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Need for Speed: Most Wanted is free on Origin

Almost paradise.

Need for Speed: Most Wanted is free to download and keep on Origin.

The 2012 racing game is the latest in EA's On the House promotion offering up hits from the publisher's past. Previous On the House offerings have included Dead Space, Battlefield 3, Plants vs. Zombies, Peggle, and Command & Conquer Red Alert 2.

Need for Speed: Most Wanted was Criterion Games' last time developing a Need for Speed title on its own, as it worked with Ghost Games - which contained many of its former staff - on 2013's Need for Speed: Rivals.

Our Martin Robinson really enjoyed Need for Speed: Most Wanted, even if he felt like it didn't quite achieve the highs of Burnout Paradise, oft considered the studio's magnum opus.

"Its sense of character may be not be as forceful as Criterion's other games - but the sense of competition that informs it, the joy of discovery and the plain pleasure of driving haven't been dimmed in the slightest," Martin wrote in his Need for Speed: Most Wanted review. "This isn't quite paradise, but it comes very close."