Electronic Arts, aka EA, has given an update on the future of the Need for Speed series, and it’s not an update fans of the racing game series are going to want to hear. We last saw Need for Speed in 2022 when the series’ developer, Criterion Games, released Need for Speed Unbound. Unfortunately, it ended up disappointing critically and commercially, and wasn’t quite the Need for Speed game most fans of the series wanted. Those hoping for a return to form soon, though, won’t be getting that because it sounds like the series is officially on ice.
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According to EA, Criterion Games is “solely focused” on Battlefield right now as a support studio for DICE. And there is no sense of this changing anytime in the near future. In other words, a new Need for Speed game isn’t in active development, and it sounds like this won’t change for a while. To this end, even if a new Need for Speed game began development next year, it will be years before it sees the light of day. As a result, this all but confirms we will not see another Need for Speed game in the 2020s. There’s no guarantee we will see the series in the 2030s, either, but EA presumably won’t let it sit on ice for this long. And if Need for Speed has been this severely relegated, this means Burnout is off ice and in the casket at this point.
One of EA’s Longest-Running Series
Some do not know this, but Need for Speed has been around since 1994 and the MS-DOS. Over this time, there have been 25 installments in it. Between 1994 and 2022, that is 25 games in 28 years. Suffice to say, the series started to burn out towards the end of this run, so it’s not surprising to see it on ice. There is certainly fatigue, with the last few installments not reaching the commercial or critical heights of the series, but these installments have also been somewhat uninspired. In other words, it is unclear how much fatigue there is versus Criterion Games simply not delivering. It seems to be a mix of both.
If Need for Speed doesn’t return anytime soon, unfortunately, fans haven’t been left with the greatest game to play in the meantime. Need for Speed Unbound is one of the more underwhelming installments, and the games before it are not much better. To this end, not many are playing it in 2026. In fact, its predecessor, Need for Speed Heat, has more than double the player count on Steam over the last 24 hours. This isn’t to say there are many active players on Need for Speed Heat, because there aren’t, but rather highlights how few are playing Need for Speed Unbound.
All of that said, and as always, feel free to leave a comment or two letting us know what you think, or join the video game conversations over on the ComicBook Forum.
