Criterion staff assisting Ghost Games with Need For Speed: Rivals

Criterion is lending Ghost Games a helping hand with Need For Speed: Rivals, sending over 60-65 staff members to assist with development.

Ozzie Mejia

June 19, 2013 7:10 AM

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The baton for the Need For Speed series has been handed off to Ghost Games, however Criterion hasn't walked away from the racing franchise entirely. Between 60 and 65 Criterion coders and artists are said to be working on Need For Speed: Rivals, which comprises roughly 40 to 45 percent of the project's total staff.

Criterion's Craig Sullivan, former creative director for last year's Hot Pursuit and NFS: Most Wanted, told VideoGamer that while Rivals is being creatively run by Ghost, "There's a lot of Criterion DNA in here." Criterion is best known for the Burnout series, though I noticed a distinct lack of Burnout-like crashes when I went hands-on with Rivals at E3.

As for Criterion VP Alex Ward, Sullivan indicates that he's working on "special, secret Criterion stuff."

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?