Crazy Taxi

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Crazy Taxi

Crazy Taxi Not So Crazy

Sega and Acclaim attempt to bring it’s highly successful arcade game Crazy Taxi to the PlayStation 2 platform, and fails miserably.

The game is pretty simple to pick up and play which in the days of time consuming strategy games and sim sports is kind of refreshing. You go around in a slick taxi and picking up customers, driving as fast as you can drop them of at their destinations within a time limit, to get the most cash possible. Pretty simple huh? Of course there are many obstacles in your way such as traffic and uh…hmmm not much else actually. There are a couple moves you can do which will get you extra money when driving a customer, such as a “crazy drift” which is just you slamming on your breaks and turning , a “crazy through” is when you dodge in-between cars and you don't hit cars (yea real cabbies get extra dough for that eh?). There are a few other moves serve no purpose, like this game.

There are basically 2 levels that will keep you busy for all of maybe four hours (even that’s stretching it). I think the game on a whole would have had more replay value if only the customers were randomized. As it stands now, the same guy stands at the same spot that you picked up in your last game wants to be delivered to the same spot in your next game. It gets so that you want to drive around for a while, trying to find new customers, just so you can get a little variety. However it isn’t randomized so the game gets pretty stale fast. So it’s a damn good thing there is a option called the Crazy Box which are little mini-game challenges that take a lot of skill to do, in fact sometimes it takes a little to much “skill” and will drive you nuts trying to get through them all.

The graphics seem crisp enough, when you can actually see them, but are nothing breathtaking. They are pretty average looking when compared to the likes of John Madden 2002 (but what game doesn’t?). I don't know about you guys, but I love just gettin' into a new "racing" game & realize that, when a lot of things are happening on screen, the road just disappears. It gives me a warm, fuzzy feeling inside. Several times during the game things like the road and say buildings will just disappear because the game can’t keep up with everything that is going, which gets on your nerves really fast. Also there is no damage done to the taxi after you run into other cars, or take out a park bench, come on guys you can’t even put a small dent or scratch just to add a little to the realism?

The sound on this game is great, who doesn’t love Offspring and Bad Religion playing non stop over and over and over? It probably wouldn’t have been that bad if there would have been more than two songs, or if they hadn’t played just 30 second clips of each song. I mean when did it get so hard to put a whole song in a game? I mean this isn’t The Dave Matthews band where they have a sax solo for damn near ten minutes this is PUNK RAWK! Where every song lasts maybe two minutes. The announcer guy is also unbearable. He’s a Wolfman Jack type announcer and just repeats “Hey it’s time to play caaaaaaaaarazy taxi” over and over along with other more annoying phrases, it gets pretty old fast like most of this game.

If you’ve actually made the mistake in buying this game write Sega and Acclaim a nice long letter telling them how much you enjoy using your new “Crazy Taxi“ coaster for all your dinner parties. I have to say that Crappy Taxi, err Crazy Taxi is the first game I have ever returned early to Block Buster. If you plan on getting this game don’t, take the fifty bucks you where going to drop on this, go to the nearest arcade, get two hundred quarters, and play the vastly superior arcade version of this game.


	Steamer Trunk \| home NCAA Final Four 2002 \| Grand Theft Auto \| EA NHL 2002 \| Dave Mirra BMX \| Nascar Heat 2002 \| Crazy Taxi \| Madden 2002 \| NCAA Football 2002 \| Madden 2001 \| Triple Play \| Knockout Kings \| NBA Live 2001 \| ESPN Hockey Night \| NCAA Final Four Crazy Taxi Crazy Taxi Not So Crazy Sega and Acclaim attempt to bring it’s highly successful arcade game Crazy Taxi to the PlayStation 2 platform, and fails miserably. The game is pretty simple to pick up and play which in the days of time consuming strategy games and sim sports is kind of refreshing. You go around in a slick taxi and picking up customers, driving as fast as you can drop them of at their destinations within a time limit, to get the most cash possible. Pretty simple huh? Of course there are many obstacles in your way such as traffic and uh…hmmm not much else actually. There are a couple moves you can do which will get you extra money when driving a customer, such as a “crazy drift” which is just you slamming on your breaks and turning , a “crazy through” is when you dodge in-between cars and you don't hit cars (yea real cabbies get extra dough for that eh?). There are a few other moves serve no purpose, like this game. There are basically 2 levels that will keep you busy for all of maybe four hours (even that’s stretching it). I think the game on a whole would have had more replay value if only the customers were randomized. As it stands now, the same guy stands at the same spot that you picked up in your last game wants to be delivered to the same spot in your next game. It gets so that you want to drive around for a while, trying to find new customers, just so you can get a little variety. However it isn’t randomized so the game gets pretty stale fast. So it’s a damn good thing there is a option called the Crazy Box which are little mini-game challenges that take a lot of skill to do, in fact sometimes it takes a little to much “skill” and will drive you nuts trying to get through them all. The graphics seem crisp enough, when you can actually see them, but are nothing breathtaking. They are pretty average looking when compared to the likes of John Madden 2002 (but what game doesn’t?). I don't know about you guys, but I love just gettin' into a new "racing" game & realize that, when a lot of things are happening on screen, the road just disappears. It gives me a warm, fuzzy feeling inside. Several times during the game things like the road and say buildings will just disappear because the game can’t keep up with everything that is going, which gets on your nerves really fast. Also there is no damage done to the taxi after you run into other cars, or take out a park bench, come on guys you can’t even put a small dent or scratch just to add a little to the realism? The sound on this game is great, who doesn’t love Offspring and Bad Religion playing non stop over and over and over? It probably wouldn’t have been that bad if there would have been more than two songs, or if they hadn’t played just 30 second clips of each song. I mean when did it get so hard to put a whole song in a game? I mean this isn’t The Dave Matthews band where they have a sax solo for damn near ten minutes this is PUNK RAWK! Where every song lasts maybe two minutes. The announcer guy is also unbearable. He’s a Wolfman Jack type announcer and just repeats “Hey it’s time to play caaaaaaaaarazy taxi” over and over along with other more annoying phrases, it gets pretty old fast like most of this game. If you’ve actually made the mistake in buying this game write Sega and Acclaim a nice long letter telling them how much you enjoy using your new “Crazy Taxi“ coaster for all your dinner parties. I have to say that Crappy Taxi, err Crazy Taxi is the first game I have ever returned early to Block Buster. If you plan on getting this game don’t, take the fifty bucks you where going to drop on this, go to the nearest arcade, get two hundred quarters, and play the vastly superior arcade version of this game.