It has been reported that Codemasters & Criterion have teamed up to work on the next Need for Speed game. Codemasters is a subsidiary of Electronic Arts after the world-famous game develops bought the British video game company last year. EA has now integrated the development team at Codemasters Cheshire into Criterion Games, hoping this will aid the progress of its famous racing game.
The Need for Speed series has been going since 1994 with the original Need for Speed, and there have been some absolute classics on the huge list of titles that EA has produced over the years. But the latest installment in the franchise, Need for Speed Heat, received mixed reviews from fans and continued a run of disappointing titles for this series of racing games.
It is now believed that Criterion will engulf the original team in Guildford and the developers in Cheshire, with both names reporting to vice president and general manager Matt Webster. The future of Need for Speed is now in the safe hands of the development teams at both locations, whilst Codemasters Birmingham will be taking the lead on the Formula One series.
A spokesperson from EA talked about the news by saying “This integration is built from the close partnership the two studios have developed over the past few months.” They went on to add, “Sharing common values and similar cultures, we strongly believe that unifying the huge wealth of experience across both teams will help us to deliver the best racing experiences we can for players.”
When Electronic Arts acquired Codemasters back in 2021, it cost them a whopping $1.2 billion (spare change for them). And if you don’t know about Codemasters, they are the brains behind the famed Brian Lara cricket series, and the now-dead LMA Manager series – we remember those games very fondly.
Here’s hoping that this partnership will lead to a very successful re-emergence for Need for Speed, turning this new game into one that rivals those great games from the mid-noughties.