Need for Speed: Undercover

Need for Speed: Undercover is the twelfth installment of the popular racing video game series Need for Speed, developed by EA Black Box and published by Electronic Arts. It is set for release later in 2008. An official formal announcement is expected to be made during summer 2008.

At E3 2008, it was unveiled that Undercover will be released on iPhone.

Development
Electronic Arts CEO John Riccitiello has stated that the previous release in the series, ProStreet, was okay but not good and that Undercover will bring better innovations and gameplay, as will future releases. He has stated Undercover has a considerably longer development cycle than its predecessors since the Need for Speed development team is now split up into two teams, both of which will work on a 24 month development cycle with future titles, alternating releases between them. Riccitiello has stated he was "torturing" the development team with a tight development cycle in the past. When this change was implemented in mid-summer 2007, one team started working on Undercover (giving it only a 16.5 month development cycle), while the other team finished ProStreet and then started working on the next title. This title has not been revealed and will be released in 2009, after a full 24 months of development.

Riccitiello also stated Undercover is taking inspiration from action films such as The Transporter, with a large embedded narrative.

Features
Frank Gibeau (president of the EA Games label) has stated that due to the fact that the sales of ProStreet didn't live up to EA's hopes for the game, the Need for Speed franchise will go back to its roots with a number of features, including open-world racing and a new highway battle mode.

John Doyle (developer at EA Black Box) has hinted Undercover will feature a brand new game mechanic and a "Most Wanted-ish" sandbox style of gameplay.

Teaser
On July 25 2008, a teaser trailer of Undercover was released on the internet. The trailer refers to the site WhichRoadToTake.com, which appears to be a teaser site for Undercover, owned by Electronic Arts, and provides small pieces of information including the date November 18 2008, possibly the release date.