Crazy Taxi – PS2 – Review

Drive taxi
man, drive.  Or woman as the case may be.  Well regardless of sex,
age, or race crazy taxi provides one of the best playing experiences on a
console today.  It is a game equally appropriate for a child’s 5th
birthday or a frat boy’s next kegger (and at least it doesn’t matter if you
crash these cars). 

Crazy Taxi allows you to
assume the persona (and cab) of one of four enthusiastic cabdrivers just trying
to earn a days fare.  However with maneuvers like the crazy dash, a stunt
course set up to hone your skills an two other modes of play, earning a days
fare is anything but routine.  One of the most important things about crazy
taxi is the in game physics.  Not only is your cab indestructible, but also
it can easily overturn any other vehicle on the road.  Jumps and dives
(apparently all the cabbies posses the ability to breath underwater) give the
action a three-dimensional feel generally lost in most driving games.

The graphics have a slightly
retro feel.  Bright and crisp you can almost believe that it’s a fully
three-dimensional world and maybe if you could find a rocket you could charge
fares to the moon (hey somebody just paid 20Mill just to get into space).
The music on the other hand is anything but retro and fits the hoppin’ sunny
California feel of this game perfectly.

I have to give the
developers at Sega a hand for creating a game like this and breathing new life
into the monotonous genre of car racing games.  They have reinvented the
wheel so to speak and my hats off to them.  Alas they didn’t see fit to add
any multi player aspect to the game so the solitary life of the cabbie remains a
cold hard fact. 

Buy
this game and show your respect for those unsung wielders of the checkered cab.

Install: Easy
PS2 is always easy.

Gameplay: 9
Precise control and entertaining game physics.

Graphics: 8.5
Engaging cabbies, customers and environments.

Sound: 9
Best music I’ve ever heard in a cab.

Difficulty: 7.5
Easy to learn difficult to master…like Othello.

Concept: 10
Takes the standard car game an adds an innovative twist.

Multiplayer: N/A

Overall: 9.5
The feel of the arcade makes a successful transfer into an exciting and
forever entertaining game that teaches everyone to respect those time honored
heroes: the cabbies.