable, but you should expect it to operate more like professional racing and not action racing," Abney commented.

Drift events will also be present in this year's NFS according to Abney, despite the title's tilt towards racing simulation: "Drift is a key aspect to our career event structure and is supported by the physics engine."

Abney was also asked whether Formula 1 cars would be amongst the vehicle list, although he refused to either confirm or deny whether this was the case, but he did reveal some details on the sort of hardware specs that will be required to play the game on PC.

"Shift will really shine on the latest hardware configs, but Slightly Mad Studios is not relying on the newest standards to drive their visual and performance engine," he explained. "DX 9a features and fully scalable graphics options should allow a great balance of performance and visual quality."