It's a bit reassuring that you guys are looking into it. I don't want to sound as if I'm ranting, but the fact remains that I haven't been able to play NFS eversince the update.
I guess all I can really do is wait and at least give you an update on how the game reacts on my end.
First of all, even though I accepted all permitted everything for the game, for some reason, it does not stay open the way it's supposed to. In some cases, if I don't touch the screen while the race is loading, it will hybernate
Also, just like what I mentioned on my original post, it would go blank after the initial "swish" sound. Every now and then, I would even notice that it will connect or try to connect to Google Play. After a few hours following my original post, I also noticed that it was still trying to download updates. The weird thing is, the screen is still black and I can only see this if I swipe down to see the notification bar. Also, this doesn't happen always. Sometimes I can see it on the notification bar, most of the time, I won't. If I click on the notification, it will only take me beck to the blank screen and the notification disappear leaving me clueless if it it still downloading or not.
I just finished downloading the required files yesterday. I got a notification saying "Download complete. You may now begin racing." Or something like that. However, it's still blank. (BTW, when I say blank screen the screen is black but you know it's active because of the backlight.)
If I wait for like 3-5 minutes, I'm pretty certain that the game has loaded because I could already hear the wind fx. I just can't see anything. I even tried disabling my game booster but to no avail.
Well, hope that helps. I'll probably try to reinstall is again either tonight or tomorrow morning.