Video Game / Need for Speed: Carbon

Due to the nature of being an Immediate Sequel to Need for Speed: Most Wanted, all spoilers pertaining to that game may be unmarked. You Have Been Warned!

The battle for the city is won in the canyon.

"Didn't expect you to show your face again. Things have changed around here. This place is a battleground now. Tuners... Muscles... Exotics. Crews fight for territory in the city, and it all gets settled in the canyon... but you'd never survive."

—Kenji, during the game's opening

The one where street racing becomes territory wars, followed by races on canyon roads.

Need for Speed: Carbon is a 2006 racing game and the tenth installment in the Need for Speed series. Published by Electronic Arts and developed by EA Black Box, it was released on October 30, 2006, for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Xbox, Xbox 360, Nintendo GameCube, Wii, Windows, mobile phones and Mac OS X and in 2008 for arcades. While gameplay is similar to its predecessor, Carbon introduced a number of new features, including crews and racing wingmen, toge-styled racing events, and greater customization options.

The game's main story takes place after the events of Need for Speed: Most Wanted. Following their time in Rockport, the player returns to Palmont in their BMW M3 GTR, but is pursued along a canyon route by former police sergeant Cross, who now works as a bounty hunter and seeks revenge against them. After a crash causes the player to total their car, Cross attempts to arrest them, but is stopped by another street racer, Darius, who pays them off. While all of this happens, it's revealed that several years prior to the events of Most Wanted, the player took part in a major street race around Palmont for a large cash prize against three other racers, each leader of a street racing crew: Kenji, leader of the Bushido; Angie, leader of the 21st Street Crew; and Wolf, leader of the T.F.K. However, the racers were ambushed by the city's police, who began arresting everyone involved. The player escaped with the help of Darius and the player's then-girlfriend Nikki; before leaving, she handed over the bag containing the race's prize money, which later turned out to contain paper.

Back in the present, Darius, who now leads his own crew called Stacked Deck, of which Nikki is a member, asks her to assist the player despite her belief that the player betrayed everyone for the prize money. With Nikki's help, the player receives two crew members to help in races and a safehouse to operate from. On Darius's advice, the player begins taking part in street races for control over territories controlled by rival crews across three of the city's four boroughs: Kempton, the city's industrial complex; Downtown, which houses the city's metropolitan and financial buildings; and Fortuna, which houses the city's residential area; with Darius and Stacked Crew controlling the fourth one, Silverton, which houses the city's casino and resort facilities. In the process, the player has to engage again against Kenji, Angie and Wolf, defeating them and securing a member of their crew to aid them, each of whom confide in the player that they suspect someone else set up both them and each crew member's former bosses.

Alongside console, home computer, and arcade versions, the game also received portable editions for the PlayStation Portable, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo DS, and Zeebo (a short-lived console produced domestically in Brazil), titled Need for Speed: Carbon – Own the City. While the portable games featured similar gameplay to the console version, they included new and modified gameplay elements, a different setting and storyline, and a different selection of AI teammates. The portable edition's story follows the player recovering from a disastrous crash during a high-stakes race that left them with amnesia and killed their brother Michael "Mick" Rogers, leader of the Lucky Sevens. With the help of Sara, Mick's former girlfriend, as well as Carter and a couple other surviving members of the now-disbanded Lucky Sevens serving as their starting crew members, the player races across Coast City and takes down rival street racing crews in search of the racer responsible for the crash.

A special Collector's Edition version of the main game was developed for PlayStation 2, Windows and Xbox 360, and included additional content including new cars, new customization items, and new events for two of its game modes. A mobile version was released for Java ME by Rovio Entertainment (yes, that Rovio). On May 31, 2021, EA announced that download versions of the game would no longer be available for purchase in any online stores, and online play shut down on September 1, 2021.

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Need for Speed: Carbon features examples of:

• Achievement Mockery: One of the reward cards, which unlocks the HRE 549R rims, requires you to earn the "Consolation Award" task, which you get for losing a race in career mode. Another one, unlocking Autosculpt for the "Slingshot" spoiler, requires a "Hard Time" task, where the player has to get busted in a police pursuit while in career freeroam.
• All-Stereotype Cast: The "Tuner", "Muscle" and "Exotic" vehicle classes, which are more or less a stereotyped portrayal of vehicle subcultures prevalent at the time of the game's release.
• Always Night: Every race and the entire storyline takes place at night, after its predecessor Most Wanted (2005) took place at day. On the contrary, Coast City in Own the City always takes place around dusk.
• Always Someone Better:
  • After losing, Darius warns the protagonist that while they may control the city for now, someone better than them will eventually come along to take it all away.
  • The protagonist in Own the City felt this way towards their brother Mick, which is what led them to cause the crash that killed him.
• Amazon Brigade: The Syrens in Own the City are a street racing version of this.
• AM/FM Characterization: Each of the crews have their own different music genre that fits with their car class. Members of Bushido have electronic music, which fits with the precise handling evoked by their tuner cars; 21st Street Crew have rock music, with fits with the rough-and-tumble appearance and performance of their muscle cars; and T.F.K. have rap music, which highlights the glam associated with their exotic cars.
• Amnesiac Hero: The protagonist of Carbon: Own the City suffered amnesia after a crash that also killed their brother, and their primary motivation is to track down the person responsible.
• Anti-Frustration Features:
  • Unlike Underground 2 or Most Wanted where you have to drive to the tune shops to upgrade or customize your car (you cannot fast travel, though), Carbon on the other hand allows you to do this feature at the safehouse. You can just simply pause, then select "Return to Safe House". Very useful if you don't want cops finding you. The same goes when you head for the Car Lot if you want to buy a new car.
  • In Most Wanted, if cops swarms you enough to put your vehicle into a complete stop, it is always guaranteed you'll get busted with no way out. Here, the cops will back off shortly before the busted meter completely fills up, giving you a small opportunity to escape the cops before they'll get you.
  • In Carbon, intentionally racking up heat is optional, only for the reward cards, instead of for progressing the storyline.
  • Your Crew Members provide you with a solid cushion on many fronts whenever available - not only will they always keep up with you regardless of what you're driving (in the console games, they level with you in car tiers^note  Save for Nikki, who always drives her signature Ford GT regardless of what tier car you're driving. ), but if they cross the finish line before you do, it still counts as a win for you as well.
• Anti-Grinding: In Career mode, playing any of the races you already completed will only net you 500 cash. Averted in Own the City, however, where you earn the same amount of money as you did before their completion.
• Artistic License – Cars:
  • The game's car classification system, which divides cars into "Tuners", "Muscles", and "Exotics", is a gross oversimplification of car types, as in real life vehicles have wider and more specific classifications than just "tuner", "muscle" and "exotic"; this system being clearly based on the distinct vehicle subcultures of the time. Vehicle tiering is this as well, as you'll never see, in stock at least, a Lancer Evolution IX being in the same performance category as the Lamborghini Murciélago.
  • In a more specific use of this trope, the classic muscle cars in the base roster, such as the 1967 Chevrolet Camaro SS or the 1969 Dodge Charger R/T, are fitted with a 5-speed gearbox at stock performance. Most of those cars, even at its highest performing models, offer only 4 gears.
  • Darius drives an Audi Le Mans quattro, which is basically the 2003 concept of the Audi R8. However, the car doesn't look like its concept model, as the front, back and exhaust pipes look more like those of the Audi R8 production model, production of which started in June of the same year as the game's release.
• Asshole Victim: Mick in Own the City, who the player put a contract on all along for being an abusive asshole to both them and Sara.
• Assist Character: One of the game's characteristics is that it allows you to have one crew member capable of helping you during races by command, be it whether smashes a rival car (Blockers, or Brawlers in Own the City), giving you a speed boost by making you draft them (Drafters) or finding shortcuts (Scouts). In the PSP version of Own the City, you can have up to two crew members during a race, while Scouts have been replaced with Assassins, who can drop spike strips in front of a rival car.
• Badass Crew: One of the central features of the game is that each of the racers, the player included, are part of a racing crew, and the player and their crew have to defeat the other crews to control the city.
• Bad Guys Do the Dirty Work: The ending to Own the City reveals that the player hired EX to cause the crash that killed their brother Mick, all because of how badly he treated them and Sara. But unbeknownst to them at that time, EX later on decided to hire Buddy to do the dirty work instead because the latter was desperate for some cash.
• Bag of Spilling: The player's fabled BMW M3 GTR GT from Most Wanted (2005) gets totaled at the beginning of this game, forcing the player to start all over again.
• The Blacksmith: If your crew member has a fabrication specialty, Autosculpt in career mode will be available, allowing you to alter certain areas for each part.
• Brand X: Not done directly, but similar to Most Wanted, cars which aren't sold in North America (like Alfa Romeo) are simply referred to as "sports cars" over police radio chatter, where as others are called out by their manufacturer or at least the specified model to a few cars like the Camaro or the Corvette... otherwise they will say that they can't have a confirmed description about the car.
  • Note that since the game reuses the police chatter audio from Most Wanted, cars that didn't appear or weren't intended to do so in the previous game have their brand calls missing or are just referred as "sports cars".
• Broken Bridge: Unlike in Underground 2 and Most Wanted, Palmont City is almost entirely drivable except for Silverton area which is blocked behind holographic barriers and the player must defeat all three bosses to unlock access to Silverton.
• The Bus Came Back:
  • Drift Events, last seen in Underground 2 return after being absent from Most Wanted. It comes in a stadium drift (akin to Underground series) or in the grueling canyons alone.
  • Nissan also makes a return after the brand alone was absent from Most Wanted due to licensing issues.
• Bounty Hunter: Carbon reveals that, following the events of Most Wanted (2005), Sergeant Cross left the Rockport Police Department in order to become a bounty hunter and goes on a vendetta towards the player.
• Car Fu:
  • Blockers like Neville or Samson can take down an opponent down and force them to a stop. Same goes for Brawlers and Assassins for Own the City as their purpose is as similar as Blockers.
  • The PSP version of Own the City has a unique race mode called "Crew Takedown" which has you wreck crew members, Burnout-style.
• Collection Sidequest:
  • The main game features Reward Cards. Each card has 4 different objectives with a certain set target. Complete a card, and you'll be rewarded nicely with bonus cars or customizable items.
  • The PSP version of Own the City has crates that are scattered throughout Coast City. Smashing them will reward the player with extra cash or concept art that can be viewed in the Game Art Gallery.
• Color Motif:
  • In the main game, the crews of Palmont City are represented in different colors: green for Bushido, blue for T.F.K., yellow for 21st Street Crew and red for Stacked Deck.
  • For Own the City: light blue for the Berserkers, orange for the Eastsiders, pink for the Syrens, purple for Team Mega, green for the Corps, and red for the Krimson Crew.
• Cool Car: Why yes! Just like Most Wanted, don't expect anything less when it comes to cool cars.
  • The car you see when you start the game is none other than an Audi Le Mans Quattro. It also doubles as an Improbably Cool Car as this is a concept model for the Audi R8. It belongs to Darius, leader of Stacked Deck, in which the car is draped in red and black, the colors of said crew.
  • As an Immediate Sequel to Most Wanted the iconic BMW M3 GTR GT (E46) makes a return. Here, the car was totaled for good while escaping from Cross, but you get to drive it in Quick Race mode after completing a reward card as well as one of the races in the Challenge Series.
  • Amongst the bonus cars, you get to drive some of the iconic exotics of its time. Cars like the Porsche 911 GT3 RS (997), the Koenigsegg CCX and the Pagani Zonda F, all three making its debut.
  • Pretty much any car can be this, regardless of it car class or tier. If you modify them, the later ones can be awesome even when stock!
• Crapsack World: Much like Rockport in Most Wanted (2005), if you take a critical look at Palmont City, the amount of illegal street racers is rampant, there's a lot of damage caused by them, and to top it, there's also a lot of economical unbalances across the boroughs in the city. The same goes for Coast City in Own the City.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Using muscle cars in a canyon duel. Thanks to their fast acceleration, it's possible to overtake the opponent before the first corner and hold the lead until the timer runs out.
• Damage-Proof Vehicle: The game opens with a race at the end of which the player's M3 GTR is "totaled" in a crash. Since it's a licensed car, all damage to it occurs during a Discretion Shot, and you never see it afterward. Averted with police vehicles deployed at higher heat levels, which are actually licensed vehicles in cop livery and are susceptible to the same rigors the generic Crown Vic expies sustain.
• Dangerous Clifftop Road: The Canyon Duels, as their name indicates, take place through the dangerous canyon roads of Palmont, which have very fragile guardrails on the edges of the cliff that you can break and fall down into the ravine if you're not careful enough. The Canyon Sprint races replace the destructible guardrails with solid barriers that prevent racers from falling off the cliff. How did they change it? Who knows!
• Darker and Edgier:
  • Besides being literally darker in the sense that it returns to the Always Night setting of the Underground games, Carbon's storyline reveals that the player was framed for stealing the prize money of a race the player took part years ago, and all of the racing crews' leaders the player faces in this game were participants in said race, and as a result, the relatively more carefree challenges from the past are now replaced with crews of racers whose leaders hate the player's guts (though the player will eventually have a member from each crew defect to their side). Not to mention that one possible option for a Canyon Duel to end is to having one of the participants thrown out of the road and off a cliff.
  • The storyline for Own the City is far more darker than the main game, and is arguably one of the darkest in the franchise. Starting with a fatal crash that the player barely survived while their brother died, they race across the city trying to uncover who was responsible for the crash, which leads them to cross paths with what's essentially The Mafia that is heavily involved in the street racing scene. The real kicker comes in the game's ending, where it's not only revealed that the player was the true culprit all along, but their brother was also an Asshole Victim with a history of Domestic Abuse and being a Big Brother Bully, and it's implied that he is so despised by everyone in the city that they allowed the player to get away with indirectly murdering him.
• Defeat Means Friendship:
  • Technically when you defeat the crew boss and control a borough, one of the members of the said crew will join your crew, if you wish to hire them.
  • In Own the City, some of the bosses you beat will choose to join your crew and help you uncover the truth behind the fateful crash that killed Mick. Or simply because of your skill in some cases.
• Defeat Means Playable: Beating the crew leader of a borough rewards their car to be unlockable in Quick Race mode. If you manage to get the pink slip bonus marker, the crew leader's car is yours to use in Career mode.
• Demoted to Extra: The police, in comparison to Most Wanted (2005). In Most Wanted (2005), participating in police chases was pretty much obligatory, as besides competing in a certain amount of races, to advance through the game it was also necessary to rack up a certain amount of police infractions and bounty for each Blacklist member, and in fact, the very final race of the game was against them, as they're led by Cross in an attempt to arrest the player. In Carbon, however, you simply progress through the game via races; the only time police would enter the picture is in certain races that have a high enough level of heat that an appearance by the police in them was inevitable. It gets worse in Own the City, though, when they don't even do that, and the only way to get them to chase you is if you actively ram them during free roam, meaning that police chases in it are 100% optional.
• Design-It-Yourself Equipment: Carbon takes its customization up a notch:
  • The game introduces Autosculpt, a customization feature that allows you create minor alterations of certain areas for each part, such as heightening the spoiler's pillar, increasing the size of the exhaust tips ^note which requires a non-stock Autosculpt rear bumper and deepening the rim's lip. In career mode, you must have either Sal or Colin if you want to get this benefit. Additionally, aftermarket body parts that were also in previous installments are also available.
  • Decals and vinyls can be adjusted and layered multiple times, marking it the first ever to introduce the Livery editor.
  • The game asks you to choose an emblem to best represent you crew. One you selected you can also give certain portions of the emblem different colors of your choosing.
  • The game's car paint system takes further strides, as it now offers a larger color spectrum, as well as choosing the brightness and saturation level. Pearlescent, Candy, Iridescent, Chrome and Matte (which were under the "Custom" category in Most Wanted with limited choices) now has its own categories.
  • Performance parts can be altered by moving a slider to tune their car towards a certain driving attribute. For example, upgrading an engine allows you to bias either for more power peak, but less torque or vise versa. Another would be whether you want a suspension upgrade built to oversteer or understeer. Very useful if you want to maximize the car's capabilities or compensate its weaknesses.
• Difficult, but Awesome: Muscle cars in the console versions have some of the best acceleration in the game, being able to go from 0-60 in a matter of seconds, and their top speed is nothing to scoff at, either. The catch? Their handling. Better get used to your car fishtailing or worse, rolling over if you don't get used to their subpar handling when compared to Exotics or especially Tuners. The Corvette Z06 is a shining example as it has acceleration that is outright better than Darius' signature Audi LeMans Quattro. And even with stock performance, it can still carry you through your journey through Silverton to get to Darius.
• Disconnected Side Area:
  • San Juan, a small borough of Palmont City is inaccessible in Career mode, despite the area being used in the game's initial tutorial mode. However, there are events in San Juan that are accessible in Quick Race mode.
  • The canyon roads that are outside of the city proper cannot be accessed unless you select a Canyon-based race event.
• The Dog Bites Back: In Own The City, the player, after years of being bossed around and mentally and verbally abused by his older brother Mick, caused the crash which killed him, by paying off EX to kill Mick.
• Dub Name Change: The Japanese release refer to the "Tuner" and "Exotic" car classes as "Standard" and "High-End", respectively, though the "Muscle" designation is retained. This may be chalked up to cultural differences particularly within Japanese car culture especially with the JDM scene which the Tuner class portrays.
• Duel Boss: Canyon Races, which are one-on-one races across the Dangerous Clifftop Road.
• Final Boss:
  • Darius is the last major opponent in Carbon's career mode.
  • In Own the City, EX, serves as the Final Boss, but later Sara asks the player to race her in search for the absolute truth regarding Mick's death, making her the True Final Boss.
• Follow the White Rabbit:
  • Drafters like Colin and Nikki specialize in giving you a sizeable speed boost by simply drafting behind them; this makes them your best choices as crewmates for Speedtrap events, as you can activate their ability right before a speed trap to reach far higher speeds than your opponents. If Colin or Nikki in that case crosses the finish line first, you as a crew still win the race.
  • Its Nintendo counterparts of Own the City has instead give you a nitrous replenishment when you draft behind them.
• Genre Motif: Each car category is associated with a different musical genre. Depending on which category, it changes the menu music and the Variable Mix music that plays when you fall behind in a race. Muscle cars have rock music and Tuners are associated with electronic music. Exotics are an odd example; they're associated with different electronic music when driven by you while instead of the rap that plays whenever you interact with TFK's members.^note Justified though, since the theme songs were meant to be mainly instrumentals, it relies on hip hop-inspired electronic music instead.
• Hated by All: Mick in Own the City. Justified, since he was a total Jerkass to everyone, including his younger brother and his girlfriend. It's implied from Sara's dialogue at the end of the game that this is why the player ended up getting away with arranging Mick's death at the expense of letting EX take the fall.
• Hollywood California: Palmont City is based on random areas of California (except San Juan, a small borough which is inaccessible in Career mode, and Silverton, which appears to be more of a stereotypical depiction of Las Vegas). Kempton for the real-life Compton is perhaps the most obvious, being a stand-in for South Central's Gangsterland reputation, while Fortuna, which appears to be the city's high-end residential area, appears to be a stand-in for Orange County or Beverly Hills.
• Hufflepuff House: The minor street racing crews, of whom Nikki remark as those who "push and pull". They're in the game for variety, but the game's lore barely even explore them if at all.
• Idiosyncratic Wipes: Perhaps the most noticeable use of this in the Need for Speed franchise, Carbon uses an effect consisting of an array of X-shaped symbols for scene transitions.
• I Let You Win: Said word-for-word by the boss Wolf after you defeat him. Considering how arrogant he is towards you before, it's probably him being a Sore Loser.
• Immediate Sequel: The game is a direct sequel to Most Wanted' (2005), with apparently only enough time having passed for Cross to quit the police and become a Bounty Hunter, as he's still chasing the protagonist, who's still driving the BMW M3 GTR GT from Most Wanted.
• Improbably Cool Car: Carbon was released in 2006 and features the concept versions of the 2008 Dodge Challenger, 2010 Chevrolet Camaro and the Audi Le Mans quattro, a concept car that was later developed into a road car as the Audi R8.
• In Medias Res: Carbon starts with the player already driving into Palmont City, before flashbacks reveal the beginning of their story in the city.
• Infinity -1 Sword: If you get the pink slip from the car of the boss of the first borough you dominated, you can use it to blaze through the next two boroughs. In fact, either of the cars are fitted with a few Tier 2 parts that are yet to be unlocked. Not only that but it also saves you money from buying a new Tier 2 car.
• Interface Screw: Crashing, reaching high speeds, landing from a jump, suddenly braking or driving offroad causes the game's HUD to shake.
• Instant-Win Condition: Canyon Duels include a handful of these.
  • A chaser overtaking the lead car, or a lead car outrunning the chaser, and holding on to the lead for 10 seconds automatically wins the entire Duel without it proceeding into subsequent rounds.
  • If either the leader or chaser smashes through a guardrail and goes over the side of the cliff, then the other participant is handed an instant win for the entire Duel.
• In-Vehicle Invulnerability: It's possible for each Crew Boss (including Darius) to end up falling off the track during a canyon duel and wreck their car by a small chance. However, this will not affect the game's storyline, though: Kenji, Angie and/or Wolf will still come back as new members of Darius's crew, and Darius will still give you his departing cutscene.
• Joke Character: One of the Challenge Series events puts you... in a Palmont DT1, aka... the garbage truck. Unlike in Most Wanted it has been Promoted to Playable when you complete the reward card tasks.
• Kick the Dog: Before the first of the final two races with Darius, Darius decides to twist the knife on the player by bringing up how he stole the player's ex-girlfriend Nikki:
  Darius: You know how I spent that money you got framed for? I bought Nikki everything that you couldn't.
• The Killer in Me: In Own the City, the protagonist is searching for the man responsible for the crash that killed their brother Mick and left them with amnesia. At the very end of the game, the protagonist learns that they caused the crash all along, having been both jealous of their brother's talent and sick of being mistreated by him, as well as wanting to save Sara from Mick's abuse.
• Level in Reverse: Some Canyon events can be this trope. Examples like Devil's Creek Pass and Lookout Point have the same track layout. The only difference is one of it is mirrored.
• Locked Out of the Loop: The player in Own the City spends the entire game searching across Coast City for the racer responsible for the crash that killed their brother, unaware that they had caused it themselves but didn't knew because the same crash also left them with amnesia. Meanwhile, Sara knew the truth behind the crash the entire time and tried to dissuade the player from finding it out, out of fear that they would somehow end up becoming just as bad as Mick.
• Male Gaze: One involving the girl in charge of starting the races. One of the race start cutscenes featuring her features an angle where the viewer can easily see a clear view of her rear.
• Marathon Level:
  • The Collector's Edition of Carbon has the checkpoint track "Around the World" in the challenge series, in which the player has to drive Kenji's Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX around Palmont City.
  • The 7th-gen console feature "Race Wars", a large-scale race mode set in the outermost roads of a district with distances averaging 10-20 miles.
  • The final race of Own the City takes place in the outer roads of Coast City, the longest track in the game.
• Master of All: Stacked Deck of all the crews drive Tier 3 cars of any car class, with all their strengths and weaknesses combines. Amongst the members is their leader Darius, who is proficient in driving the Audi Le Mans quattro, with near-maxed stats, and it is capable of taking on any track, especially on the canyon roads.
• Money Multiplier: If your crew member is a fixer, during a race, you get an extra cash bonus for every win.
• Multi-Track Drifting: Take a dump truck or a fire truck in a drift event and watch these two tanks defy the laws of physics.
• Near Victory Fanfare: The in-game music plays a more intense and dramatic variation of the Variable Mix when you're at least 90% to the finish line.
• New Game Plus: Possibly accidental. After getting Game Over from having all your vehicles impounded, you can start a new career within the same profile with all your unlocks and statistics from previously still intact.
• Non-Standard Game Over: Getting busted by the police results in your current vehicle being impounded. If all your vehicles end up being impounded and you don't have enough money to buy another vehicle or pay the impound fee, the game ends and you have to start over again. Even this tip is provided during the Loading Screen.
• Nostalgia Level: The track "Gold Valley Run" is actually a remake of a section of Jackson Heights from Underground 2.
• Old Save Bonus: Similar to Most Wanted (2005), Carbon awards $10,000 in cash if the player have a save file of a previous Need for Speed game stored in their memory card. Though this feature is only exclusive to the PlayStation 2 release.
• Once More, with Clarity:
  • For each crew leader the player defeats, one of their crew members will come up to the player asking to be part of the player's crew, while also telling the player that they were there on the night the player was forced to leave Palmont City. As it turns out, each one of them discovered a particular detail about the event that leads the player to deduce that the whole race was a set-up: Yumi caught the police radio's chatter instructing to not target the player's car, Samson saw that the driver of a Chrysler 300C SRT-8, who had been blocking an alley only to back up to allow the player to escape, was actually a plain-clothes police officer, and Colin saw that the man who knocked over Nikki carried a bag identical to hers and switched over the bags. All this leads Nikki to realize that Darius was actually the one who set up the player.
  • The beginning of Own the City sees the player and their brother Mick suffer a horrific crash in the midst of a high-stakes race, with the former surviving with amnesia and the latter dying from the incident. The last cutscene of the game replays this moment, along with The Reveal from Sara about the player being responsible for the crash as well as their motivation behind it.
• One-Steve Limit: Subverted with the Syrens in Own the City, who are all named Layla along with a number to identify each other with.
• Only One Name: Every single character in the game (including Own the City) is only known by their given name. The only exceptions are Sal Mustela, Michael Rogers in Own the City, and technically also Cross, as his name was already given in Most Wanted as Nathan Cross.^note Though the police files in Undercover gave his actual full name as Jonathan Cross.
• Permanently Missable Content:
  • The game features the Porsche 911 GT3 RS (997) as an unlockable car both through gameplay and via purchasing the Custom Car Bundle 1 DLC pack. Problem is, to unlock the car via gameplay, the player has to complete the "Porsche 911 GT3 RS" Reward Card, which among its requirements includes beating an EA Moderator in a ranked online game. With online game having shut down (and online purchases also being shut down not long afterwards), this means that the car now remains permanently locked (outside of mods).
  • Two reward cards are missable if the player completes the game at 100% without completing those remaining reward cars.
    • "Career Mogul" requires you to have at least $1,000,000 in Career Mode. Winning again the same race you won rewards you with a measly 500 or 550 with crew bonus. Completing every race means that you must grind for a lot of days or even months just to get millions. It is required to unlock the Chevrolet Chevelle SS 1970.
    • "Iron Wall" requires you to win 20 defensive races. Defensive races can only trigger if at least one territory is not conquered yet. Conquering every territory makes the achievement unobtainable. It is required to unlock Cross's Chevrolet Corvette Z06.
• Photo Mode: This game (specifically the PS3, Xbox 360 and PC versions) debuted a photo mode in the franchise, which allowed players to move the camera around their car.
• Player-Exclusive Mechanic: Crew members who often help you during races are exclusive to you only, something AI-controlled crews don't possess.
• Pop the Tires: Besides spikes strips being part of the police's regular arsenal, assassins in the PSP version of Own the City are like the blockers in the main version, but with a twist... they place tire-deflating spike strips to puncture the opponents' tires, forcing them to a stop for a period of time. The way they drop spike strips (dropping them from the rear of their cars) would be later adopted by police cars in Hot Pursuit (2010).
• Posthumous Character: Mick from Own The City where he died before the story unfolds. This is in fact the first time in the franchise where a character dies in the story. Turns out it was a Karmic Death as it was revealed that Mick was being a total Jerkass towards the player and Sara.
• Product Placement:
  • The player uses a T-Mobile cellphone when opening the messages menu.
  • There was a Mazda billboard promoting the 2006 MX-5, but said car never appeared in the game.
  • One billboard displays a political ad for◊ Barack Obama for its time being, possibly to help target a young gamer demographic. Though this billboard would also appear in other EA titles, such as NHL 09, NBA Live 08 and NFS's own sequel, ProStreet.
• Random Encounters:
  • Free Roam Challenges. Expect a rival crew who will run across you during your session and will challenge the you to a race.
  • Defensive races, where your free roam session is randomly interrupted when a rival crew is attacking your territory and you have to defend it. If you choose to not defend your territory, the attacking crew will automatically take it.
• Redemption Promotion: As an enemy driver for Kenji's gang, Yumi is usually one of the better AI drivers, but still nothing special. Once she joins your crew? It's likely she'll win every race she enters. This is likely due to Carbon's wingman abilities; Yumi is a scout, meaning she will not only show you where the shortcuts are, she'll also make use of them herself, when most enemy AI do not.
• Reformulated Game:
  • The PSP, GBA, and Zeebo version of Carbon, Own the City, features a different storyline and characters, and set in a different city.
  • Downplayed with the sixth-gen console versions, which are for all intents and purposes the same game as the PC and seventh-gen releases, except that, apart from graphical downgrades, it has a cap of four cars in a race instead of eight and lacks facial motion capture cutscenes. The GameCube version in particular suffered the most as it notoriously compressed the textures to a muddied, Vaseline-smeared mess due to storage limitations.
  • The arcade version uses around 5% of the content from the main version, just without crew members, a non-existent story, Rubber-Band A.I. and a time limit.
• Roaring Rampage of Revenge: In Own the City, the protagonist's motivation for carving his way through the street racing scene is to find the man who caused the crash that killed their brother and left them with amnesia. Subverted at the end when they discover they had caused it themselves.
• Satchel Switcheroo: When Colin asks the player to join their crew, he says that he saw Nikki knocked over by some stranger, and reveals that the stranger had an identical bag, confirming that the bag with the money was switched with one with papers.
• Secret Path: Scouts like Sal and Yumi are shortcut specialists. They're helpful in finding shortcuts throughout the race which will be indicated on your mini-map. Unlike Blockers or Drafters, Scouts have an infinite usage until they used the last shortcut discovered.
• Settle for Sibling: After Sara lost her boyfriend Mick in a car crash, whom she had an abusive relationship with, she ends up settling for the player at the end of Own the City knowing that they've arranged their older brother's death to save her from him.
• Shout-Out:
  • There's a district of Palmont City called Fortuna and the leader of the crew that controls it is called Wolf. Sound familiar?
  • The Rotor 4, a minor crew that drives tuners, is wrapped in an orange and green pattern, akin to the Mazda 787B that won the 1991 24 Hours of Le Mans. Notably, the rotary Mazda vehicles featured in the game are based on the Tuner category.
  • The vinyl design for Nikki's Ford GT is inspired by the Ford GT40 Mk1 that competed in (and won) the 1969 Le Mans, right down to the "6" on the hood and the sides. There is also a specific vinyl available for the Ford GT, allowing you to replicate the iconic Gulf livery from the said GT40.
  • The layout of University Way, a circuit located in Fortuna, blatantly resembles Swiss Alps.
• Speed Stripes:
  • If you reach a certain speed (at least 100 mph), speed streaks will emit from your car.
  • If you slipstream behind your crew member who is a Drafter, blue speed streaks will emit from the latter.
• Starter Mon:
  • Following the wreck of your M3 GTR GT, you'll be given a starter car by choosing what car class you pick; a Mazda RX-8 for Tuners, a 1967 Chevrolet Camaro SS for Muscle and an Alfa Romeo Brera for Exotic.
  • In Own the City after racing with Sara's car, you'll get to choose between a Mazda Mazdaspeed 3, a Nissan 240SX, and a Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution IX to start your career with.
  • Neville is the first member to join your crew and he will often help you in the first 5 races until you unlock Sal, another starter crew member, if you choose to hire him of fire the former. In Own the City, Lucky Sevens' Kita and Dylan are your starting crew members. Carter is also another of your starter crew members, but only for the PSP version.
• Status Buff: If your crew member is a mechanic, you get a slight performance boost to your car without the necessary need of upgrading.
• Story Branching: The game asks you to pick which car class you will start. Depending on which class, you will be starting in either of the three boroughs, whilst Neville and Sal drives the same car class you chosen.
• Supermodel Strut: In the fateful race where the player is set up, Nikki is acting as the Pit Girl, and there is a Male Gaze shot of her legs as she confidently struts in front of her cars while swaying her legs and hips from side to side.
• Survived the Beginning: Sara states that the player is lucky that they survived the accident, while Mick was unfortunate and succumbed to his death.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: The PSP version of Own the City takes place in Coast City, which its map is basically a mirrored and modified version of Rockport, the city from Most Wanted, minus Camden Beach.
• Tactical Rock–Paper–Scissors: The game features three car classes paired against three different track styles. Exotic cars are usually European supercars, have balanced performance, perform best on tracks with long, smooth corners and are used by T.F.K.; Tuner cars are mostly JDM cars, are slow but have great handling, perform best on convoluted tracks with tight corners and are used by Bushido; and Muscle cars have low top speed and handling but great acceleration, perform best on tracks that alternate long straights with angular corners, and are used by the 21st Street Crew. The final stage features tracks that blend all three design styles, and its controlling gang uses cars of all types.
• Taking Over the Town: The Central Theme for Carbon is that the player has to take control of the four boroughs that form Palmont City, each of which is controlled by a different street racing crew.
• A Taste of Power: Depending on which version, you get to try your hands on a tuned car before starting off with a starter car.
  • The main version has you start with the BMW M3 GTR from the previous game, Most Wanted (2005) and gets you immediately roped into a chase from Cross, only to end up totaling the car in a crash and having to start anew.
  • In Own The City, Sara lends you her car so you can get back in racing again. Depending on the console, her car can range from an MR2 (PSP), a Mustang (GBA) or an RX-7 (DS).
• Tech-Demo Game: The seventh-generation versions as well as the Windows and OS X releases showcased the facial motion capture system which EA flirted with at the time, years before it was further popularised by L.A. Noire.
• Tier System: Apart from the three different car classes, each of them are divided into 3 tiers:
  • Tier 1: entry-level cars (Mazda RX-8, Chevrolet Camaro SS, Alfa Romeo Brera)
  • Tier 2: mid-level cars (Mitsubishi Eclipse GT, Ford Mustang GT, Lotus Elise)
  • Tier 3: high end cars (Nissan Skyline GT-R R34, Dodge Viper SRT-10, Porsche Carrera GT)
• Time Rewind Mechanic: Exclusively to the Nintendo DS of Own The City, beating MK unlocks you the ability to rewind time back at any point by simply holding the SELECT button.
• Undercover Cop Reveal: In Own the City, defeating Corps leader MK makes him reveal to the player that he is actually an undercover cop who is looking into Mick's death and can help them uncover the person who hired Buddy to cause the crash that killed their brother.
• Unnaturally Blue Lighting: In contrast with the Real Is Brown aesthetic of its daytime-set predecessor, Most Wanted (2005), Carbon has its night scenes tinted with high-tech blue.
• Vanity License Plate: All cars in the Carbon uses almost the exact license plate as Most Wanted, but it has the name "CARBON" in their license plates. Even the police and traffic, too.
• Variable Mix: During races, the racing theme is no longer a song anymore, but a dynamic theme that changes in tempo as the race progresses, especially during the last stretch of the race.
• Version-Exclusive Content:
  • The Collector's Edition includes additional cars (such as the Nissan 240SX & Jaguar XK), additional customization options, extra tracks and more challenges in Challenge Series. Console-wise, it's exclusive to PC, Xbox 360 and the PS2
  • The 7th-gen console version introduces Race Wars, a new racing event set in the outermost roads of a district. Up to 20 cars ^note 12 for PC version can participate in this event.
  • The PSP version gets more exclusive cars that are otherwise not in the main version. Some notable examples are the Pontiac Solstice,^note as in the vanilla Solstice and not the GXP variant, which would later appear in ProStreet, the Pontiac Firebird Trans-Am and the 1967 Ford Mustang. Another exclusivity to the PSP is that the Toyota MR2 is fully customizable as oppose to the main version where its treated as a DLC bonus car with no customization options.
• Villainous Breakdown: One Darius discovers that Nikki defected to the player's side after discovering that Darius was the one who stole the bag of prize money all those years ago, he starts undergoing one, spending the final part of the game in full Tranquil Fury mode before challenging the player to a final showdown, which he then loses.
  Darius: You think you know this town? You have no idea what's in store for you other than it's gonna hurt.
• Virtual Paper Doll: Car customization isn't limited to only your cars, but you can also give the crew members' cars a unique style and design of your own. Same goes for the PSP version of Own the City.
• Wanted Meter: The games reintroduces the Heat levels of police pursuit introduced by Most Wanted (2005), from 1 for municipal police to 5 for the federal police.
• Wham Line:
  • Upon meeting with Darius after defeating the three main crews of Palmont City, he had already figured out that the player was also getting close to the truth behind the stolen prize money that they were being framed for. At that point, he decides that they had outlived their usefulness and surrenders them to Cross just so that he can claim all of the player's conquered territories for his own crew.
    Darius: C'mon, I didn't let you take my money the first time. What makes you think this is any different? You actually thought I would front you the cash to save you from this loser? Then sit around while you were encroaching on my territory? Greed's always been your problem. You got a lot to learn about the big times, little man. This city is mine, and it's time for you to disappear again.
  • In the final cutscene of Own the City, Sara says this to the player long after EX, the man who supposedly caused the crash that killed Mick, had been arrested:
    Sara: I know you think I killed your brother, but I didn’t. You did. He bossed you around all your life. To him, you were always his idiot younger brother. He even treated me like crap. Sometimes, he can be brutal. [...] You hired EX to kill Mick. You didn't know he was going to hire Buddy to do his dirty work [...] Everyone hated your brother, you just hated him more.
• Wham Shot: While seeing that the player is driving the BMW M3 GTR from Most Wanted (2005) might count as one, showing that this game is a sequel, what really seals it is when said car gets hit from behind from a very familiar-looking Corvette and we see its driver: It's Cross.
  Cross: Hey, guess who's back?
• Wide-Open Sandbox: The player can go anywhere in any unblocked zone in Palmont City at anytime in any order they wish. Just expect any Random Encounters, whether a rival crew member approaches you and challenge you to a race or another crew is attacking your territory.
• Working with the Ex: Darius has Nikki, the player's ex-girlfriend, show the player the ropes on Palmont City's street racing scene. Nikki, who believes that the player betrayed her to steal the prize money from a race years ago, is not amused by this initially. But as she gradually discovers that the player is innocent after all, she warms up to them and ends up joining their crew once it became clear that Darius was the true culprit behind the stolen prize money. By the end of the game, it remains ambiguous as to whether or not the two of them ended up getting back together again.
• You Can't Thwart Stage One: The game's prologue has you trying to escape from Cross, but it is inevitable that as you race down the twists and turns, a cutscene plays and your M3 GTR GT gets destroyed for good after being hit by falling pipes from a truck.

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