Is Need For Speed: Heat Open World?

Ghost Games decided to celebrate the 25th anniversary of their hit Need for Speed franchise with a brand new game: Need for Speed: Heat. The latest installment, which will be available for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on Nov. 8, will be "the ultimate street racer versus cop fantasy." But racing aside, just where can you go in this new game? Will Need for Speed: Heat be open world? The answer is yes!

Need for Speed: Heat will be set in the open world of Palm City, a map modeled after Miami, Florida. And the open world concept means that players will have the ability to do some major exploring and map completion. The landscape will offer many different types of areas for players to traverse but will not include a normal 24-hour day and night cycle. Instead, players can switch between daytime and nighttime as they see fit. This only makes sense, given that day racing and night racing are two very different elements in this game.

The reveal trailer got fans excited for the game right off the bat, pairing city-sanctioned daytime races with the illegal nighttime street races being monitored by a police force. This push and pull of being a socially acceptable racer during the day, and then transforming into a rogue racer avoiding the cops at night gives the game a palpable tension. And while gamers can earn credits in the day races to upgrade their vehicles, the night races gain them rep, which makes the police target them more. If you're caught by the police while racing at night, you run the risk of losing your credits and having your car destroyed if you fail to get back to your safe house.

With 127 different cars to choose from and a large open map to explore, fans of the NFS franchise may find a lot to love about Heat.