Madness, it's madness I tell you!! (Midtown Madness 3 (Xbox))

Member Name: esthersmile

Product:	Midtown Madness 3 (Xbox)
Date:	12/11/03 (120 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fun, Good graphics, Lots of cars

Disadvantages: Easy, Unrealistic, Short shelf life for the adult gamer.

Madness is right. I realise that microsoft werren't exactly aiming at the serious gamer market with this one, but I do feel a little cheated all the same. The handling and physics in this game are utterly insane!

Sorry, Ifeel I ought to explain myself a little, without getting carried away. Midtown madness is a driving game for the xbox. It has various cars and you can choose to drive in one of two cities - Washington or Paris. The single player mode consits of completing "undercover missions" such as beating computer opponents, picking up passengers withing a set limit, and collecting packages, racing against other drivers, and completing checkpoint races.

Online play is similar, with the ability to connect to xbox live and race against real people instead of just the computer or whoever you're sitting with.

On the down side:

The large number of missions does not go far enough to disguise the fact that they are all incredibly easy. Adjusting the amount of time to account for the speed of the car is a good idea in theory, but the slower cars are given way too much, which means that in order to pass a single player race all you have to is do it in the dumper truck. While you can't choose your car on theundercover missions, they're fairly easy too.

Now we come to the handling, about which I will say very little since this game is obviously not expected to be realistic. If you like driving through trees and other objects, anmd bouncing your car off things which should by all rights have killed you then go ahead, and buy the game - but don't say i didn't warn you!

On the plus side:

The graphics are on the whole lovely, with the lighting reflecting off a beautifully recreated washington monument, aah! Little people carrying xboxes also wander around from time to time, but unfortunately you can't run them over!

The missions do have a sense of humour, if you like
taking the piss out of the French that is.

The range of cars is ok, althought with a slant towards the new end of the market, there are some pretty cool ones in there (the Eldorado Seville is just cool!)


All in all, while I would love to say that I hate this game, since it's cutesy and very tame, it does have a sense of fun about it. If you like the radical ohysics of "crazy taxi" or "simpson's road rage" you'll probably enjoy it, I just found that even with the unlocking of different paint jobs for your car and lots of missions that I finished it too quickly. My 8 year old brother likes it thought, and he hates Project Gotham!

Summary: