OpenNFS

Games: The Need for Speed (Windows, 1994) · Need for Speed II (Windows, 1997) · Need for Speed II: Special Edition → (Windows, 1997) · Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit (Windows, 1998) · Need for Speed: High Stakes (Windows, 1999) · Need for Speed: Porsche Unleashed (Windows, 2000)

OpenNFS: a new engine, written from scratch in C++ with OpenGL and Bullet physics, that aims to recreate the classic Need for Speed games, the first through the fifth, by loading the cars, tracks, and music from their original files. It’s at an early stage. It reads, to varying degrees, the formats of the PC versions of Need for Speed II, II Special Edition, III: Hot Pursuit, High Stakes, and Porsche Unleashed (the last one still without a stable parser), and partly those of the PlayStation versions of II, III, and High Stakes; III for PC is the most complete, and the first Need for Speed doesn’t load yet. In 2026 it gained menus to pick a car, color, and track, skid marks, adjustable weather, and the High Stakes PC driving physics Bluv wrote for the Velocity project, which make the cars drivable. Its plans include each original game’s gameplay, configurable menus, automatic import of the games, an open world joining all the classic tracks, and multiplayer. Its last published release, 0.3 (July 14, 2020), is a build from late 2018; current builds come from its continuous integration for Windows, macOS, and Linux. The repository also includes the 11 sky textures of a Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit track, extracted from its sky.fsh file, which it uses for the cars’ reflections.

You needThe files from your own copy of Need for Speed III: Hot Pursuit for PC (the gamedata and fedata folders), which are required; those of Need for Speed II, II Special Edition, High Stakes, and Porsche Unleashed for PC are optional. Plus Windows, macOS, or Linux; for the current version you have to build it or grab a build from its continuous integration.

How it gets to PC

Fan reimplementation

Original studio

EA Canada / EA Seattle

Author

Amrik Sadhra

Stars

864

Last activity

2026-06-21 · 4 months ago

License

MIT

Language

C++

Need for Speed II: Special Edition See all →