Metacritic Games

Need for Speed Carbon (GameCube)

What starts in the city is settled in the canyons as Need for Speed Carbon immerses you into the world's most dangerous and adrenaline-filled form of street racing. You and your crew must race in an all-out war for the city, risking everything to take over your rivals' neighborhoods one block at a time. As the police turn up the heat, the battle ultimately shifts to Carbon Canyon, where territories and reputations can be lost on every perilous curve. Need for Speed Carbon delivers the next generation of customization giving you the power to design and tweak your crew's cars in every way using the ground-breaking new Autosculpt technology. Represent your car class, your crew, and your turf in Need for Speed Carbon, the next revolution in racing games. [Electronic Arts]

Electronic Arts
Racing, Driving
Players: 2
E10+ (Everyone 10 and Older)
Developer: EA Black Box
Released October 31, 2006

Overall Metascore

This is a weighted, normalized average of all individual scores given by critics, on a scale of 0 (worst) to 100 (best).

75 / 100

Critic Reviews

86	Cheat Code Central The Canyon Duel and the returning Drift Race, which has been absent in recent years, are both exciting and engaging additions to the already impressive list of race types carried over from "Most Wanted."
78	IGN Need For Speed Carbon isn't a revolutionary game and it's far from a stinker. Instead, it's what EA does best: It creates pretty good games with lots of features.
75	Game Informer It’s one thing for the current-gen versions of this game to be not as visually compelling (such as the sense of speed not being as good), but it’s unfortunate that you only race against three other cars during typical challenges.
75	Nintendo Power You may think the Fast and the Furious scene is on its way out, but Need for Speed: Carbon assures you it's still fueling up. [Jan. 2007, p.106]
75	1UP It refines previous ideas but lacks that big "wow" factor we've seen in the past. It's thoroughly, thoroughly competent and shouldn't be overlooked, but it really is "Need for Speed Again."
74	GameSpot Even though the wingman mechanics and canyon races don't quite pan out, it's still a stylish and enjoyable street racer.
73	NGamer UK It's still not meaty enough but Carbon throws some interesting new ideas at the series, adding breadth to a simple, easy but enjoyable racing experience. [Dec 2006, p.52]
70	Gamer 2.0 A solid racing game. It might have a few rough edges and frustrating spots, but overall it’s a fun game.
70	Jolt Online Gaming UK What the series needs is not useless gimmicks and badly rehashed game mechanics, but good, old-fashioned racing fun. We don’t need customisable bells and whistles; what gamers really want is a Need for Speed that uses its strengths, and doesn’t try to shoe-horn in its weaknesses for the sake of bullet points on a press release.
70	GameBrink A great addition to the series for fans and probably a decent rental for most. While things have been upgraded and new elements added on, it’s still NFS and it still gets repetitive and boring after a while. It’s like EA’s "Madden" of racing.
70	GameSpy While not all of the new additions to the series work completely -- the wingman concept is interesting, but could use some tweaking -- there are enough new ideas here to make the game feel fresh and show why NFS remains one of the top racing franchises for the system.
65	Nintendojo It's hard to say that EA is giving GameCube owners a favor with Carbon, they are a business after all, but it probably doesn't hurt.